Cauliflower and the Amish

“Life is the art of drawing without an eraser.” - John W. Gardner

I got up this morning after a night of somewhat restless sleep; you would not believe how noisy the rainforest is at night! It is going to take some getting used to. Car alarms and buses? No problem, but these damn geckos kept me up half the night.

When I got up, I decided against taking a shower as I was going to head downtown to the farmer’s market and knew I would just need a shower again as soon as I got home. I am trying to conserve where I can because clearly it won’t be in water intake or toilet flushing.

Instead of taking the bus I decided to walk downtown on the dirt road that used to be the only road between Quepos and Manuel Antonio. I thought it would be a nice way to see a little more of my surroundings and get a little exercise. I would like to point out what a courageous move this was considering the heat. The dirt road to downtown was an obstacle course, but with a beautiful view of the water that made it worth the sweat dripping down my back and almost broken ankle.

When I got downtown, I went to the farmer’s market and I bought fresh produce from kind merchants who were very patient with my lack of understanding of the colones (Costa Rican currency). I could do the dollar to colones conversion no problem, but couldn’t understand the numbers that they were saying, which were usually in the high hundreds to thousands. Sadly, all the years of watching “The Count” on Sesame Street did not pay off, as I didn’t buy a single thing that was uno colone.

To my surprise, there was cauliflower at the farmer’s market. Apparently the people on the “number one selling language cd’s” knew what they were talking about after all. Though I still feel as though “coliflor” should not be high on the list of things to teach in the first lesson.

The most surprising thing to me, however, was that there were Amish people there selling breads, jams, pies etc. I am used to seeing Amish people when I am at my parent’s house in Pennsylvania, but Caucasian Amish people in Costa Rica? Now that was a surprise. I would have taken a picture of them, but if I remember correctly they don’t believe in photographs, and I didn’t want to be disrespectful, especially because I hear their pies are to die for.

My afternoon ended by lying in my pool for a few hours reading my book. Rough life, I know. However, I would like to tell you that tonight after the sun went down; I did my first Costa Rican Crossfit workout on my front porch. Let me say this, while the sun was down, the heat and humidity weren’t… and if I had balls, I would have sweat them off. Just one more reason I am glad I don’t have them… the first of which being they are kinda weird and ugly.

Ok, off to bed, tomorrow I have to locate my school as I start Spanish classes on Monday. I can’t wait to begin learning the language as I am desperate to communicate with the Ticans in their native language. While they are very generous and gracious, and most speak English, I want to totally immerse myself in this Costa Rican experience.

As you can see, my first few days have been fantastic and I am already so glad that I moved here. Best decision I ever made, aside from bringing the floatie with drink holders… now that was genius.