October 31, 2009 5:56am ¡Pura Vida!

¡Pura Vida!

October 31, 2009 5:56am
SYNOPSIS: Pedro’s wedding last weekend; the Playa Panama elementary school tamale fundraiser; scuba diving certification progress; how Kassidy is doing; I get Pura Vida.

I hear monkeys.



One Congo Aullador, actually, who has decided to be my alarm clock. One of our first purchases when we arrived here was a wind up alarm clock. We set it on school days in case the electricity goes off in the middle of the night. This morning the digital alarm clock was blinking 12:55, but the Congo Aullador was singing to me.



I am sitting on the balcony outside my room. I do not want to come back to the states. Every morning I wake up and open my eyes and immediately look at the ocean. Even after two months I’m incredulous. So I check. To make sure it’s still there. I suppose that’s how someone in love feels, looking over in the morning to watch someone breathe and being incredulous that they’re that lucky. Tomorrow morning I will wake up and it will be dark. I will arrive at the airport as the sun comes up. So this morning, is my goodbye. I am feeling present and appreciative. I’m also feeling like my feet want to be in that water.





La Boda

Last weekend we went to Pedro’s wedding. We followed Mike and Carla up to Santa Cruz, a couple of hours away. Kassidy took some pictures from the window as we passed through a cattle drive. I just never stop thinking that’s funny.



We arrived at a bar in a little town… Nimbu?… Nubu?…Namby? We turned right at the painting of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs painted on a pre-school. You know where I’m talking about, right? We paid their buddy the bar owner 5000 colones to watch the cars overnight and then Scott Hansen, the builder of the house we’re living in, drove down the mountain to pick us up because our little rental car couldn’t make it up. It was a 40 minute drive up Pikes Peak… if Pikes Peak weren’t paved, and if they hadn’t yet cut that winding road wrapping around it. The rains had created ditches and gullies, rather than potholes.



We arrived for the 11:00 wedding with the lawyer / reverend who would marry the couple at 11:10, and so began our experiential education into the Tico time schedule. The wedding started around 1:30. It was a small group of family and a handful of neighbors. For most of the day we were the only people there who weren’t related by blood or marriage. In addition to the standard unsurprising ceremony, which was traditional and archaic in its language, there was a tradition in which the reverend asks for coins from the gathered family and friends. She put 13 coins in her hand and blessed them and then gave them to Pedro. Pedro then gave them to Teresa. It was a promise that Pedro would be a good provider and that Teresa would be a good steward of their household money. She was placed in charge of all things domestic. The wedding ended with a kiss and then a champagne toast. The reverend asked everyone to raise a glass to the couple and individually make a wish for them ---love, patience, humor, that they would always have food, for many children. Witnesses were randomly selected. They both signed their names. Afterward, there was no procession, as there had been no procession in. Immediately prior to the wedding the bride had been sitting on the groom’s lap drinking a beer. After some cajoling, Mike managed to get everyone into one family picture. The family dispersed to get food ready. (They had literally slaughtered a pig for the occasion.) Everyone else moved to a bench on the outskirts of the veranda and hung out. This activity persisted for the rest of the day. People moved from the bench to under the covered veranda when it started to rain. The food was set out on the table outside and people filled their plates and sat down. The bride went to take a nap. Someone drove the reverend / lawyer down the mountain and, while they were gone, thought it might be a good idea to stop by the grocery store and pick up a white cake. They cake was set on the counter. Someone cut it and passed pieces around. Dancing and hanging out at the wedding site continued until well after we went to bed and then it moved into the living room where it continued until the wee hours. When we were ready for bed, there were several available floor spaces for our air mattress. We were shown to the floor beside the bed of the bride and groom. I stared at him absolutely incredulous. No… thanks. We took one of the kid’s bedrooms.



I had a great conversation that night with one of the drunk cousins. He was commenting that Kassidy was a little too young to propose marriage to. He was 22. He had consumed almost an entire bottle of rum. I think he was inspired by the woman from Atlanta marrying his cousin Pedro and thought maybe he’d see what other American women were available at the wedding. We were, as I mentioned, the only people there not related to him. Kassidy was too young and apparently I was too old. Kassidy found him to be creepy. I found him to be amusing. You know… like the town fool. There are three mixed race marriages in this family. Two of them are between older American men and young Tica women in the family that originally owned all of the property in Playa Hermosa. I heard there were a couple more, too, but they don’t live here anymore and I haven’t met them.



