Panama

Bridge at Sixaola

We went on an adventure to Panama, a trip timed around the expiration of our 90 day tourist visa. By being out of Costa Rica for 3 days, we could renew our visa for another stint and see another Central American country. We drove for about 4 hours to get to Sixaola, the border town in Costa Rica, parked our car in a lot, checked out of CR border patrol, and ambled our way precariously carrying our bags and the baby across the famous bridge between the countries going over the Sixaola River. The gaps in the bridge were large enough in some parts for small children to go through, making us hold our breath to the other side. Fortunately, we and our stuff made it. Then, after we found out about an hour's jump in the time, we grabbed a taxi van that whizzed us to Almirante in just the nick of time to catch a water taxi, ie., skiff holding 30 people, to Isla Colon, where the town of Bocas del Toro is. The 30 minute skiff ride felt a little uneasy, without a lifejacket for the baby, lots of wave action, and impending darkness, but we made it to Bocas all in one piece.

Bocas is obviously a tourist oriented place, and unfortunately, it was rainy the whole time we were there, so we didn't venture out too far. We did go up to a beach that is known for all of its colorful starfish but it was too stormy, so we had lunch, kids played on the hammocks for a while, and we returned. Overall, during our very short stint in Panama, it seemed like there was more poverty, judging by the housing and children hustling work for money. Interestingly, there has been such an American influence that you can only get American dollars out of the ATMs and was the only currency used, except for coins in Panamanian balboas.
We were told at border patrol in CR that when we returned we'd have to show a return ticket out of CR but after a lot of worrying about not having that in our possession, they didn't ask to see anything of the sort when we came back into the country.

When we were in Panama about to cross the bridge back into Costa Rica, we saw an airplane flying over banana fields on the CR side, spraying what we presume was insecticide over vast areas. And, as were driving, we went through a silent group of hundreds of farm workers walking on the road together, perhaps returning to the bananas after lunch. We wondered about the effect that the spraying was having on their health and had once heard about an international lawsuit against one of the big banana producers due to the illnesses that the insectides were producing in worker. It appeared that Dole and Chiquita own vast amounts of land in this part of the country.

An ice cream cone with a Zena cherry on top

Girl selling yuca from Almirante. We paid her $1 to take a picture.

Around Home

View from our deck

Our resident "torre alba" (white tower) volcano

Asa and Eva at the soda

A friend Asa found after lunch at nearby restaurant

Saucer sized hibiscus

Eva and Rebeca's coffee yield from some coffee bushes on our property

Tim singing with children at school. "I'm gonna jump down, turn around, pick a sack o' coffee" is a class favorite.

Halloween

It's been a good while since I posted anything to our blog, so in an effort to catch up I'll go back to Halloween.....Yes, Halloween is celebrated here, not throughout CR but on the local agricultural research campus of CATIE, where expatriot Americans are in plenitude, and now even busloads of Tico kidsfrom Turrialba come to participate. All the kids and some of the adults were impressively costumed. Our base camp was Rachelle and Fabrice's house, where we ate fajitas and gabbed. We took Eva, the morpho butterfly, trick or treating to a few houses, but it was raining cats and dogs, so our motivation quickly dwindled to continue beyond a few neighboring houses. Asa, the mummy, on the other hand, joined the big kids in a whirlwind tour of a huge stretch of the campus. By the time he got back, his toilet paper bandages had dissolved and he was drenched but jolly with a bucket full of damp candy.

The Morpho and the Mummy

Festooned Friends (Note ketchup and mustard duo)



Soggy mummy with candy loot



Making Tamales

Christmas Eve day included much excitement. Jay and Erica and their kids had arrived late the day before, it rained hard the night before, and we awoke to a little landslide of mud from the dirt hill behind the house. Fortunately, the dogs we were caring for were not hurt. Unfortunately, our gardener, Alberto, had to spend most of the holiday cleaning up the mess.

