La Profundidad -- Misjudging the Depths.

I've arrived at the beach. And I'm staying for a month. There can be only one way to express it: an emoticon.

I am living in a town north of Playa de Flamingo, Portrero and I decided to walk back along the shoreline at dusk. Where I had miscalculated is that there are a series of creeks that flow into the ocean, whereas I was clad in a jeans and sneakers. I am definitely not long-jumper material. I tried to jump past one and got soaked to my thighs.

I hadn't met the mom of the household where I'm staying, and walked in the door soaked with an idiot grin. “Hola, me llamo Daniel, y no puedo juzgar la profundidad de quebratas.” So, we had a laugh.

Week 3: The Road from Pastyville -- Next Stop Playa de Flamingo

As promised for my innumerable female admirers, here is a snapshot from the Catarata San Luis. The snapshot misses about 80 feet more of waterfall. There was an arcoiris effect from the waterfall interacting with the flash- or else it's a Marian apparition, take your pick.

I'm getting ready to go to Playa de Flamingo (read “the beach“) in the province of Guanacaste on the Pacific coast, donde voy a brocearme un poco más, so I don't frighten anyone with my paleness. Scuba! Surfing! Jellyfish stings! ¡Vistas naturales y tambien esas vistas que están creadas por los cirjuanos plásticos! (Pardon, I can't be helped).

This week was pretty chill in Monte Verde. I went zip-lining again, tarzaning over the jungle canopy, held aloft by a steel cable. The thrill wore off a little on the second run, but it was still fun. I guess part of the adrenaline rush diminishes when you know what to expect, because on the first run I had felt ready to become a paracaidista and jump out of airplanes. The second, I was a little more ho-hum, I only felt like swimming with great white tiburones.

The first time I went with two other students from the school I'm going to, and one ducked out after seeing the first cable. The other woman was fine until we got to the heighest cable, for which you have to go up a steel tower about 150 feet high. She was looking at a support cable, which was practically vertical, and was about to freak out until a minute or two we saw the actual cable was going in the opposite direction, and had a good laugh.

The view on the tower was amazing, because it was situated on the continental divide, where there are fierce winds. It is also in a Cloud Forest, and as the name suggests, we were surrounded by a fog, such that the view resembled a Chinese nature painting of the creation of the world. When you go on that cable, there is only fog ahead of you for a while, like a cable out of nothingness.

Temblores y Cascadas: Que Mundo (Espanglish Edicion Especial)

Week 2 is nearly at an end. And it turns out that terra firma ain't quite so firma in these parts.
That whole ring o' fire thing.

This Saturday at about 2 in the morning, I had awoken a few minutes before the earth began shakin' its tocino -- un seis punto dos en la escala Richter. Luckily, the epicentro was far enough away that it only felt like a train was nearby, and nothing fell down or was damaged. (Which was fortunate for me, because I was out late and I don't think it would be pleasant to wet the bed at age 24. I haven't been in an earthquake before, but I wasn't perturbed much, I just got out of bed for three minutes and told my host family “Voy a tratar de dormirme” and fell asleep after about a minute.

There was a smaller aftershock I felt in the morning while sitting on the couch watching the news reports. Since they cut to a seismologists office right then and reported it, I began to think, “boy, I really need to get in better shape if my nalgas is a functioning seismograph.”
So on Saturday, I went on a 14 or 15 km hike with some other students at the language school who were kind enough to invite me. We hiked to a biological research station in a town called San Luis and took a tour and ate lunch at the facility. Some of the students at my language school work there, and gave an informal tour of some of the fauna and flora as we hiked along the Río San Luis. We saw a toad (zapo), a leaf-cutter colony of ants, a lime tree whose fruit looks exactly like an orange, and unexpectedly there is a crab that lives in the river.

We were hiking to a waterfall, and the trails were very difficult and craggy along and across the riverbed. My shoes were soaking wet by the time we reached the waterfall, and I along with everybody else had about wiped out several times.

The waterfall is a wonder to behold, jetting out from more than 100 feet. I can safely say I've never seen anything so beautiful.

Half in our group packed swimsuits in anticipation of joining the Tico Polar Bear Club. The water was at the very least 50-60 degrees or less, and you had to crawl down a rocky edge covered with slippery moss (all the while hoping the guides are right and there are no leeches or any other swimming companions). After a minute, though we acclimated to it, and marvelled at looking straight up. I wish I had a water-proof camera. I have a shot of me in my pasty-whiteness that I'll probably put here if it comes out.

Traigame la hamburguesa no rara, por favor.

He sobrevivido cinco días en Costa Rica. I have survived five days in Costa Rica of speaking Spanish, or more accurately Spanglish. Okay, survive is a bit of an exaggeration. The food is decent. Las mujeres son bellezas. I have been helped more than I would imagine by my host family in practicing Spanish, who are too nice. But when you're not going the “Do you speak American?” route, and actually trying to interact at a linguistic and personal level, it is a lot more to become accustomed to, and you have to steel yourself against the inevitable malpropisms of rapid fire speech. E.g., I ordered a “strange hamburger“ because I conflated “raro“ or “strange“ with not rare. Strangely, or not so strangely the hamburger that was sent out did taste strange, so perhaps my malaprop was a prediction.

In classes, they speak slow and clearly enough that I can understand pretty much every single word, but once you are outside of the classroom you realize how much speakers elide pronounciations, or if it's not that just generally don't always follow a text book dialogue.

I've never seen a greener place in my life than in Heredia, near the capital of San Jose. I would have pictures, but the computers in the internet cafe don't have interfaces for memory cards so that I could upload them. Walking to school each day I pass by caffeine in its original form of coffee plants. There are gates and bars around every house, and there is a multi-colored and many architectured mishmash of houses and businesses. Okay, my time on the computer is running out, so I'll just go ahead and say “hasta leugo” and spare the reader a mental slideshow.

But I think I'm progressing and tomorrow I'm going on a rafting expedition for the day, for my first adventure. Besides dodging cars in the mishmash of broken and disconnected sidewalks.

Packing up, Shipping out

Election day. And yes, I did my patriotic duty as an ill-informed, knee-jerk voter, and cast a ballot. Since I'm not into that whole party thing, I decided this year to write-in my favorite comedian of the year for president. I figure it's better to laugh with the president rather than at. So, I voted for Dave Chappelle (Partially, I'm curious if they have to enter it into the public record, e.g. 1 vote for Dave Chappelle. It would be interesting to tally all similar protest votes and find the most creative ones.). In my defense, I took the rest of the ballot seriously, exercising the .000000001 power I hold over this great land (at a cost to me of a few thousand dollars per year and the dark cloud of possible jury duty). But, hey you guys have to live with the election. I'm out of here. I'm playing ex-pat until I go broke. So that entails packing for the next three months, since I leave in five days. I'm not ready. Way not ready. I haven't gotten my "Inspector Oficial del los bikinis" T-Shirt silk-screened, nor my "Besame, soy gringo" T-Shirt. I haven't figured out my "frijoles y arroz" (beans & rice) weight-loss plan and how to parlay it into millions. I am, however, prepared for getting lost in the jungles with my three dollar whistle-compass-thermometer from Walmart. Good old Sam Walton will help me out of the heart of darkness. Ah, enought blogchat. Costa Rica, vengo!!!!!!!!!!!!