a jumble of last week and new plans

back in San Joaquin, for a couple nights.

have had an excellent week at finca 'pura vida' (the unofficial name of the neighbor's farm)

farm activites/events:

shelling beans

preparing some beds for sweet potatoes - the costa rican variety with brilliant pink skins and light yellow centers

playing cards
- kelci taught them golf, then we taught them spoons ('cucharas') which we have been playing ALL the time since then


swiming in the posas - a few different swimming holes. . the last day i was there kelci jumped off the bridge into one of the deep ones. ridiculous but sucessful.


milking the cows
almost every morning! am now almost a professional. Luz says that kelci and i are the first two volunteers to 'get it' and milk with her regularily.

fixing the classical guitar
someone gave guillermo jr a guitar, and i spent some tme with pliers trying to tune it. . but there are enough breaks and cracks and missing keys that it doesn't stay 'tuned' for long/at all. but after almost 3 months of not playing it was a fun project.


went over about 4 hills to grandma's house, to visit luz's fam and to help paint the house. spent two seperate days there and painted our hearts out. i still have some of the blue interior on my clothes/skin.
our first visit there we got a tour of their backyard river, and went crabhunting. it was al ot like being a kid on the island beaches, except i only halfheartedly looked because when one was spotted, the sister that was leading the expedition ripped off it's legs and pulled the meat out to cook later. i'm talking tiny crabs like the purple and green ones the width of your thumb. . . odd, but interesting. i had resigned myself to eating them, but we left before they were cooked.

the day before we had gone on another (unsucessful) hunt - for iguana.
no kidding. one of the may cousins that was hanging out at hte hosue (they're on summer vacation to the place was fuull of kis all the time) climbed a tree and shook it down, but it escpaed before the dog/guys with machetes could track it down.
thank goodness.



helped make tortillas and empanadas


ate flowers. a lot a lot of flowers. there is this variety of white blooms around for a short time right about now, so we steamed and picadillo-ed them quite often last week. they're fairly delicious, if a litle bitter.

toasted and ate peanuts that grew onthe farm. undeniably awesome, as i love peanuts rather dearly.

used part of the peels of a large citrus to make what seems like an original sour gummy candy - the puffy part between the friut and peel that i should know the name of - we boiled it then candied it with sugar and some yellow coloring. luz made me a little bag of it to take on my bus trip yesterday, along with a sack of peanuts of course.

what else...


ah, we:

weeded the greenhouse

planted culantro seedlingd as wellas new seeds
they have two kind of cilantro here, both of which are called culantro. one grows wild - the 'coyote' cariety, and the other, familiar kind is referred to as 'castilla'.


encountered a terciopelo, one of the more dangerous venomous snakes in the area/country. it is as long as i am tall - i have pictures of course. guillermo spotted it next to the road we were walking on, sleeping in the roots of a tree (they're nocturnal). he killed it right quick, and brought it back to bury it - i guess that if ants eat it and then bite you, they can pass along a dangerous bacteria; one of his relatives was in the hospital for about 3 weeks from such antbites.



the other day i donned a beekeepers suite and accompanied two family friends to harvest honey from the farm's 11 bee hives. i brought my camera and took some video along with photos. i got one sting, but was far enough away from teh hives that no swarming ensued. we were in the little tent where they centrifuge the oney into a bucket, and a couple 'bravas' - fightey bees came in along with the chill ones. . got me on the finger but it didnt hurt for long and was essentially gone by the time we got back to the house. the bees here are differnt from the ones in the states - tey are all africanized, which led me to believe i should be more wary of their sting, but it definitely was a peice of cake in comparison to the last sting i received. . . quite a while ago..

i have two bottles of the honey to bring back with me. got to eat pollen fresh from the hive, too. delicious. .


spent my last day there (yesterday) at the feria again, then took the bus a little after noon.
my taxi driver from san josé to san joaquin was hilarious - spoke slowly and clearly, had a good sense of humor, and was familiar with the potrero/flamingo area and even had been to the las brisas ladies' night. .



and now here i am, blogging in the internet cafes of this town, once again. .

i am going to visit my host family from december, then head to flamingo on sunday morning.
might be fortunate enoguh to stay at the house of some friends in surfside, the town between flamingo and potrero, for my secnd week there.

dad flies in on the 12th, and he will get to spend some tie with me on the coast before we head to the cdca. it is tempting to go back south to visit luz, guillermo and the fam, but that would mean as many traveling days as visiting days, so monteverde or omatepe seem to be the best plans.

am looking forward to having my own kitchen and being by the ocean again.

more soon,

love