|
INEX Summer University Costa Rica University specific Information Great Britain Switzerland Netherlands Czech Republic :: Other Universities |
Online Diary ISU Costa Rica 07.2007DAY 1 - OFFICIAL ARRIVAL DAY & NIGHT AT GREEN HOUSE - Sunday, 01 July 2007
When I woke up on 1st July I knew it would become a hard day for me. At 9 o’clock I said goodbye to my cat and than my friend picked me up to drive me to the airport.
The last hours in Austria were very stressful because I was really afraid that I would get problems with my big suitcase. Instead of 20 kilos it had 29 kilos and this was definitely way too much. But with my consciously chaotic questions the lady at the counter was so confused that she did not esteem that I had overbalance. So I checked in and said goodbye to my family before I passed the security control. Two hours later, at 12:10 the airplane took off on time. I really enjoyed the flight with DELTA AIR and landed after a long 10 hours flight safe in Atlanta.
During the flight I took the chance to improve my English skills and spoke with an American passenger about all kind of stuff. The food was eatable and I even got ice-cream. I used the time and improved also my Spanish because I went through my old Spanish book. Another avocation were the two movies shown on the plane. Finally arrived in Atlanta I started looking for my next flight-gate. I had not to hurry because I had 4 hours before the next flight to Costa Rica left. To kill the time I drank coffee and played games on the laptop and, of course, studied Spanish.
On the second flight I slept all the time. After arriving in Costa Rica at San Jose International Airport Philipp and Clara picked me up and told me that the other group which should arrive 3 hours before me, had 2 hours delay. So we drove to our hostel.
The night at “Green House” was not really calm because the missing group from Vienna arrived hours later. I shared my room with Gabriela. The finnish group of 3 people arrived one day earlier. It was a long long long day but it was worth the effort.by Carina Dorn
DAY 2 - COFFEE PLANTATION & SAN JOSE CITY TOUR - Monday, 2 July 2007
Alter having breakfast at the greenhouse hostel we started our first tour. We went to Café Volio where we visited the factory and a coffee plantation. It smelled really great and we could also have a try of pure coffee. We got an insight of how coffee is roasted and how the coffee fruit makes its way to a package of roasted coffee. We also did a short walk at a coffee plantation where we could see how a coffee plant looks like.
After that we drove through San Jose where we could see first the richer part of San Jose and we continued with a little walk and had lunch at Hotel Europa w here we had typical Costa Rican food (rice and beans “gallo pinto”, baked bananas, etc.).
After lunch we drove through other parts of the city that we haven’t seen before and were lucky that we were in the bus when a real strong rain started.
In the afternoon we went back to the greenhouse hostel, had coffee and were waiting for the host families that were supposed to come and pick everybody up. Not only all students, also the families were really excited about the first meeting and words as “ooohhh guapo” made everybody lough. Everybody then went home with their host families and enjoyed the first day with a Tico family.
In the evening, Kim, Fabienne, Philipp, me and Marquita, an American girl staying in my house, went to El Cuartel. One of the best clubs ever! The club was totally full because that’s the place to go on Mondays and we were sweating a lot! But the life-band did a really great job and we enjoyed the Latino music with Imperial and guaro con coca!by Clara Kirschner
DAY 3 - ORIENTATION & INTERCULTURAL TRAINING AT ULACIT - Tuesday, 3 July 2007
Today I got up at 2.00 a.m. for the first time, as in Europe there already was 10.00 a.m., I got a good night`s sleep and felt a little bit hungry. Bit it was too early to get up so I continued sleeping. At about 6.00 a.m. the two poodles of my host family began to bark and finally I got up at about 6.30 a.m.
When I went to the living room my breakfast was already served; I got a banana, cereals and an coffee. After breakfast and a small talk with my host mother about my first night at my host family. Later my host mother and my host brother accompanied me to the ULACIT, to show me the way to the bus station, which bus to take and where exactly to go.At 8.45 a.m. we arrived at the ULACIT where some other students and their families were already waiting. The ULACIT invited us for a free breakfast at ULACIT`s cafeteria, so almost all of us enjoyed a second breakfast.At 10.00 a.m. Illeana Cstello, Director of ULACIT`s international program welcomed us and a larger group of Us students. And Eric Liljenstolpe introduced us to the Costa Rican culture, telling us to suspend judgment and become keen observers of the culture.
