Monday, October 31, 2005
Our Last Day in San Pedro:
Today is our final day in the old apartment. We've moved everything to our new place & we're not coming back.
Well, we'll be back to visit our friends here & maybe use the internet a couple times, like we've been doing most of this month (we've been sleeping in the other apartment for @ least 2 weeks now coming here almost daily to use the internet before running off to work or elsewhere).
At moments of transition I like to reflect about what has gone before, what I will miss, what has been, & what I'd like to see in days to come...
I'm going to miss the crepe place that was over by the supermarket. I think they closed so I can't even go back sometime, damn.
I'd recount other things about San Pedro but as I think about it I like our new place more so I don't expect to miss much about this neighborhood.
Hasta La Vista!
Also, if Ellie & I don't write for another 2 weeks or something it's because we haven't gotten our internet service connected in our new apartment yet.
Kepfram
Today is our final day in the old apartment. We've moved everything to our new place & we're not coming back.
Well, we'll be back to visit our friends here & maybe use the internet a couple times, like we've been doing most of this month (we've been sleeping in the other apartment for @ least 2 weeks now coming here almost daily to use the internet before running off to work or elsewhere).
At moments of transition I like to reflect about what has gone before, what I will miss, what has been, & what I'd like to see in days to come...
I'm going to miss the crepe place that was over by the supermarket. I think they closed so I can't even go back sometime, damn.
I'd recount other things about San Pedro but as I think about it I like our new place more so I don't expect to miss much about this neighborhood.
Hasta La Vista!
Also, if Ellie & I don't write for another 2 weeks or something it's because we haven't gotten our internet service connected in our new apartment yet.
Kepfram
Saturday, October 29, 2005
Time Spent in San José:We really need to update this blog.
So much to tell, so much to tell... we've got stories about Nicaragua, our new apartment & the normal stuff about how we're so interesting & how even when things are bad here we're still in Costa Rica! Oh well, you've got something to look forward to for later.
Our new apartment is in downtown San José so there's more to see & do nearby, here's a bit of what we've been doing the last 2 weeks:
- Our move means that my 10 minute jog to capoiera class will now take about 30 minutes, but I'll be out of class for @ least the next week. I sprained my ankle jogging last Tuesday giving me another excuse not to go back to capoiera for a while. Maybe I can work on my handstands while my ankle is healing?
- We now live about 5 blocks from Tin Jo. We went there for dinner the other night & I can't wait to go back. I'm thinking we could eat there more often if we just go for dessert sometime, that way we wouldn't go out too much.
- Since el Centro Nacional de la Cultura is across the street from our new apartment, Ellie's checked out a Harry Potter Festival & an Indigenous People's Festival, together we went to an X-Files Festival, which consisted of some tables of sci-fi/X-files merchandize & a projector setup in another room playing episodes of the show. We watched about 1 & 1/2 episodes in Spanish which was just about as easy to follow as it is in English.
- International release dates being what they are we saw the 40 Year Old Virgin on Wednesday (I so love 1/2 price Wednesdays!) & we may go see it again, everyone was laughing so loud that we're sure we missed some of the jokes. I was really surprised:
1. I really liked the movie & found it really funny.
2. Comedy is SO culturally dependent I was amazed that the audience found it funny in spite of it. - Slowly but surely I'm getting to know San José better, although sometimes I wish I didn't. I found a public pool, a couple restaurants I'd love to check out (there are 2 places that have Mariachis that I'm really anxious to see), discovered an arcade, some movie theaters, a few cheap electronics stores & saw 2 places I'd rather not see again. Both were unpleasant red light districts: imagine HBO's Hookers on the Point for one & then imagine it again with everyone having big hands & adam's apples. Prostitution is legal in Costa Rica so I assumed that would mean that the problems we associate with it in the US wouldn't apply, but it may be that the problems of drug addiction & poverty don't give people a lot of work options in any country.
Ciao por ahorra,
Kepfram
Monday, October 10, 2005
Another Weekend Update:
Sorry I haven't been keeping up with the blog in the last 2 weeks, here's the abridged version of what's been going on:
Sorry I haven't been keeping up with the blog in the last 2 weeks, here's the abridged version of what's been going on:
- We're moving!
I know we've raved about our apartment & how nice our neighbors & neighborhood are, but we've got a major problem living here: there's too much English. Before leaving the states I was often asked if I thought my Spanish was sufficient for a year away in Latin America & I'd always answer back about how Ellie & I were taking a month long intensive Spanish course & then living in Costa Rica for 9 months, which would give us enough of a background to get by. Ah, "the best laid plans..." This is what actually happened: We both teach English for a living & tell all of our students that they can't speak Spanish in our classes. All our neighbors in the building speak English, all the movies we watch & things we read on the web are in English. There's very little in our routine that demands a lot of Spanish. When I take cabs or people engage me on the street I can get my point across, but I know I'm messing up 1/2 the time by the looks I get (which is funny, because until I speak most people assume I'm from Costa Rica's carribean coast). I do get about 2 out of the 3 hours of Spanish class offered @ my job every Friday, a little bit of conversation, some new vocabulary that I promptly forget, & sometimes a game before my co-workers & I switch back to English.
One of my big goals for this year was to learn Spanish. That's not going to happen if I'm not practicing it. We spoke more Spanish during the 4 days we were in Nicaragua than in the 2 months since leaving school. When we got back we realized that we needed to make Spanish our priority, so we'll be moving by the end of the month. - Ellie's back in school. She's found a language school that isn't ridiculously expensive (it's assumed that rich gringos are the only one's who need to learn Spanish here so prices are generally inflated) with a teacher she really likes within walking distance of where we've been living & her job, she's taking 10 hours of Spanish every week & loving it. I'd like to take classes as well, but want to get back on schedule with capoeira before I commit to any classes (I haven't been going since we started looking for an apartment).
Sunday, October 09, 2005
Our Costa Rican Kitchen:
Actually we don't really cook Costa Rican food in our kitchen (it's pretty bland overall, so not really inspiring), but being that we are here we do have different tools & ingredients to work with, which has changed both what & how we cook. Here're some things we've learned:
P.S. On a personal note: Kepfram would like to send a "mad" shout to the Roasted Chicken guy @ the Feria Agricultura de Guadalupe, "That was some damn good chicken. See you next week, one love."
Actually we don't really cook Costa Rican food in our kitchen (it's pretty bland overall, so not really inspiring), but being that we are here we do have different tools & ingredients to work with, which has changed both what & how we cook. Here're some things we've learned:
- Did you know you can make "muffins" on the stove? (discovered when we had some over-ripe bananas & no oven...).
- I think we already mentioned that corn flour makes damn good pancakes, we've moved on to crepes, & they're not bad with corn flour either.
- It's REALLY easy to make jam.
- A tobasco bottle with a whole poked in the top makes quite a serviceable salt shaker.
- Fruit flies can live for a few DAYS in a refrigerator.
- Ellie's finally learned how to cook plantains (mmmmmMmm).
- Kepfram's finally learned how to cook with dried beans & how to make pancakes (& crepes!).
- It is possible to get dishes clean with only cold water.
- Tamarind juice ferments into some tasty hard "cider".
- Fresh squeezed OJ ferments into some unforgivably bitter liquid (...we did manage to reduce it down into an interesting sauce, but we don't intend to need to do it again).
- Kepfram's food is delicious (as many of you know), BUT (¡mygod!) does he use a lot of butter....
- Kepfram's remembered how to make fresh coconut milk (mmmmMMmm - coconut rice), but as much as he's trying to kill us with butter, we had to draw the line somewhere... (we've only had it once).
- Achiotte is really a flavorless "spice" (no matter what the website says), but mixed with oil it's used for color - we've been having oranged potatoes & other veggies lately.
P.S. On a personal note: Kepfram would like to send a "mad" shout to the Roasted Chicken guy @ the Feria Agricultura de Guadalupe, "That was some damn good chicken. See you next week, one love."
Saturday, October 01, 2005
Border Run Take 1:
This weekend Ellie & I are in Nicaragua. We´ve been gone just about 90 days, my how time flies, so it was time for us to leave Costa Rica to renew our visas. So we´ll be in Granada, Nicaragua from Thursday to Sunday morning. I haven´t quite formed my opinion of Nicaragua or Granada yet, like most things & places it´s multi-faceted, most of the city is beautiful old colonial era buildings with tiled Spanish style roof & ceilings @ least 15 feet high (most buildings don´t have a second floor), on the flip side, most of these buildings have seen better days in their storied histories (I´m guessing most are @ least 100 years old) and Nicaragua is one the poorest country in the Americas after Haiti (explaining the condition of the buildings, street kids, homeless people, etc.). I´ll be looking around more this weekend & plan on taking lots of pictures so hopefully you can see for yourselves.
Ok, that´s it for now.
Later,
Kepfram
This weekend Ellie & I are in Nicaragua. We´ve been gone just about 90 days, my how time flies, so it was time for us to leave Costa Rica to renew our visas. So we´ll be in Granada, Nicaragua from Thursday to Sunday morning. I haven´t quite formed my opinion of Nicaragua or Granada yet, like most things & places it´s multi-faceted, most of the city is beautiful old colonial era buildings with tiled Spanish style roof & ceilings @ least 15 feet high (most buildings don´t have a second floor), on the flip side, most of these buildings have seen better days in their storied histories (I´m guessing most are @ least 100 years old) and Nicaragua is one the poorest country in the Americas after Haiti (explaining the condition of the buildings, street kids, homeless people, etc.). I´ll be looking around more this weekend & plan on taking lots of pictures so hopefully you can see for yourselves.
Ok, that´s it for now.
Later,
Kepfram
