The teacher is Arturo (for when I refer to him in the future) and he is a brilliant tico! He is so smart about so many things, I can’t remember if I have mentioned him yet or not. Anyway, I like listening to him speak about anything. Anyway, he organized a radio program to come and follow us around and they were also taking video of what we were doing. I got to do a little interview, my Spanish was most likely awful!! So these guys were following us around with a camera and microphone and talking with Arturo a lot. Our first stop was at a really small beach on the island, literally it was about 5 feet from the water to the foliage (I guess it was some sort of tropical forest). We took a brief hike through on a trail about 5 inches wide. We are all wearing flip flops and shorts…. No bueno for walking through where the bushes move because angry animals live beneath them. We saw beetles and spiders (wah hoo) and could definitely hear a very loud hum of some sort of bee hive really high up. I didn’t like walking there as you could imagine. We got back and ate lunch on the beach. Then we loaded up onto the boats again and arrived at our final destination. The place looked like anything I would expect to find in Costa Rica. Dirty stone building, a bar full of cervezas, a concrete dance in the disco etc. Nothing shocking, even the cabins didn’t seem to be as bad as he had mentioned. I was wrong. The cabins were terrible, Besides the lavish comforts they provided (none at all) they also provided the protection from other bugs with two HUGE wasps nests just outside of our door. There was one bathroom with a hose of cold water. Truthfully, it was like camping. I do enjoy camping from time to time….But I would have been prepared for camping. Besides, my initial reaction was “this is going to be an adventure, I am going to see a totally different culture. One that is very poor! Potentially the poorest part of Costa Rica, and all of this will be worth it”. I was very interested in walking through the marketplace, seeing the neighborhoods, seeing the schools etc. Arturo had made such a big deal about it all, that I thought we would be plucked right in the middle of it all. No. Friday afternoon consisted of a boat ride, we fished (by we, I mean the other boats, we didn’t have fishing equipment on our boat), we swam, we took gifts to poor children (for about 25 minutes), we came back and changed our clothes and were ready to eat dinner by 6pm. Arturo did prepare some great food. He made two kinds of fish, Sea bass and something else good but I don’t know what it was, and small shrimp and huge shrimp. They were amazing! I hadn’t tasted shrimp that fresh in my life! Yummm. Then the dinner tables were removed and the space that remained became the dance floor. The rest of the group proceeded to get wasted with island ticos. I did partake in two Imperial Cervezas….livin large! When it was time for bed, I was feeling pretty tired and expected to fall right to sleep….definitely didn’t fall right to sleep. I think I saw the sun come up before I actually slept. I cant say for sure, but I think my limits were tested on this trip. I was already disappointed with the lack of diversity on this trip…had there been some sort of amazing experience, I think I would have been more “okay” with the rooms. All I kept thinking was “what am I doing here?!” I woke up around 6:45am and figured I had gotten about 1.5 hours of sleep. I love waking up with sandpaper eyes! I went ahead and stayed up, and was surprisingly chipper! How could I not be with Alison, she is such a sweetie! She is an early riser like me! The other two were definitely zonked out for a while longer-lucky bitches slept all night!!!!!!! We ate breakfast around 8:30am and got on the boats at 11am to catch the 12:30 Ferry back to Puntarenas. By this time I was very antsy and fidgety just wanting to go home. I should have known something was wrong…I am usually more go with the flow type. What was happening was that I was getting a really bad fever. I was sick in bed all night with terrible body aches and a temperature that seemed to be pretty bad. I was hot and cold every five minutes. It sucked. For the first time, I missed HOME. I was given a prescription acetimetifin that would reduce the fever and help me to rest. I took it with some egg drop soup Ingrid had delivered. I felt ok and was looking forward to sleeping off the fever. For 3 hours I laid in bed tossing and turning. I was listening to my big fat greek wedding which was playing on my computer. Ingrid came to check on me and was alarmed that my fever was not only still present, but worse. I had to wait another hour but at that time I was able to take 2 more of the pills. Ingrid had towels of alcohol and was putting them on my head and neck and stomach. Eventually the pills began to work and I was able to relax. She left and I slept off and on through the night. The next day, Sunday, I slept almost all day, till around 5pm. No fever but NO energy. It was the strangest thing. Some type of tropical GRIPE (the flu). I am so glad I fought it off! Okay, next time I get sick I promise not to go into so much detail….here are some pics of the weekend…some of it was fun but the trip overall and my sickly end SUCKED!!!!!!!!!!
Okay these are the little boats we had to ride in forever!
This is a sea snail
This is Arturo thinking he is Jesus...we found a rock in the water, it was pretty cool, other people got better shots.
Me and the chickas on the boats
The classy Bar ;)
Getting directions from some cute little doggies
Street on the Island...just dirt. The homes were pretty cool, we did see a TV in one. They aren't totally primitive!
The kiddies we gave presents to. They were cute. One thing I dislike about this culture is that NOBODY says THANK YOU! It is so weird to me, not just on the island, everywhere in Costa Rica and it makes me crazy!
This is the shore in front of the cabins and the bar place.
No comments:
Post a Comment