Training Days in Costa Rica!!

Training: Day 1
About two weeks before I arrived in Costa Rica, I heard from my program coordinator, another Emily, that she was heading back to the states and that a new girl, Kristi would be taking over her position. So, my first real interaction with Kristi was when I met her at the Aliarse/EVOLC office on Monday morning. She is also a tall, blue-eyed blonde and is super friendly, welcoming and a great teacher. Needless to say, I was very happy with the new person in charge, and that put me instantly at ease. We spent the day talking about Costa Rican culture, safety, what to expect in a home stay, etc. AND, we did a little Spanish practice. Since my Spanish is pitifully poor, this was a good thing. However, when Kristi gave me a sheet of questions written in Spanish (and English) and told me I was going downstairs to the park to ask random people the questions in Spanish, I tried not to have a minor panic attack! Talk about instant immersion! Fortunately, ticos live up to their friendly nature, and I was surprised at how easy it was to approach them and ask them random questions about their country's history. Good lesson!...

We ended the day getting me settled back at the lovely Hotel Aranjuez, and we enjoyed a delicious cup of cafe con leche y azucar at Mussmani, a little chain that has the best coffee ever!  Sadly, I managed to catch a cold somewhere between allergy season back home and my plane ride to CR, so I spent my evening napping, skyping with the fam, and sleeping some more. Aka, no big adventures on night numero uno.

Training: Day 2
The second day of training was all about teaching, which was fantastic, as that's what I'm here to do! We talked a lot about the four areas you cover when teaching a language (speaking, listening, reading, writing), and what kinds of lessons to do for each one. We also talked about the components of a lesson plan: objective, presentation, practice, performance (PPP), and closing activity, and I got some experience doing my own mini lesson plans! And of course, we enjoyed another great lunch (have I mentioned I LOVE the food here?!?!?!).  If you're in Costa Rica, I highly recommend casados (meals con arroz, frijoles, ensalada y salsa, una refresca natural (fruit juice) y some kind of meat!) or the plato del dia, which is also usually a large meal!  Seriously, I've eaten so much food since I got here!  Whoever said Costa Rica was a good place to lose weight was definitely mistaken! :)

Here's a picture of me and my very awesome trainer, program coordinator and now friend Kristi:

Here's a picture of the Aliarse/EVOLC office where I did my training this week (yes, that is my luggage out front!)

Here's a picture of the very cute park across the street where Kristi made me talk to random people:

If you don't already know, they don't have regular street addresses in Costa Rica.  Instead, they use landmarks as the basis of their address system.  So, for example, the Aliarse office is like 100 meters east and 25 meters south of the white church (this is not the exact location, btw, but it's more or less the location).  So, here's a picture of the Iglesia that I not only walked by each day on my way to training, but is also the landmark location for the Aliarse office: