Tortuguero and Such

Alright, it's been over a week since I last wrote which means this could be a long one, so I am going to try and stick to the interesting parts only. However, I make no promises and am likely, as per usual, to be long winded and overly thorough. Basically, I am going to tell you the things I hope to remember somewhere down the line...

In general, things are still going well. I am enjoying the job, and my students are pretty great for the most part. My Saturday students are mostly working adults, though there are a couple younger students in the class. They are eager to learn and participate, and while they don't catch on quite as quickly as my Wed/Fri students, they make up for it in enthusiasm.
My Wed/Fri students are slightly more reluctant to speak in English, but I think that has more to do with their age and egos than their willingness to learn. There are only two girls in this class and about 15 boys (some of whom have yet to show up), which is always an interesting ratio.

Last Saturday after class I returned home to find my roommate had bought a router and had internet set up for our apartment :) So my computer is finally online, although it isn't the strongest connection, it works well enough. Then she took me out to purchase a cell phone, which was surprisingly incredibly complicated. I think we went to about 7 stores before we found me a cheap (by Costa Rica standards) cell phone and then went to a few more places before we finally got me a SIM card. I believe I get free incoming calls hint hint.

CR's independence day was Wednesday so I had the day off, and therefore a long long weekend to take advantage of. Sunday I headed down to San Jose to meet up with my German friend Antonia to go to Tortuguero. The trek out was an experience in itself. In order to get to Tortuguero on your own (you can get transportation from tour companies for something like $60 round trip - pretty ridiculous considering it cost about $10 round trip on your own), you have to take a bus from San Jose to Cariari, another bus from Cariari to Pavona, and then a boat from Pavona to Tortuguero Village. It's a trek, but allows you to see a bit of Costa Rica countryside, including banana plantations, and meet some locals along the way.... as well as lose 5 pounds from excessive sweating.

Tortuguero Village is a tiny tiny tiny village on the northeast (caribbean) coast of the country. The village pretty much thrives on tourism, and 19 out of 20 locals make most of their living off it. The only way to reach the village is by boat, and it is the best and cheapest way of getting in to Tortuguero National Park. To do everything the village/park has to offer (aside from camping), you need at most a day and a half. Antonia and I, on the other hand, decided to take our sweet time and spend about three and a half days there.

We found the cheapest place to stay we could (a whopping $8 per night), and settled in... We arrived at dinner time on Sunday, and decided that going to bed at 8:30pm was probably dumb, we chose one of the village's local bars to have a drink or two to waste some time. It is slow season there right now, and considering everyone in the village knows one another, my fair-skinned blond-haired travel companion and I stuck out like sore thumbs and immediately drew attention.

For the most part, the people of Tortuguero are friendly and welcoming and great. While listening to some awful karaoke and watching a hilarious game of dominoes during which every player slammed down his piece when it was his turn, we were approached my a number of gentlemen. By far, the nicest of the bunch was named Antony, who after offering us a free canal tour the next day, became our guide and friend for the next few days. Antony, 25, attended only one year of school, but speaks 5 different languages (Jamaican Patois, Spanish, English, French and something else I can't remember) and was working on his 6th with Antonia as well as other German tourists. Pretty awesome.

Monday afternoon we met Antony and two other German tourists and went for a tour in the canals of Tortuguero National Park. This was the first time I had experienced Costa Rica outside the city setting, and it was absolutely incredible. While there are a thousand words I could use to describe it, I will go with green. Really really reallllllly freaking green. Absolutely beautiful and completely different from anything I have ever experienced. You read about the biological diversity of the rain forest growing up, but seeing it in person is simply breathtaking. Go there, fall in love, bring bug spray.
The canal tour was truly incredible, and among other things, I was able to see lots of birds, monkeys, spiders, iguanas, lizards, a poison dart frog, and mini alligators whose real name I can't remember. Photos will be posted on facebook soon.