The next morning the cooking for that many people was constant. They had spent a day earlier in the week making tamales and now they were being boiled. I had the opportunity to take pictures of the entire process of tamale making at the school yesterday. Banana leaf and then masa (cornmeal rolled into a ball), and then peppers and onions and some kind of salsa thingy and then meat and manteca (that means lard – just a little piece of lard, because lard makes everything taste better) and then roll it up in the banana leaf and wrap twine around it and boil it. There was absolutely no schedule. People woke up, ate something, and then sat and watched TV. Jurassic Park and then Water World and then Pirates of the Caribbean. I wanted to go for a hike and, eventually, a couple of the boys said they would go with us. So Kassidy tucked the puppy under her arm and off we went. As we walked from the house to the trailhead, we picked up about 5 of the guys. The women all hung back and waved. I should have known better. Marcos brought a machete. This was not hiking. It was trailbreaking.



When we got back I made CDs of wedding pictures for Teresa before she went back to Atlanta and a second copy for one of the aunts who had a computer. Sometime that morning Teresa had been cleaning up and found her bouquet. She walked into the house, called for Ceci and threw it over her head directly at her. Ceci caught it. Woo hoo! Except Ceci is married to Marcos. This Tico ceremony would have driven a wedding planner up a wall. I thought it was cool. One of the advantages of being this laid back is that the anxiety about being late disappears. There’s no such thing as late. Things just happen whenever they happen.



Although we were still on no kind of a schedule, I didn’t want to drive back in the dark, so we finally got a ride back down the mountain about 3:30 and got back to Playa Hermosa just as it was getting dark.



Ohhh… just while I’m sitting here writing I can hear the waves crashing on the shore. Sigh.



La Escuela / Secret Santa

There is a fundraiser coming up in December put on by the 4 communities, Playa Hermosa, Playa del Coco, Playa Panama and Sardinal. The money that is raised from the event and auction goes to support the schools in these towns. I have been going down to the school in Playa Panama this week with John. I translate for the teachers while they tell him what they need. They are building a new bathroom right now, but don’t have the money to pay for the US $200 in labor, so they made tamales for 2 days and sold them for 500 colones (a little less than a dollar) apiece. I took pictures of the process. They have a travelling English teacher who comes in Mondays and Tuesdays. They have been told that they might be able to get a second teacher next year which would mean that instead of teaching 1st through 3rd grade in one room in the mornings and 4th through 6th grade in the same room in the afternoons, that they would be able to offer full day school. To do that, they need one more classroom. If they build that classroom with specific specifications (fans, bars on the windows etc.) the government will give them a couple of computers. This same type of fundraising built the first bathroom and the Kindergarten / pres-school classroom. This school serves 15 K and Pre-K kids and 54 1st through 6th graders. School is free, but students have to purchase their textbooks and buy uniforms and school supplies. The teachers also let the parents know when they have run out of toilet paper.



I’ll post pictures, but what I’d like to do when I’m home is see if we can tackle any of these projects. They have bathrooms now, but no sinks where they can wash their hands. (I know… eww.) They have textbooks, but no reading books. They have a pathetic play area for the littler kids, but it isn’t fenced in. I took pictures of the swing set. It is not something any of us would let our kids play on without an up to date tetanus shot.



There is a kitchen where the kids are fed lunch. A small amount of money is provided by the government for this school lunch program.



These conditions are livable, but I’m motivated to make them educational rather than just livable. John tells me that this is not the worst school. When I get back he will take me to others that this fundraiser supports. They have been in shacks with absolutely no food at all.



The underbelly of Costa Rica exposes that the myth that this is not an impoverished country is just that. It is beautiful. It is amazing. I am so very enchanted by this place. It’s just simply not true that everyone is literate. I think they only surveyed all of the people who could read. It’s also not true that everyone is fed.



SCUBA diving certification

I cannot breathe under water. I panicked. I couldn’t clear my mask. I couldn’t equalize. I felt like I was on an airplane my ears were so pressurized. Multiple attempts to clear my mask failed. I could not relax. I was with my friend Heather who had far less trouble than I did and can’t wait to go again. She was graceful. I was graceless. What else is new?



Did I mention that I panicked in 8 feet of water in a swimming pool?



I am practicing clearing my mask in the pool before I go back and am also buying a mask with a release valve in Colorado. I need every possible advantage.





Kassidy

I volunteered to read The Phantom Tollbooth to Kassidy’s class and while I was there stopped in to see the principal. How are things going? So, I told her the truth and also told her that we weren’t sure we were going to stay at Ciudad Blanca next year. She was aware of the problems, but didn’t know how bad they were. After some discussion, they have decided to move her to 8th grade next year. The school year begins in the middle of February.



