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tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26445385085092038122014-10-06T20:56:24.821-07:00La Vida TicaA journal detailing my 27 months as a Peace Corps volunteerHannahhttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-2644538508509203812.post-91456655294341756082011-10-10T08:52:00.000-07:002011-10-10T09:26:29.232-07:00A little bit of everythingBuenos dias from beautiful Comte. Everything has been going well in town. Since I last updated Comte now has a recycling center and English classroom in the grade school. Furthermore I have a new dog and am also renting a house on my own in town. Things are moving forward but time flies!

As far as projects in the grade school, everything has gone well with the recycling center and English classroom. In June 2011 the recycling committee had reached its funding goal to build a recycling center. Construction started in July. The construction was managed by a local constructor along with fathers and mothers of the grade schoool who donated their time and physical labor. The center consists of a cement floor, cement block walls and a metal roof. Since the opening of the center, the recycling committee has done various environmental education activities with the kids, promotion in the community and lots of work in the center. To-date the center has received over 100 bags of recyclable materials and will be scheduling the first pickup within the next week. I am excited for the results of all of the committee´s efforts and look forward to the future of the program.

The English classroom has also been a success thanks to the many generous donations received through CR-USA and PCPP. Construction of the classroom started in August 2011, managed by 2 construction workers in the community. To-date the classroom is nearly complete, only lacking ceramic for the floors, paint and windows. Construction should be complete within the following weeks. I am excited for the new opportunities that the classroom will bring to the children of the community and the English teacher. I cannot sufficiently thank all of the generous individuals who have donated their time and energy to this project. I believe that the project has been a success and look forward to seeing the kids in the classroom the next school year.

Another short-term project I did was a Junior Achievement program in the high school. The program lasted approximitely 5 months, in which the students learned how to plan and manage a small business through the creation of their own microenterprise. My group, AFE (Amigos Formando Empresas: Friends Making Businesses), decided to form a business that sold jewelry made from recyclable and ocean materials. Their product line was Recimar, a combonation of the words for recycle and ocean. Some of the tasks the group had to do were to sell actions, create and administer a market study, create a marketing plan, create and present a Pwerpoint presentation for a product launch, sell the product locally and in an event in San Jose, fill out administrative, production and financial forms, and pay dividends. The program was a lot of work but I was incredibly proud of the initiative, responsibility and hard work of my group. Some of the highlights were seeing them give a wonderful product launch presentation to over 100 people in San Jose and watching them sell their products in a mall in San Jose. Two thumbs up to AFE.

In the following months I hope to start a computer class for adults in my community. The high school has a computer lab and I am currently in the process of soliciting the use of the computer lab for evening classes. Fingers crossed.

I also now have a wonderful 5 months old german shepherd, Calla. I bought her from a family in my community when she was 1 1/2 months old. She has been such a wonderful companion and I am very grateful to have her. I am also officially the only person in town who walks their dog with a leash and one of the few people that teaches their dogs tricks. So I get lots of looks when I take her on daily walks and when she obeys commands given in English. She is also quite popular among the kids in town, possibly more popular than me these days. Sometimes when I walk her by the school all of the kids yell, "It´s Calla! Calla is coming!!" She loves the attention. She also obeys them when they give her commands in English, which they get a kick out of. They especially love "shake."

And as I mentioned above I also recently moved out of my house family´s house and am now renting my own small house in the community. I am enjoying the space, quiet and practicing new tico recipes in the kitchen.

So yes, that is a brief update of life in Comte. There is so much more I could say and so many things that have happened in these months and I regret not being a more faithful blogger. Hopefully I can give more steady updates from here on out. Love to friends and family in the United States!
Hannahhttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-2644538508509203812.post-39937018661706474242011-04-01T15:12:00.000-07:002011-04-01T15:36:40.673-07:00English as a tool for basic developmentAs I have mentioned in previous posts, I am currently working with my community grade school to build an English classroom. A number of years ago, Comte experienced an earthquake that destroyed a large part of the infrastructure of the grade school. As a result, in 2009 a number of buildings were found to not meet Ministry health and safety regulations and were therefore destroyed. The school director, school board and parents of the children have been working to fund the construction of 5 buildings on the school property. One of these buildings would be an English classroom. As Comte is located 10 miles from the beach and Costa Rica is a popular tourist destination, English as a foreign language is an important skill for personal and professional development. While EFL is of great importance for youth and members of the community, its educational center lacks the proper infrastructure to provide an acceptable and equipped area for the children to receive their English classes. Currently, 100% of the student population receiving English classes receive their lessons in the kindergarten building and a church across the street.

The goal of the project is to construct an English classroom in the grade school. The classroom would provide the students with a secure and stable environment to facilitate the learning and exploration of English as a foreign language. The building would also be used to provide English night classes to adults in the community.

My counterparts and I are currently in the fundraising stage of the process. This involves raising the funds necessary to pay for the construction materials. The community as a whole will provide the manual labor of the project.

If you would like more information on this project, please follow the link below:

https://www.peacecorps.gov/index.cfm?shell=donate.contribute.projDetail&projdesc=515-189

Please also feel free to contact me for a copy of the project application. Thanks for support!

Pura vida.
Hannahhttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-2644538508509203812.post-19031503047601511562011-03-27T08:19:00.000-07:002011-04-01T14:52:41.766-07:0070 degrees is cold...March was pretty busy. I was working a lot on soliciting funds for 2 big projects at the grade school; the construction of an English classroom and the construction of a recycling center. I have really enjoyed working with my counterpart, the principal, on these projects. Together, we completed and submitted 3 separate solicitudes. It might not sound like a lot, but these things take a lot of time. They averaged on about 15 pages each, including annexes with budgets, timelines and more. Now the waiting begins. Hopefully I will be posting some good news in a few months.

Besides fundraising, I have been teaching a lot. I honestly never realized how much Id be teaching... but on the other hand I had no clue what Id be doing anways. I have found teaching to be rewarding and challenging. I truly enjoy each of the classes I teach. I feel especially proud when I see my students remembering and applying things that they have learned in class. At the same time, I find the classes challening in that you must constantly work to keep the group interested and motivated. That might sound like an "obvio.." comment.. but you dont think about it until you have to do it! Kudos to all the teachers Ive had. Especially the interesting ones!

Other than work, its all good in the campo. We are in the middle of summer time so it gets pretty toasty during the day. And when I say toasty I mean freakishly hot. I literally walked to and from the soccer field to watch a game one day, which is was a total of 20 minutes in the sun, and had a bright red burn on my nose and neck. I broke down the other day and finally used an umbrella. Its what most people in my town do.. just took me receiving a serious burn to walk around with an umbrella when it isnt raining. I used to think it was funny that everyone in my town got so cold when the temperature dropped the slightest bit.. but living in Costa Rica in the summer makes me understand... 70 degrees is cold these days!

Well Ill leave it at that for now. I am currently in an internet cafe at the border (I live by the border of Panama) so time to sign off and finish my errands. I came today to buy fruit for the recycling group to sell at a school event this week. We are waiting to hear back from a local cooperative as to whether or not we will receive the fund we requested for the recycling center. In the mean time, we are going to try to do occasional sales to build up our bank account. This week involves selling fruit at some soccer games. Little by little!
Hannahhttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-2644538508509203812.post-48803894890144404882011-02-20T09:32:00.000-08:002011-02-20T09:55:44.415-08:001 year update (wait, what?! 1 year??)Summer vacations are officially over and its back to it. Summer vacation for the schools in Costa Rica go from mid-December to the start of February. It was initially weird for me to refer to these months as summer vacations because, even though it is hot and sunny here, it is cold and snowing in Ohio. But after living in Costa Rica for almost 1 year, January and February are starting to look a lot more like summer.

I was able to go home for a few weeks in December, which was a wonderful break. I don't know how I truly thought that I wouldn't miss home, because in the weeks leading up to my trip back to the states, I was missing it more than ever. It was wonderful being home with my friends and family that I love. But its always an interesting experience going between 2 very different places in a short period of time. Comte is small, rural and simple. I've grown to appreciate living a certain kind of lifestyle here. It was a weird (and indescribable, so sorry, I'm not even going to try to explain it) feeling being back in big cities surrounded by commercialization. But I have to say, it was nice being able to get to a location that is 10 miles away in less than 15 minutes, not over 1 hour.

I came back to my town after New Years Eve, right around the time that the community was in preparation for its annual festival. The annual festival is run by either the grade school and the high school and involves 2 weekends of food, soccer, bull riding, and dancing. The volunteer before me rode a bull so a popular question during the festivals was whether or not I would be making the same attempt. I had to disappoint with a definite "no." Not now. Not ever. But the festivals were fun and it was nice having an event that the majority of the community participated in.