Wednesday night we went back in to the park to do a turtle walk, which is the biggest draw to Tortuguero (translated means: turtle's place). From June to October, four different species of sea turtles come to the beaches of Costa Rica (mostly in the Tortuguero area) to lay their eggs. A turtle will come ashore and find a spot in the sand to dig a deep hole. A certified guide takes you out to the beach after dark to meet with an official "spotter," who leads you right to a turtle laying its eggs. Apparently when turtles start laying eggs, they enter into some kind of "trance" and can't stop until they are finished - they usually lay around 100 eggs 6 or 7 times a summer. So, while they are doing that, the guides lead you right up to the turtle (using their red lights so as not to disturb/scare the turtle with a bright light), moves aside a back flipper so you can watch the turtle laying eggs. Which I'm sure the turtles really appreciate.
When it's done, the turtle will use its flippers to bury the eggs and hide them best she can. Pretty awesome to watch. No photos are allowed, so you all will just have to go see it yourself some day.... Seriously... SO cool. We got to see 3 green sea turtles up close and a bunch more from a short distance moving along the beaches. Also, I should note, because it came as a surprise to Antonia and most other travelers we spoke with: the turtles are huge. The locals joke about how you can mount them and ride them like you would a horse. This of course is illegal, but funny to imagine nonetheless.

Antonia spent the rest of our time on the island eating, swimming in the ocean, walking around the town, sweating, and hanging out with Antony and meeting his friends, brothers, sisters and his some 48 nieces and nephews. Yeah. 48. He is the youngest of his mother's 11 children (not including his father's family in Florida), and is related to over half the people in the village. Antony was a wonderful guide, and was, apart from his professing his love for me and asking me to marry him, a great friend to have during our stay. He taught a couple other tourists how to make a kind of vegetarian soup using coconut as the base and saved us some. When I told him I hate coconut he replied that if I didn't like coconut I didn't like black men, haha. The soup was actually pretty good, as the taste of coconut was hidden by vegetables. Regardless, it was nice to have some authentic Costa Rican (slightly more Caribbean) food that didn't consist of rice and beans.

Not surprisingly, I was thoroughly attacked by mosquitoes, and my legs look like I have chicken pox. Mosquitoes love me. Always have. Probably always will. An interesting development I have encountered this summer (not just here in CR) is that my bites will swell, and then bruise before finally going away after about two weeks. Antony saw my legs, grabbed a plant growing alongside a local store, got the juice out of it and put it over my legs to stop the itching. It worked. I wish I could have bottled it up to bring back with me for the next time I am attacked.

Aside from the extreme heat/humidity of Tortuguero and the plethora of loud animal sounds, from dogs to birds to monkeys, that kept Antonia and I from sleeping as soundly as we would have liked (not a big deal of course), Antonia and I had only one real negative experience while in Tortuguero. The second night we were there (Monday) we went out with Antony for a drink at the bars. We spent the first part of the night speaking Spanish with Antony and his good friend Oscar, which was lovely. After Oscar went home to watch his telenovela (yes, that is what happened), the three of us relocated to bar #2, where we were approached by some other villagers.
After being harassed by almost every male in the bar to dance - they only accepted 'no thank you' after the 3rd or 4th time they asked along with an explanation why - a man old enough to be my father approached me and proceeded to hit on me. He admitted he was probably too old for me, but then made comments about how I should change my mind and leave the bar with him. I declined as politely as possible, but he lingered long enough to make me uncomfortable before he finally exited. This particular gentleman proceeded to make passes at me the rest of my stay in Tortuguero, though none quite so forward.
Shortly after he left, two other older men sat down with Antonia, Antony and I at the table. Because everyone knows everyone in Tortuguero, Antony introduced all his "friends." It was clear that the two who sat down with us had had a bit much to drink, and wasted no time in trying to figure out whether or not we were Antony's dates. The guy talking to me assumed I was going home with Antony and said something along the lines of "he can't do for you what I can." Adorable, really. Thankfully, that is where my conversation with that guy ended. Unfortunately for Antonia, she was not so lucky. The man that sat down next to her was outwardly asking her if she (and at times both of us) would go to bed with him, and when she said absolutely not he decided it was because Antony owned us and was refusing to share, and began to argue. We left at that and were mostly successful in avoiding them for the rest of our time there.

Aside from that small episode, Tortuguero was really a wonderful experience. I'd highly recommend going there, maybe just not for such a long amount of time. Antonia and I left Thursday morning and on our boat ride back to Pavona we saw a young (not quite baby) turtle making his way through the canals. Beautiful. Turtles are pretty awesome.

Since being back there hasn't been much going on, just planning and teaching. On the way back from class this morning I stopped at the market. There is a giant farmers market on the other side of the hospital (I live on the south side of the new hospital, and the market is on the north side) every Saturday, so I stopped to get some fresh goodness. I got 2 medium sized pineapples, a small watermelon, 3 bananas, 4 tomatoes and a block of delicious cheese for about $6. Be jealous ;)

Tomorrow I'm going to experiment with laundry. Wish me luck!