Twice as nice

There are now two places you can follow Tricia la Tica, here on blogspot and on Glimpse.org. I'd really like to get picked up by the site as a writer, and they tend to keep an eye on their bloggers. Feel free to follow me there and leave comments to boost my web cred!

Click here to check out my Glimpse profile and see the posts.

Puerto Viejo

This weekend I went to Puerto Viejo on the Caribbean Coast. The journey took almost 10 hours, thanks to a one-hour traffic delay on a windy mountain road, a little rain and one very animated cab driver. By the time we arrived I was ready to roll into my hammock (the hostel we chose had huge sleeping areas where you could rent one for $5 or string up your own for $4), but our driver was not wrong when he said the fiesta never stops at Rocking J's. The place was crawling with every stoner international student and party-animal volunteer who decided to roam the Caribbean Coast that weekend, so the sounds of reggae and clinking glasses carried on well past two in the morning.

One of the many mosaics at Rocking J's.

Our beds for the weekend.

Around 1am the owners of the hostel started herding everyone out to a bonfire in the back lot, where there was more drinking and odd reggae iterations of a number of songs played on an acoustic guitar. When they started up a rasta-fied version of "Lady in Red", I knew it was time to hit the hammock.

I woke up to the sound of waves rolling in on the beach only a few hundred yards away, and the discovery that someone had walked off with my shoes in the middle of the night. After a small bout of panic, I took a stroll around the hostel and found them under another person's hammock. I'm sure it was just a case of drunken flip-flop confusion, but I slept with my shoes under me for the rest of the weekend.

Transportation in Puerto Viejo means bicycles, so we rented a few and pedaled around town until we found coffee (and ice cream). Then we swam in the water at the black sand beach until it started to rain.

We had made plans to go to a jaguar refuge on Sunday morning that was supposed to have sloths and monkeys, but sadly we would have missed our last bus home if we had gone. So instead we caught an 11am bus toward San Jose after spending a few more minutes sitting on the sand.

Overall it was a good weekend, but the natural beauty of Puerto Viejo often seems overshadowed by the strong tourist vibe of the whole town. I seldom heard Spanish spoken at our hostel, and a lot of the shops and restaurants in town seemed to be run by Gringos who had moved there to live a slow life and surf the Salsa Brava. I think I was hoping for a little more sunshine and a lot more genuine Tico charm in Puerto Viejo.

Next weekend, it's off to the Pacific Coast to visit Manuel Antonio!

Cakes and Snakes

Thursdays are usually field trip days, but this week I was lucky enough to have two field trips, both involving some crazy wildlife. Tuesday, a few of us took a bus to TEC, the Costa Rican technical college, with some of the friends we met in the conversational English class. TEC has an ecotourism project on their campus that involves some local animals, so we got to see crocodiles, cayman and butterflies.

The mini-zoo was interesting, but the best part of the day by far was when one of the girls from class invited us to come have coffee afterward at a bakery her father owns.  We walked up our street to Tio Panchito and Fabiola's dad let us try a few different pastries (my favorite was gato, a not-to-sweet cake with a layer of jam in the center) and see how everything is made.  Talk about the perfect end to a great day.

We all exchanged e-mail addresses so we can keep in touch and make plans to hang out in town. I'm looking forward to seeing more local spots and having friends to show me what Ticos do in their time off. I think having these new friends may also save me the potential embarrassment of a few discoveries; on the way home from the bakery I pointed out a bar that seemed cool, and one of the guys informed me that it was a "how do you say, bar gay?". Good to know!

With volunteers and our new amigos behind Tio Panchito.

Today I went on a field trip to the Arenal Eco Zoo, just outside of La Fortuna. They have a ton of snakes and other reptiles and amphibians, including a Fir de Lance, the most venomous snake in Costa Rica. Our guide explained the process used to make anti-venom, which involves injecting a horse with venom and then extracting a serum from the horse's blood. Of the three families of venomous snakes in Costa Rica (vipers, corals and sea snakes), only the first two have an anti-venom, so don't touch any snakes you see in the ocean!

I didn't touch any venomous snakes, but I did hold a medium-sized snake, an iguana and an adorable tree-frog. Like so many of the amazing things here, it was hard to believe the frog was even real--it looked so much like the plastic ones in the States. But feeling its sticky webbed toes wrap around my finger was pretty convincing.

Iguana, with very sharp toes!

Tree frog, with toes like wet spaghetti.

After holding those animals, I was ready to move on to bigger things, like a giant boa constrictor that was more than twice my weight. I only held its head, but it was surprisingly heavy, and really smooth, not dry and scaly like I imagined it would be. This boa was born in captivity in Canada, but the idea that I could run into a snake like that in the wild is a little frightening.

280 pound boa constrictor- her name is Alyssa.