Afterwards, while the US students still stayed in the class room, Illeana Castillo gave us a tour of the university campus and showed us the most important facilities. After the tour we had a lunch break, which almost everybody used to go into the Internet to write all the people who were waiting for a message from us since we arrived at Costa Rica.
At 1.00 p.m. we had our orientation session where we got all important information once again in detail; concerning the program schedule, the host family, emergency information, etc.
At 4.00 p.m. our host families picked us up to show us this time the right way home.
Coming home my host mother made us some coffee and we talked about my day at ULACIT. As I do not speak Spanish, yet and my mother does not speak English, it was a quite monotonous dialog; she she talked to me in Spanish and asked me questions and I just answered: Si, No, O.K., Gracias!
Then we walked for a walk and she showed me the way to the Tibas Park, where I had an appointment with some students to go out tonight.
Coming home, I wanted to take a shower, but when I was standing under it, I realized that there was no water! My host mother explained me that this happens sometimes and that we will have water tomorrow! Well, so I went out without taking a shower.
We met at 9.00 p.m. at the Tibas Park and this time the whole group was joining the evening. We went to a bar called GIRO`S where I really can recommend the strawberry Daiquiry cocktail.
The first people, including me, left the bar at about 11.00 p.m., while the others stayed there.by Agnes Koczwara
DAY 4 - TOUR OF TIBAS & SPANISH PLACEMENT TEST - Wednesday, 4 July 2007
Today we didn’t have to be at school until 12.30 so many of us stayed at host families sleeping a little bit longer or just relaxing. Sherilyn and I (Katariina) had also a tour of Tibas with Shelilyn’s host mother to get know better, which is the part of the city where we our host families live.
On afternoon the ones who had studied Spanish before had a placement test for Spanish classes and some of us were very excited of the test ;) After that we had free time and went to San Pedro Mall. It was a quite easy day because we didn’t have any classes yet and everybody was just taking it easy except Kim who lost his wallet.by Katariina Räty
DAY 5 - FIRST DAY OF CLASS - Thursday, 5 July 2007
Today was our first day of class at the ULACIT, starting at 9.00 with Strategic Management with Professor Milton Clarke, followed by the course about Global Consumer Behaviour held by Professor Adriano Urbina. Both our professors are from Costa Rica, which enables us to get a closer look at this country and the culture. After lunch at the cafeteria we made our way through the busy streets of San José to reach the Spanish institute “Logos”, where our first Spanish lesson took place. On our way home we spent some time on the Avenida Central in San José looking and walking through some shops. After returning home we had dinner at our host families. The day was completed with studying and doing homework until deep in the night.
by Florian Haupt
DAY 6 - ULACIT & DANCING LESSONS - Friday, 6 July 2007
After arriving to ULACIT at 9:00 as usual we went to class for our Global Consumer Behavior Course. At the class everybody had to present someone in the class where we had to tell his interests, objectives in life etc. That gave us an opportunity to know everyone in the class better. After the class we had our TICO-Food (Rice and Beans) at ULACIT and I can say that they know really good how to cook well. Before the Spanish Course started our advisor Clara took us to a Tourist Bazaar where we could find different kinds of souvenirs for taking home. But we had to bargain very much to avoid some tourist traps. Later we left the bazaar for the dancing class. I think at dancing we all had a little bit lack of practice especially at Latin rhythms =) Some of us might have not enough of dancing so they went to dancing to a bar just after the dancing class with their Costa Rican friends in order to practice what they have learned today.
by Ilker Ulasti
DAY 7 - POÁS VOLCANO, LA TIRIMBINA - Saturday, 7 July 2007
After our pick up at 8.00 am from „Parque de Tibás“, we had a ride with wonderful music in the bus and the first discussion, what will expect us. We enjoyed breakfast in a nice restaurant, which is called Freddo-Fresas we got fresh strawberry juice to our Gallo Pinto (beans with rice, a traditional Costa Rican food)., really close to the Volcano Poás.
It was the 7th of July supposed to be a day which symbolized luck, if you see the pictures you will see also a strange woman doing some traditional speeches and dances ?
