and 897 miles later...

This weekend, I drove over to the beautiful neighboring state of Tennessee to visit my dear Costa Rica pal. Our original plans didn't quite work out, but we had an amazing time anyways. I drove with Shauna in my good old trusty companion, Luisa, who hit her 60,000 mile mark on our way there right after we crossed the state line. She's old, but just hasn't been driven a lot. But she did great and lasted the entire way. Although, every time I got anywhere near 75 mph she started shaking: her way of saying, Ellen, if you do that, you're not making it home.

We arrived at our destination Friday night at around 9 pm and had a rip-roaring first night. Well, not really, but for me it was fun. Saturday started off with some pancakes and a multi-hour long video chat with our good friend Marquillos, and his extremely sketchy friend Diego. There were a couple power outages down in Costa Rica while we were chatting ("i need to leave right now i beleive because this can get burn...") and Marco was adamant that he would burn his hands if he continued to type so he would sign off, but the virtual phone would ring the second the lights came back on. We then went to see our friend at her gig at a coffee store in their hometown. She had a whole set and rocked it. We stopped by a big rock (it was more impressive than I just made it sound) and ate at a local Mexican restaurant. Then it was time for pee-wee football! I had never been to a high school football game, let alone a pee-wee one. Those parents are inSANE crazy fans. They all have shirts that say, "My Spartan is 88" or whatever their kid's number is. It's great. Brittney's little brother was playing (and scored a touchdown within the first two minutes of the game) and I met some of her hometown buds and family.

Saturday was full of dancing. Brit and I decided that we were going to learn the choreography to the Cafe Tacvba dance to their song Dejate Caer. The moves look really simple, but throw in some other variables (*wink*), and it took us a while to get them right. We video-taped every try, and I figure that I will put our best take up on my blog instead of Facebook or something, because, let's face it, who really reads this thing anyways? Here it is:

It's always sad to say goodbye, obviously, but it does seem that we live a lot closer than we do. I have seen her more than I have seen my dad in the past year, and that's kind of pathetic. I'm glad that we're able to find the time to see each other, and I hope it continues.

I did have a rather nice time driving all those hours (minus the necks and calf cramping) because I am in love with North Carolina's mountains! They are simply gorgeous. When we drove there, it rained the entire time and I felt like I was driving to Guapiles, CR, and that the beach would be just beyond the mountains. They are so pretty. A little nerve-racking to be driving through, but so pretty. I think I want to live in Asheville and be a hippy with a sweet house on the side of a cliff with no electricity and an outhouse in our backyard. That would be pretty much amazing.

I'll have to look into that.

Peace.

What About Now?

I seriously cry every time I watch this:
What About Now

Peace,
E

ASB Italy 2009 - Wow

Today was the big day: I picked my team members for the Alternative Spring Break trip that I am co-leading next year.

Oh. My. Goodness.

We had 36 applicants that put us down for their first choice (there are about 14 different trips), about 15 as their second option, and about 20 for their third = 71 applicants in total.

We could only pick EIGHT.

And let me tell you this: We were there for almost SIX HOURS. We had to pass up a lot of good applicants because of various reasons, but we are so psyched for the ones we did pick. We are going to have the most amazing trip in the history of ASB and we're going to make it super cheap... how does $1800 sound? :)

Wednesday is reveal night; remember we don't know who we actually picked, we just saw their essays and student ID number. I can't wait to meet the people and put a face to the applications because they were seriously amazing. I feel bad that we couldn't pick more but asi es la vida. I think it was the most stressful thing I had done in a long time because I felt like I was fate and was determining the future for a lot of people. But no matter where everyone gets placed, they will have a once-in-a-lifetime experience and I hope they see that.

More life news: not much. 4 tests in 3 days = no sleep for Ellen. I wish I cared more. But right now, I'm writing on my blog instead of studying, so I think you can imagine....

Peace.

Ever want to know who was paying for my education?

The Power of Education: The Legacy of Roy H. Park

Vegetarian at heart?

Today, I experienced a very rude awakening...

Sitting in my meat science class is usually a relatively painless activity: the teacher is entertaining, I'm learning about foods, and I'm with a lot of my friends. However, today's subject was very disturbing: Animal Harvest. Just the fact that the industry calls it "harvest" makes my stomach turn. They don't think of animals as living beings, but objects they created in order to produce food. Now don't get me wrong, because I love meat. I eat chicken and turkey and cheeseburgers, but I enjoy being naive about where my meat comes from. I don't need to see the torture instruments used in slaughter houses to render the animals unconscious. I don't need to see pictures of Babe the pig being prodded and electrocuted over and over just so he could move from one end of the barn to another. And I especially don't need to hear my professor explain, with every minute detail, just how economically beneficial it is to starve animals before they are killed and how it is extremely humane to put them all in a gas chamber before sanguination.

