Here is a brief snapshot of a few things we’ve been doing!  Be prepared for a lot of nature pictures over the course of the semester:

    We have our first rest day tomorrow, which means I can finally go into town and get new rain boots and a poncho.  And turns out I also need a new watch — apparently the highly concentrated DEET we are using to repel mosquitos is corrosive and my watch stopped working (and I put this on my skin?).  Our first test is in a week, a plant practical where we have to do identifications (today we learned ten common families).  We also have to collect and identify to family ten insects, though its hard to find them because it is always raining!  I’m getting really good at catching small bees by hand though (without a net I mean;  I catch them with a small bag, not actually with my hands), so thats a skill I’ll be bringing back to America.  Tonight our resident Costa Ricans are going to take us out to the town, though they said not to expect much because the town near our station, San Vito, is extremely small. 

    Pura vida is a saying they use everywhere here, like a national motto.  It means roughly “life is good,” which basically encompasses the Tico worldview. For those of you who speak Spanish, they also almost never use the “tu” form, always the “Ud,” and seemed to think it wasn’t so much rude as just distasteful.  Unrelated, but interesting.  Anyway, I hope you all are feeling pura vida!  Congratulations to the duke football team for winning a game and no longer being a complete embarrassment to the school!