seven buses and a priest from new york

So usually when I talk about my adventures they are over a several day span but today was one big adventure. So I have this seven to ten page research paper to write in Spanish. It is due Tuesday morning at 8am. As of 12pm Monday I was one very important interview short of being able to finish my paper. My topic is catholic and evangelical relations here in CR…very interesting stuff. So naturally I wanted to interview a priest and a pastor. My advisor wanted to hook me up with some big wigs in the catholic church. I was slightly intimidated but told her to go for it. Well Friday night I got an email from her that her connection fell through and I was going to need to find my own priest. She recommended the catholic church of san pedro which is close to the university so they like kids like me. So class finished at 12 today and I decided to first check the catholic church by my house so I didn’t have to go all the way into san jose. So I hopped on bus number two for the day (number one got me to class in the first place) I got to guadelupe during lunch break so I wondered around and walked to a book store then to mas por menos a grocery store and bought myself some cheekys (some yummy Costa Rican cookies) I got back to the church in guadelupe just as they were reopening. Went in and told my story in Spanish to the nice lady at the front desk. She said sorry the priests are napping right now (she actually said resting but napping immediately translated into my mind and I think it makes the story a little more entertaining) so she says would you like to make an appointment for tomorrow morning at 9am…as you may recall the paper is due at 8am. I said thank you very much but I’ll try another church. So I hopped on bus number 3 to head into san jose. Got into san jose at about 2pm and quickly found a mcdonalds b/c my bladder was about to burst. From there I decided to kill a little more time just in case the san pedro priests were still napping. So I went into another book store and browsed a bit. A Time magazine in English here costs 5 bucks! Naturally I didn’t buy it. So I figured I had killed enough time that I could go see the priests. I hopped on bus number 4 to get to san pedro. Well all the priests in costa rica must have been at the same convention or something b/c the priests at san pedro were out until confession at 3:30 and I was not entirely sure if it would be appropriate to conduct an interview during confession. So feeling surprisingly upbeat (probably because the weather is absolutely gorgeous!) I headed over to the American outlet mall to buy a calling card so I could call my advisor and find out what I should do. I found the card finally after browsing another book store…not sure what my book store fascination was today but it was fun. So I took the card to the pay phone and dialed my advisors number…turns out its her home number. So I decide to call the secretary at LASP there were two numbers for her so I called the second one…it was her cell phone. So I called her again on the LASP phone so she could put me through to my advisor. My advisor says…sorry go home and finish your paper I’m out of ideas. Well that was not exactly what I was hoping for but I was still shockingly upbeat. So I hopped on bus number 5 to head back into san jose. All the while completely calm, enjoying the scenery and eating cheekys (the cheekys may have had something to do with my happy mood as well) By the time I got into san jose I had decided that I would go back to the catholic church in guadelupe and make the appointment for tomorrow morning b/c I figured the 5% lower late grade would be higher than my paper if I didn’t have both points of view in it. So feeling confident and surprisingly non-chalant about my 5%late grade I hopped on bus number 6 to go back to guadelupe. Hopped off the bus and walked back in to try to explain why I was back and wanted to make an appointment for tomorrow morning. The lady said something I didn’t understand and then said something I did…”he speaks English” Turns out there was an off duty priest from new York who is in costa rica to learn Spanish and if I was willing to wait 15 minutes he was willing to impart his knowledge…in English to me : ) I gladly took a seat. We chatted for about 20 minutes…his English was excellent…we commiserated over not knowing Spanish…and he casually tried to figure out why a catholically raised girl was at a Nazarene university. So I finished up that interview we both said adios…just to say we practiced our Spanish a little and then I hopped happily onto bus number seven singing to myself…outloud. : ) Got on the bus and sat down next to a guy about my age he proceeded to freak out as he tried to figure out why a gringo was sitting on his bus (he didn’t actually say anything but I’ve gotten pretty good at mindreading lately) so exited bus number seven skipped home singing in English the entire way and finished my paper. Thus ends the overly long story about 7 buses and a priest from new York. Hope u enjoyed this page and a half single spaced story about nothing overly exciting.
Pura Vida Y’all!
KT
Ps. Just realized the other day that for the first time since 3rd grade the ppl I’m with don’t call me KT…it’s a little weird! : )