Fortunately we waited a few minutes and took, in spite of the fact that nothing could be seen, our hundreds of photos.
Then we hiked a bit through the national park and as it was a “lucky day” we got the possibility to see the nice lake and later on another time the Volcano with the scratch. We took another 100 fotos and went back to our bus…
…to drive to „La Páz Waterfall Gardens“. Arrived there we went through the butterfly observatory, snake and frog house, saw a few hummingbirds.
In the afternoon we arrived in our nice Hotel. We made a walk through the area and we already saw the river, which would be our destination for Rafting on the next day.
On the way back to our rooms we had the best idea to play mood soccer, as you can see on the pictures it was a lot of fun and we enjoyed it – PURA VIA!by Felix Stäritz
DAY 8 - RAFTING AT SARAPIQUI RIVER - Sunday, 8 July 2007
After having a typical tico breakfast consisting of rice and beans, scrambled eggs, sausage and toast at the La Tirimbina forest lodge at 9 o’clock, it was time for white water rafting. The previous night some of the group had stayed up quite late so the breakfast was quiet, but the rafting served as a good wake up. We were divided into two groups of six persons and sent out on the white water with the instructor/guide after a short introduction with instructions. It was an adventurous, bumpy, wet and really fun ride of over two hours. In between the rapids we were able to jump off the boat into the refreshing water and swim for a while. We also hade a short break including watermelon, pineapple and more swimming. One of the boats flipped over (on purpose) during a rapid making everyone fall into the water, which gave everyone an awesome adrenaline kick. The instructors were in between the rapids telling jokes and guiding us through the beautiful rainforest. Some of us had done rafting before but the amazing nature and warm climate made the ride something to remember. After the two-hour ride and after changing all the wet clothes and shoes we hade a nice lunch at the rafting center. As we were in the bus heading back to Tibas it started raining heavily. The bus ride was also very quiet because everyone was so exhausted after the adventurous day.
by Caroline Lindberg
DAY 9 - ULACIT - Monday, 9 July 2007
Good day, sunshine! This Monday morning started so brightly that we were not really to keen on going to school. However, an exciting Strategic Management class with Sr. Milton was waiting for us so the four of us living close to each other met as usual to take the bus together to ULACIT and then listened to our UN expert as he was telling us about the importance of environmental scanning and the Systems Theory. Throughout the lesson we heard a lot of interesting stories, as for example about his Lybian friend who - filthy rich - invested $ 1 000 000 in Costa Rica to get a passport (of course without success). Great class!
During our lunch break I then had the chance to receive some more information about working for the United Nations as I consider this a very interesting working field. :) As expected it started to rain during that time and as the shoe-loving European I am I was wearing slippery sandals and had better taken a taxi to the language school in the center of San José before I break my feet or even my neck on Costa Rican streets (their supposed to be the worst streets in the world, and ideed, they do have a lot of holes...).
Spanish classes were fine even though the ventilation was not so comfortable as it was waving cool air directly onto our heads, but Clara, our Dona Quijote, fought the ventilator successfully and solved this problem for us.
After having dinner with my Tico mom and my American sister while watching telenovelas and noticias I quickly did some of the readings for my courses to then again meet up with the group to go bowling. Tico time... about one and a half hours later we finally had a lane to jugar bolos. In the meantime some of us had played table soccer which a very helpful man opening and deassembling the whole table finally agreed on.
As we were bowling, me and Sr. Milton, who also had joined our evening activity, in a team strategically sent friendly messages to the little men at the end of the lane and pulled a strike from time to time.
After all a speedy taxi driver brought us home and as I was quite tired I was glad to face my pillow. All in all, it was a pretty good day, especially for a Monday. :)by Cherilyn Knaupp
DAY 10 - ULACIT - Tuesday, 10 July 2007
Business as usual!
