Finally, the past couple of days, the sun decided to stick around for the majority of the day making it nice to get out and enjoy this beautiful place.
I’ve been very happy to enjoy a good amount of amazing fresh papaya thanks to the papaya tree in the yard of the police station. I don’t know how they retrieved this papaya, as the fruit grows at the very top of the tree some 20 feet high, but I’m glad they did, as it is so delicious. I’m betting they waited for it to fall.
Wednesday night, Gabe and I were not able to truly have our first class teaching together as many of the officers were out and about doing business, and there was also a local soccer game on television, which guarantees less students in class. Nonetheless, it was nice for Gabe to get to visit with the officers and get more acquainted. I enjoyed listening to Game explain to the officer Mauricio the game of American Football and baseball while adding in my own few tid bits here and there during the conversation, plus I got a pretty good Spanish practice in. I felt pretty proud when Mauricio and a couple of the other officers explained to Gabe that my Spanish has improved tremendously since when I first arrived, although their explaining teasing while explaining how bad my Spanish was when I first got here was bit embarrassing.
I was also surprised and glad that the local church did not have their usual service this Wednesday night. Usually, during Wednesday night classes I am have stressed out the entire class from the horrible screams and shouts from this church behind the station. No matter how many times I hear their screams, I always feel the need to go see if everything is OK or ask the police to go check it out because something must be going wrong. I don’t know what kind of church it is, but man, do they like to yell during their services.
I also finished the book The Help, which is an excellent read. I would certainly recommend it, especially if you enjoyed the recent film based on the book. The movie really followed the plot of the book closely; however, as with all movies based on books, the book is much better. The author Kathryn Stockett wrote the book alternating from the perspectives of three of the primary characters Minny, Skeeter, and Abilene, meaning as a reader, you get to know the characters and have their experiences in much more detail.
Thursday morning Gabe and I with lucky timing were able to enjoy the morning with a nice run together. I was happy to share with him my favorite street to run, show him the nearby river, the track, and get to know each other a bit better. For lunch, he and I and my friend Sanne went out for a special lunch. Sanne had told me about a really good Chinese restaurant in town that I had wanted to visit for a while. Although I really do enjoy the rice and beans and fruit and veggies I eat at the station every day, it was extremely good to have a meal of a different variety. Sanne and I split a delicious spicy veggie and tofu dish along with some veggie noodles. This Chinese outing was certainly the most expensive meal I’ve had at $13, but the huge portions meant I got two meals out of the visit.
Yesterday also included another bi-weekly get together of the Fortuna Social Club. I wanted to be sure to go and invite Gabe so he could get to know some of the other local gringos. It is also nice to see some familiar faces and welcome some new Americans to the town. I always like to get to know someone better and hear new stories. Yesterday I had a very interesting conversation with one of the members named William. I had to hear his story after he mentioned he had lost track of how many countries he has visited and lived in as well as the fact that he has citizenship in 3 different countries. To say the least, his story of growing up throughout Africa with his missionary parents, coming to the U.S. at age 16 to Springfield, MO, of all places, to attend Evangel University where unfortunately he had a bad experience and thus went out to become a successful business man starting at the age of just 17, later going to Canada to be a praised actor in that market and having small extra roles in major American films, and now has a travel housing company based in Costa Rica, Italy, and Thailand, was very interesting.
Thursday night class was once again a much-unorganized night for class. I have a feeling that the fact that the normal supervisor of this group who has the best English of all the officers and usually gets everyone focused on class is not around this week does not help with the matter. We were able to get a handful of the officers to introduce themselves to Gabe in English and have some conversation and question asking in English, but this was short-lived as the conversation easily slipped into just Spanish. Nonetheless, it was a very interesting night as I got to learn more about some of the officers, especially concerning their families. For example, I learned that the officer Mauricio is one of seven children that were born over a span of over 30 years all by the same mother, but only two of the children had the same father. He explained that his mom was born in a very poor rural town and was never educated and could not read or write, thus this life is often the only choice for such women. Another officer, Berta, was one of 12, that’s right 12 children, all from the same mother and father. Berta, who is 35, has a daughter that is 16 years old and a little sister that is 12 years old, thus, the niece is 4 years older than her aunt is. And from what they say, this is not that uncommon here in Costa Rica. I can’t even imagine being Berta’s mother and living 20 years of my life either pregnant or with a newborn baby. We also had a discussion on some vulgar words and their meanings in English. It was funny how the women told me to cover my ears as this conversation came up, and I realized that unlike most people that learn a foreign language and learn the bad words first, I really do not know but a couple of bad words in Spanish. I know a couple of officers that I’m sure would help me out with that vocabulary if I really need to one day.
Last night’s dinner was pretty good as it included some mashed potatoes with cilantro, a first that I have seen here in Costa Rica, and the officer named Carlos made a delicious pineapple and raisin dessert that went along well some yummy Costa Rican coffee.
I enjoyed this beautiful morning and taking advantage of always waking up early by going with my friend Lindsay to have another great yoga session with my yoga-instructing friend Dee. I had wanted to go back for another yoga session but do to the recent rain that was impossible. Once again, Dee’s yoga session was extremely enjoyable. I was also excited that Lindsay and I did well for “new yogi’s” according to Dee. Furthermore, the extremely kind and open Dee invited to me to a delicious cup of coffee and a great conversation to end the session. I was kicking myself a bit as I forgot to take my camera to take photos of the nest of baby humming birds which have grown quite a bit in just a week. While performing many of the yoga moves in the beautiful courtyard of the hostel, I was more than excited to get to watch the gorgeous hummingbird mom fly around- I’d say it, the pretty flowers, the trickle of the fountain, and Dee’s relaxing music definitely added to my “zen” during the yoga session
While sitting on the couch of my small apartment writing this post in my apartment while my host dad Andres watches “Storage Wars” on A&E, we shared a laugh. For a good 15 minutes I attempted to kill a mosquito flying around, and during this attempt, a commercial came on for the mosquito repellent “Off” and asked the question “Do you have problems with mosquitoes?” I then learned that the term “irony” is very similar in Spanish- “ironic.”
Speaking of ironic, also while writing this post, the group of young kids that live in the neighboring apartments came to the door to show me something special. The oldest boy surprisingly knew my name and told me to come see the little bird in his hand, a baby humming bird! Although I felt a bit upset and guilty that these little kids had the fragile birds out of their nest which could not be good for the health of the baby birds, it was incredible to see these amazing baby birds up close, and also meant I could get some really good photos which you can also see on the blog. Certainly something I will not forget getting to see.
For the rest of this afternoon I plan on taking advantage of the perfect running weather and planning a class for the officers that hopefully will take place. And this weekend there are some plans in the work for a visit to the home of the station’s secretary William and possible pool time!
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