Hello again :-)
The second week is already coming to a close. I cannot tell if it's sudden or long coming. It's an odd feeling. In some ways I feel like I've been here for a long time. However, the fact that yesterday was my last day of classes felt kind of sudden. Oh well, the point is I've been here 2 weeks and now I'm going to Alejuela for 2 weeks.
In the last blog I mentioned the Jazz Cafe and Puerto Viejo. Jazz Cafe is supposed to be a nice place with good Spanish and local music. It was nice, I s'pose, but the band that night was playing selections from Eric Clapton's Crossroads Concert. So our night of Spanish music ended up being a bunch of English songs I hear all the time. But all in all it was an enjoyable night. Myself, Vicki, Joanne (Vickie and Joanne live in my homestay with me), and Lisa (a girl from our school) went together and some Germans from the school were at the bar so they sat with us. It was good to sort of meet new people and to axtually do something in the city.
Friday morning myself, Vicki, Kira, Lisa, Ivonne, and Keyo (all girls from school) left for Puerto Viejo. The bus ride through the mountains was quite pretty, from what little I saw. Motion sickness set in pretty quick with a Tico bus driver on curvy roads so I spent as much as I could asleep. 4 hours later we arrived and checked into Hotel Pura Vida. It's a small quaint hotel with a hammock clad commons area and friendly staff. Quite a nice play to stay. I spent an awful lot of down time in said hammocks and ended up buying one to take home.
After we got our stuff in the rooms we walked around the village a bit. We found a place to rent bikes for the day and decided that could be a good way to see the area and go to prettier, more secluded beaches. The bike ride was wonderful, I haven't spent that long on a bike in years, I will have to do that more when I get home. Costa Rica is a rainy country in general and as the dry seasons ends in April and the rainy season begins in May its been a toss up as to the weather. That being said, you can pretty much guarantee rain year round on the Caribbean coast. So, when it started to rain really hard we pulled into a little restaraunt for tacos and drinks. As the rain subsided we started riding again and eventually found a nice beach spot. I haven't been in the ocean since I was really little. It's a lot different than the rivers and lakes of Missouri, I enjoyed it very much. It was awesome riding our bikes onto the sand.
After the first beach we rode a bit more to another one and swam some more. This beach had less coral than the first so we could go out further and the sand was finer. We wanted to go a bit further and make it to this beach that was supposed to be "the pretty one" but the bikes had to be back by 7 so we rode just a bit further and found a cocao farm that advertised tours. So we locked our bikes together and hiked up this huge hill to get to the office. At the top we found out that the tour was about 3 hours long and we couldn't do it :-( But there was a bright side! We bought some chocolate that was made on sight (ginger and chocolate for me. Muy bueno.) as well as roasted cocao beans. Those were interesting, I've never had anything like them. Good, but one could only eat maybe 2 or 3 in a sitting. On the way back to the village we stopped at another place for happy hour and had Pina Coladas whilst caught in the rain. This whole being able to drink in Costa Rica thing has been really nice. It opens up more options for places to go and things to do. Stupid U.S. drinking laws...but that's another story.
The bike ride lasted 5 or 6 hours. My bum was super sore for the next few days...it was worth it though. Back at the hotel we all showered and let me tell you, I could have stayed in that shower for days. It had consistant hot water and...wait for it...pressure! Water pressure is not something we get at our homestays. Or, rather, not mine and Vicki's, I don't about all of them. Over the course of the weekend I showered 6 times. All showered and dressed up (thank you Mom and Emily for putting my wrap skirt/dress with my clothes to pack, it has come in handy) we hit the main street in search of good food and local reggae (the caribbean loves their reggae. Reggae and marijuana...). Apparently finding music sung in Spanish is a feat in Costa Rica. Who woulda thought? Lots of Bob Marley (which is at least reggae) and American radio. I heard "Save Tonight" twice that night...The main street is pretty nice place. By nice I mean endearing. It's a dirt road with handmade shacks lining it where vendors set up shop and restaurants. Most of the vendors are the same, Costa Rican memorabilia, handmade jewelry, marijuana accessories, etc.
