Day 3 of Costa Rica

written by Robert Murphy, student
Edited by Mr. Moreland


I am recovering from our salsa dance lessons at "Peppers" night club last night. At Peppers I learned how to dance the salsa. This dance to me at first was a challenge since I didn't know how to dance at all before this experience. I am looking forward to future events where I can show off my salsa dance moves.


The breakfast today really wasn't what I was expecting because we received pineapple and watermelon slices on a plate and then a piece of ham and cheese and a croissant. I was hoping for more of a breakfast that included rice, beans and fruit. This meal shows me that the Ticos have all sizes of meals and that they are not generally the same portions everyday.


Today we went to La Carpio where we interviewed the president of the local community association. I found out that La Carpio is a squatter town which was created 18 years ago.

Five years ago the people of La Carpio held a protest because they wanted running water brought to their area, so that they didn't have to walk two miles to go get drinking water. The people of this community protested by blocking the road that was the only entrance to the city dump. San Jose was unable to get rid of its garbage and the city provided La Carpio with running water. Since the people live in a squatter community, the people of La Carpio don't own the land that their shacks (houses) are on. That means that the government can come in at any time and kick them out.

The service project that we worked on today was to help the community become an official community of San Jose. In order for the community to do this they must build their own sidewalks, roads and drainage control for the run off water when it rains. The roads must be paved and must be a certain length across.

While I worked on this project in the community I noticed that there were stray dogs and these dogs were eating anything they could get from dirty diapers to small amounts of food the community gave to them if they could spare food scraps.

Also I noticed that when we took a water break as a group the members of the community that were working with us kept on working and when they worked they weren't in a rush to finish the project. This is different than America. Usually, American contractors rush to get jobs done so that they get paid.

This service learning project isn't done and we will be going back tomorrow to finish paving a section of the road and finish removing and replacing an old drainage pipe that runs through the road.

Im looking forward to going back out and working in the community