Post-Puerto Viejo Slump

Posted on July 29, 2012 by newyorkwhimsy

I’ve been dreading writing a blog. Not that I haven’t missed you terribly, and I know you’ve missed me.

If you’re just joining us here, here’s what happened.

First I decided to stay and psyched myself up.

My bus journey to Puerto Viejo.

My first day and I’m already holding sloths.

Let’s try to forget this post happened.

Oh… and then I may have temporarily misplaced a sloth.

My Experiment with Bridgette the Ocelot.

Banana Sludge Treatment.

The one with all the cute monkey pictures.

Zoey’s Book Report Ending.

What can compete with adorable pictures of sloths and baby monkeys? Certainly not pictures of me stuffing my face with cookie dough at the beach, or my bratty cats who won’t leave my side since I’ve returned. I doubt even pictures of me at trampoline world getting beaten at dodge ball by 10 year olds would be sufficient. All I’ve heard since my return was how much everyone loved the sloth posts and how amazingly, ridiculously adorable the baby spider monkey was, blah blah blah, I get it!

Finally I thought of something that was better than those photos. Videos.

So here they are, some poorly shot videos I took on my iPhone while inside the Jaguar Rescue Center, and on a monkey picnic in the forest. Enjoy. See you in another few weeks when I can come up with something just as entertaining. Maybe I’ll train my cats to do some spectacular trick. Or Scout falling asleep mid meal.

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Ciao! Puerto Viejo

Posted on July 12, 2012 by newyorkwhimsy

It’s my last morning here in Puerto Viejo, I leave in an hour for San Jose. I’m laying in bed listening to the gigantic waves crashing on the beach outside. Even though it’s only been a few weeks it’s going to be strange going back to New York. It’s probably the most opposite place you could find in the world. Everything here is calm, laid back, no schedule, never-need-a-watch kind of place. It takes waitresses 20 minutes to bring you a menu, and that’s perfectly reasonable to them. You make friends with the taxi drivers here and have their cell phone numbers. Nine year old boys try to sell you weed. Besides my apartment, nothing here has fully closing walls, it’s all open, the restaurants, the stores, the markets. The only place with air conditioning is the ATM vestibule.

But I can’t stay here forever. I think I’ve eaten in most of the restaurants, and I’ve walked every inch of the town several times. I’m looking forward to delivery Pad Thai, snuggling with Scout, and fast internet. I’m not looking forward to that heat everyone won’t stop complaining about on Facebook.

It was a great trip, a wonderful experience, I’m definitely considering doing something like this again. I’ve always wanted to, but didn’t have anyone else to go with. But now I know I can travel alone and make friends quickly.

Here’s some other things I’ve learned from this:

If you do good things, you’re bound to meet good people. I wasn’t sure what the other volunteers were going to be like and if we’d have things in common and get along. But duh, we all came here to volunteer, FOR FREE, to hang out with animals all day and scoop poop, you can’t be too terrible of a person to do that. I’ve met lots of wonderful, amazing people on this trip and I’m going to miss them all (especially Jess, Jackie, The Sophies, Diana). But now I know people in Minnesota, Holland and Slovenia – so that’s free tour guides in three new places.

If you get attacked by an ocelot, keep trying. I wouldn’t say my experiment was exactly a success, I’m not sure if Bridgett ever recognized me, but it was fun going into her cage every day and playing with her in the garden. No matter how many scratches and bites I got.

I’m okay with being peed on by a monkey while eating. Not that I enjoy it. But if you want a monkey to sit on your shoulder, the peeing comes with it. You just lift their tails and lean backwards.

I can travel alone and not be kidnapped, murdered or sold into sex slavery. Maybe I shouldn’t jinks myself just yet, I do have to go back to San Jose today.

A monkey using your stomach as a trampoline is the most adorable thing ever. Probably even cuter than kittens, or Scout. And that’s saying a lot coming from me.

Never send your mascara (and all of your makeup) home with your sister-in-law. Just stupid.

I can eat PB&J’s every day for 3 weeks and still lose weight. Maybe because I have some PB&J-eating parasite living in my stomach I haven’t discovered yet.

I can walk through the forest with 4 monkeys on my shoulders, grass up to my knees, have my feet bitten by fire ants, know their are poisonous snakes in the vicinity, and NOT scream. Seriously, the more you react, the more the monkeys poop on you. But I really wanted to scream that first time on the way to the monkey forest – killer bees flying by, 30 pounds of heat yanking my hair out, wrapping their tails around my neck tightly, no path to walk on. In my head I was screaming.

