2025 Blog
Monday, June 23, 2025 (Facundo)
I woke up around 9am, finished my last minute packing as mom got to my apartment. I went to take the trash out and did some last minute searching. I think we are all good! Get in the truck, check in for my flight and arrive at the airport. We parked and walked together to the international gate. Took a pic with mom, said our goodbyes and as I passed through the gate as the tram arrived! I turned and waved “love you! See you soon!”
Got through security after they threw away my mosquito spray :( big L. I sat a restaurant and got a Cuban sandwich and a tea. Finished my last quiz for Intro to Philosophy and enjoyed a delicious sandwich! Got up and waited at my gate. Got an hour to kill. I did my final, got a 12/15… okay but not great btw. Oh well can't complain. I realize that no one is at the gate and we should be boarding in like 45 minutes, weird. I checked the gates list and it changed to another gate! Luckily it's close so i just walked over and am still 45 min early. Time to board! Take my seat and Professor Himmelgreen and Professor Romero-Daza pass by!! Omg hello it's great to see you! What a relief tbh, I always get that anxiety of not thinking you're in the right place despite all the redundancies.
Opened up the Jurassic Park book and started reading. I've always been a fan of the movies so I'm excited to read it and so far, i'm loving this book. We land in Panama City around 6pm their time. I make small talk with my neighbor which was nice! All in spanish too. I don't feel to bad about my spanish so i'm hoping it'll only get better as we go!
Waited for the professors to leave the plane and we walked to our next gate. We waited in line and this TALL guy walks past. Like literally 7 feet tall. The profs and I realized that we have different flights to San Jose??? Luckily it's the next gate over but we won't be on the same plane to CR.
Took a short nap, kept reading until we landed. I was questioned a bit at immigration but all things considered were good! I waited outside by a restaurant that I saw the other at in the group chat but several hours had passed and no one was there. I got a little worried but a lady walks over and introduced herself as Luisa! The profs arrive 20 mins later, and we wait for Pablo and the Chico kids, Kacy and Alan. We introduce ourselves and make our way to the hotel! It’s late so I crash with Kacy and Alan for the night.
Tuesday, June 24, 2025 (Elyssa) - Exploring San José and its Universities
Today we woke up bright and early at Hotel Aranjuez to have breakfast at 7 am. For an American used to hotel continental breakfasts when traveling, this was a veritable feast with fresh juices, fried plantains, sausage, eggs, pastries, gallo pinto, pancakes, and more - all delicious of course.
After breakfast, we loaded into the van and went to tour two universities in the city: Universidad Nacional (UNA) y Universidad de Costa Rica (UCR). At UNA, we got to tour an educational subsurface biojardinera meeting with operators and maintenance workers. The tour was in Spanish so Pablo and Nancy had to do a lot of work translating for us, but I was still able to catch a good bit of what the UNA workers were saying. After a while, the sun really started beating down on us, but it was still super interesting to get to see each step of the biojardinera from the intake to the sludge chamber and sedimentation tank, the vegetated section, and eventually, the output. This wetland included four different gardens to study the effectiveness of different plants on their filtration capacity; one didn’t even have plants for a while but was still effective. Others had ornamental and palm plants. This biojardinera was very interesting because it treats water from the veterinary school so it poses interesting challenges in addition to just gray or black water such as medical waste and animal products. We were lucky enough to get to see some of the facility’s horses and cows as well!
After UNA, we traveled to UCR. We first had lunch in the cafeteria - for me, more delicious arroz con pollo, salad, and fruit juice. We met with various professors after lunch to tour their laboratories and listen to several educational presentations. We learned more about how biojardineras function, how circular economics and sustainable design are being implemented in Costa Rica, as well as various water, health, and sanitation topics. I really admired how involved the students at UCR seemed to be in research and really enjoyed seeing them at work in the labs and giving presentations.
We returned back to the hotel to rest for a little bit before we went to Café Mundo for dinner. We had a long table full of students, professors and their families, and we even got our talented bus driver to join us as well. I had fettuccine alfredo with ham and mushrooms, tiramisu, and limonada (which is not the same as lemonade!). We got back to the hotel after this and relaxed until the next day.
I think the most challenging part of the day was getting used to the weather! One of the other students said he “dressed for the weather, not the bugs”, and I think I did the opposite and dressed for the bugs not the weather! Learning how to dress will take a little bit of getting used to but I’m sure we’ll learn quickly! Tomorrow we will travel to Monteverde and meet our host families. I am a little nervous but equally excited!
This photo is from the biojardinera at UNA. It shows two of the gardens - the one on the left uses ornamental plants and the one on the right uses a lot of palms. In this picture, you can see some damage on the leaves of the palms. This can indicate issues with the water level and the roots. Plant health is a great indicator of biojardinera function!
