With owls.

Tomorrow is May.

...How in god's name is tomorrow MAY already??

Anyway. I'm going to apologize in advance for not having much time to write. Most of my days have been hours and hours of measuring trees and canopy cover in the 25 m x 25 m plots surrounding all the owl sites: and the randomly selected "non-owl" plots that accompany each. Lots of walking. Lots of opportunity to birdwatch while working. All of the enjoyment.

I did get a chance to go to the Monteverde farmer's market, held in the high school gymnasium just above Santa Elena center, with my host mom and the chiquitita. Here's a blatantly stolen internet picture.

Mangoes are still obscenely cheap, and there were even some decent apples. Guayabana and guyaba pods, calabasa for lunch picadillo, yucca for chicken soup. 

      I'm really starting to look forward to living in the station with the CIEE crew again. I do wish I had more time to chase owls around (I stumbled upon the MOTHERLOAD of  bare-shanked screech owls between my house and Selvatura on a twilight run), but it'll be awesome to be able to study late nights with the twenty two of us at such close quarters again. 

The last nineteen days. 

Time to make it count. 

Pura Vida. 

La escuela de amigos

  Another Sunday where I should be hard at work. Heh. 

I'm going to try to do this quickly! After a wildly successful night at the Santa Elena Cloud Forest preserve--nine owls on one 2.6 km trail--I got a lusciously full eight hours of sleep, and got up early this morning to head down to the Monteverde Friends' School for a ten thirty Quaker's meeting. 

Where my best friend on the street (a seven-year-old girl who dreams the pasture behind her house is all her own Costa Rican kingdom) lives. They have quite a few birds...I'll be sure to feature them sooner or later.

Another mini-story: the kids on my street love to give me handfulls of Bougainvillea when I come home because I told them once that Bougainvillea remind me of California. 

The beginning of my walk in to Santa Elena!

The vet's office: a garage under a store that sells farm and pet supplies. This is where our sad little owlet is currently living. 

..... veterinarian. 

The vet's office is on the main drag in Santa Elena. Santa Elena central is about 3x2 blocks total. 

It takes me about 47 minutes to walk here from home. 

The friends' school is where my homestay family sends their children, and where Kathy and Alan, our program organizer and director, sent all their kids. It was founded in 1951 by the Quakers that settled Monteverde: the community grew around it, in a way. 

I saw five different perching bellbirds before I went in to the service! This picture should be titled "Nikki needs a lens with more zoom for all the birds she's always seeing." The bellbird is more or less in the middle. Yeep. 

Pasture behind the school. Have I mentioned how gorgeous Monteverde is?

The school from the soccer field. 

Everything hand-painted! Love it. 

Sorry to be rushing through these. The service was an hour and a half long, after a half-hour hymn warmup. For those of you as unfamiliar with Quaker custom as I am, a friends' meeting consists of everyone gathering in a meetinghouse in complete silence.

Stained glass panels by a local artist and alum. 

I liked the difference between the arrangement of seats in the meetinghouse versus the Catholic church I used to attend back home: here, the benches are fashioned with thin cushions and arranged in a sort of circle, so at any given time, you can see most all of the people in the room. 

Sleepy cat. There were also two middle-school age girls making bracelets throughout the service in the back. That took me back to when my Dad used to let us bring coloring books to mass. Heeee.

Anyway: when any single person in attendance is moved to speech, they will stand up and say what they feel is right, sit, and continue contemplation. This particular meeting had translators: if a person spoke in English, the other would translate to Spanish, and vice versa. It felt familial to sit in complete silence in a room of people who welcomed so wholly the travelers in their midst: I would highly recommend it to anyone who gets the chance. 

And I suppose I'll include the last shots of my walk home, too. This is the cheese factory that the whole CIEE program visited before the second field trip. 

The Monteverde Institute has trails I walk for owls. This is where I found the fledged juvenile about a week ago. Yay owls!

And gotta say, I love the pine-lined roads and dirt paths. 

Yeeee. Monteverde, how I love thee. 

So. 

        Sunday! With that, I can start on my epiphyll lab writeup. Cheers, and expect an update soon on our Humans in the Tropics field trip tomorrow!