So back to work. The recycling project received a donation from Kids to Kids in January and is currently writing letters to some local organizations for donations of the rest of the materials. We are hopping to construct a center to hold the materials in the next couple of months. I have also started working with the school director to solicit funds to build a classroom for English classes in the grade school. Currently, the students unfortunately receive English in either the kindergarten room or the church across the street. If all goes well, the project will be a great benefit to the school. Smaller, individual projects will remain the same; computer classes, english classes, etc. Things have a way of coming up, so I guess I will wait and see what 2011 has in store for me.

Other than that, if the Ohioans could send me a little of their cool weather, that would be wonderful. Comte is getting into the hot and dry season, which is pretty brutal. On a more positive note, I will be receiving my 1st visitor in April (Mama Kight), which I am very much looking forward to. Take care everyone. Pura vida.
Hannahhttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-2644538508509203812.post-74895723906473944592010-10-31T06:55:00.000-07:002010-11-08T08:21:28.088-08:00And then there was rain..Last week it rained gatos (cats) here, which is the equivalent of raining cats and dogs. The south of Costa Rica literally saw nothing but rain from Tuesday until Saturday. Flooding, landslides, roads closed, the works. Due to the condition of the roads, buses werent running, meaning no school. I guess you could compare that with a snow day in the states.. although not quite as fun because you dont really go out and play in the rain. Oh, and Comte reached a record low of 75 degrees last week. I guess thats what happens after 4 days of rain and no sun. It was quite exciting.

Things have been moving along here in Comte. 2 weeks ago I had my first class of basic english class for adults. In the class there are 17, 15 adults and 2 students from the high school. The first 4 classes were a lot of fun. The group gets along well and everyone is eager to learn english. We started with the alphabet, numbers and basic classroom directions and items. We are currently working on the verb "to be" and basic conversations. I think that the hardest part for my students will be the pronunciation. I never really thought about how difficult it is for people learning english as a foreign language, because the sound of a word can often be different from the way it is written. But so far everything has gone smoothly. I was actually really nervous about starting classes, mainly because Id never taught a formal class before and I am teaching adults. I was feeling this way up until the very start of the first class, but the minute I started speaking in front of the group, I felt right at home. About a month back we had a t-shirt design contest for Peace Corps Costa Rica shirts for the volunteers. A t-shirt design that one of the volunteers created that I liked read, "Peace Corps Costa Rica: Creating Unofficial English Teachers Since 1963." I think that sounds about right.

Along with english classes, work has been good. I am still teaching computer classes in the grade school and enjoying my time spent with the kids. Something that I enjoy about the classes is seeing their progress between week 1 and week 10. We are currently at the point where I can give them small projects using Microsoft Encarta, Word and Paint. Last week we discussed endangered species, which we researched in Microsoft Encarta.

Other work-related things I have been doing involve english coversation classes with the english teachers at the grade school and high school, helping the cooperative at the high school create a website and working with the recycling committee of the grade school to plan and implement a recycling project in the schools and community. I am still hoping to find a group of community members interested in working on a microentreprenuial project or a community credit union. I have presented in 2 community meetings, but nothing has yet to come of that. Even though it is not in my project goals, I think an important project I work on will end up being the recycling project.

So on another note, time flies. I have currently been in Costa Rica for 8 months, but it certainly doesnt feel like it. It makes me realize that I need to take advantage of my time here and the opportunities that this experience presents. Up to this point, I havent had much of an opportunity to travel. Since being in site, almost every month there has been a Peace Corps related activity in San Jose. I am hoping to travel more next year.

I think that sums up things for now. Heading back to Ohio in December for Christmas and looking forward to seeing everyone. Love and miss you all. Pura vida.Hannahhttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-2644538508509203812.post-25204983876344819522010-09-16T17:34:00.000-07:002010-09-16T18:14:25.841-07:00Independence DayCosta Rica celebrates its independence September 15th. This past week marked celebrations, festivals and bands, lots of bands. On the 14th they had the running of the torch and lighting of the faroles (I dont know how to translate this, but its esentially a decorated box with a light inside). So in the morning the high school ran the torch from a town about 7 miles letter and then meet with the grade school that ran it through the town. In the evening, everyone went to the school for singing, typical dances and walking through town at night with the lighted faroles. The next part of the traditional celebration involved a soccer game. During the day I was told to bring a flash light and rain boots to play soccer later, which I didnt quite understand why. Around 7 pm, it all made sense. At 7 pm in Costa Rica, its pitch black. Furthermore, living in a very rural town, there arent many lights on the streets at night. So as the tradition goes, the football game starts at night. You wear boots because its the rainy season and you are playing on a muddy field. You bring a flashlight so that you can see the ball. And out of bounds doesnt really exist either. It was my favorite game of soccer that Ive ever played.

The celebrations continued the next day, with a parade through town and then a festival at the border. I think one of the most enjoyable parts of Independence Day in Costa Rica was seeing the town united. It was a good feeling to see everyone coming together to show their pride for their country. Its interesting being a part of traditional celebrations in foreign countries. Its hard to explain, but I felt pride for my community while at the same time reflecting on 4th of July celebrations in the States and feeling a renewed pride for where I come from.

Onto the work front. Last Monday was the parent-teacher conference in the grade school. Previous to the meeting, I had requested from the director a time to speak so that I could present the idea of a recycling project in the school. I would just like to note that public speaking is hard. Especially in a foreign language. I was a little nervous. Not just from the speaking in front of 50 parents in Spanish, but more that there would be 0 volunteers to help with the project. So I presented the project, receieved heads nodding in approval at the idea and then crickets when I asked if there was anyone interested in being a part of the committee. But eventually, thankfully, 1 by 1, hands started to raise, and when it was all said and done I had 6 volunteers. Awesome. More than I was expecting. We will have out first meeting next week and Im looking forward to having a concrete group of people ready to work on the project. Step 1, find a group of interested community members, check.Hannahhttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-2644538508509203812.post-7554185415827369492010-09-06T16:22:00.000-07:002010-09-06T17:15:01.334-07:00IST in San José and trying to get to a soccer gameTwo weeks ago marked the end of my first 3 months in site. During this week, all of the PCVs from Tico 20 headed to San José for our first session of training as volunteers, known as In Service Training (IST). The idea of IST is to give the volunteers to share and receive feedback on their community diagnostic, as well as attend classes related to future work in the sites. The classes were helpful, especially now that I have a better idea of what projects I will be pursuing in my community. Some of the sessions involved resources for teaching ICT and EFL, funding opportunities and general health and safety. Beyond classes, IST meant a chance to relax, share stories and receive some generally needed support from fellow volunteers. I have to admit that the first 3 months have been difficult, what with being a new member in my community, trying to better my Spanish and attempting to lay the groundwork for future projects. It was good to listen to other volunteers stories and see that were all in the same boat.

Speaking of the word boat, today I was at someones house and I told them that since its the rainy season I should buy a boat (bote) to help me get around. I meant that I should buy boots (botas)... It rains a lot here, so I guess both would work.

So the week of IST passed well. I had a great time with everyone and took away a lot of valuable information. As much as I love San José, after a week out of my site, it was good to return to Comte. A man that owns a motorcycle repair shop by my house asked me the other day why he hadnt seen me in such a long time. I told him I was in training in San José for the week, to which he replied, "oh good, I thought you were lost. But now youre back and Im content." Yes, its good to be home.

So its back to the grind in Comte. Back to teaching computer classes, working with the english professors in the community, trying to get new projects started.. and back to soccer. Lots of soccer. Last weekend our team went to a nearby town to play in some matches against other local womens teams. I call the next part of the blog, "trying to get to a soccer game." So my friend calls my house at 8 in the morning to let me know that theres a game that day. She says to be at her house by 1130. The game is supposed to start at 12. At 1130, I arrive at the house. Nobody has yet to arrive. 12 pm, still waiting. At 12 pm, my friend, another girl on the team and her mom get into a rickety 2 door red jeep to drive around and look for the other members of the team. We go to one house after another, picking up all of the teammates. At 1230, most of the team is in the car.. there are 17 of us.. in this 1 little red jeep. It is so packed that a woman in the front literally yells to the back, "Hannah? Are you there?!" I yell back, "Yes!" She replies, "Oh good, I wasnt sure!" Ok, so we are off. Just kidding, because after picking up the last group of people the car wont start. Did I note that the ignition is basically a wire hanging from the side of the steering wheel, which she starts with the help of a screw driver? Oh, and while we are sitting there waiting for the car to start, someone on the other side of the street starts burning their trash, causing piles of smoke to enter the car through the windows. I want to close the window, but its so hot outside that I decide the smoke to be a better option. Ok, so car starts, finally. Everyone cheers. As we are almost outside of town we come across 1 last girl on the team. We literally discuss having her enter through the window, which might possibly easier than using the door. Around 1 we arrive. Nobody is there. We are informed that the other teams arent showing up. We wait about an hour, and bit by bit some girls from the town come to the soccer field and we finally end up playing around 230. We win. To get home, we start the car by pushing it down the street as fast as we can. So that was my Saturday. And the thing is, I wouldnt have it any other way.

