The Next day we all got up at 5am, had a quick bit to eat and then were off towards the Fresno airport, where, if all went well (I only wish it had), we would be flying out of on time and landing in San Jose 7 hours later.The journey to the airport was an uneventful one. We got out of the car, went inside and met the attendant at the front desk. He quickly informed us that the flight had been delayed and that we would have to wait for him to figure out what he could do for us. It quickly turned from the flight being late to it not coming at all and us having to wait another 7 hours from that time to get the next available flight.That would have been bad enough, but in addition to us having to call my friends dad and have him pick us up again, we were told that we would have to remain in LA for an additional 7 hours after arriving. What he failed to mention further still was that we would have to land in Guatemala and then fly out from there as well... The worst part was that when we expressed our frustration with the situation the attendant more or less told us to watch our mouths and take whatever option he was offering without complaint, a position that nearly frayed our patience with him into dust, but one we walked away from without further incident.We were picked up again from the airport a short time later, thankfully my friends dad hadn't gone too far out of the city and we were back to the house again before we knew it. Having burnt through our supply of medicinal erbs the previous night there was little to do but drink, and drink we did.The boys introduced me to a game called spoons, involving 1 less spoon than there were people playing, a deck of cards and a bottle of alcohol. The cards would be dealt out continuously until one player had 4 of a kind, once this was accomplished the player would grab a spoon and then, regardless of whether or not you had 4 of a kind you were to grab a spoon and wait for the rest of the players to notice as well. The last player to notice was shit out of luck, for there would be no more spoons to grab. For the first 3 rounds of the game, I was the looser, and thus was required to drink.Our drink of choice, or rather our only option, being gin. By the third round I was weary of having another shot so close in succession, since the game went so quickly, it would have been the equivalent of drinking 3 beers in 5 minutes, luckily one of my buddies offered to take the shot for me. Having figured out how to play I was fortunate enough to grab a spoon for the remaining 5 games played.Even so, by the time we were ready to leave yet again for the airport, we had drank enough outside of the game to be well and drunk. So much so that on our way to the airport I got into a heated debate with my friends dad, who was a Vietnam veteran, about the validity of the war, and the actual reasons we were there. Needless to say the conversation almost came to blows, and as I was told hours later by the boys, they couldn't believe what was happening, and feared for my safety during the exchange more than once.Somehow making it to the airport in relatively good health, we got out, shook hands with the hardened vet and got through security somehow without a hitch, still totally under the influence of alcohol.Upon arriving in LA, we found a restaurant to eat at and rested in the terminal for the next 7 hours before our next flight would depart. We met a few people while waiting, but I can't really say exactly what the boys were doing for that period of time, seeing as how I was asleep on the floor with my head on top of my bag, but I'm sure whatever they were doing it was more exciting than that.Finally we arrived in Guatemala, staying on the plane for the short exchange of passengers, we were off again into the airways of Central America. On the plane, finally heading to Costa Rica, I rapidly became sick to my stomach, and ended up having to purge whatever vile poison was lodged within my stomach in the planes bathroom, a first for me, in recent memory at least. Soon after that we arrived in San Jose, quickly through security, we exited the airport tired and a little drowsy, but ready to meet the challenges of a quick cultural shift and new reality of working and living in a foreign land.