August 11

Hola

Apologies for delayed update- internet access here isn't exactly ubiquitous, the connections are slow, and the one internet cafe is usually full.

But who cares when you've got pura vida!


Pura vida is a Costa Rican expression that basically sums up their philosophy of life, which is pretty much equvilant to gather thy rosebuds while ye may, or carpe diem, with as little hassle as possible involved.

Our padre tico, Henry, says Pura Vida! at least 5 times a day.

We saw a whale!! Debs and I went parasailing over the coast and we saw a mother whale with her calf. She jumped so high out of the water-just this immense and beautiful creature. I felt so lucky that the world revealed that to me.

Our guide steered our boat over to where the whale was (they come up for air about every 4 minutes or so) and we got several glimpes of the amazing animal.

Later when we got back to school we told some people in the office about what we saw, and one older tico insisted that it couldn't have been a whale, because the water was too warm for them (bellanas son immensos, fue un dolfino..........) and Katy, another tica, started arguing with him in rapid Spanish that there were too whales, so the argument bascially sounded like (Bellena, Dolfino, Bellena, Dolfino) it was pretty funny. It was definitely a whale, though.

Yesterday a monkey swung across the coconut trees in our front to the telephone pole across the street. I love their curly little tails.

We also saw a woodpecker pecking at a coconut, and Henry cut a coconut down for us so we could drink the coconut water, too. That will be the last time Debs and I drink any, I think

Deborah and I went to Playa Conchal today, which is a beautiful stretch of coast where the sand is comprised of zillions of broken shells that clear blue water washes over. I found several shells that I hope to make necklaces out of and Deborah and us both are pretty much completely roja. Our tico family finds this incredibly amusing.

The whole family really likes Deboarah and jokes with her a lot. The family is just amazing...we keep trying to get our madre tica to stop doing things for us, but she won't!! She does our laundry all of the time and she cleans constantly, but the worst part is that she won't let us pour our own water or cereal. She does it all with a smile and I think if anything she'd be offended if we insisted to do our own dishes.

One day her daughter got sick and so we told her not to worry about cooking dinner, that we'd just go out to eat, and she really did get a little bit offended. SO different. Next week is Mother's day, which is national holiday here (i.e., banks close, schools close, etc) so we're going to do something special for her.

Deboarah got her hair cut in a little beauty shop next to our house and let's just say it was an interesting experience.

Everyday we get more conversant---debs is talking a lot more now and I don't have to think about it as much. We need more time, though!

See everyone next Saturday!

Love,
Sara & Debs