Ps if I could snap my fingers and kill every mosquito in the world, I would do it. Ants too.

Pura vida.Hannahhttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-2644538508509203812.post-24554335706142582972010-07-26T18:29:00.000-07:002010-07-26T20:19:37.271-07:00A Change in PaceOne thing I am learning about, appreciating, hating, and loving is the pace of life here in Comte, and Costa Rica in general. An important key to success for being a volunteer, and not pulling your hair out, is to maintain the mindset that you are here to work at the pace in which the community wants to work. If you arrive at your monthly meeting with the development association and they decide that on that day, they prefer to relax and drink coffee, you relax and drink coffee. If they want to work, you work. If nobody shows up.. well that happens too. Like I´ve mentioned before, "a productive day" has taken on a different meaning for me. And I enjoy this aspect. I am often asked if I miss the United States, the answer obviously being yes, which is followed by the question of what do I miss. I usually explain that while there are things that I prefer about the U.S., I appreciate the tranquility of my day to day life in Costa Rica. I appreciate sitting on my porch and reading a book, or walking over to the neighbors to bake, or riding my bicycle down to the beach with a friend. I appreciate that I spend my days with people who are content to spend the afternoon at a family members house, laughing and sharing stories. No cell phones, no televisions, no computers (I realize the possible irony, seeing as I´m typing this post on a computer). My point is that it´s good to change your perspective every once and while and look at life from a different angle.

To those are my deep thoughts at the moment.. onto a minor update of what I´ve been up to. As I´ve mentioned, I´ve been finishing up my community diagnostic while continuing work with some smaller projects in town. The diagnostic is pretty much done.. it only lacks an interview with an employee at the local health clinic, which it turns out, is extremely difficult to do! One of these days... I will be traveling to San Jose in about a month for my first in-service training session. I am hoping that the town meeting relating to the projects I will pursue can take place before this, so that I know which training sessions to attend. The past couple of weeks have also been pretty busy with lots of activities in the school. I started computer classes and library time, helped cook and decorate for a culture fair, helped to clean up the property, and more.

On the topic of the culture fair, it was a really cool activity. They had schools from the area come to Comte, where each school represented a province of Costa Rica (there are 7). Each school had to share typical food, dance and clothing of the provice, among other things. They also had a section for "extranjeros" (foreigners), because there are a lot of foreigners that live in the beach communities. So it turned out that nobody came from the beach communities.. leaving me to be the only foreigner at the festival.. and therefore when the time came for the extranjeros to present, I am finding myself in front of a hundred or so people with a microphone in my hand. I was asked to speak about my experiences in Costa Rica as a foreigner. I still feel like I can´t properly describe my feelings on this subject in English.. so here I am trying to do it in Spanish, not an easy task. But I reflected on the question before I spoke and came to the conclusion, which I shared with the room, that it´s a beautiful experience, because as seen in the fair, many cultural differences existed not only between the States and Costa Rica, but in Costa Rica itself, from the provinces, to the communities, to individuals. And while yes we are very different, we are also very much the same. We are people who love, who care, who laugh, who cry, and who fight on a daily basis to better our lives. And it´s a beautiful thing.Hannahhttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-2644538508509203812.post-88329844587157946392010-07-09T10:13:00.001-07:002010-07-11T09:53:13.771-07:00Sitting on Peoples´ Porches Drinking Coffee
I have been informed that I am being a bad blogger.. so I will try to pick up my game. Things have been pretty relaxed these last few weeks. The schools are currently on vacations, which is their mid-year break. In Costa Rica, the school year begins at the end of January and ends early December (though I´ve heard that November is the unofficial end of the year). So my last week in town has been relaxed, as will the next.

I have been continuing to get to know people in town, and have been enjoying spending my afternoons in the houses of neighbors and friends. I can´t sufficiently express how friendly the town is. I especially adore the kids from the grade school that run to give me hugs whenever I´m out walking around town. One thing in particular that I am enjoying about this experience is that by spending an afternoon on a neighbor´s front porch, I am essentially doing my job, because I´m learning about Costa Rican culture, sharing my culture and through general conversation I am learning what types of projects interest people in my town. I particularly love the aspect of learning about culture here, because everyone is so excited to share their lives. People are particularly amazed at the common things I have never done in my life, such as killing snakes and milking cows. All in due time...

For the 4th of July weekend I traveled to San Jose to celebrate Independence Day with the other volunteers. We found out that their is an annual picnic (50th year this year!) in San Jose, which was a lot of fun. Normally I am not a fan of corny typical holiday celebrations but I think 4 months outside of the States has made me start missing some of the things that I love about the states. We enjoyed an all you can eat/drink, live rock band, traditional games and sports kind of day. Though I have to note, that after being around 4 months of energetic latin music and dance.. the optional square dance lesson wasn´t my cup of tea. But it was good to be back in the city, see close friends and visit my host family.

8 hours by bus later and back in Comte... I am looking foward to the next month from a work stand-point, because I will be starting computer classes in the grade school, finishing up my town diagnostic and holding a community-wide meeting to discuss potential projects that we can work on over the next 2 years. I see a lot of potential and looking foward to the meeting as a jumping-off point for larger projects.

As always, much love to friends and family in the states. Pura vida.

Hannahhttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-2644538508509203812.post-52483768512859252432010-06-18T18:21:00.000-07:002010-06-18T18:42:21.477-07:005 Books Later...1 month down, 5 books read in site.

My first month is Comte has been new, exciting, scary, and great. Right now I feel like I am in a weird, transition stage. I´ve just come out of training, where it´s constantly "go, go, go" and now that I am finally enjoying some time to relax I feel conflicted as in, "why aren´t I working yet?" "what am I doing here?"

In reality, the first few months are supposed to be this way. Which I have to keep reminding myself on a daily basis. We have our first 3 months at site to get to know the town really well, get to know everyone that lives in town and complete our CAT, which is a diagnostic of the community. So now that I am starting to know people in town, I´ve been able to ask for interviews and am starting to gather a lot of information. So far I have about 8 pages of typed information, and an additional 5 of graphs, tables and interview notes. It might not sound like a lot, but doing everything in Spanish isn´t exactly a quick task. But am I´m going through all the parts I am realizing how helpful it is as more projects are becoming evident to me. My counterpart and I decided that once I complete it we will have a community wide meeting to discuss the results and potential projects. That´s when the real work begins.

But I´ve enjoyed my first month in town. I´m really enjoying getting to know everyone that lives here, and enjoying the little moments throughout the day. I like that a productive day can involve typing a page of my diagnostic, playing soccer with kids from the school, sitting on a neighbors porch drinking coffee, and sitting in a rocking chair reading a few chapters from a novel. Ps I am always the worst one on the soccer field, and my competition is 12. Pura vida.Hannahhttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-2644538508509203812.post-25658076956212952212010-06-03T15:37:00.000-07:002010-06-03T16:31:03.216-07:00Soccer TournamentToday teams from 6 different schools came to Comte to compete in a soccer tournament. It´s a national tournament, where the winners advance to the next level until there are only 2 teams left in the country.

I first have to note that kids are amazing. All of the kids from the school were at the tournament, and everyone was nothing but hugs and kisses.. I received so many that I even forgive those that lovingly refer to me as Hannah Montana. But really, kids are awesome. They are so uninhibited in all aspects; the way they meet new people, the way they ask questions, the way they play. For instance, I was asked by a little girl today if I was 35. That´s a new one. There´s a little girl named Male that´s especially sweet, who loves hugs and sitting on my lap. My favorite part was where she came and asked me if I wanted a coke, I said, "that´s very sweet of you, I´d love one!" Then she went and asked her mom for $.50 to buy me a coke. Somehow, I didn´t see that coming.