Wednesday, June 25, 2025 (Alan) – Leaving San José, Heading to Monteverde
Today was our last morning in San José at Hotel Aranjuez. We had breakfast at the hotel before heading out around 8:30 AM on a bus with the entire IRES 2025 crew.
During the ride, some of the group were practicing their Spanish—Facundo and I helped out whenever anyone needed clarification on words or phrases. It was fun seeing everyone try to improve and communicate more confidently.
Something that caught my attention was how most of the cars here are manual, which isn’t something you see as often back home. But what really stood out were the amazing views on the way to Monteverde. The elevation here is around 1,200 meters, and in some areas, it climbs up to 1,500.
After arriving at the Monteverde Institute, Nacho, Luisa, and Karen gave us a tour of the campus and shared important information about our homestay families. It was a great introduction to what our next few weeks will look like.
After the tour, we finally met our homestay families! It was exciting (and a little nerve-wracking) to meet the people we’ll be living with, but everyone was welcoming and kind.
One interesting thing I noticed today was the weather—while not exactly a challenge, it’s surprising how much it rains in the afternoons compared to the bright and sunny mornings. Also, the sun starts to set pretty early here. By 5 PM, it’s already going down, and by 6 PM, it’s completely dark.
Here’s a photo of the view from today—it really captures the beauty of the landscape we’re getting to experience.
Thursday, June 26, 2025 (Kacy)
Today was a great day, today was the first day for collecting water samples and data. We started at the biogarden at the institute with all of our equipment, figuring out all that we would need for testing at all the other sites. We then piled into the car, all squished together to make our way to the biogarden at Katy's house where we got partially lost with all the forks in the road, but we made it and were able to test the water. We also saw the composting toilet at el Bajo del Tigre reserve and then the biogarden at Hotel Pinos, all different styles and different reasons. The rest of the day was pouring rain and we had to postpone the last two sites until later, which was the most fun personally as we went to the Monteverde Brewery and saw the first biogarden that filters grey and black water, with even more added nutrients from brewing, attracting many more insects. Everyone sat down for a drink afterwards and had a great time. The most interesting thing today was seeing all the other bio-gardens in action for the first time, things I had seen in diagrams or photos so much but never had experienced the real thing, such as the sound of the water trickling out of the pipes as it rained on our backs. What was challenging was figuring out how to efficiently test the water quality at each site and document all the data whilst fighting the rain, but we all figured out our roles and were able to mostly do it quickly. Today was the most fun day yet and I can't wait for more just like it!
Friday, June 27, 2025 (Brayden)
Today was a relatively chill day compared to the previous week. We met at the institution at 9:00 with the goal of going over interviewing techniques, practicing, and learning about anthropology. After reviewing the interview sheet, our group split into 3 teams to practice interviewing about Biojardineras. These interviews went pretty good and a lot of improvements were made on the interview sheet. After these improvements and an amazing lunch, Facundo, Kacy, and I went for a walk in the reserve and checked out some of the properties and bugs, with a picture of the spider web from behind the Monteverde Institute below.
After this chill time, we met in the glass classroom to learn about and practice pile sorting, which was a really interesting interviewing technique I had never seen. This will be useful in collecting additional information on Biojardineras and the public's opinion on them. Then, the rest of the day was free. Our group hung around and organized the lab as well and enjoyed some ice cream, which Jackson couldn't have porque tiene huevos (he’s allergic to eggs). And after a restful afternoon and dinner with the host family, the group checked out Bar Amigos.
Saturday, June 28 and Sunday, June 29, 2025 (Jackson)
Today begins the Freakin Costa Rican Weekend! Our group divided and conquered on Saturday and as one group explored the butterfly garden and waterfall hike, another did a tour of the local grey water exposure. Brayden, Jackson, and Alan ate ceviche that one of Brayden’s neighbors was selling out of their garage. The guys didn't even get the slightest stomach ache! Later, we went on a guided night walk through the children’s eternal forest. Here, we saw tarantulas, scorpions, ants, toucans, kinkajous, and motmots. Alan almost massacred an innocent tarantula but with grace he was saved.
Sunday was a big day for our group, Alan, Kacy, Jackson, and Brayden all went Bungee jumping! It was very exciting and each of our team members said a variety of funny sayings as they jumped, including “Que lo Que mi gente!” and “Sorry mom” or just “AHHHHHHHHHHH.” Without question, this team of researchers are having great fun on their days off. Afterwards, tacos were eaten and laughs were shared in downtown Santa Elena. Most of us went back to nap and prepared for the evening to come. That’s because this night was the USA vs. Costa Rica Soccer (futbol) match. Everyone from our group watched in excitement at a local pizza restaurant as the game ended in an overtime penalty shootout. With USA as the victor, Jackson and Brayden silently celebrated as the others sat in somber. The night ended with some time spent at the Alisson restaurant and Inn before everyone headed to bed.
