¡Manuel Antonio!

My dear friends,

I kind of suck at keeping up with this whole blog business. Therefore, I will write a few catch-ups, and hopefully that will count for having documented my time here in Costa Rica.

Before coming to Costa Rica, I had thought about planning all my weekend travel in advance, to ensure that I could do what I was interested in without outside input. Upon consideration, however, I thought it might be smart to wait until I got here, to see what sort of travel secrets I might uncover. Turns out, I was right to do so! Originally I wanted to spend my first weekend in Puerto Viejo de Talamanca, a really chill-sounding town on the Caribbean coast. The eastern coast is where the African ex-slaves settled after working on the banana and coffee plantations as free laborers. So I thought the mix of cultures would be fascinating, and I loved the idea of kayaking through the coastal mangrove swamps. This, however, was not in the cards for me (this time, at least.) Puerto Viejo is about six hours away from San José, and with my limited amount of time on the weekends and the danger of third world countries after the sun sets, I decided to search for closer, if not greener, pastures.

For my first weekend my wonderful host family, consisting of my mamita, Flory and my hermanita, Michelle, invited me to go with them to a place called Manuel Antonio, a national park that is well known for its beaches. Then I found out it was a "gay paradise", and I was in! I was flattered that they liked me well enough to want to spend the weekend with me. On Friday afternoon, I left early from class and we took a four hour bus through the mountains, the farmland, along the coast, to the village of Manuel Antonio. The first night we met an awesome Colombian woman named Jovvana (Yoh-ah-nah), who has since become my tía (aunt) Jovvana in my Costa Rican family. She joined us on our adventures!

Interestingly, the entry fee for gringos into the national park is way more expensive than it is for nationals. Flory tried to get me in as her daughter, but alas, my pasty whiteness gave me away... The walk from the entrance of Manuel Antonio led us through the forest, where I saw capucin monkeys for the first time (they´re like the monkey in "Pirates of the Caribbean"), a wee green frog, a snake with a cream-colored belly and an emerald green back, some bats, lots of racoons, and some SLOTHS. Kill me now. Sloths in life are just as horrific as they are on the National Geographic shows. The monkeys are cute though :)

Manuel Antonio has three beaches within the national park, with the third being by far the most spectacular. Don´t get me wrong, the other two are also lovely, but the third one has the animals, the white sand, and more places to explore! The presence of wildlife has its price though - we had to fend off a gang of monkeys, who get rather aggressive when they want your food. One of them stole a small packet of cream-filled cookie sandwiches from another group, then ran up into a tree to eat them in peace. He pulled out each cookie, one by one, then pried the cookies apart, licked off the cream, then dropped the cream-free cookies onto the man sitting beneath the tree. The guy´s face was priceless when he realized with this cookie rain was coming from...

That night, after a day of swimming in water the temperature of bathwater and watching monkeys cavort in the almond trees lining the beach, we went out to the public beach to watch the sun go down. It was quick, because of Costa Rica´s proximity to the equator, but very beautiful. The next day, given the ruby red status of my skin, I opted to stay in the shade during the few hours we spent at the beach. We took the bus back to San José in the afternoon, and that was the end of my first weekend in Costa Rica... or so I thought. I woke up around midnight, feeling like I was going to die, or at least puke up all my internal organs. But one day of yuckiness and the loss of the pinkness in my hair in exchange for a weekend at a national park? I´ll take that trade any day.

Things I learned: 

1. Those birds gracefully wheeling through the sky are not hawks - they are vultures.

2. Salt water is the enemy of unnatural hair colors. My streaky pinkness VANISHED during my day in the sea.

3. Probably not news to anyone, but the sun close to the equator? It´s hot! And carrying a backpack on sunburned skin is nobody´s idea of a good time.

4.  I wouldn´t mind if sloths were an endangered species.

Oh and 5. Costa Rica is awesome.

Happy adventuring!

*Olivia

Travel blurb for Framingham State University..