Speaking of running into snakes in the wild, our car ride home was interrupted by a snake having dinner in the road. A huge gray snake (maybe six feet long) had already halfway devoured another snake! The tail end of a Fir de Lance was still hanging out of its jaws. When it finally finishes eating, it will basically have another snake nested inside of itself.

Chowing down.

It really says something about the wealth of natural wonders in Costa Rica when you can leave a zoo or a museum and see something even more amazing outside on the street. Donde quiera que miremos, hay pura vida!

Little earthquake

We had an earthquake here in Costa Rica yesterday. The epicenter was in Puntarenas, which is about 250km from where I am, but one of the volunteers who works outside our town said she could feel the ground shake. I didn't feel anything, but with all the kids running around at my daycare, the ground is always shaking. You can read the USGS report here, and there's also an article on Earthquake Report.

Google.co.cr

One extra little tidbit of information: Costa Rica, like many countries, has it's own version of Google. Today there was a special Independence Day masthead with a purple orchid, the national flower of Costa Rica. Made me smile, so I thought I would share :)

Día De La Independencia

Today, Costa Rica celebrates 189 years of independence from Spain. Back in 1821 this meant that Costa Rica (and the rest of Central America) could adopt their own constitutions and start holding their own elections. Today, it equals a day off from work and one hell of a parade.

I woke up around six this morning to the sound of tubas and drums coming from the street outside my window.  The parade didn't officially start until 8a.m., but the Ticos have been practicing for this all week. Last night was the faroles festival, when everyone carries candle lanterns to the town center to see dancing and listen to some patriotic music. We bought our faroles on the street, but a lot of kids had ones they had clearly put a lot of time into making.

Me with my lantern, ready for the faroles festival.

 Today there was a lot more dancing, and every school in town came out to put on a show. There were little girls dancing flamenco (led by their whistle-tooting teacher) and young caballeros throwing lassos. Baton twirlers marched behind xylophone players and cheerleaders to the beat of a tiny drumline (and by that I mean an enormous drumline made up of little children, the sound could be heard halfway across town!).

I also had my first pipa (literally a coconut with a straw stuck in it), which I bought from a vendor in the park for 500 colones (about $1). After obsessing over packaged coconut water in the States, the real straight-from-the-coconut deal puts it to shame.

After about six hours of marching, the massive crowd finally subsided so people could go and spend time with family or congregate in the local sodas (small cafes). There was rumor of fireworks, but the rain clouds that had been threatening Ciudad Quesada all morning finally decided to release their payload sometime in the late afternoon. At least it didn't rain on our parade...

La Fortuna (w/ MORE new photos!)

"How vain it is to sit down to write, when you have not stood up to live." -Henry David Thoreau

I feel that I am entitled to sit down to write a great deal, because I certainly stood up to live this weekend. I traveled to La Fortuna on Thursday for a group field trip, and we loved it so much we decided to go back after work on Friday.  The city is a major tourist attraction, but it's so breathtaking that even locals have their favorite hangouts. On Thursday we hiked to Arenal volcano--Costa Rica's most active volcano--and it was a prefect day to see the small eruptions that happen every 20 minutes or so.  Costa Rica's humid climate often means that it's too misty and hazy to see very far, but we could see all the way to the peak.  You could hear the rocks tumbling down the slope even from far away. Our guide told us that you can see the red of the lava at night, and the biggest rocks that roll down from the top are as large as a Volkswagon.

At Arenal volcano in La Fortuna

From far away, the volcano looks a lot like the pyramids in Egypt. It's cone shape stands out from the sloping mountains around it and, as you get closer, the details of it start to become more clear. Even from far away, you get a feeling that you are approaching something very special and very real. So many things we have in the States are made to recreate the things that you can only truly experience by traveling. It is a strange feeling when the pyramids of Giza or a tropical volcano feel somehow familiar because you've been exposed to so many impostors.  But once I wrapped my head around the fact that everything I was seeing was the real deal, it continued to blow my mind over and over again. (Check out this video of a sleeping fern, a totally mind-blowing plant).

 White water rafting was the same way.  Unlike all the phony, amusement park facsimiles where you get the same pre-fab, homogenized, "you-may-or-may-not-get-wet" experience every time, the real deal is a total rush and completely unpredictable. Except for one thing: you WILL get wet. Before we hit the water my heart was pounding in my chest. Rushing through the procedures for what to do if you fall into the river or get trapped under a flipped raft did nothing to put me at ease.  But once we flew down the first rapid, hit the rocks and I got my first mouthful of water, I was hooked. For the next three hours, my focus was torn between the directions from our guide to "backpaddle!" and "get down!" and the paradise of waterfalls and trees (with the occasional howler monkey!) all around us.  The next day's ziplining adventure was pretty much the same, except it was the rain forest canopy and my fear of falling into it that were vying for my attention.

Getting ready to ride the rapids.

Strapped in and ready for action!

Zipping through the rain forest.