Monday, June 30, 2025 (Facundo)
Got to the institute early at 8 AM with Kacy. We all hopped into El Blanco and headed to the stream to take measurements and samples in collaboration with Adopt-A-Stream. After a 20 minute drive we arrive near the stream and take a small path that leads up down to the bank. Brayden and Kacy measure the width of the river and we start to measure the flow rate of the stream. This is done by using a yard stick, ping pong ball and a stopwatch. After taking several measurements, we take some strainers and position them below different areas of the stream that are bottle necked and agitate the area leading up to the bottle neck. From there we counted the amount of macroinvertebrates we caught in the strainer. After counting we let the macroinvertebrates back into the stream and started packing up our equipment and headed back to El Blanco.
After returning from the stream, the group split up with me and Elyssa sitting in during an expert interview that was conducted by Cornejo and R-D. I recorded the interview on my phone with Elyssa and I both taking notes. It went well but ran a little longer than expected. We got a lot of great info on biojardineras and as a bonus we also sat down afterwards and talked at length about how to better calibrate the expert interview tool. Although we planned to do more interviews we spent the time on the interview tool itself and tabled the interviews for the day. After this we met up with the rest of the group and wrapped up the day!
Tuesday, July 1, 2025 (Elyssa)
The first day of laboratory testing
As soon as we got to the institute, boots were on the ground. 4 people went off with Dr. Orner and Dr. Cornejo for another round of sampling, during which, I heard Brayden threw his pencil out the window and had to have the van reverse to get it. While this was happening, me and Jackson stayed behind to start on the COD lab testing. We ran through how to use the pipettes and the test maneuvers while listening to Townes Van Zandt and John Prine. Everyone else arrived after about an hour and a half and helped us finish our sample analysis.
For lunch, they served chickpea patties with gravy that tasted incredibly similar to biscuits and gravy in the US - quite delicious. After lunch, we returned to the lab and Facundo and I kept working on our samples while the rest of the group sat in on some expert interviews. After we all came back together, we did COD, total nitrogen, and total phosphorus for samples from day one and two. Our anthropologists Jackson and Facundo picked everything up really quickly and everything was moving smoothly - the samples just take a lot of time (which left us enough time to go to the ice cream shop next door for the third day in a row)! We all left the lab around 6:30 and got to see an extremely pink sunset. Figuring out our flow for the lab work will take some tweaking because the timing between three tests can be difficult to get right but I think we’ll get the hang of it!
I might’ve been really hungry, but my dinner of fried fish was probably the best thing I’ve eaten in Costa Rica so far; my host mom is a really good cook! I finished off the night with some ice cream cake that was brought to the house. A very good day was had by all!
Here we see Jackson proudly wearing his nametag of “skientist” proving that he does indeed do science.
Wednesday, July 2, 2025 (Alan)
Today was a big day of research and productivity for our team in Monteverde. We kicked off the day at 9:00 AM at the Monteverde Institute, with Kacy and Facundo arriving early to get a head start on the day’s work.
At around 9:10 AM, we participated in a training session on qualitative and quantitative data analysis. This session was incredibly helpful, especially for interpreting the interviews we previously conducted with both local residents and experts regarding greywater and biogarden systems.
After the training, we had lunch at the Institute and then returned to the lab to continue our research activities. While Jackson, Kacy, Facundo, and Elysa focused on testing water samples and refining proposal work, Brayden and Alan worked on preparing 36 samples to be sent to the University of Costa Rica (UCR) for further parameter analysis. Once the sample preparation was complete, they joined the rest of the group in the lab.
We wrapped up the day with a full set of tested samples, a fresh to-do list for tomorrow, and a strong sense of teamwork—plus just the right amount of lab chaos to keep things interesting!
Thursday, July 3, 2025 (Kacy)
Today was the first day without the professors so we were on our own time. I started the same time as always, at 8:30 and relaxed outside the institute, enjoying the cool air. We all worked on separate things with the same goal today. Elyssa and I worked on parts of the proposal, Jackson made a map of all our sites, Alan and Brayden worked on quantifying the data from the professional interviews and Facundo worked on coordinating our other interviews. Brayden tried to use the rolling chair to have better posture at the table and tilted it a little too far and broke the leg! He tried to fix it with aluminum rods and duct tape, it may not look pretty, but it worked... as long as you don't sit back too much. After lunch we finally tested the nitrogen samples from the brewery as they needed to be diluted in order to use our HACH kits, and we finally got usable values. We also had a meeting with Karen, our homestay coordinator, today and shared with her what was difficult, good and needs improvement with our experience so far, while drawing it on large papers. Facundo and Elyssa drew each other very well and made a poem, Brayden and Alan illustrated theirs with fire and lots of pictures instead of words, and Jackson and I wrote our answers in all purple and then drew a very distinguished and fancy frog.