My dear friends,

I got an email from the Chair of Modern Languages (who was also one of my teachers last semester), asking me if I would write a paragraph about my experience in Costa Rica. I assume it´s because they want to get people excited about languages, travel; all that good stuff. Anyway, this is what I wrote:

Mark Twain once wrote: “Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things you didn´t do than by the ones you did do. So cast off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade wind in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.” It is because of this very sentiment that I chose to spend the month of January in Costa Rica, studying Latin American literature. I am currently enrolled in the PBTL program through the DGCE program to become a high school Spanish teacher, and I am using this course to help fulfill a requirement. I feel so lucky that I was able to have this wonderful experience - Costa Rica is a beautiful land of contrasts, and a living testament to the incredible majesty of the planet we inhabit. In my short time here I have seen everything from volcanoes to cloud forests, but the best part about this adventure has been getting to know the people in this tiny country. The phrase used here is ¡Pura vida!, which means “pure life”, and it really is. Through my time here, I have grown as a person, and for that I will be forever grateful. The opportunity to study and travel abroad has immeasurable benefits and should not be missed, even if you´re not studying another language. Exposure to other countries and cultures gives you such great perspective and transforms you more than anything else.

Happy adventuring and ¡Pura vida!

*Olivia

Pura Vida!

My dear friends,

2400 miles and a million worlds away from dear old Boston lies the magical land of Costa Rica; a country where fresh papaya in the middle of winter is a matter of course and the only tool you need for yard work is a machete.  The buildings are a little crumbly, the insects are scary, and there aren’t “rules” of the road so much as “suggestions”.  The people are warm and loving with their friends and families (including temporarily adopted members, like myself), the food is fresh and delicious, and the variety of biodiversity is enough to send you reeling.  The Spanish is also beautiful here, though they do have a tendency to abbreviate words, like saying “la u” instead of “la Universidad”.  

My school, Conversa, is situated on top of a hill in a compound that used to be a dairy farm, accessed  by ascending a winding dirt road that is bordered on either side by jungle and a drop of a few feet.  I found myself thinking on the first day that the roads would be impossible in the winter… before remembering that, of course, snow has never made an appearance here.  This is the tropics, after all.  The campus is surrounded by bougainvillea, coffee plants, banana trees, tropical pines, mandarin trees, palms, bamboo, and a vast array of other flora that I couldn’t hope to identify.  Across the valley from Conversa are a few scattered homes, along with some horses and cows.   Totally normal here, as are the street and pet dogs that wander the streets. 

The student body here is varied and appears to be constantly changing.  For example, on my first day there were only five students, including me.  But then things took a turn for the worst when about 20 students (from Massachusetts, ironically) arrived.  To give you an example of their group dynamic, their conversation on the bus ride back to the town center after the first day of classes consisted of their plans for that night.  It was a tough decision: do they go to the local gringo bar, Amigo, or do they go to… Applebee’s?  Applebee’s won out, apparently.  Through their excessive loudness and their near-mockery of the Costa Rican culture and language, they represent all that is bad about America. 

Not to be a total bitch, but I am the opposite, and I am very thankful for that.  On my fifth day here, I am still constantly amazed by my incredible surroundings.  I took a break from writing a few minutes ago and went up to the comedor (dining room) to get some delicious coffee, and on the way back I found this enormous caterpillar!  It was longer than my pinkie and its back was covered with long, thick hairs that looked almost like spines.  I read that there are venomous caterpillars here, so I kept my distance; much like I kept my distance from a Yellow Crab Spider I saw yesterday.  It looked like something out of a nightmare!  And I certainly checked my bed last night before crawling in.  This is a nice evening ritual to complement my morning ritual of checking my shoes for scorpions.

This weekend I am bound for Manuel Antonio National Park with my fabulous host family (my mamita, Flory, and my hermanita, Michele.)  It’s on the Pacific coast and well known for having magnificent beaches, most of which are also populated with white-faced monkeys, like the kind in “Pirates of the Caribbean”.  I plan on trying fresh ceviche, swimming in bath-warm water, and going exploring.  I can’t wait!  

As wonderful as this adventure has been, however, it would be a gagillion times better if my love was here to share it with me.  But I’ve got five days behind me, and lots of things to do in the days that remain.  Happy adventuring!

*Olivia