Easy Living in Costa Rica

May 7, 2010

Hello everyone! Chell and I are both going to write in the blog... so we will sign our names after whoever wrote. We Miss everyone dearly. Keep in touch!

We arrived after flying from 8am till 10pm Costa Rica time, to Nick and Dawn (the people we are staying with) promptly at the airport in San Jose. They took us home and showed us our very own bedroom (w/ a tv) and bathroom, and then we passed out.
The next day we spent hanging out trying to catch our bearings, relizing what we are doing. We walked to the Costa Rican Walmart (Hiper Mas). Which definitely felt like home, other than they use colones which is about 500 to $1 , and I still cannot do the conversion. After Hiper Mas we went with Dawn and the kids (Hayden and Arianna) to the Terra Mall and walked around and rented some movies. They have more shoes stores in Costa Rica than I have ever seen. Probably about 5 to 1 in the mall. They love their shoes!.
It has been nice staying with Dawn and Nick because they have lived here for about 4 years and have told us so much about this country, that otherwise just traveling we may have not learned. Oh and the cable television, American phone line, internet, private bath, and priate taxi driver has also been really nice:) So we are not even close to roughing it! Maybe in Peru:)

Love ya
xoxo
Lindsay

May 10, 2010

Hola, friends and family. The easy living continues. Still doing a good amount of lounging at Nick and Dawn's (their hammock is addicting) and getting prepared for a couple trips around Costa Rica. Visited Volcano Irazu, ~11,500 feet above sea level, and walked in the crater. The volcano is no longer active so you can go into the area where lava used to spew. We could see above the clouds at the top of the volcano and not being acclimated to the elevation wipes you out. On the way down, we picked up a little boy who was waving us down with his mother and gave him a ride to school. Our Costa Rican pirate tour guide (Byron) put it well when he said, "This I do not agree with." Also went to Cartago and saw the Basilica, the ruins and a new museum about the town. There was an earthquake 100 years ago (almost exactly- May 4, 1910) with 700 fatalities in 16 seconds. The museum is in the old jail and even though all the info was in Spanish, we could understand the devastating effect of the earthquake. The Basilica in town is built right on a spring with holy water- something about a girl finding a statue of the Virgin Mary on a rock for 7 days and on the seventh day water sprang from the rock. Every year, 1.5 million people make a pilgrimage to Cartago to visit this site.

Some random Costa Rican facts you may enjoy:
-Most homes/businesses do not have addresses and there is no postal system.
-Craig told us about this and we tried it... Coke with rum can be purchased in a can. I liked it... Lindsay not so much.
-10 grams of cocaine is considered personal use.
-Because of traffic issues, depending on what the last number of your license plate is, you cannot drive into San Jose on certain days of the week. For example, Dawn's last plate number is 0 and she can't drive into the city on Tuesdays.

-They turn off the water for ~5 hours while they clean the water storage tank once per week.

-Burial space is rented.

-Public schools have 2 shifts for children so they only go half day. This is due to overcrowding in the schools.

-The common terms for Costa Rican men and women are ticos and ticas, respectively. We're gringos and gringas.

Miss you all. Will keep you updated.

Caio,

Michelle