I woke u pas usual and I enjoyed a beautiful completely almost warm shower, which had like -10 °C, after that I was really awake. A loco taxi driver drove me to ULACIT where I had the pleasure of a class about Consumer behavior. After a well deserved break Prof. Milton went on with strategic management. Completely exhausted, I got my chance to enjoy the long queue at the cafeteria, which as usually offered very wide range of different European dishes. So after i finished my rice and beans, Kim and I went to play some ping pong but it crowded with Ticos, so no ping pong. Half dead I arrived at the Spanish class where, Carla had a hard time to fight our sleepiness, which she mastered easily as usual. After Spanish the highlight of my day was closing, soccer game against the Ticos. We played at a place close to Felix´s casa. First the good news, we won the second half with 4:2, but we lost the first with 7:0. The rest of the day was like in the morning, luxury warm shower and a tired estudiante falling a sleep.by Jakub Jaros
DAY 11 - ULACIT & MOVIE THEATER - Wednesday, 11 July 2007
We all woke up facing another day at ULACIT university, with lectures in
strategic management and consumer behaviour in front of us. Both professors,
Clarke and Urbina greeted us happily as always, and gave us our daily dose of
information and our share of their experience. After a more or less routine
filled day at the university we continued to Logos for Spanish instruction. And
as the weather permitted it (that is, it was not raining for one reason or
another), some of us even went out to a nearby park for the spanish lection,
for a little change in environment.
Having finished the spanish course at logos our next goal was to reach the mall
at San Pedro, where the movie theater awaited us. After a super quick shopping
session it was time to go see the movies; some asked for action (Transformers),
others hailed to Harry Potter. Wathing a movie in English but with Spanish
subtitles was actually quite fun. At the same time it was a interesting way of
recognicing the vibrant Costa Rican culture - the crowds reactions during the
movie weren't quite like a stale and pale Finnish crowd's.by Kim Gustafsson
DAY 12 - ULACIT - Thursday, 12 July 2007
Today was one of the usual ULACIT – LOGOS days. In the morning at 9 am we had to show up in class on time. First was Strategic Management, however this was an exceptional class, as we had to go through the following day’s program (our banana plantation trip). Later, at 10.50 we joined another beautiful class of Professors Adriano Urbina’s Global Consumer Behavior. After a short lunch break at a supermarket downtown we moved on to Logos, where we had Spanish Classes. Once we finished these lectures, most of us still stayed at Logos to work on our Research Papers for both business courses. So all in all, it was a usual day in San José, even though there was a little sight of excitement for our upcoming trip to the Caribbean Sea.
by Gabriela Jiskrova
DAY 13 - BANANA PLANTATION & PUERTO VIEJO - Friday, 13 July 2007
One day earlier than scheduled, we left Tibás at 6.00am in the morning to enjoy a nice weekend on the Caribbean side of Costa Rica. After a 2,5h drive we first went to a banana plantation where we met our teachers Milton and Adriano and also Illeana from the Ulacit. Milton’s friend – the owner of the plantation – was so nice to invite us and to let us have an experience of where the Chiquita bananas really come from.
We got to see how the bananas make their way from the plantation to the exported boxes and could watch workers by sorting out good and bad bananas and getting them ready for the export. It was really a special experience and Milton did a good job by translating the Spanish from our tour guide into English. Jakub and Kim tried at the plantation to use the “manchette” by cutting a banana tree. Furthermore, we also got to see the houses of the plantation workers and made a walk through a really beautiful garden before we enjoyed lunch at the end of our “banana tour”.
Then we had another 2h drive to get to the Caribbean beach where we went first to Puerto Viejo and to our hotel called “Perla Negra” located directly across the beach.
We enjoyed the beach a little bit and in the evening we went to eat in Puerto Viejo where we had a lot of fun with nice conversations about big things fitting in small wholes and tractor drivers…
Some of the group went out then to dance and stayed a little while in Puerto Viejo, Carina, Gabi, Jakub, Felix, Cherilyn and me went back to the hotel where we played a little pool billard and then talked a little bit next to the hotel pool.
It was a really nice day and we were all waiting to catch some son the next days at the beautiful Caribbean beaches of Puerto Viejo and Cahuita.by Clara Kirschner
DAY 14 - PUERTO VIEJO - Saturday, 14 July 2007
The day was completely free and finally without schedule, we just met to breakfast in la Perla Negra – our Hotel.
Already to breakfast we figured out that the most of us wanted to take a ride on the surfboard… and we did… we rented the surfboards, no teacher and got to know that surfing looks way easier as it is in reality :)
The most of us enjoyed the beautiful day on the beach, exploring the city Puerto Viejo or just relaxed somehow.