What was really interesting today was working on the proposal, as it is the entire purpose of our project and to finally lay it all out on paper and in writing was great. I also loved doing the dilutions, as I had only done it once before, and doing it again made it easier for me to understand. What was difficult today was scheduling our own work and having no one to tell us what to do. I did my best to try and organize our tasks and the troops in order to get as much as we could done. With each day, the group of us get closer and are having so much fun working together and seeing the work finally coming to fruition with the tests, surveys and the proposal is making me excited for the final product.
Friday, July 4, 2025 (Brayden)
This Friday felt pretty similar to last Thursday, I think we have all fallen into a routine already which makes working easier. We all arrived around 8:30-9:00 and got to work on each of our respective parts. Allan and I worked on Interview Qualitative and Quantitative data, Jackson worked on Transcribing, Elyssa worked on the proposal, Facundo worked on getting interviews, and Kacy helped with everything. Facundo was sitting in the chair because IT ISN’T BROKEN. It is working completely fine and everyone agrees with that FACT. Jackson is also having his own little side quest with his digestion system and is attempting to drink a bunch of coffee to fix it. Overall, I feel like the day was pretty productive in wrapping up work and organizing things for the coming weeks. We have good contacts and good organization systems for all of our data. The past two days I have been working on quantitative data collection and organization, and I feel like I have come up with a good system for the weeks to come, along with a lot of help. Wie also had 3 Expert interviews today, with the goal of front loading our stay here and getting as much valuable data as possible. As I am writing this, two have been completed and Elyssa and Jackson are conducting the third in the Glass Room.
Some of us were sad today because the 4th of July lunch was vegetarian, going against MERICA tradition. However, Elyssa and I were big fans because it reminded us of midwestern Casseroles, especially with the hot sauce they provide at the lunch station. Overall, a really good day, we are all tired but learning to work well together down in the lab.
Jackson at Lunch
Saturday, July 5 and Sunday, July 6, 2025 (Jackson)
Buenos Dias! This is the Freakin Costa Rican Weekend official recap. Saturday morning our group (Minus Brayden) had scheduled the famous Jeep Boat Jeep adventure from Monte Verde to La Fortuna. We left at 7:30 am and hopped into a sprinter straight to Lake Arenal. This is where the jeep switched to a boat. I called it a yacht however and convinced everyone it was my rich dad’s. Here there were stunning views of the lake and volcano. We arrived at our hostel, inconveniently named “Argdival.” I had a great time trying to explain this to the taxi driver in Spanish. After walking around the city and filling KC up with caffeine, we split in half with the fellas going to a rope swing and the ladies hanging back at the hostel. Here our lads jumped and swam in some beautiful and questionable water.
Saturday night was filled with meeting up with the other students from other Monteverde programs. We saw the kids from PITT at the hot springs and then the University of Buffalo Architects at a Discoteca.
Sunday morning was spent BACK at the ropeswing!! (Yay) Facundo did a back flip and everyone else gave it a shot. I kept trying to do a back flip and practicing the form but did not commit. (Lame) All this time Brayden laid in bed and went to church and also did pull ups. After being dropped off outside of my hotel we all watched the sunset at a roadside viewpoint. Overall, this weekend was fantastic, and I am eager to see what we end up doing next!
Monday, July 7, 2025 (Facundo)
Woke up feeling rejuvenated after the weekend. Flourishing, thriving, feeling joyous. Met up at the bank with Alan, Elyssa and KC at 7:45am. We were getting a ride to the Monteverde Reserve today! Jackson got to the bank 5 minutes early but it was the wrong one, he was near Bar Amigos. Brayden was still getting ready so we picked them both up from the mall. We headed up the hill and past the Institute which was new territory for us. We were dropped off at the entrance of the reserve where Luisa was waiting for us with our guide, Victorino.
Before even getting into the reserve from the entrance we saw a kuati in a tree picking fruits! So cute! Luisa hands us our entrance cards and we make our way into the secondary forest. We are told that the reserve is separated in secondary and primary areas, secondary being the area that was deforested for pastures but has been regrowing for the last several decades, and the primary being the area that has been untouched.
As a group we follow Victorino down the path and we stop. He sets up a telescope on a tripod and takes a moment to focus on something. He says “don't say anything when you see it”. After peering into the scope for a moment, we noticed that balled up in the canopy, was a green palm viper! It was very difficult to spot, its colors hiding it perfectly. Moving on, the trees became thicker and more varied in size as we headed deeper into the forest and it became apparent that we were now in the primary forest. Many of the trees we saw looked very climbable and really were very tempting but Luisa was onto me early :(
After continuing down the path, we saw a baby Toucan in a tree, with its little head poking out and looking down at us (or probably looking for mom with food), a young Trogon, and 3 or 4 agoutis. Our path led us to a long red bridge that passed over treetops, with a break in the trees every now and again showing us that we were easily about 20 meters above ground! From this point we went back down the hill towards the entrance and on the way we found a small orange kneed tarantula’s hole!
