¡Costa Rica and Pura Vida!

As my body heals and I feel ready for more adventures, I decided that I needed a new experience, so I flew to Costa Rica for the month of April to take a Spanish language immersion course through Maximo Nivel. Ever since I started traveling overseas several decades ago, I have been self-conscious of the fact that I am monolingual. Though I have taken courses in Espanol before, and was even stationed in Rota Spain for three years, I’ve never been able to pick up more than a few greetings and phrases. I realized long ago that the only way I have even a remote possibility of learning the language would be to be totally immersed in it.  So, I chose a program in Quepos, Costa Rica and am staying with a host family.  My hosts and instructors are awesome, but they only speak to me in Spanish, so it is time to sink or swim!

Quepos is a small town about midway along Costa Rica’s Pacific coast and is home to gorgeous beaches, abundant wildlife, friendly people, and delicious food!

Pura Vida translates to pure life in Spanish and is a common phrase used in Costa Rica for everything, like hello, good-by, thank you and just about anything, kind of like the word Aloha is used in Hawaii.  The phrase encapsulates the Costa Rican way of life – positive, relaxed, and simple.

The main road through Quepos runs along the beaches of the Pacific Ocean.
A common sight here, the Black Spiny-Tailed Iguana is an omnivore (eats both plants and animals) and hangs out in trees and on rocks. They are not usually aggressive towards humans unless provoked, so I kept a safe distance.
I looked up into the trees on my walk to school to see what was squawking so loudly and spied this Scarlet Macaw, a huge, long tailed parrot. I can hear them from my bedroom window along with lots of other birds and wildlife. It was pretty high up in the tree, so the photo is blurry.
Since arriving several days ago, I’ve had some form of beans and rice at every meal. My host greeted me the first morning with a traditional breakfast of Gallo Pico (beans and rice seasoned with onions and a local form of cilantro), a farm-fresh fried egg and local semi-hard cheese made by one of her farmer friends. She said that they don’t usually eat fruit for breakfast, but she knew I would like it, so she included some local favorites. Making coffee in an automated coffee maker is a huge faux pas, so she makes it by using a traditional pour over method with only local Costa Rican beans. More to follow on that!

I’ll post more about daily life later, but I wanted to at least get the ball rolling before I started forgetting some of the details of my experiences.  More to come!

Oh, and I didn’t bring my computer, so I’m posting from one at school that has a Spanish keyboard.  Please be patient while I learn how to navigate computers, and the internet, in a different language!

4 thoughts on “¡Costa Rica and Pura Vida!”

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  2. My two biggest regrets in my exceptionally good life is that I never learned Spanish and I never learned how to fly. I think total immersion may be the best way to learn relatively quickly and well.

    Keep us in the loop.

    Chief & Babycakes

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