Off to the Farm

After a few days in Alajuela with the Nuñez family, I was off to go work on a farm in Mastatal. The trip only took a few hours by bus but I had to sit on a giant tire in the middle of the floor because there was no space. I was shocked how many people piled onto this bus carrying so many bags of food. One woman even carried on a box full of birds. But I was happy because at least I was with my bags and I met this girl who happened to be going to the same farm. Halfway to the destination the bus pulled over next to a store in which many people including the bus driver got out to go buy snacks, head to the bathroom, etc. I thought it was so interesting that after only 1 hour of driving on the bus everybody seemed to need a break. The last hour of the bus was beautiful but also terrifying at the same time because it was all dirt roads driving through the mountains with a crazy bus driver. But I survived and the bus dropped us off right in front of the farm.

Once on the farm I very quickly learned that I would be living literally outside for the next two weeks. I go to make my bed with the sheets they gave me and the first thing I find is a black scorpion, crawling in the cracks of my bed. I wanted to kill it, but of course that’s not okay to do here so we just took it out and let it go free. I wrapped a mosquito net around my bed so hopefully nothing else can come in but I am in the jungle so there’s only so much I can do. I’ve also realized that they don’t really eat meat here, so I have to learn to be vegetarian for the next two weeks which will be a struggle considering I don’t eat beans and that’s the main protein in all the food they serve.

Here is a picture of my bed once I got the mosquito net on. I’ve never done this before so it doesn’t look the best, took a few tries but it got the job done.