I like her. We have had some difficult times together, but now when I pick her up at the bottom of the hill we take a minute to be excited that it’s the end of the day and we get to be together again. It’s a moment we hadn’t been appreciating. One day I was late and it was horrible for her. We both realized how much she looks forward to seeing me parked next to the bus and decided to relish that. She’s very excited to come home. When we come back she’ll be travelling with my parents by herself. We’re totally excited about that, too.



Pura Vida



I understand Pura Vida now. It was an abstract, silly concept when I got here. Now it’s a pace. It’s a feeling of going along with the waves and not fighting the tide. It’s a feeling of using the time for meditation and insight and presence. It’s what we would be… on vacation. It’s not just doing things slowly, it’s doing things more spontaneously. I lose track of whatever schedule I had intended to follow when something comes up.



It’s taking advantage of the moments in the day when the sun comes out to be outside. It’s taking advantage of passing someone on the street and stopping to chat. It’s dropping everything to watch the sun set. It’s spending an afternoon basking alternately in desire, pleasure and satisfaction. It’s beating the rain to the pool and floating happily but it’s also standing in the rain and feeling it instantly cool the surrounding air. It’s taking time to take pictures.



It’s having nowhere else to be but exactly where I am in this moment.



And it’s experiencing and appreciating the sensation of joy at being present in this very moment.

Costa Rica 10.11.09

We are haunted by an ideal life, and it is because we have within us the beginning of the possibility of it. - Phillips Brooks

SYNOPSIS: You, in Costa Rica; Volunteering at the Vet Clinic, walking through the real Costa Rica, Juxtaposition --- the Happiest Place with extreme poverty on Earth; White Water Rafting, Poverty, Prisons, drought; S.C.U.B.A, snorkeling, rumors. Things are better. Kassidy is adjusting. We’re trying new things. We’re started volunteering. The creamy filling inside of the real Costa Rica seems to be both happiness and also severe poverty.

YOU, IN COSTA RICA

When you come to Costa Rica I will wake you up in the morning and we will walk 9 minutes down the hill to wait for the school bus. We will walk away as it approaches to avoid embarrassing Kassidy as she boards. We will walk 10 more minutes to the beach and we will walk on the beach and look at the footprints in the sand while we walk. Some with sneaker patterns, some with toes, some with paws. We will walk and watch the wave patterns in the sand.

We will joke about Match.com descriptions of ourselves enjoying “long walks on the beach.” We will hop away from the waves if they lap too closely. We will come to the realization that if a person can’t be happy here, it might not be within his or her grasp anywhere. We will walk from one far end of the small beach to the other and back again and then we will climb on the rocks and then we will strip down to our bathing suits, set our towels on the furthest possible ledge and we will jump in and swim to the beach that is inaccessible on foot.

We will swim in the still, clear ocean water and we will wish we knew how to order room service to the hidden cove so that we could have a cup of coffee on the beach.

We will swim out of the cove and wrap up in our towels so that we don’t get our clothes wet and we will walk back down the beach to Diving Safari’s where we’ll pick up our S.C.U.B.A. gear and go to the boat. We will sail out around Monkey Rock and head to Catalina Island where we will dive. We’ll get back in time to meet the bus and we will watch the sun set over the ocean while we drink cocktails by the pool and do 6th grade math homework.

We will put on our Costa Rican perfume and we will eat ceviche and arroz con pollo for dinner.



We will go to Tamarindo and take surfing lessons.
We will go to the Playa Panama and body surf. We will take the kayaks around the peninsula and watch the sun set. We will learn to snorkel. We will go to the National Park and see monkeys and birds and snakes and take pictures. You will make fun of me for ogling the pool boy, not because he is so young, but because we are so, so old. We will play pool. We will go hiking. We will see a volcano spurt fire and ash. We will fish from a boat in the middle of the ocean and joke about the suicidal flying fish that are jumping near the boat and seem like they want to jump in. We will watch for dolphins and whales. We will play in a waterfall and wonder at how any one place can be so utterly perfect and not be heaven. We will decide maybe it is. We will decide Heaven needs calorie-free cheese cake.



And we will be gluttonous, not content to enjoy just these moments alone, but will instead fantasize about moving here and being beach bums and never going home.

And when you ask me what I do when I walk the beach alone, I will tell you that I think about how fun it will be when you’re here and I plan imaginary days in which I get to show you the things I think you’ll like. And you’ll laugh and say, “Yeah, right.”

But it will be true.