Saturday morning Vicki, Lisa, and I went out to breakfast at a place around the corner called "Bread and Chocolate." It was an adorable cafe with a good vibe and food from scratch. I had oat pancakes with pure honey instead of syrup and they were amazing, I've never had anything like them. The coffee came to the table in a personal french press for each one of us. Very nice. After breakfast we headed to Cahuita (the next village over and home of the Cahuita National Park) while the other girls stayed in town and went to the beach. Cahuita was kind of a smaller and quieter version of Puerto Viejo, charming. It was raining again ( I have yet to be able to take out my good camera :-( Luckily I do have a waterproof one as well) but that's just something that happens and we weren't going to let it keep us indoors. So we went to the park, it's mostly just a trail about 6 feet into the jungle from the beach. When the rain let up just a bit we found a quite spot of the beach and decided to take a swim. I don't know how many of you have swam in the ocean while its raining but it's quite lovely. There were a lot of waves, enough to have fun with them yet not enough to be too dangerous. It was awesome just floating in the ocean with the rain sprinkling around you feeling the pull of the waves. There's something freeing about just letting the waves carry you in and out to sea. We tried body surfing for a bit. That was, I'm sure, entertaining for anyone watching but did not go so well in terms of follow through. It was more like we were attacking the waves. Lol. But it was really fun and very tranquil. Anyone who knows me knows that it's hard for me to feel any sort of tranquility but in the sea at that time I managed to do so.
It did nothing but continue to rain harder so we headed back to Puerto Viejo and hung about in the hammocks for a few hours. The commons/lobby of the hotel is outdoors but covered by a clear plastic ceiling so we could just lay there in a hammock and listen to the rain and feel the breeze and that rainy feeling of the air. That was also quite a tranquil time. There are two guys who sit on the side of the road by a coconut tree and pick coconuts, cut the tops off, and stick straws in them for people. That was pretty awesome. We met up with the others around 7 and went out for dinner at a place called Cafe Loco. There was supposed to be good live music and Lonely Planet rated their food pretty high. The music...that wa interesting. This guy looked like Enrique Englesias' less cute brother and sounded like the guy you would wake up to naked on the end of your bed with a guitar badly serenading you. Everything he played sounded like he was trying to come on to somebody. It was actually quite funny and uncomfortable. He played a lot of Beatles and other random songs that I hear all of the time. So much for live Spanish music. Lol. I started feeling ill at dinner and by the time the food came I couldn't smell my tacos without wanting to vomit. Luckily two of the girls didn't think they were hungry so they hadn't ordered food and they ate mine. The waitress was very nice and brought me some toast and coffee, that I could eat. When you're sick (or, at least, when I'm sick) the last thing you want to eat is any Spanish based food. That makes Costa Rica a bad place for me to be sick. I went home that night and wnt to sleep pretty quickly. When I woke up I felt like shit and Vicki was throwing up in the bathroom. We were supposed to go on a canopy tour that morning but the combination of the sideways pounding rain, my pounding headache, and Vicki and I's pounding stomachs, we had to skip the tour :-( Checkout was at 11am and our bus didn't leave until 4. The lady working at the hotel was extremely nice and helpful and let Vicki and I keep the room for free until it was time to leave so we could sleep.
I was feeling pretty bad for the next few days and, to be honest, I still don't feel all right. I think maybe drinking the water in Puerto Viejo was a bad idea. In San Jose it's fine, or at least mostly fine, but in a small dirty village on the Caribbean coast its not quite as pure. But, it took me a little over a week to need immodium in Central America so I feel I've done well. Lol.
When we got back to the house we found Natalie. She spent two weeks at our homestay (in my current room, actually) before doing some volunteer work in Monteverde and now she's back for a few weeks to work with a local school. She is extremely nice and reminds me quite a bit of Carol Kane. Kind of awesome.
Monday after school Vicki, Max, his friend Florian, and I explored the city a bit, headed to the city center where the craft market it and the...city hub, I guess. It was alright, still my least favorite in terms of cities I've been to. There's just something about San Jose about which I am not a fan.