I can’t live without a washing machine. My clothes smell so terrible. I smell so terrible. Washing them in hot water in the shower just isn’t the same. My clothes I brought here will never be the same.

I really don’t like grasshoppers. Nope, not one bit. I will not go to the garden to catch them for the opossum. No way. Get those crazy hopping things away from me. Tiny ants in my bed every night, I can get used to.

Just because someone has dreads doesn’t mean their going to try to sell you weed. Just kidding, they all tried.

That’s my list. I think those are pretty good things to learn in a few weeks, learning a little how to care for animals and a lot about yourself. I’m not sure I’ll ever enjoy camping but I can rough it a bit. I can travel alone, make friends with strangers, I’m stronger than I thought (though I still have to ask someone to open a jar of jam) and a little braver than I realized.

Ciao! ZZ

To read the other parts from my Costa Rica story, click here:

First I decided to stay and psyched myself up.

My bus journey to Puerto Viejo.

My first day and I’m already holding sloths.

Let’s try to forget this post happened.

Oh… and then I may have temporarily misplaced a sloth.

My Experiment with Bridgette the Ocelot.

Banana Sludge Treatment.

The one with all the cute monkey pictures.

Monkey Picnic

Posted on July 11, 2012 by newyorkwhimsy

Every day when the tours are over at 12 PM, the monkeys start going wild, pooping and peeing everywhere and swinging around their cage. They know it’s forest time. To have a successful transition back into the wild, the monkeys are free to explore the jungle every day for several hours. The teenage girls can go out and flirt with other males, and the males can practice their tree jumping. When picnic time is over, if they are in the vicinity we bring them back with us, or if not they can stay in the jungle for a few nights, weeks, months or forever. The hope is that they meet different wild troops in the area and eventually can join one when they are old enough.

I’ve been looking forward to this monkey picnic since I got here and was finally able to go a few days ago. Women volunteers are generally not allowed, or at least not alone, because there are two aggressive females who don’t like the female volunteers. On my first trip to the forest, the ‘mean’ monkey immediately jumped on me and starting licking me. The owner thought that was a good sign and I was hopeful that I could spend more time out there. My second time, they both attacked me, scratching at my face, neck, and pulling at my hair. Good thing there was a big, strong Canadian there to yank them off me. (I kept that visit’s event to myself). But my third time, I was able to lay in the hammock, snuggle with all the monkeys and leave generally scratch-free. Though every time they walked by, I did flinch and say “is this her?!?”. I’m pretty sure they were just trying to mess with my head.

At 12PM, we grab all the monkeys by their tails, (after the babies have had their bottles of course) swing them onto our backs or shoulders, some hang down our bodies, and we march out to the forest. As soon as we’re close enough to the opening, they bounce off your head and into the trees, where they jump and swing and play for hours.

Narea the spider monkey hung out with me on the hammock, she’d run up the side then jump onto my stomach like I was a trampoline. It’s the cutest thing I’ve ever seen, but every time I tried to capture it on video, she’d get distracted by my phone and start sticking it in her mouth. Some of the of the baby howlers would come down to play too, all climbing to the top then landing on my stomach. When Chipeto, an 2 year old male grew tired of playing, he’d come and hang with the babies and I on the hammock. He’s a pretty cute snuggler as well.

By the end of the three hours, everyone is pretty tired and ready for a nap. Myself included. I have been abused like a bouncy house and was bruised up, covered in animal crap and my was being eaten alive by mosquitoes.

But not tired enough to start whacking through the forest with a sharp machete, cutting down branches, grass, and playing ‘slice through the cocoa pod’. I came in 2nd place. (Ok, fine, there were only two of us, but STILL!) Watch out y’all, I’m dangerous!

And that was my last day at the Jaguar Rescue Center, it’s been a great couple of weeks, and I’m sad to leave all my new people and animals friends behind, but excited for a week at the beach with my family!

Dad, I’d like hummus, bell peppers, and a delicious healthy meal waiting for me at the airport, and the words ‘rice and beans’ need not be mentioned for the next week or anywhere is my eyesite. Thank you.

xo ZZ

Jungle Pampering

Posted on July 4, 2012 by newyorkwhimsy

After working seven days in a row slaving away in the garden like Cinderella, I wanted to treat myself to something nice. Okay, so I admit six of those days were spent sloth-sitting and I’ve only done one day picking weeds and laundry. Someone else took the task of cleaning the mouse cages. Bless her for taking that off my hands, she-who-remains-nameless is also on a valiant mission to set one pregnant mouse free each time she cleans, so that at least they can have a few happy moments frolicking freely through the jungle.