After rafting, we kept our word to our guide, who had joked that every person who fell out of the raft owed him a beer.  Making fast friends with locals is definitely the best way to see a new country.  Our new amigos met us at our hostel and took us to a semi-secret hot spring where locals hang out while all the tourists burn holes in their pockets going to Tabacon.  The hostel manager balked when we told him we were going to the hot spring under the bridge (apparently a common spot for unwitting gringos to get robbed), but I felt much safer being there with a couple Ticos.

The spot was pure paradise. On top of being completely free, it was uncrowded and obviously a favorite of locals, rather than a hyped-up tourist hot spot. After climbing down a steep path and doing a slow shuffle across a scummy rock, I was in volcano-heated hot water heaven. Beers always taste better in Costa Rica, but grabbing an Imperial Light out of an ice-filled shopping bag and watching the hot steam bead up on the can as you crack it open is the very best.

Rio la Fortuna- another favorite spot for Ticos, and any gringos lucky enough to have one as their guide.

First impressions

I was planning on writing this post after a week in Ciudad Quesada, but the first three days have been so full that I should probably just dive in now. The butterflies in the stomach have all but vanished, only to be replaced by mosquitoes, stray dogs and some very hungry birds that love to hang around the home base.  My first day here, I noticed three not-so-new bananas resting on a small pot in the garden. After wondering for about five minutes what they could be for, a small bird (of some type we do not have in the States- a million shades of blue) flew down and starting eating them. Discovering the banana bird-feeder has been like a lot of my discoveries so far--sometimes it's just best to observe and figure things out, rather than ask a question right away.

That's basically the way of things at my volunteer placement, which is at a daycare called Llevando Luz. The kids get dropped off at Dona Karen's house every morning around 7am, and I help her watch them until I leave around noon, which gives her time to clean up from breakfast and prepare lunch for them. There are nine kids between the ages of two and five, and they are mostly a joy to work with, although there are definitely challenges.  I thought the language barrier would be my biggest obstacle, but my basic Spanish is serving me pretty well so far. A well-placed "siéntese" or "silencio" (and the occasional "no lo muerda") is really all I need to keep everyone in line.  The real challenge has been keeping my energy up, even just for four short hours.  I've only ever volunteered with children for a few days at a time, so 12 weeks should prove to be an interesting test of my endurance. I'm going to try to introduce a few structured activities tomorrow, but the environment is usually so hectic that I can only hold their attention for a few minutes at a time.  Even so, I know these types of daycares are a hugely important part of Costa Rican society. The parents who leave their kids with Dona Karen would have no other way of caring for their children while they are at work, and the meals they receive for breakfast and lunch are big and healthy.  It's amazing to me how much time Dona Karen spends cooking their meals (she usually starts lunch right after breakfast), when kids in  some U.S. daycares probably get by on peanut butter and jelly. Dona Karen gets some money from the Costa Rican government for running Llevando Luz, but the parents don't pay her anything.

After the kids have tired me out, I come back to the home base hungry and dying for a nap. Food here does not disappoint (highlights so far include yuca frita, carne asada, chayote and the best pineapple I've ever had), and my room has an oscillating fan, which may seem like a small detail, but these are the types of small favors that make living in a foreign country that much more comfortable.  At the end of the day, having a fan at the end of your bed, realizing you know your way home from the market or waking up to find that your roommate has put a cup of coffee on your nightstand can feel almost like curling up in your own bed after being away for a long time.

I think I'll be flopping down in front of that fan pretty soon-- another long day ahead tomorrow. I'll be sure to keep you updated (pictures coming soon, don't want to look to much like a camera-snapping tourist in my first week). Until next time, pura vida!

Pre-departure checklist

I have a 10:55 flight out of Baltimore tomorrow morning. I have a  three and a half hour layover in Dallas, Texas. I have one suitcase and a backpack. Sometimes I worry that I didn't bring enough, but when I close the straining zipper it feels like I packed too much. Are five pairs of shoes too many for three months? Maybe I could run in my hiking boots or hike in my running shoes, but every time I take one pair out, I panic and shove it back in. I have three kinds of bug spray.

I have three years of high school Spanish, and a fear that I will not remember much of it.  I also have an outdated Spanish phrasebook with expressions such as "Do you sell analog cassettes?" and "Your fax is illegible."

I have never lived away from home for three months before, with the exception of college, which was close enough to my parents' house to justify driving home on the weekend to do laundry.  When I come back to the States, I will have one semester of college left. This feels so far away that it seems almost unreal. I imagine that my first few days in the home base will feel something like college. I will live with a bunch of strangers and sleep in a bunk bed. I will say my name a million times as I meet new people and try to remember their names.

But instead of having new classes and teachers, I will have students of my own. I will have 10 children between the ages of three and five, and three months to teach them English and hopefully make some sort of impression on their lives that will persist after I am gone.

I have a very good feeling about this, but I also have butterflies in my stomach. I have 19 hours to go.