Peace

Things were kind of slow here today.  We had two afternoon activities scheduled, but they both got cancelled for different reasons.  We did finish yesterday's puzzle though! That was exciting/gave me a headache.  Then we started another..

Tomorrow we are headed to Puerto Viejo for the weekend.  It's on the Caribbean coast, complete with lots of rastafarians and dreadlocks.  We are staying at a hostel called Rockin J's with live reggae music and sleeping arrangements that range from hammocks to tents to treehouses.  I CANNOT WAIT to see it.  We will be sleeping in the "Pimp Suite". hahaha.  I'm half expecting to open the door tomorrow and see a random rasta-man awaiting us inside.. 

Tonight a couple of us went for a walk before dinner to this hill behind our house.  From the top you can see over the whole city, and there was a small band of drummers (like a marching band) practicing so loudly in town that you could hear it from the hilltop.  When we stopped at the top and looked to our left, away from the city, we saw a huge cloud of fog moving in.  I've never seen anything like it.  This fog was like a steam roller, moving out of the valley, over the hilltop, and down the city streets.  And you could literally just stand there for 2 minutes and watch the whole thing.  

Then somehow we ended up wandering into the town's new Catholic church where we sat and watched the first few minutes of a mass.  It's funny...I don't think there's anywhere in this town that's not really loud.  Anywhere from sitting in my bed to sitting on a pew in the church, the sound of a car driving by is magnified enough to make you think that the car is about to bust through the window.  But somehow I feel like the chaos in the noise is balanced out by the serenity in the view.  I wish so badly that my camera would have worked tonight to take a picture of the view of the foggy sunset out the back entrance of the church.  

Now to yesterday's field trip...I wanted to talk about that.  

Yesterday afternoon we drove to the University of Peace, a graduate school set up by the UN that's located about 45 minutes from Puriscal.  It's a pretty secluded little place, definitely giving off the hippie-ish, peace/love/tranquility vibe.  We were all excited to have the cafeteria's lasagna--something other than rice and beans for lunch!  But other than that, none of us really knew what we would be doing there or what the place was.  

This Canadian guy who had graduated from the University and was now working there as a publications editor ended up sitting down with us at lunch.  We asked how he ended up there, and he said he had gone to Ireland after graduating college in search of a place where he could just live and be happy with his extended family (basically looking for his idea of a utopia).  He wound up being discouraged by Ireland's weather though, so he essentially googled "tropical, peace, and grad school", and ended up finding this university.  After finishing the 11-month degree program, he got his editing job, and has now been there for almost 3 years.  When we asked how long he wanted to stay, he said he hoped to leave soon.  But, he said, it's so easy to get sucked in to the tranquil, tropical lifestyle that leaving might be hard.  In the next year, he's hoping that some ambition will grab him--that he might get the sudden urge to go out and save the world.

I though it was interesting listening to him talk about that.  It's strange sometimes, the contradiction in things.  This whole academic community is here training the world's young minds to promote peace (they currently have 150ish students from 42 countries), but, by being so far removed from greater society, it seems like there's a tendency for the very peace-promoters to fall into an assumption of permanent retreat.  I'm sure that doesn't happen for everyone.  I mean, this guy will probably leave soon and end up doing something good for the world...who knows what.  But still, his talk made me think about how sometimes those who seem to most value peace--those whom much of society most needs in order to improve, might go to measures to surround themselves with a certain sense of peace that, in turn, remove them from the position where they are actually needed, where they can help spread to others that much-desired sense of peace.

To apply for a thesis topic at the school, the students simply have to prove that what they want to study is in some way related to peace.  From promoting peace with sustainability and the environment to promoting inner, more psychological-based peace, the school handles a wide range of subjects.  And with such a small and diverse group of students, and so little outside of classes to do, the guy said that most time is spent just getting to know each other.  On one hand, the place sounded like a sort of ideal, but, on the other hand, I think going there might make me frustrated.  Too much time to think, too much of a sense of peace...I think I would get sucked into the lifestyle and then get restless like the Canadian...but then I think I might sit back and wait for an ambition too and just never figure out where I wanted to turn..

So I think I've decided that I'm not going to apply to the University of Peace, as nice of a place as it is.  Not that I was actually considering it in the first place..

Anyway, that's all for now.  I'm sure there will be plenty to come on Monday about the rastafarians and the Pimp Suite!

:)