As we were leaving we saw a couple white faced monkeys in the trees above the entrance including a baby! After a couple pictures in the hummingbird garden and a gift shop, we all headed back down to the institute.
At the institute we conducted some more interviews and spent the day organizing and planning our week. The highlight of the day was definitely the reserve and the challenging part for me was scheduling interviews, but everything has been running relatively smoothly so far! The experience was so nice that I would definitely like to see more activities in nature as a group!
Tuesday, July 8, 2025 (Elyssa)
Today was a mixed bag of activities. I got to the institute in the morning with Brayden and was greeted by Jackson’s piano playing in a nearby classroom. We made our way down to the lab and got ready for the day. I started the day by re-running a lab sample to double check one of our data points (it was correct) while Kacy, Brayden, and Alan went out to start sampling day 3. Facundo and Jackson had an early morning interview. We regathered after about an hour and continued work in the lab before lunch. Perhaps not the most exciting morning, but it is good to get work done. A pull up bar was put in close to the lab and during our free time waiting for samples to process, we’re seeing how many we can do.
Lunch today was amazing. We each had a big bowl of soup with vegetables, plantains, a lot of beef, and homemade tortillas. After lunch, Facundo and I continued lab analysis while everyone else went to sample at the last two sites. Once they got back, we finished the last few test preparations and worked on miscellaneous tasks while they digested (proposal, interview analysis, quantitative analysis). We took a quick ice cream break and I got bright purple bubblegum ice cream. We finished the day working on our tasks and preparing for interviews tomorrow.
Wednesday, July 9, 2025 (Alan)
The day kicked off at 8:30 AM in the MVI lab, where we got ready to interview a local community member we had scheduled the day before on the group calendar. By 8:45, Facundo and Alan realized we needed the Spanish interview instrument, so they grabbed it and, along with Luisa, headed to the mall in Santa Elena to meet the interviewee.
The interview went smoothly and lasted about 30 minutes. After that, we jumped into the electric golf cart with Luisa and made our way back to the institute. Once there, we met up with the rest of the team and did some lab work: finishing analysis on a few samples, creating notecards, and updating/correcting parts of our Spanish interview instrument. Productive vibes all around.
Later in the afternoon, we prepped the water samples that are being sent off to UCR for testing—the third day’s batch, and Kacy worked on grabbing flow measurements of the institute biojardinera. We also discovered a trail that cuts some of the uphill to the institute.
Thursday, July 10, 2025 (Kacy)
Today was a slow start for everyone because we went to Karaoke at Bar Amigos last night. Brayden, Facundo and I walked to the institute together, with a banana in hand, because my host mom gave me that for breakfast. Today was a slow work day as I just collected more flow data from the MVI Biojardenera as well as calculated water flow based on water usage of one of the other sites. Everyone else worked on the two interviews we had today and transcribed them. An ice cream and milkshake break was taken at the end of the day as I finished up the last flow measurement. Alan also finally got his phone back after getting fixed!!!
What was really interesting today is seeing the biojardenera influent tanks getting desludged and the grease trap getting cleaned and how it stopped the flow through the biojardenera completely even as there was an increased amount of people here today. What was challenging today was finding tasks to do with the amount of data that we currently had, not enough data to start analysis per se but just enough to have tasks to do. We are also all addicted to the chocolate here and keep buying more each time we walk home, at least I do.
Friday, July 11, 2025 (Brayden)
Today was a pretty slow day, with the main activity being our call with the PIs at 1:00. We all did a little bit of work in the lab, but most of our data collection and analysis was already taken care of. Facundo bought yoyos for everyone and it is the new current obsession. Luisa also took our first flight of samples to SJO, and we will be getting the second batch ready next week, along with many local interview
The plan was to have a movie night after work with the group, but those plans got changed to a poker night and we had a really great time.
Saturday, July 12 and Sunday, July 13, 2025 (Jackson)
I woke up late today and decided not to do much. Today was a lazy day for everyone. Brayden and KC explored Santa Elena and found a mini zipline. Everyone else slept in. I personally played minecraft and enjoyed the rainy weather from the indoors. Later I went to a Tico (cosTa rICO) Soda (mini mart) and ate some local cuisine. It was more ceviche! Later I ate dinner with my host family and went to bed early.
Sunday was a very exciting day! We all went horseback riding, well, everyone except for me. At the start I went Mule riding. This mule in particular was named Shakiera and did not really enjoy being ridden. Once our group became accustomed to our horses, (and one mule) we saddled up and hit the dusty trail. Immediately, Shakeria’s hips began to do their thing and bucked me off. I was enthralled after falling into the grass because I felt like a real cowboy. The guides made fun of me for a second before checking to see if I was okay. Thankfully, everything was fine and I switched to a real horse. The views for the rest of the tour were amazing and I even hopped in the water.
A fantastic way to end our week as we prepare for our upcoming work tomorrow! Here attached is a picture of Elyssa being awesome and the evil mule shakira.