I was crying. I excused myself from the class and went to cry. But why?? I like meat! Here's why: no one should be numb to killing a living being. I was surprised at the lack of emotion in that classroom, just like killing thousands of beings is an everyday thing. Well, unfortunately it is. But that doesn't mean that we should enjoy looking at pictures of dying hogs. I think the other reason that it was particularly difficult for me was the fact that we were learning about hog slaughtering. Chickens... kill them as far as I'm concerned. Those are dirty, nasty, mean animals and I don't like them and I'm sorry if that is heartless, but I've had some pretty bad experiences with chickens. But little piggies!? I once was woken up in Nicaragua to the sound of a pig being castrated and it gave me nightmares for weeks. It sounded like a baby who had just been trampled on by hundreds of horses or something. It was awful. So that was probably another reason for my sudden emotional breakdown. And I don't really eat pork...

Moral of my story is: show some compassion, people. And know where the line is and how it can be crossed. I eat meat, but I want to know absolutely nothing about what happens before it goes into my mouth.

Irony: I'm going to a swine packaging plant in October. Yippee.

The hurricane... known as life

Well, supposedly Raleigh was hit by Hurricane Hanna last night... good thing I was having the best night of sleep in a long time and missed all the hullabaloo. Even though the physical hurricane didn't leave a mark on my life (or on my car, thank goodness) my life has become a hurricane of its own. My 18 hours of classes are catching up with me, and my new practice of not procrastinating and getting assignments ahead of time is slowly fizzling. Everytime I open up my assignment notebook, it is a flurry of tests, quizzes, homework, meetings, talks, events, activities, wow! Every day is packed full with something, and the weekends have truly become my only free time of the week, even though I'm still working on homework. We were supposed to go the beach this weekend and have some true down time, but obviously the hurricane, the real one, ruined those plans. But I'm enjoying not having to worry about what's going on tomorrow and what I have to get ready.

Something that just hit me: my life is so structured in the states. In CR I did what I wanted to, when I wanted to. There was no assignment notebook. There was no planning my life. I went with the flow, traveled when I could, did homework when I wanted to, and never stressed over deadlines. I recently have been put through the wringer with my schedule changes, and experienced some truly unnecessarily stress and I just flat out miss my carefree life in Central America. Not to mention my friends, family, and favorite hangouts. Just tell me one place in this country where I can slip under the bartender door and help myself or my friends to our choice of beverages... I got nothing, you?

Some hopeful news: as part of my GRASP application for my airfare to CR, I had said that I was going to give a seminar in the food science department about food handling practices in Central America given my vast knowledge on the subject. I talked with my mentor and decided that the perfect place to practice would be the Study Abroad Symposium. I am going to give a lecture about the differences in food storage and preparation and really try to inspire students and professors to do something about, especially from the educational point-of-view. If a couple of dedicated people educated the masses of Central America about the fact that although microwaves keep rats and flies away from food, they are not proper alternatives to refrigerators or freezers that would be amazing. And I have seen both extremes as far as economic status goes, from my spacious Costa Rican home to my dirt-floored, rotting shack in Nicaragua. Even my travels to Guatemala and Peru can shine some perspective on my audience, or so I hope. And that is what I will be working on independently this semester, hoping to give my lecture on Nov 17 (so if you're in the area, COME!). Obviously I will be working closely with my mentor to perfect the seminar, but I really hope to put a lot of Elena into the mix and make it a personable experience. I'm excited, if you can't tell :)

Oh, I have officially started working on the novel. We'll see how that goes...

PEACE!

I should have known

I should have known that the time would come when I would be in the United States, doing the whole university thing, and one of my friends would be in Latin America, living it up like we all should. And I'm jealous, upset, frustrated, and basically a Debbie Downer because of it. I don't want to be here. Don't get me wrong, I'm happier here compared to Chicago where I had my parents (and I still love them don't get me wrong) and zero friends. Thanks to technology I still "have" my parents, and now I have all of my friends. But some things just aren't quite fitting in like I thought they would once I got back. And I think you know what I'm talking about... actually, I don't really know what, but I thought maybe you could help me out...

I had a great weekend with Brittney/Plinko. I'm so glad she came to visit me, because I just had that itch to talk about nothing but CR. Scratched! But of course now, I want more, and I'm just going to have to wait. We had a little, ahem, get-together on Friday with a bunch of my friends, jock jams themed. The theme failed as Brittney and I were in 100% sports get-up and changed out as soon as someone showed up. Oh well, at least there are some photos as proof of our initial effort. Saturday we tried to go to a men's soccer game - rained out. That's something that just isn't the same.... it rained a butt load in CR but the rain here is different. It makes everything sticky instead of fresh and cool. I don't like NC rain. Anyways, we went to Pullen Park on Sunday and I was very impressed. I kind of wanted to steal someones kid so I could have an excuse to go on the carousel, but we ended up renting the little paddle boats and attempting to communicate with the wildlife with our duck-calls. Let's just say it wasn't a complete failure.

Now classes are back in action, my calendar is filled to the brim, and I'm not in Latin America. You do the math.

Peace.