My first night free we all set off to make dinner together. A hard task when we have limited pans, silverware, spices and fresh food to choose from at the market, but we managed to pull it off. It took 2 kitchens going at the same time, using the outside to chop vegetables and lots of going back and forth between apartments to see the status of the others’ food.

I was on veggies with tomato sauce and garlic bread duty. I think the girls grabbed everything the store had, so we had a huge pot full of broccoli, eggplant, zucchini, and peppers – which I then added some cans of tomato sauce to.

I preheated the garlic with butter, and the bread separately before adding them together and covering the whole thing with another pan to heat. It actually turned out pretty delicious.

In the other apartment they had red snapper and rice cooking.

It was like a real family dinner.

My day off doesn’t coincide with anyone else’s, so after about an hour of sitting around this morning I was already bored. I headed into Puerto Viejo, did some shopping for local jewelry, and on the way home saw ‘Pure Jungle Spa’. While in the jungle… why not go to a spa? I believe I certainly deserved it after that brief time of plucking weeds.

Upon entering the gates of Pure Jungle Spa, everything suddenly quiets around you, a waterfall is flowing while a turtle crosses your path, and there are wonderful smells wafting through the air. I chose the Garden of Eden body treatment which was described as:

“You are enveloped in a luxurious masque of fresh papaya and honey nectar then wrapped in banana leaves as your skin absorbs this exotic skin infusion.” What about that doesn’t sound AMAZING?!

While waiting for my turn, I was brought a delicious drink of ginger, lime, cane sugar and spices. It was wonderfully refreshing after my bike ride around town. Soothing, soft music is playing as the woman takes a machete, goes out into the garden and chops down bananas leaves for my treatment. Next she brings over a copper bowl of warm water, hibicious flowers and adds lemongrass oils for me to soak my feet in.

Once inside the open air room, I undressed and she scrubbed me with a loofah, covered me in coconut oil then rubbed me down with freshly mushed bananas, honey nectar, and sea salt (they couldn’t find a fresh papaya). The last 20 minutes were layering the banana leaves on me and letting it all soak it while I got a head massage. This was the last picture I could snag while in there, I thought it might be too weird to ask her to take a picture of me covered in leaves.

Afterwards I showered in the private back garden and then sat in the lobby and had local chocolates made by the indigenous people.

I’m hoping I can top it tomorrow by visiting the place where that chocolate was made or maybe another day of zip lining.

xo completely relaxed and smelling of coconut, ZZ

You want to go to a Sushi Buffet?!

Posted on July 3, 2012 by newyorkwhimsy

When the girls said there was an ‘All You Can Eat Sushi Buffet’ night at a local restaurant, I immediately thought… no. Not because I don’t love sushi, but I’ve found that in Costa Rica there aren’t a lot of sanitation standards and even though I’ve yet to get sick, sushi isn’t something I want to test that out on.

We’ve eaten at roadside restaurants where a little boy peed feet behind us. Fruits and vegetables are often found not refrigerated. And I’ve never seen so many flies, bees and ants. I’m sure I’m just being an American sissy, people lived for centuries without refrigerating their food and they were fine right?

The town I’m living in Puerto Viejo, seems to take it to a new level of relaxation on sanitation. It’s an Afro-Caribean town, full of Bob Marley lovers, everyone rides a bike, has dreads down their back and a joint in their pocket. (My apartment fills up with smoke every morning at 6AM from the neighbors below me). So who knows if they remembered to wash their hands, or clean the knives with soap and hot water. I know at the JRC, we certainly don’t. The animals dishes are washed in cold water, we all eat at the same table where the pinkies are slain, and I certainly pay no attention when an animal pees on my head.

But I went anyway to the Sushi Buffet, because I never say no to sushi. Turns out, it was the best meal I’ve had here so far. It was more than just sushi, actually that was the smallest portion of the line, the other foods were: chickpea and tomato salad, cole slaw, papas fritos, fried yucca, Indian beef curry, veggie kofta, chinese fried rice, white rice, Thai hot and sour fish, fish croquettes, Indian rice curry, and the sushi was veggie rolls, spicy tuna, california rolls, and tempura shrimp.

Most of my pictures came out blurry or too dark because I was hungry and trying to move down the line, so you probably can’t see how delicious my plate looks. Seriously, everything was sooo good! I even really enjoyed the Indian curry dish.