Volunteering at the Vet Clinic, walking through the real Costa Rica, Juxtaposition --- the Happiest Place with extreme poverty on Earth

We are over the hump. We have been here for 5 weeks and will be in Denver to work in 3. Kassidy is happy about that, but she’s also happy here. I’m not allowed to go into detail. But there is a boy. And he talked to her. Living here feels mostly normal now and I am relieved of the stress of being told every morning and every evening that she wants to go home. For that, the boy is on my daily gratitude list.



Yesterday, Kassidy volunteered at the spay and neuter clinic that comes into Playa del Coco once a month. I walked to the gym from there. Gross stuff is really not my thing. They put all the dogs under on the floor of the school at the same time and while the vet goes around neutering and spaying them, the volunteers follow cleaning their ears, removing ticks, spraying flea and tick treatment on them, spraying and cleaning their wounds and comforting them as they come out from anesthetic. Kassidy said she felt like a real vet. Most of the volunteers speak English, but most of the people who bring their dogs to the clinic speak only Spanish, so Kassidy became the translator. Seriously. Adult volunteers would bring her over to use her limited Spanish to explain how long the wait would be and what they would need to do to take care of the dogs when they took them home. She called me at the gym asking to take one of the puppies home.

Someone found one on the beach this morning and brought it in. It’s something crossed with a Chihuahua, so it’s very small. She can fit it in her carry on. She can take it home. It can live with her dad!

We returned the rental car and are now on foot. The gym is approximately 20 kilometers from here. Not walk-able. Not bike-able. But, I have found a couple of work-out buddies and car pool in with them until I solve the problem. I am quickly learning that while it is possible to live without a car in Playa del Coco, it is not possible when you live in Hermosa. There is a 7-11 size market, but no grocery store. There is a gym, but it has 3 machines and 2 of them don’t work. Right now, I’m not terribly concerned because I can walk to the beach from here. 9 minutes down the driveway. 10 more minutes to the beach. Once I get there, finding milk doesn’t seem too terribly urgent. Janet is checking on some rental car companies that she says won’t rip us off. She will call “ahorita.” Mmhmm.



Friday night we had some neighbors over for dinner. Faith and John. I can feel myself being drawn in, like water rises to its own level. There is a school in Playa Panama that they help support. They want to send 25 additional children to school next year, so they need to raise $5000.00 to build an additional room onto the school house and then they need to raise money for uniforms, shoes and textbooks for each of those children.



I just can’t… I can’t clean ear wax out of a stray dog’s ear. I can’t remove ticks and soak them in alcohol. I so admire Kassidy for having so much compassion for animals that she wants to take them home and that working on them makes her “feel like a vet.” But I have an over-active gag reflex. =) But I can do schools.



Schools are free here, but uniforms, shoes and texts are required. Many of the kids here don’t go to school because that stands in the way every year. I’m going down this week. I’ll take pictures.

Being on foot has given me the opportunity to SEE more than I did before. There are monkeys in the trees on our driveway. There are more houses and businesses on each street than I noticed before. There are people walking on the street who wave and say, “¿Como amaneció?”

I translate this in my head every time because it seems so funny and I have no idea what the response SHOULD be. How did you wake up? The answer is “bien” – (well). I think it might be something along the lines of “How did you sleep?” but if you think about it, “How did you wake up?” is more important. As opposed to, say, not waking up.



I generally stammer through my answer to this question because it always catches me off guard and I get distracted by trying to remember exactly how I did wake up this morning.



Anyway… back to the point. While walking from the elementary school (escuela) in Playa del Coco (a very, very hot connection of outdoor classrooms made of brick with holes in it to keep it cooler, but not real walls) to the gym about 15 minutes away, I passed fruit stands and a panaderia (bakery) and a rooster just hanging out at the side of the road.

An old man in the panaderia said I was pretty and that I had a good body and asked everyone else in the store to agree. I’m fairly certain that he began thinking he was talking behind my back and that everyone would get a good laugh out of him talking about the gringa. When I responded in Spanish, he said, “¿Hablo bien o hable mal?” which means literally, “Do I speak well or do I speak poorly” but means, “Am I right or am I wrong?” I told him he was right and thanked him. =) One of those lovely situations without a good answer. But I was on my way to the gym, so it was cool to walk to the gym in a “good body.”

I walked past the gym to the beach, about 10 minutes further because… I don’t know if you knew this… but there’s a beach here. And I like it. Walked a little on the beach before going to the gym and tried to go to the massage place to make an appointment. $29 massages if you buy 10. I had spoken with the owner only last week. The office is closed. The phone number is disconnected. I called the second number on the door. A woman answers and says the business has been closed down by the police. Nice. Moments away from giving away $290 to a business that immigration shut down. Let this be a lesson to you, Americans. You can not run a business in Costa Rica on a passport.