Fridays!

        So. Friday is our day of lectures. We get to the station at nine, have lectures until lunch, and a single lecture after. Below? The fruits of our labors (hah.) We're terribly productive. 

Fruit loop bird mosaic, courtesy of Erika.

       After our lectures at the Biological Station, we head down as a group to CPI, the Spanish Immersion Institute, and have class until dinner. Yesterday, we were treated to a Costa Rican cooking class, complete with awesomely flattering hair nets. I'd post more pictures, but my peers would probably shun me. Yeeeeee hairnets!

We made a Guanacaste-inspired dinner of fried cornflour "zapatos" which we filled with fresh tomatoes, cilantro, parsley, naranja, cabbage, lettuce, carrots, black beans, stewed chicken and vegetables, and carne with onions, parsley, and squash. Pretty delicious. 

Annnnnnnnd after that: house party with Alan Masters and the rest of the TA's. 

        You'll have to peruse facebook for the people pictures. Darwin, Wallace, and Moncho are preparing two birthday cakes to make sure that Bailey, Audrey, and Kyra are properly celebrated in the picture above---the cake and MORE food was followed up by drinking and singalongs, and free access to Alan's music room. His violin and harmonica solos are fantastic: it was awesome to be back on a porch with night air and music. I really miss that part of our field trips: 24/7 time with the crazy biologist family that is CIEE, voices rising and falling and cracking and interspersed with laughter, or fantastically, miraculously in tune. Less than a month with these lovely people now. Gack. 

Anyway. 

It's Saturday and it's raining. 

Tonight I'm headed to the Santa Elena Cloud Forest Preserve--we'll see how it goes. 

Hopefully owly. 

Cheers!

Business, Birthdays, y Buhitos

Well, apologies. Here I am, over a week since that last post, with too many things to say and not enough time to say them. 

Rainy season has begun.

      That fact is currently dragging a lot of people with weather-picky research organisms down. I've been largely lucky with my owls: the thought is that I've been able to identify six breeding pairs and one juvenile, more than anyone has really studied previously. And as of my first habitat characterization yesterday, the nest hunt is on. 

Updates. 

The main events since last post: 

        The completion of our second Tropical Diversity practical: a four-hour deal involving such gems as cotton balls glued to the underside of a modified heliconia leaf (for a "field identification" of Ectophylla alba), and quetzal playback calls (they make one noise that makes it sound like they're on a rollercoaster.) I don't know at what other point in my life I'll be able to be so belligerently playful with my peers during a test---sleep deprivation can be magical. I'll mention once again how thankful I am that everybody here is as crazy-silly as I am. Biologist power. 

And as thrill-seeking, I suppose.

Vera and Kyra!

        Twelve of us went ziplining at discount price for Audrey and Bailey's 21st birthdays, courtesy of Sarah's homestay family, at Aventura Park in Monteverde. Usually I'm not so keen on touristy things, but I will admit that that entire day was just awesome. 250ft from the forest floor, above the canopy, ziplining with arms outstretched and two attachments to the cable to keep your body parallel to the ground--I could see my shadow following over the trees (feeling like a bird, in all it's corniness, goddamnit). Then, of course, the riotous hilarity of watching everyone do the "tarzan swing": a swooping, 120 foot drop while harnessed--dividing people in to "screamer" and "cusser" categories. I was in the latter. 

Birthday girl Bailey and Jeff!

        I can't believe I only have a month left with all these wonderful people. The one thing I have to say I dislike about being nocturnal is that I don't get to hang out with the group as much during the day at the local spots: The Common Cup, the Santa Elena Pension and community center next to TacoTaco, the lower lab at the station. Also, the University of California program, the EAP students, have arrived at the station! It's been great getting to bond over Marin and Claremont and California things with them at the bars on weekends. Fun to figure out mutual friends. 

The group!

      One thing I can say: I do get around town and talk to enough people to have a solid group of Costa Rican friends. People in Monteverde know me as the owl girl (what more could I really want from life)--which led to a friend from the Common Cup walking to my homestay house a few nights back to inquire as to whether or not I knew much about owl care. Jesus, the local vet, had an owl that my friend had found in the street one morning: blind, probably hit by a car, and a baby. He wasn't taking food. 

