Day 11

Hellllooooooo!

Today we all had a pretty tiringday. This morning we all woke up and started working at the site; we had tofinish clearing all of the plants that we started on Saturday. By the end of itwe were exhausted and all of our white shirts that we were wearing had turnedbrown from the mud. We also had to move big cement blocks that we are going touse for the fence. They were very heavy, and it was kind of embarrassing whenwe would need at least two or three of us to move one, while Domingo, a man whois helping us work, could move one all by himself. After working we ate lunchat Chilamate. We had pasta with meat and vegetable sauce, garlic bread, andsalad. It was so nice to be eating a meal without rice!

After lunch a local biologist cameto Chilamate and we walked with him to his house. Along the way he pointed outdifferent plants that we could smell, and he would explain to us differentthings that we could use the plants for. When we got to his house he had a widevariety of different plants and fruits for us to smell and eat. We ate rawcocoa beans, star fruit, and a lot of different leaves that we had never heardof before. Some tasted like mint and a lot were bitter, but probably the worstwas one that made our mouths completely numb. At first we were given a smallpiece of the leaf, but after seeing what happened we all decided to chew on afull leaf each. Long story short, we couldn’t feel our tongues for about 30minutes, and none of us could control the amount of spit that our mouths wereproducing. When we were done there, we walked to a local market. Some of usbought cookies or candy for the last few days of staying at our homestayfamilies. After that we all walked back to our homestay families, which is wherewe’ll be for the rest of the night.

Tomorrow we’ll work in the morning,then we are going zip lining in the afternoon. We’re all really excited!

Before I go, I want to make sure tosay a very happy birthday to the best mom in the entire world!!!! I love you somuch and I can’t wait to see you on Thursday. I hope you had a great day, andhopefully everyone showered you with love and happiness on this very specialday!!!

Enjoy your time without us, becausewe’ll be home before you know it!!!

Love, Aby