Then, it was off to make tamales at Rebeca's house. There is much ado around tamale making in Costa Rica. Tico tamales are not like Mexican tamales. The basic filling includes corn mush mixed with mashed potatoes, then a small piece of pork or chicken is added with a slice of red pepper and one of carrot, then a sprinkle of peas. Some people put anchovies or raisins in theirs but this is considered a tamale on the fringe. All of this is wrapped up in a carefully processed banana leaf, smoked or dipped in boiling water to soften, and tied into neat little packets of two.Then the tamale packets are put into boiling water to cook for several hours. Ticos like to eat tamale with coffee in the afternoon It is a long process and an important tradition around Christmas. Rebeca invited us to partake in this event at her house on Christmas Eve.

My brother, Jay, and his family had just arrived in Turrialba and were able to join us for a bit of tamale making between diagnosing a tenacious skin rash and doing last minute Christmas shopping. We got to Rebeca's house a little late but set in right away with the process of making the masa. She had already bought the pork and had the carrots and peas ready for insertion. Then it was a matter of assembling all of this, learning the art of wrapping and tying these little presents in banana leaves. They are tied in a pack of two and that pack is called a "piñon". After the tamales boiled for a couple of hours on Rebeca and Roy's big wood stove, we all partook in eating the first ones with a cup of strong coffee. This is how many Ticos eat their tamales. We were so honored to have spent the day in Rebeca's home, and we had tamales in our freezer until May!

Landslide on Christmas Eve

Making the "masa" for tamales

Tamales wrapped in banana leaves and ready for boiling

Roy, Rebeca, and some of our crew at tamales production central

Zena looking at "Pi Pi"

Zachary and Asa tucked in watching Spanish TV

Festival de las Luces

The Festival of the Lights is an annual tradition in Turrialba during December. This is the dreariest month in Turrialba with lots of rain, fog, and chill and for the night of the festival there was a constant drizzle. All during the day of the parade, parents from our school helped create a fairy woodland scene on a float with the school name, all lit up with tiny lights. I put in a few hours stapling burlap to a magic tree trunk and skiriting the float with paper greenery but several other moms spent much more time than I preparing the float. They really wanted it to be a success because apparently the year before, the truck on which they rode, stopped and couldn't start again right in front of the mayor's stand at town center. It was very embarrassing. This year it was a success, and all the paper objects held up amazingly well in the drippy weather. The kids sang Christmas songs that Tim had taught them, although it was hard to hear their little voices over the giant generator and loud music of a huge truck float right ahead of us.

A funny little story...I bought a little nativity scene for our kids, and more than anyone, Zena, loved sticking her face right into the scene and declaring all the four-footed animals in the manger as "dog-dog". Then, she would pick up the tiny ceramic Baby Jesus and carry him around in her fist. The morning I was to take off to help with the school float, Baby Jesus was last seen being toted around by her, and then he disappeared and everyone was looking for him high and low but to no avail. Meanwhile I had nursed her and off I went to float making. About two hours after helping with the float, I noticed a hard lump protruding from inside my bra, and when I dug around a little, who should I find but Baby Jesus! I had a good laugh and so did everyone else at home when I told them what happened.

Family Walk

A few photos from a family walk we went on from our house down a little road nearby last Sunday.






Pig friends--photo by Asa




Unknown beautiful bird




Masquerading duck, perhaps sitting on eggs



Adios Pájaros y Tía

The other day as we were busy getting children ready for a school day; breakfast, teeth brushed, lunches ready, sun lotion on, we heard a loud whomp--a sound that has become all too familiar and sickening to us, of birds crashing into our windows. We looked outside to see a dove type bird laying on the deck, its last life force making its body quiver. Just then, our beautiful housekeeper, Rebeca came along. She picked up the bird and stroked its back. She blew on its neck and near its tail feathers but its head was hanging to one side. Clearly, it had broken its neck. Asa and Eva watched with hope it would revive but after Rebeca shook her head, no, they understood it was dying. Asa held the little bird as it died, all of us sad in the moment.

