Well, its all over, the event has come and gone, we were able to hold the event without too many problems but certainly had many moment of stress and small moments that almost got out of hand.  It was without a doubt the biggest thing I have done here thus far and easily the most stressful week of my service so far and I am extremely grateful that it is over and we can now look forward to the construction of the court, which I can only hope will go a lot more smoothly.  I had a ton of help with this event and was extremely fortunate to have such great community support and the help of a fellow PCV, Francisco, who made the trek all the way from Gandoca (4-5 hour bus ride).  It was a great learning experience and one that I think will stay with me for the rest of my life and I think that is what Peace Corps is all about; learning not just technical knowledge or helping communities grow, but being a part of the community, learning from them and sharing in the exchange of cultures.

Anyway, onto the event.

I spent Wednesday and Thursday in Edgar's house in the city of Cariari to buy prizes, finalize food budgets and buy a couple small food items we could find at a lower cost than the pulperias near our community.  We decided to buy most items from the grocery store over on a credit system which lowered our budget up front and most importantly, allowed us to return any items at the end of the event we didn't use. While the cost was significantly more expensive once we have to pay, it was 100 times more convenient and lowered our risk of buying too much and losing the money at the end of the event.  For example, we bought 960 beers at the price of 695 colones per beer and sold them at 1000 per.  Outside the community we would be able to buy the drinks at 550 a beer and gain a higher profit per unit but in our case, we were left with 300 beers left over at the end of the event which would mean that would be a loss if we had bought them up front, or we would have to sell them at a lower unit cost/in bulk.  In our case, we take the profit from the 700 or so beers we sold and return the remaining 300 as though we never asked for them.

Friday, I spent the morning hanging around Guapiles buying a couple things for the house/food for the week and a present for Michelle who turned 9 on the 27th of March.  Francisco arrived in Gaupiles around 1230 and we went into the community on bus.  We had our final community meeting on the 1st to finalize positions, the food menu and what the kitchen would need to cook.  Unfortunately, Edgar couldn't attend as he was sick and I had no idea what the kitchen was trying to tell me.  What had happened, from what I understand now, is that the escuela director, who was supposed to be in charge of communicating the food needs to the pulperia in the town over and buying everything on the same credit system as us, didn't actually do anything except take all the notes about what the kitchen needed and then left the community for the weekend.  So when we had the meeting Friday, I was the only one the cooks could ask about what they were cooking and what they needed to ask the pulperia for in order to begin cooking...disaster 1.  We left the meeting deciding that the next morning we would meet with Olger from the ADI and Edgar to finalize the food and then go and buy the food and drinks all at once. 

But then Edgar didn't show up to the meeting in the morning Saturday and Olger and I were stuck trying to figure out what we would need to begin cooking as soon as possible.  Unfortunately, Olger has no experience planning events and this is my first of this size and in this country, so I was of little helping trying to plan out food.  Disaster 2.  We spent an hour or so trying to figure out the costs and then out of the blue, the director texted us with a list of materials to buy. We decided in the previous meeting that we would hold a small event Saturday night so we needed some food to sell and to set up the kitchen and bar area.  Through a miscommunication on my part, we forgot to buy plates and forks for the food (disaster 3) and were only able to sell a small portion Saturday.  Ice was also in short supply and had to be picked by only Franciso and I with a knife (no fingers were lost!) so that caused some issues but nothing too serious.  The end of the night (around midnight) also brought some unnecessary problems that I don't want to discuss here but all in all the small event served its purpose and we managed to make a little bit of money Saturday night.

Sunday was the big event.  We started the day around 6 with a big breakfast in the house and then quickly made our way to the plaza to begin planning for the day.  We had scheduled to begin selling around 10 so we had 3 hours to make sure everything was set.  I had taken notes from the previous night about things we could have improved and what we needed to do to make sure Sunday's event went smoother.  We set up the bar area, the kitchen, installed cables for lights and electricity, brought the beers and drinks over, coordinated the food and then sent a list of extra supplies to buy in the pulperia.  Everything was going fairly well as we had sufficient change available (an issue the night before), enough ice and drinks available and Edgar was around to bring anything extra we needed.  Then around 12, people started flooding in all at once and Edgar was pulled away, our exit was blocked and the other car we were going to use to bring the beer was boxed in, and suddenly I was being pulled from every direction.  There wasn't enough ice, some drinks were missing, the change was running out, etc.  It was certainly an extremely stressful 5 hours of running all over (I literally did not stop sweating the entire day) but we managed to hold on and in the end we raised over $1,500 "puro ganancias" (pure income).  Obviously more happened during the event but for the sake of not writing a novel, i'll let the pictures tell the rest of the story.

Recycling Update

All the materials were bought last week and we were just waiting to hear from Jorge to begin construction on the water pump.  Rafa had bought an old used bicycle from a student so we are back to using a bicycle water pump which I think should be cooler than a manual pump anyway.  On Wednesday, we spent the day digging a 9m hole in the ground and installing 2 large pipes.  Tomorrow, Jorge will put the bike together so that next week we can finish installing the bike in the recycling center and finish up the tubing so that we are all set there.