Now that my money has FINALLY been transferred into my bank I’m going to try out some other restaurants and maybe stop eating PB&Js for every meal.

Really apologize for the how terrible these photos are.

Even though we were so stuffed from dinner, there is always room for dessert. We stopped at the market on the way home to grab some popsicles. I guess crabby had the same idea us.

xo ZZ

Weekend Update

Posted on July 2, 2012 by newyorkwhimsy

An update on my last couple of days sans blog. I’ve been having too much fun with animals and friends here to type up a blog.

Last week we tried to watch the sunset while taking a walk on the beach.

Here’s my apartment. Third from the top left. Three Dutch girls, and one American girl all who work at the Center live here too. It’s nice enough, except for the 100 tiny ants I found in my bed yesterday. Maybe I should quit eating bread in it. It’s also about a 30 second walk to the beach.

I spend a lot of time in this hammock.

It was one of the girls 29th birthday on Saturday, so I tried to make a big deal out of it, or with the limited resources I can get here in Puerto Viejo. I would hate to have a birthday and not have people singing to me, buying me dessert, and hanging with my friends. So I biked to town and got her chocolate cake, and the ingredients to make Pina Coladas.

That night we put on the fanciest clothes we had with us and went ‘downtown’. Our first stop was the Lazy Mon, where we ate delicious fried pickles (a first for the Dutch girls), had fish tacos, and Sangria. We talked for hours about the most random stuff. A lot about the differences of where we grew up, drug use (weed is legal there and they don’t even consider it a drug, yet still don’t use it, and were curious how to get drugs in the states because if they wanted it, they would just go to the coffee shop), who we like to travel with, which birthdays are special, our favorite holidays. The funniest thing Sophie said was “Christmas is basically the same as yours except no drunk Santa”.

Exsuse me? Drunk Santa?

They story they hear is that our Santa is drunk and has flying reindeer. Theirs is a much more civilized Santa who uses horses that hop from house to house and the ‘helpers’ take the presents down the chimney.

After this we went to the only other bar that’s open on a Saturday night, where they also have dancing. We hung out for a little, chatted with other friendly travelers, and finally biked home in the pitch black. That’s probably my least favorite thing about this town.

Sunday morning, I continued my experiment with Bridgette (the baby ocelot). A few times a day, I go into her cage to play with her and hang out. I was hoping after a few days she would quit growling and attacking my legs. Yesterday, it finally worked. Maybe it was because she had just woken up from a nap and was in a cuddly mood, but I was able to pick her up without her scratching and biting me. Instead, she licked my arms. I kept thinking, she’s cleaning me because she’s about to bite my arm off, but no, she was just licking licking licking. It was so adorable. I hated to put her down and leave.

Then this morning when I went to visit, I picked her up and tried to kiss her and she turned around grabbed my face with both claws and bit my lip. So now I have a tiny hole near my lip and scratches on my face. I should keep trying right?!

The rest of the weekend was nothing but baby sloths and tiny monkeys sitting on my head, but I’ll save that for another blog. Here’s a cute picture to hold you over.

That’s Charlie and Jeremy the terrorizing two toed sloth monsters. And the other is the sweet and adorable Meta. None of them are related, but they cuddle and pick on each other like brother and sister.

Off to a sushi buffet with the girls, wish me luck I don’t get some crazy food illness.

xo ZZ

The one where I lose a sloth

Posted on July 1, 2012 by newyorkwhimsy

I lost a sloth today. Not a joke. Literally lost a sloth. They can only crawl 15 feet a minute, and yet I managed to let one escape. Sundays at the Center there are no tours, we still have the same routine with the animals as a normal day, but with no rush to get things done.

The morning started as usual, we cleaned cages, fed animals – actually, no it didn’t, a horse got let out. One of the girls forgot to close the gate and the giant horse is running around the backyard. The other horse still inside the gate was also running around like crazy, maybe wondering how her friend got out? There was a little chaos until he found his way into the garden and was fed some leaves and led back into the horse area.

I was on teenager sloth duty today, so I had four medium sized sloths to watch after. It’s really only one, because the other three are lazy sloths and crawl onto the top of the monkey house (where there is a bed, chair and day bed with blankets waiting for them to snuggle on) they immediately fall asleep and don’t wake up until we come get them.