Monday, July 14, 2025 (Facundo)
Woke up around 6:30am after an awesome weekend! Feeling refreshed and ready to get to the lab and start preparing for the week. We met up at 9am and began planning out our week and preparing to take samples in the morning. Luisa is on vacation and we are flying solo for this week starting today :((( We will be in charge of communicating directly with the institute for setting up our transportation to collect samples, do interviews, etc. Missing Luisa already but she does so much for us and others that she deserves the time off!
This week, after getting clearance from the PIs, we are planning on deploying the flyer to all families of the home stay program through Karen, our home stay coordinator. Luisa floated this idea last week and we can finally take the steps to make it happen. Our expert interviews are effectively complete after this week so we are now going to be focusing on interviewing our own home stays and other participating families in the community! I feel that this will be the key to keeping our research grounded within the reality of the community and adds a human touch that will enhance the quantitative data we have been collecting for weeks. I am optimistic for the future!
Most of us were feeling a little under the weather and shortly after lunch decided that we have done all that we can to prepare for the week. We elected to end the day a little earlier than usual and work from home. Jackson and Brayden found a guitar and a banjo and started jamming, both being very skilled with the instruments! Definitely makes me want to learn how to play. I left shortly after, finished some homework for my summer class, worked on transcribing interviews, did some reading (Jurassic Park, still not done but close!) before turning in for the day.
Tuesday, July 15, 2025 (Elyssa)
Today was another sampling and analysis day. We left early in the morning to visit all six of our sites and made it back right before lunch and had some tilapia (fan favorite among us). We saw ourselves on the Monteverde Institute Instagram with our awesome picture of us pointing at Volcano Arenal. Some of us haven’t been feeling too great lately but it’s been absolutely beautiful and windy today which certainly helped me a little! During lunch, Facundo had a guitar lesson and figured out how to play “Mary Had a Little Lamb” - he’s basically Jimi Hendrix now. We’ll probably go to the store after we finish our lab analysis and buy more chocolate; I don’t think we’ve gone a single day without it so far.
My host family just rescued a new cat (named Princessa) and tonight it met with my host sister’s hedgehog.
Wednesday, July 16, 2025 (Alan)
The day started at 9:00 AM in the MVI lab. Alan and Brayden prepared the second batch of greywater samples to be sent to UCR. The rest of the team worked on finishing transcripts and doing some qualitative analysis.
On the walk to the Institute in the morning, the group saw a lizard without a tail sitting on a rock in the sun. The weather was sunny and windy, with a bit of chill in the air.
Around noon, everyone took a lunch break and had some good fajitas. Around 2:00 PM, Facundo and Alan walked halfway to Cerro Plano to do an interview with a local resident who owns two houses and has several biojardineras. It was useful to hear their experience.
After the interview, they came back to the Institute and uploaded the audio and transcript to the shared research drive for later analysis.
It was a steady day with a mix of lab work, interviews, and data prep.
Here is a picture of the Lizard we saw:
Thursday, July 17, 2025 (Kacy)
Today I woke up late...again. I had the off brand lucky charms for breakfast and then ran down the hill to join Brayden and Facundo on the walk to the institute. Today it was sunny but also raining so on the way to the institute we saw a double rainbow, probably one of the brightest we've ever seen! Today was a double down work day as we all had our tasks and locked in. We all worked late and took another snack break to the creamery a little bit after lunch to keep us going until 5pm.
What was really exciting today was getting the social-technical weights done after causing me grief for so long as well as seeing the double-rainbow.
What was challenging was delegating tasks and figuring out who is working on what, in a timely manner, especially the preliminary results and what to put in it. It seems to be overwhelming how little time we have left, but we are beginning to see the results!
Friday, July 18, 2025 (Brayden)
Friday was a bit of an unusual work day, starting off with our anthropology meeting with Devin, where we gained some valuable insight on new organization methods and interpretation techniques for our interview data. Then we had a Spanish practice meeting with Karen, to assist with the use of the Spanish interview tool for locals, as we plan to interview our host families for some of this data. Then we had our meeting with the PIs, going over everything we had done so far and plans on how to finish this work trip strong. I entered as usual with a goatee and sunglasses. After this meeting, we all did a little bit more work and then set off on our separate ways for the rest of the day. I taught Kacy how to solve a rubik's cube, as well as re-teaching Facundo the ending algorithms for the solve. Then, after some guitar time, Elyssa, Facundo and I bummed a ride off of Nacho along with two other students from the Institute, making for a super cramped car. And the location of the night was Bar Amigos, but I was resting and chilling with my host family for our trip to Liberia in the coming weekend. (Jackson also came back for his first day of work since leaving for Miami).