But back to the day... I arrived at the school at 8 am this morning. I spent the day being in charge of money at the food stand, playing with kids, talking to parents, and watching soccer. By the way, these kids are good! Maybe it´s because I was never a soccer player, but I was incredibly impressed. I´m not ashamed to say that pretty much all of them play better soccer than I do... and they´re all younger than 13. The day was a lot of fun, and I can´t believe that the evening has already come. The kids played really hard, and really well. The boys team of Comte made it to the final match, and lost in a shoot-off that took place after a tied game. It had been raining on and off througout the day, and it really started to pour in the final shoot-off. After the game, everyone finished up the day by playing soccer in the rain and mud. It was a good day.

Tomorrow I´m heading to San Vito to have lunch and meet some other volunteers in the area. By area I mean the size of Ohio more or less because to get to San Vito I have to travel about 2 hours east.. and there are volunteers coming from east of San Vito. Besides that, I was invited to a town member´s house to learn how to milk cows. Everyone here gets a kick out of the fact that I´ve never milked a cow, planted crops, or rode a horse. A family that I´ve been hanging out with told me they are making me a list of things that I have to do here. I think dancing is on that list. Pura vida.Hannahhttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-2644538508509203812.post-43724599349881607362010-05-26T17:02:00.000-07:002010-05-26T17:16:58.967-07:00First DaysI moved to Comte Sunday May 23rd. My host brother picked me up from the bus stop and during the dark, rainy ride to the house I kept thinking, wow. Here I am.

These past few days have been a bit of a reality check. I´m realizing that I´m here for 2 years, it´s going to be hard, but it´s going to be great. I can´t describe how welcome I feel in the town, and it´s only my first week. The few days that I´ve gone to the grade school the kids love to yell my name (those that don´t remember my name endearingly refer to me as ¨the new Katherine¨) and give me hugs. Walking up and down the street, everyone says hi to each other. It is something about the town that I already appreciate. There´s another family in town that is super kind and have already designated a rocking-chair on their porch to be ¨my chair.¨ Each time I´ve passed their house they´ve waved me down to sit, drink fresco and talk. They´re on my walk to the high school, so I feel that I´ll be spending a bit of time at their house.

The first 3 months here I plan to get to know everyone, better my Spanish, and complete the CAT. The CAT, which stands for Community Assessment Tool, is something that every volunteer has to complete in there first 3 months. It´s basically what it sounds like, an analysis of the community with details such as history, population statistics, education, crime, needs, opportunities, etc etc. From that, we should be able to see potential projects.

In the meantime, I´m going to start on some small things that I know I´ll be doing in the future. The volunteer before me taught English classes at the grade school and HS. Since there are already English teachers at both schools, I felt that it would be better for me to work with the English teachers to help them with pronunciation, fluency, etc. The teachers are really happy about this, and therefore so am I. I also someone became a pseud0-leader of a women´s exercise group. They asked me if I was interested, and of course I said yes, and today found myself leading everyone in stretches before going on a run. Aftwards they had a Zumba tape that they wanted to do. If you have seen this before, picture me and a room full of 40 year old women rockin out to Zumba exercises. It was a lot of fun.

Pura Vida!Hannahhttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-2644538508509203812.post-64568858501142363902010-05-13T18:20:00.001-07:002010-05-13T19:21:56.719-07:00Pura VidaPura vida is a phrase you hear a lot in Costa Rica. My best translation of it is a mix between "live good" and "chill." If you are walking around town and pass someone you know (or don't know), you can say, "pura vida." You can refer to a person as being, "pura vida." You can refer to an event as being, "pura vida." The other day someone in my town refered to another person as pura vida and I decided that is the ultimate compliment in Costa Rica, and I hope that one day someone refers to me as pura vida. That being said, one day Edwin (a volunteer in my town) was sitting outside when I dog came up and peed on him. This can be referred to as "dura vida."

Focus. The point of this post is my site visit. Yay! There's a million things I could say, so I'll try to hit the main points.

Comte: This place is the Campo.. capital C. The town has about 600 residents. It's about 8 hours of traveling from San Jose, and the closer you get, the hotter is gets, and the more rural is gets. It's pretty much 1 main dirt road. Maybe 20 min walking from 1 end to the other. On the main road there's a grade school, high school, soccer field, 2 pulpereias (small mom and pop store), 2 bars... that might be about it. There is sort of a pseudo-square of houses, where the majority of people live.

Host family: The house I will be living at isn't located in the main cluster of houses. It's on the other side of the main road, surrounded by trees, so it's a nice and peaceful location. There are 9 members in the intermediate family, mom, dad, 2 daughters, 5 sons. The daughters and sons are all in their 20's. 2 sons live elsewhere, and the wife of 1 son lives in the house. I spent the first night there sitting in rocking chairs on the porch, chatting with the 3 girls, I felt very content. I'm looking forward to living in the house.

Gente: The people that live in Comte are amazing. Everyone I met was so warm and welcoming. It's a little intimidating because it's obvious that everyone loves the current volunteer, but I felt the same warmth and love when I met everyone. I am really excited to be a member of this town.

I'll leave this post at a final comment. During my site visit, the current volunteer and I went to the high school, and when we arrived, the entire school was sitting outside waiting for us. They did a goodbye bit for Kathrine, and a hello bit for me. Then the director called me over to introduce myself in front of everyone. It was a really gratifying moment because I stood in front of over 600 people (the high school has 600 because kids from other towns attend it) and talked for a bit in spanish. It was great. Yay Spanish.Hannahhttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-2644538508509203812.post-68531413269417597942010-05-02T18:07:00.000-07:002010-05-02T18:22:52.471-07:00Site Assignment!Friday we were given out site assignments. I am beyond excited about my placement. My site is located in the province of Puntarenas, if you look up Golfito, I am in that area. Its right by the coast and by the Panamanian border. I will be taking the place of a Peace Corps volunteer from the CYF program (the program involves working with youth and families), so my counterpart is the director of the local school. The town is small, about 600, but it seems to have a lot of resources. Among programs I will be involved in are teaching ICT classes, helping to form a development association, helping with hydroponic systems (very cool), possible doing some summer camps for kids, and more. I am really happy about the location and nature of work and feel so lucky to have been assigned exactly what I wanted. I am very grateful. There´s a lot more to say about everything, but I am going to visit the site next weekend so I will update after that. On Thursday and Friday we have counterpart workshop where we meet out counterpart and begin working with them, then on Satuday we travel to our site for 5 days. It´s about 10 hours of traveling from San Jose to my new site. Oy!

So to celebrate site assignments, most of Tico 20 went to the beach this weekend. About 35 of us went to a beach town called Puerto Viejo. The weekend was perfect. We have beautiful weather, the ocean was amazing, and we all got to spend time together before heading out to our new sites. The town was very tranquilo. We stayed at a place called Rockin J´s, where one sleeping option is to rent hammocks. The day involved laying on the beach, playing in the ocean, listening to a live band, dancing, and spending quality time together. I am going to miss spending time with Tico 20.Hannahhttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-2644538508509203812.post-34619269489181581982010-04-22T17:05:00.000-07:002010-04-22T17:31:34.152-07:00Tech WeekThis week half of the CED group went to the province of Alajuela to visit another CED volunteer, Brigitte. Her site is absolutely beautiful. Its in a biological corridor between 2 volcanoes. The view of the volcanoes is amazing, especially at dusk when their outline is contrasted against the dark blue sky. Another cool thing is that every morning you wake up to the sounds of howling monkeys. Its a little different than the roosters that are normally outside my window, and I like it.

Saturday was traveling (about 7 hours) and meeting our host families. On Sunday we went to Rio Celeste, which was amazing. Its a big tourist spot where people come to hike, see the waterfalls, and swim in the rivers. We did one hike for about 4 hours, stopping along the way to swim in the river and sit by the waterfall. We ate lunch and then went to another river to cool off and swim. It was an awesome way to spend the day. Afterwards we played soccer for about an hour and a half with some people from the town. Talk about tired. I went to bed at a whopping 930 pm.

Monday through Thursday was a lot of work and a lot of fun. We had to prepare lessons for and teach an English class and a computer class. The computer class was especially cool because another volunteer and I helped a women set up an email account and she was able to send her first email. It was cool seeing how excited she was to be able to do this. We also attended a meeting with the local ECC (Empresa de Credito Comunal), where we had a question and answer session to get to better know the process or forming and maintaining an ECC. The ECC in the community was actually started with the assistance of the prior Peace Corps Volunteer so it was cool to see how it had grown in the past 2 years. The final activity was for Earth Day, where we went to a grade school and did a talk/activity on recycling. The kids were from 1st to 4th grade and were really enthusiastic and absolutely adorable. We started off by introducing ourselves and naming our favorite animal, and after each person said an animal the kids liked to share their thoughts on whether or not it was a good favorite animal. One little boy seemed to have pets of all the animals we were listing. It was a lot of fun and I hope to be able to work with a grade school in the future.