Frankie and Jimmy above the monkey house

That leaves me with Couer (or Corey). My favorite three-toed sloth. He has a skin infections right now so he has to stay in a tiny house at night, which means during the day he is super active. I start him on a row of long, low branches, he climbs across them all, I pick him up and start him again. Sometimes we cuddle. Sometimes I feed him leaves. It usually takes him 20-30 minutes to climb across the row of bushes, and I read my book in between pickups.

Couer reaching out for me to pick him up.

There was a Canadian family who came today that wanted to film some stuff to make a documentary about the JRC, so I led them up the ladder above the monkey house to check out the lazy bums snoozin’ up there. We got to chatting about anything and everything, they were really nice and fascinating, and by the time I came down Couer was nowhere to found. I looked everywhere. I recruited three other girls to look everywhere.

This wouldn’t have been a big deal if it were any of the older sloths, they are free to stay out at night if they wish, or venture out into the jungle and never return, but since most of them are afraid of heights, they don’t do that. Couer is too young to leave yet and needs his daily medicine to fix the skin infections. So I was dreading telling the owner I couldn’t find precious Couer (she recently had to put an injured monkey to sleep and these animals are like her children. Are her children. )

When we were about to give up hope and go tell someone, a girl finally spotted him in a tree on the edge of property. He had climbed down his branches, across the horse yard, onto a limb that had snapped off a tree, and was hanging onto the middle. We thought it we showed him we were there he would start to climb down, but it only fueled his teenage rebellion, he climbed to the very top of this skinny tree, and even onto to branches that almost snapped below him. We were cringing from the bottom the entire time. I am so relieved (and lucky) that he picked the one tree that doesn’t have branches to other trees, otherwise he could have just climbed and climbed into the forest forever.

Eventually, he started to climb down, we put a ladder up, and I climbed up to get him. Unluckily, he picked the one tree that had thorns for bark, and thick vine with huge leaves preventing me from getting Couer unhooked and into my arms. (Not to mention I’m terrified of heights, on a shaky ladder, and there are bugs and ants and creatures climbing all over this tree). I start grabbing at leaves and vines, and Couers limbs, and yank him down and place him on my chest so that I can climb down the ladder with two hands. Of course he choose this one time to not hold on, and when I let go, he’s only holding on with his bottom two feet, so he flips upside down and lands on a ladder step. (He’s fine… I think.) Lift him up, make sure he latches his claws on, now I can climb down. I put him straight inside his cage, give him new leaves, and pray that the owner never finds out about this.

That ladder is about half the way he climbed up

I have lots more updates to share, just not enough internet juice. So three pictures will have to suffice for tonight.

xo ZZ

To read about the rest of the trip, click below.

First I decided to stay and psyched myself up.

My bus journey to Puerto Viejo.

My first day and I’m already holding sloths.

Let’s try to forget this post happened.

My Experiment with Bridgette the Ocelot.

Banana Sludge Treatment.

The one with all the cute monkey pictures.

Zoey’s Book Report Ending.

No Post Friday

Posted on June 29, 2012 by newyorkwhimsy

There won’t be a post today, I know know, sad, don’t cry. There probably won’t be one tomorrow either, but I think I have Sunday off. Just wanted you to know I’m alive, the internet is really, painfully slow here, and I’ve been doing much more exciting things than sitting in my room on the computer – like sitting outside on a hammock looking at the ocean.

Sneak peek for Sunday? I held a baby monkey, he peed on me. I held a baby “rabbit” thing, he peed on me. I held a baby sloth, she peed on me. I held another baby monkey, he had diarrhea on my shoulder.

Pura Vida!

Come back for a visit Sunday.

xo ZZ

Don’t eat before reading this

Posted on June 28, 2012 by newyorkwhimsy

It only took an hour and half to upload 13 pictures… so there will be no “well” written blog tonight. I’ll be commenting or narrating each picture. Here we go.

My ride to work, ‘Mark Zimbicki picture style’

I was on sloth duty again today, except in a different area. This is the sloth garden where the babies hang out all day. The blankets are on the floor so that they won’t eat the pebbles (which they did when I got distracted). It really was a lot like watching kids. They’d all be trying to eat pebbles at the same time and I only have 2 hands. And as soon as they fall asleep – I wanted to fall asleep. Good thing the tour came around every so often so that I would need to pick 2 of them up so the guests could get a closer look.

This is Bridgette (pronounced Brizheette) a baby ocelot, who is impossible to get a picture of because she never stops moving. She has some brain damage and is blind (they think) but still so much fun to play with. She attacks as well as any cat using her ears. She also makes a great noise, that sounds like purring but is actually growling. I think by the time I leave I won’t be able to play with her anymore, she’s already biting super hard and not letting go. Ahh but it’s so much fun wrestling with a baby ocelot!