The kids wanted to have a funeral for the bird, so Tim and they went down to the garden and buried it with some rocks marking the spot. Since then, we've had several other bird crash incidents, most of which have resulted in birds flying away. Today we had two crash into the window during the perfectly dreadful conditions of a certain kind of morning light that makes them believe our window is open space with another tree on which to land--a little yellow bird and then an iridescent, aqua winged one, both of which flew away but the latter of which suffered a bent beak from the incident. We have looked up how to prevent this bird crashing, and other than covering the window entirely with something, it sounds like it is difficult to do. We will start with some silhouettes of hawks taped to the window to see if that works. We also said goodbye to a beautiful hummingbird that died. Rebeca helped the children bury this one and added some hibiscus flowers to the graves. We hope our bird cemetery doesn't grow any more.

Asa and Eva with deceased hummingbird

Our little bird cemetery

Yesterday Rebeca came to the house with the news that her great aunt had died in the early morning. She lived just down the road from her and was almost 90 years old when she died suddenly. Rebeca had only just heard the news and was quiet and sad as she went about her work at our house until she left to join her family and wait for her aunt's body to be returned from the morgue to her house. She knew her well, something hard for me to imagine having grown up far away from great and regular aunts and uncles but easier for Tim to understand I think, having grown up with extended family within baseball throwing distance. She had memories of this particular great aunt always giving out bread to her and her childhood friends as they would pass by her house after school.

As I write this, Rebeca is at her aunt's funeral mass at a tiny little pink church down the road. Surely, there will be many attending as her aunt was one of the oldest people around and many people knew her. Her body has been at the church since yesterday and through the night. The family has stood vigil with her all night through and friends and extended family have come by for the "vela" or visitation. Funerals happen very quickly here as bodies are typically not embalmed. As is traditional, all the people at the funeral will walk to the cemetery one last time with Rebeca's aunt to bury her. We've inadvertently gotten behind this kind of procession before when we first arrived and were in a hurry to get some errands done. We could not drive faster than the masses who were slowly walking behind the hearst to the cemetery--a good opportunity to practice putting aside our agenda for what is presently going on.

Tim was commenting today that our life in Anchorage has us so removed from old age and death. Older people are generally put in nursing homes or assisted living, far from our neighborhood. It is rare to hear of a family that has a grandparent living with them, and once someone dies, the grieving process is discrete and enclosed in the funeral parlor or church. Our children don't know very many older people, and this is different from Tim's growing up experience in rural Arkansas, where he knew many older people, and their passing was a regular occurence. This proximity to death makes it seem more like a natural part of living and a reminder of the temporary nature of all living things. It seems like this can only make us dig in to living our own lives most fully.

Trip to San Jose

We drove to San Jose the weekend before last to see the sights. We were a little anxious about driving as we had heard horror stories about the traffic, and we did get lost enough that it took us twice the time it should have to get to our hotel. We parked the car and took cabs the rest of the time. It rained the whole time and we were downright chilly and wished we had our fleece with us but we did get out and about and enjoyed seeing the major plazas downtown, including walking around el mercado central, a labyrinthian indoor market of various food, handcrafts, pets, costume jewelry, etc. A highlight was going to a children's/ art museum that had been made out of an old prison. It felt like we were witnessing the right kind of transformation to be patronizing a place with happy children flocking around inside of what once surely only housed heartache. Other highlights were fabulous food at Tin Jo, a nice Asian restaurant and Saporo, a Japanese restaurant. We also went on a crazy goose chase looking for a Lonely Planet guide for Panama, resulting in a $14 cab ride through multiple neighborhoods.
Next time we go, we'd like to finally find the purported bus/ train that does a little tour of downtown, see the gold museum and the national museum and maybe visit the big zoo outside of town.

Eva and Asa in front of gnarly tree on street

Asa feeding pigeons at Teatro Nacional

Trip to the Caribbean Coast

We went on an adventure to the nearby Caribbean coast a few weekends ago. It was hot, hot, hot. The sand at gorgeous Punta Uva was burning the soles of our feet at 10AM. And, sadly, almost everyone got sunburned despite spf 30 lotion and only morning sun exposure. Nonetheless, we loved the bath water temperature of the ocean, clear green, gentle waves, and the outragous howler monkeys yelping in the jungle behind us. Our main objective seemed to be either to stay submerged in water or retreat to air conditioning. A mere 2.5 hours away from Turrialba, I'm sure we'll return soon. 