Overall it was a great week. I really enjoyed seeing the life of another volunteer and learning more about projects that Im interested in. We had our final interview about site preferences and we find out next Friday where we will be living for the next 2 years. Yay!

Ill be posting pictures from Tech Week on facebook sometime soon.Hannahhttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-2644538508509203812.post-39972477863418859712010-04-14T18:04:00.000-07:002010-04-22T17:32:01.468-07:00VAC dinner and moreLast Saturday I went to a CED project fair. There were about 10 current volunteers there from CED, who talked to us about some current projects in their community. Some of the things we heard about were community newsletters, ECCs (empresa de credito comuntario) <-- I hope to get to work with this, chicos/as poderosos/as (camps and workshops for youth), environmental projects, teaching english, teaching ICT, starting computer centers, and more. It was great getting to hear from current volunteers and get a better idea of what our next 2 years here could be like. I especially liked talking to some of the volunteers about ECCs, which is something that I am very interested in. I really like the idea of starting a community funded credit union and the potential that this project can have.

After the project fair we went to San Jose for VAC, which is a get together of all trainees and current volunteers. The night included spending time with Tico 20, meeting some volunteers from Tico 18 and 19, dancing, eating, and disfrutaring (disfrutar = to enjoy).

On Tuesday we were given our assignments for Tech Week. For Tech Week, they split CED in half, and each half goes to different sites in Costa Rica to learn more about volunteer life/our preferences for our future site, learn more about current projects, and help work on some projects relating to ICT and teaching English, among other things. Myself, and 8 others from CED are going to a current volunteers site in Alajuela. It should be a good week.

In 2 weeks we receive our site assignments. In 5 weeks we move. Good times.Hannahhttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-2644538508509203812.post-36674190300551552852010-04-03T17:08:00.001-07:002010-04-03T17:23:20.674-07:00Semana SantaThis past week is known as Semana Santa in Costa Rica, or holy week. Ther have been lots of celebrations and masses going on at the church every day. I attended mass a couple of times with my family. There have also been a lot of processions, which is a sort of parade. We had classes Monday-Wednesday, then were off on Thursday and Friday. Having days off has been nice. There is a pool at my house, which was just filled this week. We have been playing a lot of pool volleyball, and there is a basketball hoop so I taught some of my siblings how to play Horse. I really enjoy just hanging out at the house with my family, I feel like I am always laughing (and sometimes being laughed at for my Spanish failures)

Next week is sort of a mid-way point for training. We have our next Language Proficiency Interview (LPI) to see how we have progressed in our Spanish in the past 5 weeks. In order to swear-in as a volunteer you have to be at a language proficiency level of intermediate-mid. I tested in as intermediate-low. The LPI is basicallya 30 minute conversation with one of the language facilitator. As far a my Spanish goes, I am definitely learning a lot, and feel that I can have conversations more fluidly and with greater ease. I especially like learning Costa Rican pachuca, slang. Heres a goodie I learned while playing cards the other night, tome chichi. It means take that sucker. Good stuff to have in my Spanish vocab. At the 5 week mark we also have to turn in all of the work we have done for our classes in the past 5 weeks. So I have been putting that together and making sure that I have everything.

Nothing too eventful going on next week besides classes. Next weekend there is something called VAC dinner, which is a get together for all volunteers and trainees in Costa Rican (there are about 150 total). That is in San Jose so I am going to that and they most of us are staying in town over night, which will be fun.Hannahhttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-2644538508509203812.post-77352877548886904602010-03-26T17:27:00.000-07:002010-03-26T17:44:18.538-07:00Service Learning ProjectThis week we met some students from the local high school. In order to graduate, they have to complete a service learning project. So we are going to help them with these projects. Edwin and I are working with a group of 4 kids to help them forumate project ideas and start the project. Today we went to the school and had our group draw a community map. It was really interesting because when we first arrived, we did this same activity. It was interesting to see the perspective of a visitor (we did the map our first week in town) vs kids that live here. Having them draw the map was a great way to get talking about their community, likes and dislikes, resources, dangerous places, etc. The kids are awesome and I had a great time hanging out with them this afternoon. Side note, we ate with them in the cafeteria and when we were being served our food Eric asked the cook if it was chicken or fish.. she smiled and said, its a banana. We´re still amateurs.

I´ve also pseudo-adopted a little puppy. My brother found a 1 month old puppy in the street and brought it home. I´ve been feeding it and cuddling it every day since. Nancy and I decided on the name Lily. It is the most precious puppy. My host mom always calls her a chiñada because every time I hold her she falls asleep in my arms. My family asked me if I wanted to bring her with me to my community.. duh I do. So I will have to find out about this. Go figure I´d be trying to adopt dogs 3 weeks in.

I´m looking forward to a relaxing weekend. It has been a very long and tiring week. There is an arts festival in San Jose. I am planning on going to that with my sister tomorrow. On Sunday I believe we are going to check out a local waterfall/river and maybe do some swimming.

Also, I went around town and took some pictures today. I will be posting those soon.

Another thought, one thing I love about being here (and Ive briefly mentioned this before) is being in the mountains, so close to the clouds. Sometimes a fog will roll in from a cloud passing over the mountain. It is the coolest sensation.

Love you guys.Hannahhttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-2644538508509203812.post-86193948607027635892010-03-23T15:28:00.000-07:002010-03-23T15:42:14.901-07:00Cold showers and other good stuffFirst off, I take an ice cold shower every morning. And I really like it. Before coming here, I thought that the word rico only referred to food. For example, I would use the word rico to say that something tasted good. It turns out, that rico can be used for a lot of different situations. A cool breeze on a humid day. A beautiful view of a valley below. And cold showers during hot mornings. Que rico.

The past 4 days I went to visit a current volunteer. Her community is absolutely beautiful (I feel like I´m going to be sayin that every time I visit a new place). It is up in the mountains, overlooking a valley. She lives about 3 hours from me on bus, and has been working in her community for the past 1 year. Everyone in Tico 20 went to visit current volunteers to get a better idea of how volunteer life is and other things of that nature. It was great getting to talk to someone that is doing more or less what I will be doing in 2 months. We hung out around town and I meet some of the community, I went with her to a couple of meetings with the community development association, a local women´s group, the grade school director. I also went with her to an English class that she teachers. Overall it was a great weekend and I learned a lot.

I came home today and my family has a new puppy. It is about 1 month old. Felipe found it in the street. It is the sweetest little puppy. It took a nape with me this afternoon. I might accidentally end up adopting plus 10 street dogs while I´m here. I can´t help it.

That should do it for now. Miss and love everyone back home.Hannahhttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-2644538508509203812.post-77345702611703977532010-03-15T16:44:00.001-07:002010-03-15T16:56:39.038-07:00Weekend ActivitiesNothing too eventful happened this weekend. So good thing Im writing in my blog about it.. Friday evening I went out to a local place with 2 other volunteers in my community. Had good conversation, talked to some other people in the town, I really enjoyed it. Saturday it rained on and off through out the day. I ended up saying in and reading some of the materials Peace Corps gave me as well as doing working on some Spanish grammar exercises. I also watched some movies with my family. It was a nice, relaxing day. On Sunday we drove to a mall to see a movie. We saw Shutter Island. I really liked it, but was the only one that did, so I dont know if my opinion means anything. PS a movie ticket, popcorn and soda at the cinema is about $5. Good stuff. I also got a call from my mentor (shes in the Tico 19) group and found out that I will be visiting her site this weekend for 4 days. It will be great to get to talk to a current volunteer in CR and have a better understanding of an average day for a CED volunteer.

Today was classes and homework. We have been going around the town talking to various people in order to practice for what we will be doing in our future communities. Some of the activities have been meeting someone and finding out about their family, having a child and an adult draw a map of the community and analyzing different perspectives, interviewing a microentrepreneur to find out opportunities and challenges they have faced as a microentrepreneur, etc. Its really interesting talking to different people in the town. Everyone is extremely nice. After talking to one particular woman she invited me over to her house for coffee and to meet her family, which was a very nice gesture. I am excited to get to know more people in the community.

Hope all is well in the states. Miss and love everyone.Hannahhttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-2644538508509203812.post-61797287998856764822010-03-12T14:03:00.000-08:002010-03-26T17:27:15.582-07:00My CommunitySaturday we moved to our training communities. Since there are 3 programs in my group, they put us in clusters based on our program, and then on our language proficiency. There are 4 other people in my town, we are all in the Community Economic Development program and at an intermediate Spanish level. 3 days a week we have Spanish classes in our town, 1 day a week we travel to a nearby town for program training with everyone in our program, and 1 day a week we travel to San Jose for training with the entire group. I really like the training setup. I especially love my Spanish classes. For part of the day we have class in the classroom and for the other part of the day we go around town or to nearby towns to do activities related to what we learned in the morning.