After a nice walk along the beach a few of us played pool billiard and others played beach soccer – after the mood soccer game a week earlier we needed to explore new territory :)
In the evening we went together with the whole group to a restaurant and enjoyed seafood and a fantastic night in Puerto Viejo.by Felix Stäritz
DAY 15 - CAHUITA NATIONAL PARK - Sunday, 15 July 2007
Sunday morning, somewhere in the Caribbean: a group of mainly Austrians and Finn-Swedes took an early breakfast served by a very pleasant German hotel manager of the "Perla Negra". Next they were transferred to the beautiful white beach of Cahuita, where they spent the day.
As you might have already guessed, I was in the lucky position to be part of this group. Unfortunately I had caught some sunburn the day before at the beach just in front of the Black Pearl so I condemned myself to staying in the shadow, continuing my beach novel by Paolo Coelho.
The beach was indeed very clean, the sea a bit rough but refreshing and the sun shining... and we enjoyed the company of little crabs and a bit bigger howler monkeys (maybe it was them throwing fruits on us?).
Since Cahuita National Park is one of the most beautiful places of Costa Rica there is of course long white beaches and coral riffs bordering the Atlantic ocean. However, one has to take into account that long beaches also mean a long walk to the next bathroom or to a place to have lunch. At the restaurant we ordered so much banana milk (delicious!) until they ran out of bananas. So we had to switch to mango juice ...menos mal ;)
When I returned to the others that had stayed at the beach I realized that some nice wave had simply "washed away" all our stuff in the meantime and so our towels were soaked and sandy, yummy, and also my beach novel was mojado :/
The boys then insisted on watching the soccer game (some final Latin American Championship...) on TV meanwhile the girls attempted to go shopping but soon found out that there were not more than two or three shops in Cahuita. Apparenly we met a girl asking for money or food or anything and it turned out she was from Salzburg, Austria! Qué vergüenza! Well, the world is small. After the game we left an hour later as originally scheduled at 5 pm to finally arrive home after a 4-hour drive, tired and sunburnt. And just in case you would like to know, Brasil won against Argentina 3:0.by Cherilyn Knaupp
DAY 16 - ULACIT - Monday, 16 July 2007
Monday and two lectures of Milton 9-12.30 pm. Milton was telling us about mission but somehow he ended up talking of Caribbean island (and draw a quite an extensive map) and their airports and economy. After that quite many of us started to work on two group assignments that we are having and continued after spanish classes. I (Katariina), Florian and Kim were writing our business plan until 9pm at ALACID and were quite exhausted after that. Even the school day had been long I coudn't miss the live band in Cuartel. I, Agnes and her host brother, Sherilyn, Felix and spanish teacher living also with his host family and of course Philipp went there all together. Everybody was dancing like crazy and enjoying the Latin rhythms.
by Katariina Räty
DAY 17 - ULACIT & COOKING CLASSES - Tuesday, 17 July 2007
This day started, like all days before with a terrific, rich breakfast with fruits, toast, cheese, ham, …
Later, at 8:30 I met Ilker, Katariina and Cherilyn in front of my house and we drove to Ulacit, where we listened for one and a half hour Prof. Milton Clarke and after that very interesting and exciting lecture, we spend further one and a half hour with Prof. Adriano Urbina to learn about something concerning Global Consumer Behaviour.
At 12:30 Gabriela, Agnes and me, were checking our E-mails at Ulacits computer rooms and than we left for our Spanish course at Logos.
Before the cooking class at Logos in the evening started, the whole group was preparing for the Quiz for the next day.
When cooking class started, the group was divided in smaller groups to prepare a variety of traditional Costa Rican meals. My host mother gave us instructions to guide us. We made chicken, rice and beans, backed bananas, salad, and a real good coco dessert.