My first day I didnt bring lunch, so someone let me eat their tortilla with these beans. Then everyone starting pulling out their tortillas with beans in a pouch. I guess that’s the only thing to bring to lunch here. So I caved and bought my own. It’s actually not that bad…. or I’m just really hungry.

Paol likes his on white bread.

Even the Sophies from Amsterdam eat it. Though Sophie 2 made a genius move by adding sliced cucumbers.

This rest of this blog is going to get a little weird and gross. So if you don’t like dead animals stop reading, I feel strange even starting to type this, picture me having to sit there! Ok, deep breath…

After all the bigger animals have been fed we start to take out the smaller ones. One of them is a baby opossum that eats “pinkies”. Pinkies are teeny tiny, just born mice that are still pink. You take one out of the cage, LIVE and cut it into pieces using scissors. Not kidding. I hope I can go 3 weeks without hearing the words “Zoey, could you pick out the pinkies”. Here’s a picture of him loving it.

The worst is over, you can open your eyes now. I’m really sorry you had to see that, but I was eating my lunch while this was going on, so it can’t be any worse than that.

Another related job is feeding the other opposom who likes grasshoppers. One job is actually going out to the forest and catching the grasshoppers (I really hope I don’t have to do that either.) Then you take a live grasshopper and hand it to the opossum without letting it jump away.

She may look sweet and innocent here, but she was the pinkie killer today. Also a really good multitasker.

The worst thing I had to do today was go to the forest to pick hibiscus flowers.

And here’s just another cute picture for good measure.

Wonder what’s is store for me tomorrow?

XO ZZ

Sloth!

Posted on June 27, 2012 by newyorkwhimsy

Yesterday wasn’t really as bad as it sounds. Actually… it was.. I just kept telling myself it’s an adventure, I’m in Costa Rica, this hostel has no walls yay!!! But today was definitely better. The real reason I volunteered here is because I wanted to hold a sloth. I thought it might take a few days, I’d do some training, but no – Day 1 at the Jaguar Rescue Center and I cuddled with many sloths all day long. I could go home happy now.

I hopped on a bike at 7am and headed to the JRC. Of course, I got lost (even though there’s only one road). By the time I got there I was out of breath and sweating. Also, of course, I was still the first one there. Finally someone showed up, and sent me to work with Jimmy the gardener who didn’t speak one word of English, and gardening words are not in my spanish vocabulary. It took us 5 minutes to realize that we were both saying the word “rake.”

Rake I did. For about 3o minutes. Instantly I had blisters on both thumbs, but it wasn’t so bad, the chatty girl from Holland was “enjoying” it as much as me, so we spent a lot of time talking, not raking, and asking Jimmy por que do we have to rake everyday? Then I picked up a little horse manure and swept some hay. I have never gotten so dirty in such a quick amount of time.

There are only two tours a day, at 9:30 and 11:30 and then it’s closed to the public for the rest of the day. For a three week stay, you’re assigned to 1 job per week. Week 1- Garden. Week 2- Sloths. Week 3-Monkeys. So for week 1, I am supposed to hang with Jimmy all day, rake in the morning, do laundry by hand during tours, then rake some more in the afternoon.

But in typical Zoey-fashion, I managed to get around all of that. It seems that’s what everyone does. You get assigned a task, then you need to run and chase after a ocelot. A bird flies into the house so you have to go get it, etc.

After the little raking, I did do a little laundry, then I got the opportunity to sloth sit, and didn’t leave that chair for hours. I got to wake the sloths up and put them in trees to climb. I got to cuddle with them when they didn’t feel like climbing. I got hold 3 baby sloths at 1 time!! Holy crap, so much slothage going on. It may seem boring watching sloths all day, but it IS NOT! They are fascinating, and adorable and have so many facial expressions, and are just so damn slow its the cutest thing ever. There was also a monkey cage directly behind me for when I needed a change of scenery.

At 3 its feeding time. So I got to go into all the cages and put the food in, hand feeding a few sloths and injured birds. Good day. Just hope I can get out of raking every day.

After work I moved hostels and am now staying at what they call an “apartment”. Some of the rooms have kitchens (mine doesn’t) but it’s where the other volunteers are staying, it’s closer to the JRC and it’s only $15 a day. I’ll take it!

And now, a bunch of pictures of sloths!