     ...until I went to the Serpentario, a snake and lizard zoo in the area, begged them for a squirmy white mouse, and took it over with owl calls, a towel around my hand, and tweezers. I had to kill, skin, and cut the  mouse in thirds, but he finally took it, and my owl-girl reputation was set in stone. 

      Such a hard decision to make, when an owl is injured this badly. He's got a bum leg, and will need a flight cage if he's to learn how to fly and feed himself. The vet was hoping I'd care for him...but I have a month, and school, and I don't know how ethical it is to keep him, anyway. But bwuhhhh so sadly adorable. I gave my two cents about what I'd learned of owl and raptor care from the Oakland Zoo and the Bird rescue center and left him with Jesus. 

       To be known in Monteverde. What an honor. What a place to live. 

I really don't know how I can ever leave this life. I love the hours of walking and the fresh food: the fact that a 2mil colones bill has a shark on it and salsa on Saturday nights at La Taverna. Coming up tomorrow we have lecture, Spanish cooking class, and a dinner at Alan's house with a guitar sing-along after---we'll see if I can make it out for a night with owls afterward. Pura vida, indeed. 

Write soon, now that my computer is back up and running. The fact that it was out probably contributed to the blogging drought. So. 

Cheers. 

Birdwatching bonus post, as requested.

Total species identified from Costa Rica and four days in Panama: 456.
To the person who demanded this post.

Stole this from the interwebs. Saw this guy at La Selva. 

Golden-hooded tanager.

I'm over the moon. 

And I'm out.

La casa Tica and life as una lechuza.

        So apologies for the delay, but ever since we arrived in our homestays on Saturday morning, life has been a whirlwind of wings in silent flight, walking for hours and hours from Canitas, Santa Elena and Monteverde to wherever I'm going, and visiting friends both CIEE and Costa Rican. And apologies too for the nature of this post. I'm heading out in about 40 minutes to begin night two of my owl-chase. Last night was successful: three individuals near the station, four instances of hit-the-deck-oh-my-god-it's-so-cool-how-they-come-out-of-nowhere-when-attacking-you (feathers designed for silent flight are -so- amazing), and one wonderful walk back home with a fellow nocturnal peer and a new friend and conservationist from the Monteverde butterfly garden. Also worth mention is an AMAZING night in La Taverna with my professor's band, Chanchos del Monte. They're a biologist power group: the son of Eladio (of Eladio's refugio), Robert Dean (who illustrated the Costa Rican bird guide and was the victim of my endless fan-girling all night long), a CIEE-official bus driver, and of course: the badass director Alan. We can only hope to rock as hard as he did when we're his age. Rock and Roll in Spanish or English--didn't matter. We danced and sang to an absurd degree. But man, is that old news--things have been happening so fast!

My homestay family is the best. 

      Here are the specifics: I am on a farm that keeps a cow for milk, gardens to provide for the family and neighbors (the entire "block" seems to be related---okay, the entire surrounding area, really), chickens for eggs and to eat, two dogs and countless farm cats, cabins which are trip-advisor approved (where I can get internets), in a room with a double bed to myself, with 30-some-year-old parents that have two kids: seven and two, respectively. The food is fantastic: lots of gallo pinto, TONS of mango, good soups, coffee. 

The house has the color scheme of  a female blue dacnis. Amber and I discussed how we want this in any future house we inhabit. 

 Their daughter is a huge fan of butterflies. Love this mobile in the kitchen. The house is so open, too-wooden rafters, chairs, tables: fresh air from the laundry room window always. It's glorious.

Baby roooom. Love the tile, too. 

And these two. On top of being exceedingly intelligent for a seven and two year old, they're hilarious, and they get along famously. The daughter loves to give "besitos" to everybody all the time--and the son described his sister as cuddly or loveable, teaching me new words in Spanish. It's awesome. 

I have a lot of school photos and artwork in my room. Jorge el curioso. Adorable. 

Simple. Stunning. Love the small touches. 

And I love to play harmonicas with energetic seven year olds. I really do have a little brother now. We played a little futbol and went on an easter egg hunt at sunset on Sunday. 