It was still a lot of fun to prepare the delicious Costa Rican food, but it was even better enjoying it, after cooking.by Carina Dorn
DAY 18 - ULACIT - Wednesday, 18 July 2007
Another day at the university and the Spanish institute Logos awaited us this wednesday. Today we were going to have something different on the menu at the university, though. In the strategic management course we hade an interesting person as a guest lecturer, Arthur Rasher, with an even more interesting topic: "The world is flat". During the consumer behaviour class we had no lecture, but were in stead free to do research for our projects. This time was more than welcome considering the amount of work to be done during this and next week for both of the courses!
After the Spanish lections some stayed at Logos for working on the group assignments, while others headed home for recharging their batterys - a wise choice espcially for those of the group that had been or still were sick after the weekend.by Kim Gustafsson
DAY 19 - ULACIT - Thursday, 19 July 2007
Today was another day of class at the ULACIT, with the usual courses Strategic Management and Global Consumer Behaviour. After the lunch break the Spanish course took place, while some of the students had to visit the Clinica Biblica, a private hospital in San José, in order to be checked. In the evening the dancing lesson, which was rescheduled from last Friday, was held at the ULACIT. Salsa and Merengue were on the program, but this time the ladies had to prove their ability to lead each other without relying on a man, who guides them. Due to illness none of the men could join this part of the day.
by Florian Haupt
DAY 20 - ULACIT & SOCCER GAME - Friday, 20 July 2007
Business as usual!
Well it was another joyful day. We had the pleasure of Consumer behavior and another Consumer behavior, since on Friday we have only Consumer behavior with Adriano. He was so kind as to distribute the final test, which we enjoyed tremendously. After all the good news we left the class and made an excursion in a supermarket. While observing the consumer behavior of people in Costa Rica, we did our shopping as well. Later there was Spanish at Logos and in the evening we played a game of soccer against Ticos. This time it was a better game resulting in a fair score of 9:9. …. And at night in preparation for our trip to Arenal and the hot springs we spent a good portion of the night at la Hacienda a local disco where we really enjoyed the consumer behavior of the locals.by Jakub Jaros
DAY 21 - ARENAL VOLCANO, LAKE ARENAL & BALDI HOT SPRINGS - Saturday, 21 July 2007
We started at 8.30 from Parque the Tibas with the goal Arenal. Arenal Volcano is a still active volcano and there is a lake with a great view close to the volcano. Our first adventure was a boat trip on this lake. We were really lucky with the weather and had an almost perfect view of the volcano from the lake. It was nice weather and we enjoyed relaxing in the boat watching the incredible sight and taking some pictures. However, the weather was not nice for a very long time, as we reached the root of the volcano dark clouds started building up alarmingly close to us. Ten minutes after relaxing in the sun “walls” would have been needed in the boat, it rained heavily and we experienced a short but scary thunderstorm. The lightings were not that far away from over boat but luckily it lasted only for a short while. We decided not to do the hike because of the weather and had a little sight seeing tour by bus, and saw both a flood and some monkeys! After that we headed to the Baldi Hot Springs, which consists of 10820 square meters of swimming pools with temperatures between 39 and 67 degrees. We had dinner at Baldi and after that we enjoyed the various pools until closing time. After the Hot Springs we drove to our hotel with a common goal, to get some sleep before the Canopy adventure.
by Caroline Lindberg
DAY 22 - CANOPY TOUR AT SAN LORENZO - Sunday, 22 July 2007
This amazing day started with a beautiful breakfast at our hotel Luigi’s. There was everything, eggs, toast, pancakes… etc even Gallo Pinto wasn’t missing!
At 9.30 we all met in our little bus and Agustin took us to the Canopy Park, which is a huge cable park directly on one of the slopes of the volcano Arenal, the most active volcano in the world! Canopy was one of the most amazing experiences of my life. Especially the Tarzan swing, which was a huge adrenalin kick!
After the Canopy tour we got a little refreshment and then started our way back home. We only stopped for lunch on a beautiful hill and it took us about 3,5 more hours to get back home to San José.
In a nutshell, I have to admit that this weekend was one of the most fantastic weekends I have ever had!by Gabriela Jiskrova
DAY 23 - ULACIT - Monday, 23 July 2007
Today I got up at 7.00 a.m., as usual, and enjoyed a nice breakfast with my host-mother. Relaxed I left home to take the bus to ULACIT.