Saturday, July 19 and Sunday, July 20, 2025 (Jackson)
This weekend we headed to Liberia to see the beach, a rodeo/fair and a potential Rock climbing and cliff jumping spot. (Deep Water Solo) Saturday morning we rolled into town and heard that the rodeo isn’t happening until later. Instead we quickly decided to take a public bus to the beach. This bus was comically hot and slow. Regardless, we arrived at coco beach and enjoyed the serene views and water. I even decided to eat a kebob off of a street vender here. We then went from the beach to “Expo Liberia 2025.” This event was scheduled to have live music, rodeo, selling of lawnmowers, and thrill rides. Seemed like the perfect spot for us. We all watched in the stands for hours being blasted by the screams of the announcer and uninterpretable Spanish. The event was overall pretty fun and I considered pretending to be from PETA and freeing the calves. This did not end up happening. Instead, Alan, Brayden, and I went into a haunted house and rode just one sketchy ride. We decided to head back to the hostel around 10 to get some rest for our big day tomorrow.
Sunday we woke up and got some food at a local soda. I remember eating a bacon wrapped chicken breast and admiring Facundo’s order of tacos. From here we called an uber and headed into what looked like an uncharted jungle at first. We soon realized that we were in fact at the right place and found a beautiful swimming hole and cliff jumping spot. The rock climbing section was impossible for me but not for the professionals I found online. Backflips were partaken in by Alan and Facundo while I floated around and Elyssa read a book.
We then went into town and ate some more fantastic food and headed back to Monteverde around 5PM. This weekend was jam packed with travel, heat exhaustion, adventure, and tons of fun. I cannot wait for our next.
Monday, July 21, 2025 (Facundo)
Started off the day going on a group coffee tour! We were picked up from the bank (everyone showed up at the right bank this time) and were driven to Life Monteverde and had a tour around the coffee fields. We were shown what coffee pickers look for when picking coffee fruits and the sustainable practices of the farm. They have been experimenting with using biochar, creating their own antifungal spray and fertilizer. The process seems pretty solid unless there are extreme circumstances like large rates of fungal infection among crops, which forces the farm to use antifungal chemicals, or severe weather conditions. Due to the weather in Monteverde being so humid, the beans are actually transported off site for the drying portion of the process. Sometimes due to changing weather patterns, beans can be transported several hours from Monteverde.
After the tour, we were given small cups and got to taste all the different types of coffee they produce, including their light, medium, dark, natural, and honey roast. We were wired for the rest of the day to say the least. We had a really nice lunch then made our way back to the institute, where we started prepping for the final round of samples. We did some more work on the preliminary before calling it for the day. We all decided we wanted to have dinner together so we went to Tramonti. Got home and finished up some homework and got ready for bed!
Tuesday, July 22, 2025 (Elyssa)
Tuesday was the first part of our last day of sampling. Half of the group went to sample while others stayed behind to work on our preliminary results report. I spent most of the day working on the report. We ran our lab tests as well. We listened to a presentation on removing polymers from wastewater given by a UCR student which was very interesting.
We saw an agouti at the Institute and got to see a beautiful sunset.
Wednesday, July 23, 2025 (Alan)
The day began with our usual beautiful walk to the Monteverde Institute—slightly rainy, but relatively comfortable. Once we arrived, we prepared for the weather and got ready to take the final samples of the entire program, which were scheduled at the brewery and a local home.
We first collected samples at the local residence and finished the day's sampling at the brewery. After wrapping up the fieldwork, we took a short break to celebrate our last sampling day with Luisa by enjoying some wings at the restaurant.
Later, we returned to the Institute to continue working on the draft of our final paper, which we plan to submit to the PIs for feedback. We kept the momentum going by moving to Monteverde Coffee Shop, where we continued editing and refining our document.
After the paper was emailed to the PIs, Alan and Facundo assisted the rest of the group in conducting interviews with their homestay families.
Here’s a picture of the view from this morning and other stuff that happened during the day :)
Thursday, July 24, 2025 (Kacy)
Today was a late start for me. Jackson and I decided to start the day and take in the sun on the front lawn as it was the first day this week with a beautiful sunny morning. Today was a slow work day as well since we had worked hard on the preliminary report yesterday so today was simply just catch up. Alan and Brayden did the final water quality testing while the rest of us worked on smaller tasks. We all also went to the presentation from the Sustainable Future kids and saw how we will be expected to present our research next week, and then a few of us went to the opening of their dog park that they designed and had lunch there.
Friday, July 25, 2025 (Brayden)
FRIYAY! The day started with Facundo and I waiting in our normal spot by the Indian place for Kacy. This has become the new chill routine and it's really pleasant when it's sunny out. Today was a good day, with a lot of solid work on the presentation and the preliminary report, along with the meeting with the PIs. Because the meeting was on teams, I couldn’t enter with a mustache and sunglasses unfortunately. In the meeting we went over what the final steps for the internship, paper and presentation will be as well as some reflection techniques. After work, the destination of the night was Bar Amigos, where Kacy and I played 3 HORRIBLE games of pool and eventually quit. Facundo also stopped by the climbing tree after work. The tree is a strangler fig with the inner tree rotted out, leaving a hollow center to climb.