Tuesday was mi diecinueve cumpleanos. When I got to breakfast Vicki had a birthday card for me. I felt loved. And during class our professora, Karla, surprised me with a cake complete with candles. I had happy birthday sung to me in 4 languages, German, Finnish, Spanish, and English! It was awesome and really really sweet of her. When we got home from school we found Noami in the kitchen baking a cake from scratch for dinner, complete with homemade whipped cream. A lot of work went into this cream, people were passing it around and shaking it for a good hour. The cake was some sort of banana thing and was really good. I'm glad it's not like "cake" cake. I don't like birthday cake...but this cake was good :-) People from school wanted to take me out for my birthday so after dinner Vicki and I met Max, Florian, and Kira at Mall San Pedro and walked to a local bar street. We ended up in a place called Caccio's. It was an interesting place, for sure. Their sign said 'Por un Mundo SIN reaggaton' and had a picture of 2 stick figures grinding circled with a line through it. It was on their shirts too...Also, beer there came in litres. Gone, it would seem, are the days of 'It comes in pints?!' Althought, I s'pose a pint to a hobbit would be much like a litre to a non 3 foot tall person. Nobody needs to drink beers by the litre. Except apparently customers of that bar. Max and Florian are German and naturally had 2 each. I had wine and a Sex on the Beach. Good thing about birthdays: you don't have to pay for anything. I am too cheap to be an alcoholic, definately.
Wednesday after school Vicki and I went to the bookstore at the mall. I got something cool for Pop that I can't mention on here, a traditional Costa Rican cookbook, and "The Best of Spanish Pop 1999." Should be interesting. We then met up with Natalie and Joanne at a coffeehouse in said mall and had pretty lovely lattes. Vicki went home to pack after that (we both are repacking so we can leave one of each of our suitcases at school rather than bring it to our placements.) while Natalie, Joanne, and I went to see a movie. We saw "Date Night" and it was a lot funnier than any of us thought it would be. It was a nice night all in all.
Classes at CRLA have been going really well. Julia switched classes so it became just 4 of us and we all get along very well. El clase es muy divertido. We're also learning pretty well and generally at the same pace. Since Max is the only boy, and he's German, the poor guy gets picked on a lot by us girls, teacher included. It's kind of sad that it's over actually. But we had a nice little graduation ceremony complete with certificates and cake. After classes Vicki, Joanne, Ivonne, Kira, Lisa, Max, Florian, Natalie, and I went to Bar Rio to hang out for a couple of hours and have drinks and spend the little time we had left together. When we got home Joanne, Vicki, and I ventured the Mas o Menos, the local supermarcado. I enjoy grocery stores in the US and they're extra fun in another country. Althoughht it's odd, some things are so much cheaper in Costa Rica (movies are $3 on an expensive night, $10 for the VIP theatre with table service), most things cost about the same, and some things are downright expensive. $8 for shaving cream! Crazyness... Joanne left at 5 this morning so we sat up and talked for bit after the store. She's gonna spend the next few days traveling on her own before heading back to the UK.
This morning Vicki and I took a tour of the Cafe Britt coffee plantation and roastery. There were two tour option, the regular 1.5 hour tour, and a 4 hour Coffee Lover's tour. We planned on the latter but found out that you had to have 4 people minimum. I was pretty annoyed at first because the 4 hour tour had a coffee cupping session while the 1.5 tour had only a cupping demonstration. However, luckily for me, I was the one who demonstrated. So, I found the tour quite enjoyable and got a free coffee pickers hat for volunteering for the cupping (that sounds inappropriate). There was a lunch buffet option which Vicki and I hadn't signed up for but when we got to the end of the tour in the coffee shop/gift shop/restaurant, one of the waiters got us in. It was a really nice buffet. The whole place had a good, chill vibe, so sitting and eating and wandering the gift shop wondering how the hell we were gonna get all the coffee and stuff we bought home was really nice.
Tomorrow I am going on a 3 part day tour to the Irazu volcano, Orosi Valley, and the Lankaster Gardens. Hopefully it is sunny long enough for me to get my camera out and take some good pictures, the place looks gorgeous. After that, my first 2 weeks come to a close and I move camp to the San Carlos in the Alejuela province of Costa Rica to begin my volunteer work at the La Marina Zoo/Animal Rescue Centre. It will be nice to be in a new area, I think. I don't really like San Jose. A few things I do like though are all the different colors of houses and buildings, and the fact that we're totally surrounded by mountains.
Tonight some of us from school are going to try to find the local roller disco. Should prove to be an interesting night.
I have no idea what kind of internet access, if any, I'll have after today. So, hablar tu lluego! (I'm sure I butchered that grammatically...)