At 9.00 a.m. we had our strategic management class, where Prof. Milton explained once again what he is expecting from our research papers and how the final exam, which we will have on Thursday, will look like. After a short introduction, he gave us time to work on our research papers and to ask him questions concerning our topics.
The hours before our Spanish lesson at logos, almost every group used to work on the research papers, either the one of consumer behavior or the one of strategic management.
After Spanish lesson we stayed at logos to continue our papers or to prepare for the tests.
It was a quite busy day and I think everybody was really whacked.by Agnes Koczwara
DAY 24 - ULACIT - Tuesday, 24 July 2007
Today was again one of the usual Ulacit days, although instead of having one of the beautiful classes of Professor Urbina we had a guest lecture, held by a Marketing Director of a big company. After our Spanish lessons in the evening most of us had to hurry up and get back to Ulacit, as there was a party given for all of the exchange students due to the anniversary of the annexation of Guanacaste to Costa Rica. In the first part of the festivity a man was telling jokes and a woman re-enacted a Costa Rican story. After that there was a buffet with traditional food prepared by our host families.
by Gabriela Jiskrova
DAY 25 - NATIONAL HOLIDAY - Wednesday, 25 July 2007
What a day! Today was our free day to explore San Jose and prepare for our final presentations etc. So we did exactly the same spontanously=) During the day we visited the tourist markt where we could buy presents for our families and then we went to San Padro Mall where Felix and Jakub raced hours lon in the racing machines but felix was the one who has won nearly all the games actually.After doing some shopping in the mall too we met at Felix's house to talk about our presentation a little bit and we finally had the idea of hiring a dancer for the presentation too. What a suprise for the class for tomorrow!
by Ilker Ulasti
DAY 26 - ULACIT & CLOSING CEREMONY - Thursday, 26 July 2007
Today was the day of the final exams and the presentations. We started with the presentations for the Strategic Management course. All the groups had done a great effort and the presentations were well performed and furthermore interesting. After the presentations we celebrated Professor Milton Clarke’s birthday with a traditional cake, which of course was nice. Then followed the Global Consumer Behavior presentations, which also were well done by all of the groups. The lunch-break most of the group spent doing the last shopping or preparing for the international evening. In the afternoon we had our last Spanish classes and after that we got our Spanish certificates!
In the evening we went to Giros, the local bar in Tibas, to celebrate Clara’s last evening and some of the group continued later to la Hacienda. It was crowded by locals and all of us went home quite early, after “enjoying” a suspicious stage performance.by Caroline Lindberg
DAY 27 - INTERNATIONAL EVENING - Friday, 27 July 2007
Coming soon.
by Clara Kirschner
DAY 28 - MANUEL ANTONIO - Saturday, 28 July 2007
Coming soon.
by Felix Stäritz
DAY 29 - MANUEL ANTONIO - Sunday, 29 July 2007
After a fairly early wakeup call we hopped out of our beds at the hotel, and went down to the "restaurant" for breakfest. Others even had the time to the eat theirs, me and Flo, we were kind of late. Nevermind the breakfest, we drove by a store to buy some snacks and drinks for the day we were going to spend at the beach at the Manuel Antonio park. Jakub and Felix, though, walked their own path and went fishing for the day. They even claimed they actually caught something! This was however, not surprisingly, never proven.
The others in the group spent the day at the picture perfect beaches of the park. The ticos had actually been right claiming this was one of the most beautiful places in Costa Rica; I certainly do agree with that. Among all the beautiful plants, trees and different kinds of animals we also met the stealing monkeys; apparently the art of pickpocketing had spread to the pacific coast as well. The only difference was that instead of local people in San José, these pickpockets were small furry ones trying to steal the occasional snack in form of the tourists' foods.
Spending the weekend at the idyllic beaches of the pacific coast was a perfect way to end the program in Costa Rica, leaving a good taste in the mouth after a couple of weeks of hard schoolwork. Some of us even had the pleasure of staying in the area for a couple of days longer, returning home some 3-4 days later than the others.
Finally I would like to conclude the diary by thanking all the staff, family members and other persons involved in the organisation of the program in Costa Rica; it was truly a month to remember!by Kim Gustafsson
DAY 30 - DEPARTURES FROM SAN JOSE - Monday, 30 July 2007
.GIF){kind=small}