For training I am living in a town in the county of Aserri. I think the population is around 4000. Its only 24 km from San Jose, but about an hour and a half bus ride to get there. My homestay mom and dad are Rosiris and Saul. There are also 4 kids at the house; Nancy, Arnold, Raquel, and Felipe. The family is great and I really enjoy spending time with them. I have a double bed in my bedroom and Nancy, Raquel, and Felipe like to come sit on my bed and hang out when Im in my room, its nice. Another sweet thing was when I first arrived, Nancy, Arnold, and Raquel picked me up because their mom and dad were working. I had a really heavy duffel bag which Nancy and Raquel insisted on carrying by each holding a handle and walking on either side of it. The family is extremely nice. A lot of their extended family live in the community, we live next to an uncle, grandparents, an aunt, some cousins, and more. I am gone every day from 7 or 8 am depending on the day to around 5 or 6 at night. Usually after classes I hang out for a bit in the centro with some people, do some homework, then eat dinner and play cards, watch tv, or talk with my family.

Another thing, my community is absolutely beautiful. We are surrounded by mountains and the scenery is wonderful from every direction. I feel lucky to be in such a wonderful town.

There is lots more to say, but Ill have to stop here for now.

As always, miss and love everyone back home!Hannahhttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-2644538508509203812.post-38667257686244730432010-03-04T16:59:00.000-08:002010-03-04T17:10:57.525-08:00I made it!Day 3 in Costa Rica. Blog Spot must know because all of my settings have been changed to Spanish. So in regards to my last post, the State Dept came through and processed my application and gave me a passport on Monday. I flew out of D.C. Monday morning!

The first week we are having a retreat outside of the city of Costa Rica, in a city called Tres Rios. We are up in the mountains and the view is beautiful! We overlook San Jose and have an amazing view of the surrounding mountains. Yesterday, I noticed that a nearby mountain had clouds surrounding the peak and wondered what it was like to be standing in the clouds. Today everything in our area was very foggy and misty.. so now I know how that feels. It was pretty cool.

There are about 55 of us in my group, which is called Tico 20. Currently there are about 100 other Peace Corps volunteers in country, which have completed training and are working in their respective communities. The retreat consists of different sessions throughout the day pertaining to safety, security, health, language, and our specific programs. It is a lot of information, and very informative.

Another thing I am learning is that I will be eating a lot of "gallo pinto" in the next 27 months. It is the main Costa Rican dish, which consists of rice and beans. It is delicious, especially with cilantro! I am excited to be introduced to all of the Costa Rican dishes and learn how to cook them.

Now I am off to get some dinner. Hope everyone in the states are doing well!
Hannahhttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-2644538508509203812.post-44002110963309259072010-02-26T16:29:00.000-08:002010-02-26T16:35:28.855-08:00My passport :(Was called this morning and told that the Dept of State has lost my government passport application.. and my actual passport that I was required to mail in with the application.. so I currently cannot travel to Costa Rica. Spent today scrambling to get birth certificate, new passport photos, signature from an authorized passport agent, and new application overnighted to Washington D.C.

Fingers crossed that everything arrives ok tomorrow and that the Dept of State will be able to process everything before Monday! Ahh!

Special shout out to mom for helping me keep it together today.

On a happier note, friends are on their way over to celebrate my 23rd birthday! :)Hannahhttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-2644538508509203812.post-79528838943559838612010-02-17T17:29:00.000-08:002010-02-17T17:51:46.650-08:002 Weeks to GoAs most of you who are reading this already know, over 16 months ago I applied to volunteer for the Peace Corps. And I'm beyond thrilled to say that I'm finally going! I receieved my invitation in December to the Community Economic Development Program in Costa Rica. In less than 2 weeks, I will begin my adventure.

There's lots more to say, but I will leave it at that for now.Hannahhttp://firstname.lastname@example.com


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Browse > Hiram Reynolds Bloomer
Click on an image for a larger view.
H.R. Bloomer moved to San Francisco as a child and grew up with the ambition to become an artist. In his early career, his landscapes showed the influence of Thomas Hill, depicting lofty mountain subjects like Lake Tahoe and Mount Shasta. In 1874, he held a successful auction sale of his own paintings and traveled to Paris, studying under Carolus Duran and other masters. He went on sketching trips to the village of Barbizon and was one of the party, along with Robert Louis Stevenson, that discovered the nearby hamlet of Grez. Legend has it that he introduced Stevenson to Fanny Osbourne, his future wife, who had come to France from San Francisco to study art. In any case, Bloomer was a lifelong friend of the Stevensons. After successful sojourns in Paris and London where his paintings were admitted to major exhibitions, Bloomer returned to San Francisco in 1893 and spent the remainder of his life as a California artist. He was a frequent exhibitor at Bohemian Club shows, often sending views of Mount Tamalpais and other Marin County locations. In 1899 he moved to Sausalito, perhaps to be near the marine painter, W.A. Coulter, with whom he shared a San Francisco studio. In February 1899, the San Francisco Chronicle noted "a portfolio of the most refreshing sketches, things caught here and there in Marin County." (February 19). He exhibited paintings with such titles as "High Road, Marin County" and "A Meandering Road" in exhibitions at that time.

subset: commoncrawl


text:
Reddit Solitaire Lite
By esDot Studio Inc
Open iTunes to buy and download apps.
We've combined two of the greatest things of all time, Solitaire and Reddit!
The concept is simple, play standard Klondike Solitaire, but on the front of each card is a random image downloaded from Reddit. As you play your game, each card unconvers a new Reddit Image.
If something looks interesting, tap the card and jump into full screen view. When you're done laughing your butt off (or not), jump back into solitaire and continue your game. Awesome? Yes.
You can choose from a variety of Reddit feeds, including "funny", "sports", "art", "comics" and many more.
Features include:
* Modern polished UI
* Either 1 or 3 card drops
* Vegas Mode
* Select from a variety of Reddit Feeds.
* Zoom / Pan Fullscreen Reddits
* View comments
* Share email link
* Tracks highscore's
- Free
- Category: Games
- Released: 10 June 2011
- Version: 1.0
- Size: 11.1 MB
- Languages: English, Czech, Dutch, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Polish, Portuguese, Russian, Simplified Chinese, Spanish, Swedish, Traditional Chinese, Turkish
- Developer: esDot Studio Inc
- © ShawnSkinner
Compatibility: Requires iOS 4.0 or later. Compatible with iPhone 3GS, iPhone 4, iPhone 4s, iPhone 5, iPhone 5c, iPhone 5s, iPhone 6, iPhone 6 Plus, iPhone 6s, iPhone 6s Plus, iPhone SE, iPhone 7, iPhone 7 Plus, iPad, iPod touch (3rd generation), iPod touch (4th generation), iPod touch (5th generation), and iPod touch (6th generation).


