We awoke at an average hour to eat breakfast. After breakfast, we were assigned different places to go using names drawn out of a hat. One group would explore the rainforest with Karla, and the other would go down to the Coast Guard and work with turtle hatchlings with Miah and Laura. I honestly didn't care where I went. I was too tired and too sick for it to matter. By now I was on chewable antibiotics, which by the way, taste like bubble-gum flavored howler monkey ass, and attempting to drink a lot of tea. Plus, I'm pretending like I'm not feeling bad so that I don't have to go to the doctor. Miah called my name to go to the Coast Guard station, and I just went with that. In the end I think it was a good decision. Also after breakfast Alex gave his talk on ants, which I found pretty interesting. Bugs aren't really my specialty, but they are cool-looking. At least I'm not afraid of them. But I will admit that I didn't know a lot about the leaf-cutter ant, other than it cuts leaves and I'd seen it in the game Amazon Trail on my computer. That game taught me a lot of useless information that I'm actually putting into practice here, which is sort of scary. Anyway, after out ant talk, we went with our respective groups. I was with Andrew, Aponi, Karen, Jim, Miah, and Laura. The boatride to get to the station was really nice, and we saw some interesting animals, like the howler monkey and the roseated spoonbill or something like that. Anyway, it was pretty and it gave me some time to think, which was much appreciated. When we arrived, Roberto showed us the hatchery he had on the beach. As we walked through the town to get to it, the locals all stared. Actually, Karen saw her uncle there, so that was pretty cool. The hatchery was awesome. We watched Roberto excavate one nest and count the eggs. He also classified them by whether they had embryos or not, whether they were shells, and whether the embryos had developed. He found 2 hatchlings in the nest, and went to set them free. As he did, locals came around with exclamations of "ˇMira a la tortugita! ˇQue linda!" They got pretty into it. It was cool to watch Roberto release the turtles back into the ocean. Then he assigned us to our own nests that we had to excavate. Now, I had no idea what I was doing when I got assigned this little mission. I was just sort of digging without any clue of the proper way to do things. And it didn't help that every time I got a decent hole dug, my body weight would cause the sand to slide down into the hole and I'd have to dig some more. Finally, I just gave in and decided I might as well get covered with sand anyway. So I laid belly-down and started digging. I found lots of eggs, but it took a while for me to find my first hatchling. I wasn't sure if it was alive or not, but then it started moving and so I dug it out. It was very weird because I felt this connection to the turtle because I had just saved its life. Roberto told me "This is your baby" and that's the way I felt about it. But as much as I wanted to hold my turtle, I kept digging only to find probably the most unloved and uninvited creature ever: that's right, folks, it's the maggot. They were all over the rotting eggs. And it wasn't so much the sight of them, or even the smell (although the stench of rotting eggs is incredibly nauseating). It was how warm they were in your hand when you had to dig the eggs out. They moved and wiggled, and it was just not a pleasant feeling (though I did have gloves on). That was about when I made my saddest discovery: a dead baby turtle being eaten by maggots. The poor little thing! It was really disgusting, which is why I was so happy to find a live baby turtle further down. Another one of my babies. It was very cool. Soon after that, I had my entire arm and head in this hole. It was very deep, but it gave me an idea of how big the mama turtle is: she digs holes that deep with just one flipper. Sheesh. At last I stopped finding eggs, so I ended my long excavation. Aponi and I went to go wash off 2 of the hatchlings. They were soooo cute. Then we gathered in the bathroom with Andrew to use the showerhead and wash up. Karen described the bathroom as "bery bery nasty" and I'm afraid I had to agree. But there was a bar of soap which we quickly defiled until it was left in pieces. I had sand everywhere, all over my face, in my hair - it was gross. After we had washed off a little, we each picked up 2 hatchlings and went to the beach to set them free. By now there were tons of locals all around wondering about the odd group of gringos setting the turtles free. Anyway, we raced the turtles and all of them went into the sea. I hope a lot of them make it, but all anyone can do is hope. Frankly, my babies have very little chance of surviving, but I prefer not to think about that. At least they got to the ocean. That's the first big step. After we were all done at the hatchery, we washed our hands a