The word that came to mind on this walk was “juxtaposition.” There is a sign for resort condominiums next to, literally, a one room shack made of scrap wood and corrugated metal. There are beautiful houses with swimming pools – empty swimming pools and abandoned houses. My experience in other countries has been of segregation. The poor and the rich live in separate neighborhoods. Here, there are nice houses and even resort condominiums in gated communities next door to dilapidated houses. Many of the houses have bars over the windows and the doors and even enclosing their patios.

On our way home we see a man carrying two Dorado (Mahi Mahi). He holds them in large plastic bags by the tails, holding them aloft so they don’t hit the ground. They stretch from his shoulder to the ground, easily. I can buy one for probably 5000 colones (double it to make $10 and then reduce by 15%, so about $8.50), and I would… if I knew how to clean a fish.



This level of poverty has a normality to it, too. There is an article in a local magazine that says that there was a survey done all over the world assessing where the “Happiest Place on Earth” is, and it’s Costa Rica. They are mostly on bikes. If I lived in Coco, I would definitely use one for all transportation. But in Hermosa, we are in an enormous valley and I only see the mountain bikers in spandex riding them. Anyone else on a bike walks the bike up the hills. The pace of this place is slow and happy. There is music coming from some of the houses. There are roosters crowing from multiple houses. I feel out of place, but still, no one really seems to notice me or care that I am walking through their neighborhood. There is no obvious need for help as there is in Mexico. No one is begging. No one looks miserable or hungry (except the stray dogs). No one appears to need anything. This is where I want to shop. There is a fish market around the corner, a bakery, a farmer’s market. I buy a banana for 30 colones and receive change from my 100 colones that is no longer valid in Costa Rica. The government is asking that all of the small silver coins be returned to the banks. I imagine this will happen with pennies someday, too.



Funny thing, too. We went to the beach at Ocotal a couple of weeks ago and even took pictures and posted them. Turns out… that wasn’t Ocotal. We turned right instead of left and came back to the far end of Playa del Coco. We went to Ocotal yesterday. Nice beach. We’ll go back and re-publicize for it when we have a car again.



I LIKE it here. I try to have a daily rhythm and build habits, but each day is different and unpredictable because no one does what they say they will do when they say they will do it, so we are beholden to some external rhythm instead.



White Water Rafting, Poverty, Prisons, drought

Since I last wrote, I went White Water Rafting. I’m going to let the Facebook photo album and narration tell that story.



What I learned on the way, though, is that we were between two volcanoes and that each was in a separate biosphere. We were on the edge of a rain forest. As we drove from Liberia toward San Jose, we passed taxis that were waiting for the arrival of busses from San Jose. It was a Sunday and Sunday is visiting day at the prison in Liberia. There are 600 prisoners there.



On this Sunday (last Sunday) there is an article in the paper about starvation in Guatemala. We talk about the difference between Guatemala and Costa Rica. There is poverty here, but not misery. The government feeds the poor people. I learn later that this is a myth and there are plenty of homes here with absolutely no food in them. Guanacaste is the poorest region in Costa Rica, but also usually has the most tourists. Tourism is THE industry in Costa Rica. The paper this week also said that tourism is down 40% from this time last year. The lack of rain in this rainy season is killing the crops. This will be a very bad year for Costa Rica. I cannot spend this year oblivious on my veranda over-looking the ocean, and I know that. I will find a balance between using this opportunity to overcome my fears and live a life I never thought was possible when I was a little girl and also finding out if there is any knowledge or skill I have accumulated so far in my life that can be helpful here.



S.C.U.B.A, snorkeling, rumors

I also walked across the street to Diving Safaris and got in the pool with all of the scuba diving equipment on. I have the certification materials and after 3 more hours in the pool, taking a number of tests and doing 4 ocean dives, I will be certified and will be ready to go again. If you’ve done this or snorkeling before, you know that the biggest obstacle to overcome is the feeling that you are not supposed to be able to breathe underwater and will breathe in water and die. If it weren’t for the people who said they were coming and want to go scuba diving, I don’t think I’d be doing this… but…. I’ll be ready for you.

We are going down to Diving Safaris today to rent snorkeling equipment. I may need to add an underwater camera to my list of things to bring back from the U.S.

The woman who has given us a couple of rides into Playa del Coco to go to the gym and volunteer at the clinic told us yesterday that it’s a very small community here and everyone knows everyone else’s business. The only way to really get bad rumors started about you, though, is if you start hanging out with the Ticos. I am horrified. Seriously? Why? Why? Why would you COME here and then only hang out with other ex-pats????? To work on your English?

Let the rumor mill start grinding.