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Republican senator Kelly Ayotte appeared on CNN's State of the Union today, and after brushing aside a few gaffes Mitt Romney made during his overseas tour, claimed his foreign policy would be stronger than President Obama's. Candy Crowley reminded Ayotte that Obama ordered the mission that killed Osama bin Laden and has increased the use of drones, and asked her what in that shows a weak foreign policy.
Candy Crowley Grills Republican Senator On What In Obama's Foreign Policy Is 'Weak'
Current Status: Published/No Action (12)
Seeded on Sun Jul 29, 2012 12:24 PM
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text:
Bookmark this site
BRISTOL, PA, March 12, 2013 -- AMI Entertainment Network is excited to announce its annual St. Patrick's Day playlist, available right now on any participating AMI jukebox. This year's playlist features a veritable pot o' gold of Celtic rock, pub jams, and other music that's perfect for bringing out the spirit of the Irish in any music lover.
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National Bank of Dubai opens branch in Dubai Festival City
National Bank of Dubai (NBD) has opened its 41st branch in Dubai Festival City in line with its strategy to expand in strategic locations close to growing customer base.
The new branch was inaugurated by R. Douglas Dowie, Group Chief Executive of National Bank of Dubai along with Senior Executives from the Bank.
"NBD's latest branch enables us to offer a comprehensive mix of services and products for individuals and businesses alike and extend the Bank's commercial and financial operations throughout the emirate. The continuous expansion of our branch's network reflects the growing customer base and our commitment to high levels of Customer Service," said Ali Al Kaitoub, Chief Manager Retail Distribution, National Bank of Dubai.
The Dubai Festival City branch will open from 8:00am to 2:00 pm from Saturday to Thursday. The branch is fully equipped and provides NBD's various retail and corporate banking services. The branch is also equipped with automated banking lobby which provides 24/7 access to NBD's ATM and Cash Deposit Machine for the convenience of the banks' customers.
About National Bank of Dubai
Founded in 1963, National Bank of Dubai is the oldest, locally incorporated bank in the Southern Gulf. Known as the bank with a performance that is second-to-none, NBD has built a reputation of stability and strength much appreciated by shareholders and customers alike. Recognizing this leading performance, NBD has been awarded with the Dubai Quality Award for the year 2005.
Offering diversified financial services, NBD is a leader in corporate banking. Its portfolio covers a wide range of services including transport, real estate, construction, manufacturing, tourism and service industries throughout the region. In addition, NBD's 'Private Office' provides private banking services, offering highly
tailored solutions to preserve and protect the personal wealth of its customers. Along with supplying customers with a variety of exclusive service based products, secured facilities, Credit Cards, personal loans, , auto loans and home loans, National Bank of Dubai also offers a variety of treasury products and services, advising customers on exchange markets and interest rate outlook. NBD, also launched Suhail Priority Banking Services, a premier banking service offering customers personalized relationship management and a host of exclusive products and services. Furthermore, NBD offers customers automated banking services, which consist of an internet service (NBD Online), a telebanking facility (NBD Telebank), an SMS based service (NBD Mobile) and an online brokerage trading in UAE shares through its subsidiary, NBD Securities.
NBD also recently established NBD Investment Bank which is its' investment arm operating from DIFC.
With a comprehensive card portfolio that provides an array of benefits, NBD has, over the years, built a wide ATM network as well as Point of Sale terminals in select locations throughout the UAE.
National Bank of Dubai currently has an extensive branch network that includes 41 branches throughout the UAE. In addition, NBD also has a branch in London and Qatar as well as a representative office in Tehran.


text:
News Clips - October 17, 2008
From October 10 to October 16, Carnegie Mellon Media Relations counted 292 references to the university in worldwide publications. Here is a sample.
Scientists view both Obama, McCain as supportive
USA Today | October 15
Science policy experts like
Granger Morgan
Carnegie Mellon
University says, "Far more critical is to understand how the two candidates use science and technology advice." And he and others say either man would be an improvement over Bush. "They both appear to have areas where they've had terrific track records, and we think that many of the issues will be handled in a way that tracks more closely to the science," said Alan Leshner, chief executive of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.
Helmet to convey messages by thought
Discovery Channel | October 13
The Army grant to researchers at University of California, Irvine,
Carnegie Mellon
University and the University of Maryland has two objectives. The first is to compose a message using, as D'Zmura puts it, "that little voice in your head." The second part is to send that message to a particular individual or object (like a radio), also just with the power of thought. Once the message reaches the recipient, it could be read as text or as a voice mail. While the money may come from the Army and its first use could be for covert operations, D'Zmura thinks that thought-based communication will find more use in the civilian realm.
Swagger turn to shudder a year after market high
The New York Times | October 10
''I think right now there are just some very powerful negative images that are alive in many people's minds -- images of the Depression, images of people selling apples,'' said
George Loewenstein
, a behavioral economist at
Carnegie Mellon
University. ''The images of the downside are just so salient in people's minds, and nobody has presented an upside image yet."
Education for Leadership
A golden girl
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette | October 9
Alexandra Dixon-Ernst, 17 and now a freshman at
Carnegie Mellon
University, took an examination in June run by the long-standing music-educational institution in England (with branches in America). Basically, Dixon-Ernst showed a ton vocal talent and sensitivity to church music.
Arts and Humanities
Work is a pleasure in tomorrow's office
CNN | October 16
The Center for Building Performance and Diagnostics (CBPD) at
Carnegie Mellon
University in Pittsburgh has built the Robert L. Preger Intelligent Workplace -- a functioning workplace that is also a 'living laboratory' for researching office design.
Researcher brings message of hope to autism conference
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette | October 16
For families struggling with autism, Kathrin Hippler has a message of hope. A clinical psychologist at University Children's Hospital in Vienna, Austria, Dr. Hippler has tracked down many of the adults who were the child patients of Viennese physician Hans Asperger, whose name is now attached to people who have a high-functioning form of autism. By and large, she found, these 34 men, ranging in age from 25 to 65, are happy and have been able to lead fulfilling lives. And that, says
Carnegie Mellon
University professor
Marcel Just
, should "lift up the spirit of anyone with autism. The story of their lives, I would say, is a wonderful outcome."
Information Technology
APC & Carnegie Mellon University announce fellowships for data center efficiency research
PowerPulse | October 13
APC by Schneider Electric, together with
Carnegie Mellon
University announced the establishment of the APC Fellowships for Data Center Efficiency Research. The APC Research Fellowships support Ph.D. students at Carnegie Mellon with research foci in the broad area of data center efficiency. APC Research Fellowships are part of an ongoing collaboration between APC and Carnegie Mellon focused on data center efficiency.
VC funding for biotech firms
Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology News | October 15
As I write this column, we are now experiencing the biggest financial crisis since the stock market crash of 1929 and the Great Depression. Eventually this crisis will be resolved, and life and business will go on. On October 19, 1987, the Dow Jones Industrial Average dropped 22.6%, and the closing high for that year, on August 25, 1987, was not attained again until almost two years later. Nevertheless, according to a 2002 report by
Lena Andrews
Jerry Paytas
of the Center for Economic Development of
Carnegie Mellon
University, venture capital (VC) funding of biotech companies was higher in 1987 than in 1986, and while it declined a little in 1988 (but still greater than in 1986), it surged in 1989.
Earth-friendly eating
Reader's Digest | October 10
What's good for your body also turns out to be good for the environment. Substitute chicken, fish, or vegetables for red meat and dairy just one day a week, and your family of four will eliminate the greenhouse gases produced by a 760-mile car trip, say researchers from
Carnegie Mellon
University in Pittsburgh, who studied the impact of dozens of foods.
Regional Impact
'Time' article addresses Pittsburgh's hard times
KDKA-TV News | October 14
Lester Lave
, an economist at
Carnegie Mellon
's Tepper School Of Business, says it helps that Pittsburgh's economy is now based more in its universities and in medicine. "If the economy is not very good, we still need to have healthcare, people still need to get educated and so we don't have the kinds of recessions that we used to have," Lave said.
State energy bill targets electricity costs
Pittsburgh Tribune-Review | October 10
Jay Apt
and two other experts at
Carnegie Mellon
University's Electricity Industry Center pushed for utilities to lock in prices for longer terms in a study last year. They said the deals could spur investment in new generation plants, along with lowering customers' bills.
Newsmaker: Deborah A. Lange
Pittsburgh Tribune-Review | October 14
Education: Doctorate in civil and environmental engineering and master's degree in civil engineering, both from Carnegie Mellon University; bachelor's degree in civil engineering, Penn State University […] Background: Executive director,
Carnegie Mellon
University's Steinbrenner Institute for Environmental Education & Research […] Notable: Lange recently received $900,000 from the Environmental Protection Agency for continued research and education concerning the economic use of brownfields -- industrial or commercial locations that are abandoned, dormant and underused.
Education: Some local universities falling behind in hiring of women
Pittsburgh City Paper | October 9
Everett Tademy
Carnegie Mellon
's assistant vice president for diversity and equal-opportunity services, points out that the school focuses on a number of fields where there are generally fewer female applicants. "I'm not saying that we can't do better," he says. "I'm saying that there are restraints." Tademy admits the increase in diversity has "been glacial. "I'm not going to lie about that," he adds. "But it's been steady; it's been intentional; it's been something that university focuses on." As a sign of that growth, Tademy says that the percentage of research-track faculty who are women is "up to 30 percent," whereas in 1997, it was closer to 10 percent. [...]
Lenore Blum
, a distinguished career professor of computer science at Carnegie Mellon, also says that Carnegie Mellon has the largest percentage of women in computer science of "any of the major" comp-sci schools in the country. In a field that is statistically heavy on Y chromosomes, Blum says Carnegie Mellon's comp-sci program has reached a ratio where about 1 in 4 students is female. "It's not 50 percent," she concedes. She adds, "but it's not 5 percent."
Teaching consumers on-line safety easiest when they take the bait
Virtualization | October 15
The Anti-Phishing Working Group (APWG) and
Carnegie Mellon
University's Supporting Trust Decisions Project have established a phishing page redirect initiative that protects global online consumers who have been tricked into clicking links in scam emails by delivering them to Web pages that instruct them on the dangers of phishing – and how to avoid them. The program was announced today at the APWG conference in Atlanta.
The return of the short sellers
Moneyweb | October 14
Chester Spatt
, the SEC's former chief economist, said short selling is important to markets. "If you try to shut off the ability of investors to express negative sentiment... that does not necessarily raise prices," said Spatt, now a professor of finance at
Carnegie Mellon
Tepper School of Business.


