March 31st, My first day of work.

It's Monday and officially my first day of work. I woke up at 10 for my big day..I know..I shouldn't wake up too early. It might spoil all the fun. The first thing I did was try to work out getting back into my cabin without a key. I told Ramido in very broken spanish that I left my keys in my house and couldn't get back in, so in response he took the entire tin of keys, and sat in front of my cabin door trying to find the one that would open it. I told him I was really sorry, and he said not to worry about it in comforting hand gestures. Fernando did return sometime between 11 and 11 30. He knew where the key was and let me back in. I was then informed that I would be riding the ATV with Ramido to look for nests for the rest of the afternoon.
So from 12 45 to 4 15, Ramido and myself rode up and down the beach. We rode all the way up...and all the way back to where we got on the beach...and then about 3/4 of the way back...then returned to camp. It wasn't only riding however. We made a few stops. The first was to a beach front house, where we delivered food from the main land and a 2 liter bottle of coca cola.
After we drove for another 10 minutes, we found our first nest! The process of finding, marking, taking care of etc goes a little like this. First, you look for tracks and when you find them, you get out of/off of your vehicle and examine the area. Second, you take a pointy stick and carefully poke through the sand to see if the sand is loose. If it is, then you've found a nest. You then proceed to un-cover and check that the eggs are safe and indeed exist. You re-cover the eggs to create a flat surface, and with your squared shovel, you carefully dig a 4 ft/4 ft square, with the nest at the center of the square. Then dig about 3 inches deep and lay the 4ft/4ft piece of chicken fence wire so that it covers the entire area you've dug out. Re-bury the wire and make the scene look spotless so volunteers from the camp don't stop to check the nest! This is done by brushing away the tracks and dragging large pieces of drift wood around the nest. This prevents people from stepping on the nest, and cars/ATVs etc from driving over them. Then you must mark where you've been in a notebook in order to find the nest when you go back to collect the eggs. ( I know it sounds like I'm somewhat rambling, but this is being written on Tuesday morning at about 8 45. I've been up since 3 30 this morning. My brain stopped working a while ago). BUT BACK TO THE GOOD STUFF. For this particular nest, Ramido painted an abandoned woven basket blue and put it at the top of the nest. He dated the page and drew a detailed map, much like an archeologist would. He said we would be back for the eggs later, but that we were keeping the eggs there for some other reason..I didn't catch what that reason was so I just let it happen. Then we left the scene, to return another day.

The next stop we made was in the middle of no where. We stopped for about 10 minutes, and ate some oatmeal cookies. Ramido asked if I wanted a coconut from the palm trees, and although I wasn't thirsty or hungry anymore, I wanted to see him climb the tree to get them. I made his way up and dropped about 7 on the ground. He cut the top off of two so we could drink the juice that was inside. The green coconuts, by the way, taste nothing like brown coconuts that have the weird hair all over them. The juice/water inside of the green ones tastes like warm, poorly sugared water. I imagine it's good for you. The skin-textured inside that you can eat, tastes like nothing. It tasted weird but he did climb up a tree to get me one, so I ate/drank it. Now for those of you who do not know Ramido, he is approx. 20 years old, married, and has two children. So just calm down kids, the coconuts meant nothing but friendship. Anyway, after we had our own coconuts, he cut the skin off the 6 other coconuts, bagged them, and brought them back to the camp. I rinsed my hands off in the ocean and we rode another 40 minutes back to camp.
There were a couple people sitting outside the camp that we went to talk to when Ramido and I returned. One 17 year old girl, who had been laughing at me the night before, was there that afternoon and I guess had a change of heart and was being very kind. Monse said that they made fun of her the first few days she was there and that I shouldn't take it personally or feel bad. After talking, I hurried back to my room to take care of some work. I guess I was in there for about an hour, when Monse came over and said it was time to go into town. She needed money and I needed to the internet. After taking care of our errands, we got dinner in town and talked for a while. She is such a good person. She tells me that I have to ask for certain things because she won't do it. This is a nice shove into the language. Her intentions are always good, however, and her friendship has been wonderful in getting me adjusted to my new home.

ALSO..
The man who runs the library is named Chencho Santiago..I don´t want to forget. So I´m writing it here!