Saturday, July 26 and Sunday, July 27, 2025 (Jackson)
Sadly, this is the last Costa Freakin weekend. Saturday and Sunday were both very slow for me. Saturday morning half of the beloved researchers went on a 4 hr long hike that showed off some very impressive waterfalls. I was not in that half and instead I enjoyed my bed thoroughly. Our whole group did meet back up after the hike for some pizza. This was my highlight of the day. Later I went back home and spent time with my host family and played cards with Brayden and Elyssa.
Sunday I slept in (again) and decided to get ahead on some of the work we will be doing next week. The paper and presentation we have been working on is coming together nicely but still needs finishing touches and analyses of our finalized data. Looking forward to seeing this work once it is fully completed!
Monday, July 28, 2025 (Facundo)
Our final week begins! After our meeting with the PIs on Friday and another splendid weekend, we are ready to get this week started strong! The majority of the day was spent refining and going over the paper, while I worked on the finishing touches on the transcript, including a one-hour long interview that was still needing work. I was getting tired of working in the stuffy lab and opted to do my work on the floor directly above the lab that overlooked the front lawn of the institute. It was a beautiful day, and the editing was flying by. I was nearly done with editing this transcript when I see Elyssa, Jackson, KC and Brayden all walk to the front lawn. Brayden then starts doing the worm on the lawn?? It clicked that I was watching a “how to worm class” and was immediately interested. It was a much-needed break, and I could definitely use more practice. Right after, me and Alan recorded this awesome slow-motion video of Jackson jumping and grabbing a branch (flames). We ate lunch shortly after our impromptu dance lesson that also included “how to cartwheel”. Everyone was either working on the presentation or working on the paper while me and Jackson met with Nancy over zoom to discuss results and get general advice. We also met up with Devon separately later in the day to talk about the data and, overall, a very productive day and a great start to our final week! It has been stressful especially with how much we have to get done in such a short amount of time, but I am confident that our team will crush it!
Tuesday, July 29, 2025 (Elyssa)
This week has been very work heavy so far. We are working on finishing up our paper and presentation. However, there were a lot of other cool activities today. We had a cooking class with our homestay coordinator and some of the cooks at the institute. We each had something to cook, and I ended up with steak fajitas with onion and pepper. We also had pico de gallo, guacamole, fresh juice, a potato dish, tortillas, empanadas, and our favorite: maduros (sweet plantains). We all shared what we made and had a delicious second lunch out of it.
We’ve been obsessed with taking LiDAR scans of each other and as it turns out, we can 3D print them at the institute. My scan was the guinea pig and we started printing me today. I think I came out pretty good.
In the evening, there was a meteor shower we tried to see. It thunder stormed all evening and finally started to clear when we went out but no meteors were seen unfortunately.
Wednesday, July 30, 2025 (Alan)
Wednesday was quite workload-heavy, with both the final presentation and paper writing underway. We spent most of the day in the Institute's lab, focused on drafting the paper and preparing the presentation. We ended up staying pretty late, but it was rewarding—feeling the excitement of wrapping up our research, presenting our results, and explaining the process that brought us here. Here's a cool pic of a local artist we came across that day!
Thursday, July 31, 2025 (Kacy)
Today was the day to lock in, we were finishing up the report and prepping the presentation. Today was a long day of work. We spent all morning working on the presentation in preparation for our practice run with Nancy. We presented to her with the projector putting our presentation up in the lab and we watched as the sun beautifully set over Monteverde from our little cave. After that, we spent all night working hard to finish it before we went home. We were all starving by the time it was 8 so we ordered a semi-ok pizza and absolutely devoured it. The Wi-Fi ended up going about an hour later and we called it a night. We then all went to bed, ready for our final presentation tomorrow! There wasn't much exciting today except maybe me and Jackson debating if we should stay to keep working or not, and what was hard was trying to perfect both our normal presentation and then translate it to Spanish as well in the time period we had with the addition of the PI’s suggestions. Crazy that our trip here is almost over.
Friday, August 1, 2025 (Brayden)
Friday! Final presentation day! We were all up at the institute early this morning for presentation prep and practicing. We were making some last-minute changes and Alan and Kacy were translating it to Spanish. I was practicing my part, which was mostly on water quality metrics as well as the conclusions and recommendations. The presentation went well, lasting around an hour with some questions as well. Then we had the host family lunch, with empanadas and watermelon, as well as saying our goodbyes to people working with the institute. Then the rest of the day was set aside for our group tattoo!
The place was wonderful and it took around 6 hours to get all of our tattoos completed. 4 of us got it on our legs and two got it on our arms. Then the destination was Bar Amigos, but I ended up staying back to watch a show with my host mom.