By far my most tired day. I woke up without the proper amount of sleep, desperately wishing for more. It's not that I didn't want to go see the Bribris, I really did, it's just that I was dead tired. But I suppose it was my own fault. I could've chosen to sleep rather than go to the disco. But where's the fun in that? Sp we ate and headed out early into the Talamanca Mts. That bus put me to sleep as soon as I sat down. Karla was talking about the Talamancas, and I was trying to take notes, but my eyelids were soooooo heavy. My letters deteriorated into some sort of primal hieroglyphs that I can't even interpret now. I was actually asleep sitting up and I felt so bad because I should've been listening to Karla. Anyway, we passed though Bribri and arrived at a place where we would meet a boat. This wasn't the original plan, but the water was so high that we couldn't go to our original destination. Instead, we were going to a different Bribri reserve and eating lunch with a different Bribri family. But everyone was just sort of going with the flow about it. So we get into some small motor boats to go across a river. By now I'm partially awake thanks to some cookies. We crossed uneventfully and I tried to get some good pictures of the mountains, but I'm not sure how successful I was. Then we waited for a bus to take us closer to the reserve. I'm still half-asleep when the bus, which was an awesome old school bus, arrived. I hadn't ridden in on of those things in a while, and it was pretty fun, but bumpy. I listened to Laura have a conversation with the guys sitting next to her behind me. When we got to the Bribri house, we didn't really know where we were. We just put on some more bug spray and we were told to start walking along a road. So we did. And then along came the most awesome thing ever - plantain truck. We all got in the back of the truck and it drove us to te reserve. It was so great. It was bumpy and a cool experience. We walked up to the reserve, and Ozzie asked the people there if they would talk to us. So they agreed and took us to a meeting place. We sat and asked them questions about themselves, and they asked us some interesting questions about North American Indian tribes. Then we went into another building and they told us about their religion and their stories. A bird flew in during it and landed on my leg. It was medium-sized and green, and I decided not to try to touch it for fear that it would bite my finger off. It was weird to have so many translators. First it was Bribri, then it went to Spanish, and finally to English. Many people there don't even speak Spanish. Only Bribri. So it goes through a few versions and I wonder how accurate the message is when it comes out. But inside that hut - I was so tired. It was all dark and I though I would fall asleep a few times. It was terrible because my body and my mind were in a constant battle. My body wanted sleep, and my mind wanted to listen. Luckily, my mind won for most of the time. I felt a little more awake when we left the hut and got into the sunshine. But sadly, we had to leave. But not before doing one of our favorite activities: making fun of French people. There was this big group of them in the first meeting place singing French songs, and it was just hilarious. Frenchies are the funniest people ever to poke fun at. But it's all just fun - we don't really have anything against French people. But our fun had to end because our happy plantain truck had come to take us home - well, not home, but back to a Bribri house for lunch. That truck was so cool. Anyway, we got to a house owned by a Bribri family. Nisha and a few others, went out to play soccer with the kids, but I wasn't feeling so good so I decided to stay in. We ate lunch, which was rice, beans, and chicken (shocking!) and after we had some sugar cane, which was very tasty stuff. Then the father and his kids sang us a few songs in Bribri, and once again, Karla forced us to sing our national anthem. Then we sang Old MacDonald. It was sad, because we liked singing the 2nd one better. Then we still had some time left before the bus was set to arrive, so we decided to play a game. Now, games aren't exactly my favorite things in the world, especially when I've stayed up late the night before. I was determined not to play. Plus, I really did feel sick and my throat was doing quite badly. So everyone decided to play a "Hot Potato" type game where you have to do whatever the group tells you to when you're caught with the "potato." I took pictures. Laura had to act like a sea turtle laying eggs, it was great Everyone had to do silly stuff and it was really fun to watch. But soon our bus arrived and we had to leave. Once again, we boarded our rickety old school bus. And we said good-bye to the Bribris. I felt bad because in my sleepy stupor that morning I had forgotten to pack the toys I was going to give to the kids. Anyway, the busride was interesting 'cause everyone was teaching Christian English curse words. Oh dear. It was pretty hilarious though. And then we got on the boat, then back on our good old tour bus - where I promptly collapsed into a deep sleep. I was beyond tired. When we got back to Pizote, I stumbled into my room and took a nap, 'cause honestly, I would've fallen over if I hadn't. Then we had to work on our labs. Party. Blah. It was no fun, but I know it's necessary. And Miah made the angiosperm lab a lot more managable, so that's good. After the lab work, we went out to a restaurant. We picked an afro-caribbean style place, but it was 20 minutes away and we were all starving so it was torture. We finally arrived and the restaurant was nice. There were cute lizards on the ceiling and the TV had Fight Club with Spanish captions. I got a dish with shrimp and rice, and it was quite tasty. Then Emily broke a glass and tried to cover it up, which was amusing. But nothing really eventful occurred. We went back to El Pizote, and I surprised myself by having enough energy to stay up. Amy and I were bored, so we went out to the pool table, then came back to our room and started chatting. We talked for a long time and it was cool 'cause we covered a wide range of topics and I felt like I had known her longer than two weeks. She's good to talk to.

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