After a long day of traveling, we arrived in our hotel in San Jose, Costa Rica. It felt so good to be at our destination and be able to relax for a little while. A drive to Charlotte, night in a hotel, shuttle to the airport, plane ride, gate transfer, a second plane ride, and a bus trip finally got us to our hotel. For such a long journey, it went smoothly and uneventfully. The guy next to me on the first plane ride had never been on a plane before which surprised me. I guess having traveled so many times I did not even consider the fact that someone in his late 20s wouldn't have experienced the trauma of flying. It was quite humbling to think about how many people have not and will not have the opportunity to travel across the country or even around the world. In contrast, the girl next to me on the second flight was a pilot. She received her private pilot license when she was 16. Now she is going to spend 3 months studying and taking aerial photos for her job. It is amazing how influential your upbringing is on your life and its direction.
More specific to our trip, the hotel will be our beautiful, 4 star rustic looking home for 4 nights. It has lots of wooden features that make it feel homey and welcoming, I love it. It has wireless internet, air conditioning, and a safe deposit box. The bad part is that we are not in a great location. Walking more than 2 blocks from the hotel is a bad idea, there is not really anything else around us. I did not get to spend much time with any of the group, but I will get to know them well enough soon.
Dinner was delicious, we ate at the only place within walking distance; a restaurant/disco club. It was delicious, I love all of the rice and beans. Dr. Medlin was super kind and paid for our meal as a welcoming to the country and class. The guy who will be organizing most of our trip and giving lectures, Mauricio, joined us for dinner as well. We have already learned several things about life in Costa Rica. For example, the gas is about $4.80 per gallon here after converting it from liters to gallons and colones (the local currency) to dollars. We are about 4000 feet above sea level, but the city spans over several hills so it changes quite a bit depending on where you are. It has a population of about 1.8 million while the country is approaching 5 million.
Lastly, we had two lectures for the night, which was difficult to really pay attention because of how exhausted we were from travelling. The first was simply on the introduction of the class and Costa Rica as a whole. It is considered one of the happiest places on earth, and is aiming to be carbon neutral by 2020. 90% of their energy used is hydro-power. For a country which is smaller than the state of West Virginia, it has some big goals and is a leader in Latin America. However, instead of simply improving it's "green" standards, Costa Rica also has to find a way to control the growing tourism industry as well.
The second lecture dealt with the politics of the country which is not something I am very interested in, although I did learn a lot about the way it runs. One of Costa Rica's distinguishing factors is that the country has no army. Instead, they are able to spend their money on things such as education, health care, and sustainability. In fact, the nation has improved to having a better life expectancy rate than the U.S. As you can see, it is a rapidly developing country that has grown a lot in the past 30 years. It will be really interesting to learn about this workings of this country from scholars as well as local families during this two week class.