All of the cute. She squeals and loves my bird books and journal--always calling birds "pipios!"--which are the young chickens in their sheds. She copies whatever you do: for example, when you try to do situps, she joins in. She calls me "NiNi"--just like my sister did when she was that age. Dying of the cute.

Their son knows a TON about animals. Dinosaurs, birds, sharks--you name it. Apparently biology is a huge part of elementary school education in Costa Rica. He came out to look for owls with me on a woods trail behind his house two nights ago, and he was flipping through my book and teaching -me- what their calls were. So great. 

Homestay house! Their yard is full of birds' nests and flowers. Lovely sweeping view of the valleys. 

Their son took me on my first tour of the place. They have a timber operation in addition to the farm, which is the main use of this shed. 

Nesting white-eared ground sparrows in the rafters. Yeeeee.

Pollos! For eating. 

Pipios! For being adorable. And I suppose eventually for eating.

Gallo lindo. 

And a garden, freshly stripped of all tomatoes. 

Oso, the collie, and Bambi, the mutt.

So many delicious fresh things. I've taken on chicken care and I got to collect eggs this morning: there are breadfruits, plantains, tomatoes, peppers, cucumbers, duranzos (a sour sort of green peach, pomegranate in color on the inside), and various other things. This is the grandparents' ranch-type house, a short walk down the road. All the family gathered here for Easter. Kids screeching and fighting for chocolate eggs in the sunset, dogs and cats stealing scraps. 

And a swing!

AND something crazy: another study abroad student, who is calling the grandparents' place home. He's also 21, and he's from SHADYSIDE ACADEMY. My rival high school. Crazy as anything. My mama Tica was right in saying, "Que pequeno es el mondo."

Did I mention how fantastic the fresh vegetables/cooking are?

Mmmmm. Tomatoes. 

Oso. Again with the cute. I handed over my camera to their son so he could snap a few shots. 

So he got this one of the tractors and the dog. 

And he loved my necklace. Colibri means hummingbird.

In exchange for the treats I brought from Chinatown in San Francisco and for playing harmonica with him, Fabian gave me some erasers. He failed at teaching me the word for rainbow, which was entirely my fault for having such bad Spanish. I'm getting along just fine, though, really: my conjugations may be iffy, but my Italian makes it easy for me to understand most things. I've gotten through an entire hour of showing my Tico family pictures of my actual family, a game of soccer, Easter, farm work, telenovellas, and keeping up with various young children that speak with lisps from missing front teeth. 

I love it.

While I was unpacking, their son showed me his Max Steele figurine and took me through a bunch of facts about the planets and the solar system. Again, amazingly sharp for seven. And he's such a good kid. 

Obligatory parts of the room shot.

Max Steele had a theme song, which I was treated to. Their son is full of performances--last night he danced four different manakin dances, including a Michael Jackson level moonwalk. Definitely check that video out. 

I love me some crazy biologists. 

...have I mentioned how much I adore Costa Rica?

Their daughter is TOO ADORABLE. She loves my journal. For the "pipios".

...She wanted to play harmonica, too. Her brother helped her out. Sibling love. 

 So that's about half of the story! Heh. I can't begin to tell you all how incredible it is to be in the forest at night, calling owls, bats coming in and out of the dim red glow of my headlamp, buggies and frogs galore. There was a ton of wind last night and the moon didn't emerge from the smoky mountain of clouds until we were leaving. 

       I love walking around town with my huge measuring tape in tow and my binoculars around my neck. I love how I can stop in five or more houses around Monteverde to say hello to cooks, fellow bird watching friends, fellow biologists. I can stop at the homestay homes of my friends as well: and gosh, if I could live like this forever---travelling everywhere on foot, picking up small amounts of food from markets, studying in the tropics and living with a small farm family---I would. I can't express the contentment, the elation, the straight up health of it all, and my love for all the people I've come to know over the best two months of my life.

       Getting carried away. 

I am officially late for my professor and my owls. How time flies. I'll try to keep updating as soon as possible, but no promises. The creeping realization that this only lasts a month and a week more is going to keep me off the computer and in the woods as much as possible. 

So cheers, write later, and as always--Pura Vida.