Camino Claro Blog

Spring greetings from Escuela Camino Claro!

What’s been happening at ECC the past few months?

‘Tis about time for some ECC updates, tidbits, news, and other anecdotes.

Earth Day

ECC celebrated Earth Week by joining in on a community beach cleanup, followed by an Easter celebration at the community center. Lisa facilitated several Earth Day- inspired activities, turning the day into an educational and fun-filled celebration. As you can see, bilingual bingo finds its way into every celebration…

Farmer’s Market

The Farmer’s Market continues is the Pura Vida fashion (relaxed and non-hurried). Now that several of these monthly markets have taken place, it’s catching on! A great way for local ticos, foreign residents, Guaymi indigenous, and tourists to share their goods and produce. Plus we all need a stimulus in the economy, right?

Other Classes and Activities

ECC’s bilingual programs and daycare continue on with great success and increasing attendance. We wouldn’t be nearly as successful without the help from The EDGE Charitable Foundation and their generous donation of school supplies.

Creating a Thank You banner is a great excuse for an art project…

…The final product!

Another successful Anti-Tuna Farm Festival

May was a month of action for the Pavones community as a whole. Pavones hosted quite possibly its largest festival of the year in opposition to the proposed tuna farming in the Golfo Dulce. We had much support in gathering the town’s signatures on the petition; I won’t lie, getting everyone together for an awesome party puts people in a helpful mood. There was great food, delicious chicha (tastes like kombucha, feels like moonshine), rappers and clowns entertaining children for hours on end, a baile that went too late for my tastes these days, and other amazing things I can’t put into words. Gerardo took great control of the events organization and everyone worked together to volunteer their time. It was really cool to see everyone coming together to throw this big awareness festival. A fantastic mural is near completion on the once-white wall of the fishermen house – thanks everyone who worked on that (I know I saw Aurora, Alex, and Hadas there!). Although things seem to come together at the last minute here, I must say the Tuna Festival was a fantastic success.

ECC’s classes continue to go well

I know Lisa’s sure are: to paraphrase her students’ sentiments, they really like: “all of the games, singing, and food.” I can attest to their delightment in these things as I often hear the enchanting little voices singing such titillating tunes as “Clean Up! Clean Up!” and “London Bridge.” I won’t lie; I’ve even had fun playing some of the games – and eating the snacks! I never knew I liked raisins so much… Lisa has combined her two bilingual classes into one and they sure are swell. Speaking of swells, they even dedicated themselves to a pledge of environmental stewardship and conducted quite the beach clean-up – some tourists and locals even volunteered their abilities at picking up rubbish.

My classes are still going strong. Leon, my private home school student, and I become a more proficient studying machine as the days progress. He’s doing a good job at keeping concentrated on our work, even when I know at times images of waves are rolling through his head. Adult computer classes have finally collated into one Thursday evening class. Everyone has been making leaps and bounds in computer comprehension and that includes the kids’ computer/photography class. Of course, this month was exciting for us as the students have been creating a documentary focused on “No a Las Granjas Atuneras” (Anti-Tuna Farm). Gerardo’s Adult English class is still great fun. Lately, students have been working on putting together a travel guide in English, combining both English practice and computer literacy.

Other community happenings

Las Gemelas public school is chugging along like the little engine that can, and has. We’ve really come along way in our community garden there! Just today the students of Las Gemelas got their hands dirty planting a variety of different flora. En lieu of Dia de los Arboles several trees were planted, along with herbs, vegetables and even ornamental flowers.

Escuela Camino Claro’s benefit dinner up at El Castillo Restaurant was quite the fiesta. There was an appetizing spread of pizza, pasta, burgers, and make-your-own-salad with a dozen ingredients! We had a great turn out and a great time. It was so fun to be in such a swanky little place nestled up in the hills of the jungle. Everyone’s support and energy made all of us at ECC feel that proverbial warm and fuzzy feeling.

This month we have had several different volunteers from the tourist community volunteer at the public school’s library and during ECC’s English classes, which was a great surprise and help. I feel like this might be a great untapped resource as a lot of people feel like giving back to the community they are visiting. There may be more tourist volunteers to come. Of course we would like to thank everyone for coming and helping us to be a positive community.

~Jacob

We got ourselves some hard-workers!

It’s been a jam-packed few weeks for the Kalapuya High School group and it’s not even over yet. We’ve sure been busy keeping them busy with projects, excursions, and lots of fun activities. So busy, in fact, that I run the risk of another long-winded post (big surprise, eh?).

The main community service project has been painting benches and landscaping the new playground (more on that later), but while the paint is drying and the shovels and wheelbarrows are put aside, here’s a taste of what they’ve been up to.

Colegio Visit

This was definitely a first for everyone involved. Kalapuya High School students were each paired with a Pavones local to attend their high school for half a day. It was mind-opening, they reported, to witness such striking differences between their liberal, alternative high school in Eugene, Oregon and Comte’s 7^th-12^th grade colegio; a vastly different system of education. Start with an hour and a half bumpy bus ride at 5:30 am, and then add the lack of polyester uniforms, the language barrier, and the general disorientation, it was quite challenging for the seven high school students, some of whom said, “It was pretty chaotic and the teachers didn’t seem to have any control over their classes. Everyone was talking and playing in the halls,” and “The fence around the whole school made it feel like a jail!” While trying to ignore questioning stares from local students, the visitors sat in on a few classes and played foosball in the courtyard, returning to Pavones relieved and with a newfound appreciation for their school.

Beach Cleanup

…is always successful here because, well, there is SO MUCH of it! Not to mention that the sight of a group of foreigners cleaning up garbage on the beach sets an example for the community, especially our ECC students. This community service activity goes hand in hand with our increasing efforts to create a sustainable recycle system for Pavones and surrounding areas. Fostering awareness for recycling and waste management has been a goal of ECC’s for the past few years and hopefully Kalapuya groups in the future will take part in building Pavones’ first recycle center.

Left- Do some of these people look out of place? Playing foosball at the Comte Colegio

Right- I told you we had some hard-workers: they covered about two miles of beach during the garbage cleanup.

What’s a trip to Costa Rica without some outdoor fun?

Taking advantage of “outdoor playground,” as my friend, Amy, most aptly calls our home, the students also have been surfing, swimming fishing and relaxing on the beach in their free time. The balance of work and play makes the trip a blast and meaningful at the same time.

Left- River walk up the Rio Claro

Right- Dorado for dinner!