text:
U.S. Escapes Mexico With a Draw
Believe it or not, it isn't a foregone conclusion that the U.S. team will qualify for the 2014 World Cup. Despite the progress they've made, no one would call the Americans a frontrunner of any kind, and their iffy beginning to the World Cup qualifying matches had the Journal's Matthew Futterman speculating whether a fumble in Tuesday night's match against Mexico might trigger a more harried rebuilding process. "[Coach Jurgen] Klinsmann is trying to usher in that process as he overhauls the U.S. roster," he writes. "But to accomplish those goals, he may need a crisis of the sort that would cost him his job."
Fortunately (or perhaps unfortunately, in the view of big picture pessimists), that crisis didn't come to pass. Playing in front of a raucous Mexican home crowd, where the U.S. hasn't been traditionally lucky in overcoming, events played out to a slightly staid 0-0 draw marked by high level defenses and a few lucky breaks. Penalties that could've thrown things toward Mexico's advantage weren't called, and their 15 corner kicks went nowhere. "Despite the disruption, the U.S. defense held firm in the face of sustained pressure from a Mexican team desperate to kick-start its own qualifying campaign after two successive draws," writes Yahoo's Martin Rogers. "The displeasure of the home fans was made further evident at the final whistle, when it booed its own team and launched a shower of beer cans and cups onto the field, as well as at the contingent of traveling American fans." As a result, the U.S. came away with a vaunted point, placing them in third place in Concacaf for World Cup qualifiers. After an upcoming match against Jamaica on June 7, they'll play four of their final six at home, surely an advantage as things tighten up.
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Pit Note 6: Elliott Talks Hall Of Fame; Evernham Talks Of Gordon's Toughness
Posted by: newsla on May 25, 2014 - 05:05 AM
Pit Note 6: Elliott Talks Hall Of Fame; Evernham Talks Of Gordon's Toughness
ANOTHER UNIQUE HISTORY 300 TROPHY â The winner of Saturdayâs HISTORY 300 NASCAR Nationwide Series race at Charlotte Motor Speedway will take home a beautiful one-of-a-kind trophy built by Rick Dale of the hit television show American Restoration. Dale designed the trophy, which was unveiled in the media center Saturday before the start of the race, using authentic items that tell the story of the speedway.
âItâs an honor as far as Iâm concerned,â said Dale. âWe have been here for the last four years, but it was only last year that we got to make the trophy for the winner. That trophy was designed to incorporate the beginnings of NASCAR. This year they wanted to make one a little bigger and better. This yearâs trophy is basically designed and built around the history, the hard work and perseverance and the dream of Charlotte Motor Speedway. I had a lot of fun building this.â
After researching the speedway and its construction, Dale used a piece of North Carolina granite for the base of the trophy, the same kind of rock that was blasted before the speedway could be built. Attached to the base are dynamite sticks and a brass blaster to show the force needed to move the granite. Next to that are two .38 revolvers representing speedway founders Bruton Smith and Curtis Turner, who allegedly drew guns to encourage crews to pick up the pace as construction deadlines loomed.
The building of the trophy was documented for an upcoming episode of American Restoration, which will start a new season on Monday, June 2, at 10 p.m. on the HISTORY channel.
EVERNHAM EXPECTS GORDON TO RACE â Ray Evernham has known Jeff Gordon as long as anyone in the NASCAR garage. And if he says Gordon will race Sunday in the Coca-Cola 600, in spite of sitting out Saturdayâs final practice because of back spasms, heâs probably right.
âAs long as heâs breathing and his heartâs beating, heâs gonna race,â Evernham said. âIâve seen him do some unbelievable things. Youâve got to remember, we won the Southern 500 one time and he started throwing up at halfway. He threw up all day in the race car and still won the Southern 500. Iâve seen him win Sears Point, Watkins Glen, with a hole in his hand, skin hanging off of it. His back, to my understanding, is uncomfortable, but I donât feel like itâs a big deal to miss this practice. If Jeff feels like the carâs good, I think heâs making a smart move resting his back.â
ELLIOTT TALKS HALL OF FAME â NASCAR Hall of Fame inductee Bill Elliott was part of the sport before multimillion dollar sponsorship and TV deals, before the drivers were household names, and before the days of luxury suites and condos at the race track. As he talked about his journey to the Hall of Fame in the Charlotte Motor Speedway media center Saturday, the dichotomy was striking.
Elliott recalled his big break in the sport, which attributed to a $500 sponsorship deal in Charlotte in 1980 with Harry Melling.
âI asked Benny (Parsons) one day, âDo you think Mr. Melling would give us some money?â He asked how much we were looking for, and I said like $500,â Elliott said. âAnd that was a heck of a deal for us. Harry agreed, and we put his name on the side of the car. We ended up winning the deal. Our next race was going to be Atlanta so we left Mellingâs name on the side of the car. We ended up qualifying on the outside pole. The clutch tore up in the race and we came in and changed the clutch during the race. Harry came over there and watched us change it all and go back out there and run. He was so impressed that ⦠he took a chance on us. He was really the one that helped us go to the level we went to, and without him we would never had made it.â
And make it he did. He became âAwesome Bill from Dawsonville,â and won 44 races, the 1988 Sprint Cup championship and the first Winston Million in 1985. He left an indelible mark on the sport and this week was announced as one of this yearâs five inducteeâs to the sportâs Hall of Fame, along with Fred Lorenzen, Wendell Scott, Rex White and Joe Weatherly.
âTo be at this juncture in your life and ⦠for them to call my name ... It was just an incredible day,â Elliott said. âItâs just an incredible run, an incredible journey through life. One thing I am so thankful for is that I am still around to enjoy this.â
Elliott is especially thankful for that, since he said he wasnât really able to enjoy the journey as much as he should have.
âWhen you are in the heat of the battle you donât have the chance,â Elliott said. âOnce you get outside of the bubble you can see it and really look at the accomplishments and achievements ⦠you donât see that until you get out.â
Elliott came from a racing family in Dawsonville, Ga., a hometown that he admits he took for granted in the early days.
âI donât know that I really realized the history of Dawsonville,â Elliott said. âI didnât realize what Raymond Parks and Lloyd Seay contributed to that area, and what they had done in the past. It took a lot of people and it took and lot of parts and pieces. My dad giving up a lot of stuff to buy the parts and pieces we run and used to do what we did. If you could take that formula and try to do that today, it wouldnât work. You see where the level of racing is today versus back then, itâs a whole different world. We built a championship team there in Dawsonville, Ga., and did it our way.â
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text: On the basis of the power, a large metallurgical industry developed, including a major iron and steel plant . Zaporizhzhya has and one of the largest strip-rolling mills of Ukraine. Coke by-products supply an important chemical industry. A range of engineering and light industries includes the in Ukraine. Other economic activities in the city have included the manufacture of automobiles and electrical apparatus and a chemical industry supplied by coke by-products. The city stretches for several miles along the Dnieper, with a greenbelt separating its industrial and residential sectors. There are teacher-training, pharmaceutical, and machine-building institutes. Pop. (1993 2001) 815,256; (2005 est.) 900799,000348.


text:
Most of my recent development work is available on github. Below is a summary of several of the projects I have developed and maintain.
RDF::Trine, RDF::Query, and RDF::Endpoint, part of the perlrdf project, provide a full framework for managing RDF data. They provide RDF parsers, serializers, triple- and quad-stores, and full SPARQL 1.1 Query, Update, and Protocol support.
RDF::EARL provides an interface to generating W3C Evaluation and Report Language (EARL) test reports.
Math::RandomOrg provides an interface to obtaining true random numbers from the random.org web service.
WWW::Search::PubMed provides a backend to allow searching the NCBI PubMed abstract database using the WWW::Search API.
Older Stuff
Modules that I have authored, but that are now mostly unmaintained:
- MT::CommentIcon (tar.gz); A MovableType plugin to add user icons to weblog comments
- MT::Redland (tar.gz); A MovableType 3 backend for storing weblog data in Redland.
- MT::SemWeb (tar.gz); A MoveableType plugin to provides common semantic web markup to weblog entries.
- Apache::XPP (CPAN); Yet another HTML templating language.
Drop me a line if you have interest in adopting and re-starting any of these modules.