lot (the second rape of the soap) and went to a little local restaurant to eat. I had a chicken empanada and some yuca, both were very good. Finally, it was time to go back home on the motor boat. Honestly, I didn't want the boat ride to end. It was so great with the wind blowing through my hair and the mosquitos unable to touch me. Oddly, the boatride was something I enjoyed more than some other things we've done so far. But not more than the turtles. I really did love the turtles. When we got back to Pacuare, everyone was bustling about to prepare for the dinner we were going to make that night. Spaghetti and salad - real American food (yeah right). But at least it was more like the food at home. Actually, I was going to help with dinner, but I had to read my turtle article, which I did quietly while I listened to everyone else having fun without me. When I came out, everyone was playing volleyball, so I joined in. Even though I'm terrible, and I didn't really enjoy everyone else's competitive nature, it was hilarious to see Karen fight back when Jim laughed at her. Well, everything was going okay until the game sort of deteriorated and people were chasing each other with nasty water. Karen and Marion were teasing each other and then Karen threw some lab water on Marion. Then he ran after her with foot water, and she went into the woods. She came out again, and ran towards the beach. Marion goes after her, but she gets away. Then Andrew jumps on her so Marion can dump water on her. He tries to hold her and hurts her back, which she had injured earlier. She gets up, and in a lot of pain, throws a stick at him. I don't think she even cared if it hit him or not, but it hit him in the head. It wasn't very bad because he wasn't injured enough not to get pissed off, and he quickly stormed to his room. Karen, practically crying, goes to her room. So now everyone's all uppity and taking sides and saying Karen's allowed to do whatever she wants just because she's Karla's niece. Blah blah blah. I hate when people get like that. It just makes the whole thing worse. So I guess I'm not very confrontational when it comes to things like that. Anyway, Chris and I sat out on a picnic table in front of the dining room/all-purpose main lodge. I don't even remember what we talked about really, I think we were just sort of quiet for a little while. It was nice. But then Emily came out singing the Little Mermaid soundtrack, and that was my cue to leave. She has a fabulous voice, don't get me wrong, but I just wasn't in the mood for Disney. I had to get my turtle article stuff ready, plus Miah had told me I was going to have to do my book review, so I was nervous about that. But first was dinner, so I would have some reprieve. The spaghetti was great, and it was nice to have a little taste of home. We also celebrated Colleen's birthday during dinner, and there were a bunch of Brits there. Marion made merciless fun of everything having to do with Britain, which I found hilarious. He especially had fun making fun of the accents. And the Queen. Oh, it was so funny. I love Marion. He's so great. Anyway, we did have to present our articles. Veronica started to go, but Miah told her to re-read it and start again in a little while. And she asks who wants to present. Dead air. Silence for about a minute. Okay, that's my cue. So I start and I think I did pretty well. It's hard to tell, but I think I did okay. Then after the other articles, Miah and Laura tell us to get our stuff ready for the beach patrol and be back for my book review. By the time everyone got back, I had 5 minutes before the first group had to leave. So guess what? I didn't do it that night. But after my no-go book review, I still had to wait an hour before my patrol started. Hardly anyone was going. It was me, Aponi, Nisha, and Laura. I hung out in my room for an hour and headed out. I was in Colleen's group, and she was cool but was determined not to get wet, unlike Belinda, who doesn't care too much. Anyway, this meant that we were always running frantically so we wouldn't get wet. It failed for me, I still got wet up to my knees. Plus, I fell on my face when I was running and a stick jumped out in front of me. I love it when I do that. Hey, at least only Laura saw it. I should probably pretend like it never happened. Too late now. Anyway, my second turtle patrol wasn't nearly as awesome as the first. It was quite uneventful. No turtles. No hatchlings. Nada. I felt sorry for Colleen on her birthday. But Miah made up an extremely odd turtle dance to the tune of the macarena, which was amusing. I think it might've scared the turtles away rather than attracting them though. =) When we got back to the lodge, we had to get turtle data from Alex's notebook, which took a while. And I mean it when I say that I was dead tired by the time I fell asleep my last night at Pacuare.

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