Agapi



Eva and Friend in their Restaurant Kitchen

 We stayed at Agapi--an apartment hotel place, the main attraction being the swimming pool for the kids. It was perfectly fine for us with enough beds and a kitchen. We did find a lovely new bakery in town where we ate lunch and bought chocolate croissants and dense and delicious banana bread. Puerto Viejo seemed a little tired and has an abundance of Bob Marley beach towels and the iconic pot leaf on various chachkas for sale. Beyond Puerto Viejo going south seemed more wholesome in the family sense. We especially loved Selvins restaurant for lunch, right off the beach at Punta Uva, where the food was fresh, hearty and cooked Caribbean style--beans and rice cooked in coconut milk, pineapple in the salad, and an extra spicy kick in the broths and sauces, owned by a long-time resident of the area from a well-known family. We are loving "refrescos", or juices made of any number of fruits. My favorites so far: passionfruit and tamarind with ginger. After lunch, Selvin himself even offered us a free shot of some kind of fire water that seemed to rival the heat outside. While having lunch, Eva made a new friend, a little girl who was the daughter of the cook, and they played restaurant in the nearby courtyard, serving us various delicacies (stones on leaves) at our table.



Asa--hunter of los cocos





Eva, Zena, Daddy at Punta Uva



Mama and Zena at breakfast at Agapi

Costa Rica Independence Day

In a lucky break during a 5 day viral epidemic in our family, including yes vomiting and diarrhea and aching bodies (a wicked virus that rampaged Eva's kindergarten and eventually all the families in the school), we were able to participate in Costa Rica's independence day on September 15.

Asa's class made "faroles", or lanterns, and we all joined in with the whole town in the evening, gathering at town square and carrying lit up lanterns through the streets of Turrialba in a huge crowd. The lanterns came in all shapes and sizes, including a giant puffing Turrialba volcano being carried by a dozen people.

Our landlady told us the reason for the lanterns is because the news of Costa Rica's independence from Spain came country by country through central America by messenger carrying a lamp. Each country was in turn illuminated by freedom. Such a beautiful way to commmemorate this country's origens.

Costa Rica has a lot to be proud of with the way it has developed. Life expectancy and literacy rates have increased dramatically during the last part of the 1900's, housing is on the whole of decent quality, there is no army (thus freeing funding for healthcare and education), and they have done an admirable job preserving their natural environment. A good opportunity to ask how does the U.S. measure up in these same categories?

 

Äsa, Tim, Zena parading through Turrialba

Below is a close-up of Asa's lit-up farol in the form of the iconic wooden cart pulled behind a donkey, honoring the beauty and heart of Costa Rica's agricultural legacy.

 

Asa's farol

Waterfall Day

The weekend before last, we hiked to a waterfall a mere 4 miles from our house. We meandered through a huge coffee plantation in full-on harvesting mode, through a forest of stunningly tall trees, including the magical and colorful rainbow eucalyptis, and saw a lovely additional waterfall on the way. Our destination waterfall was a glorious gushing 60 foot flow of water pounding into a pool below, where we swam. It was totally exhilerating to get so close to such an intense and wild force of nature. Asa and I swam around and Eva dared to get in with her floaties and stayed on the edge. All the kids played in the pools and on the rocks, and we had a picnic lunch in the middle on some big rocks.

After hiking out, we got to town in time to check out the farmer´s market and go to the best ice cream store in town--Pops.



On the trail to the waterfall




Rainbow Eucalyptus

  





First Waterfall

 



Eva picking coffee








The Big Waterfall

 

 

 

Asa and me on the rocks

Zena investigating

Eva looking over lychees at market

Eating ice cream at Pops

Asa and Zena on the train

Eva and Zena in their private heliocopter