Coffee, pants, and wine. YES.

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Hehehe. Today was one of those days that just left me giggling—full of random craziness where I have to look around me and laugh at the situation I’m in. The youth forum ended at lunch today, and during the closing ceremonies they told us that they had a surprise: everyone who was staying for the Scouts of the World Award Seminar would get a chance to be bussed in to San José for some sight seeing and shopping. Sweeeet! I thought I was going to have almost 24 hours to kill before the next event started, so I was quite happy that we would be able to make good use of our spare time.

Before we loaded into the mini-bus, Cata, this amazing girl who was one of the main organizers of the event and is here representing Guías (Guides) of Costa Rica, gave us a big lecture on safety in San José, since we would be going right smack dab into the tourist center. She said that since we were such a big group we would really be a target, so we should leave our passports at the camp just in case we got robbed. Huh. Sooo passport was left behind. I was going to bring my laptop into town so I could find an internet café and upload some of these entries, buuuuut that was certainly left behind, as well.

We crammed into the mini-bus, and I put my seatbelt on. Seemed like a reasonable thing to do, I thought, but of course once that was noticed the whooole bus burst into laughter at the Canadian who was scared of the crazy Costa Rican driving. “No, no!” I exclaimed. “I always wear my seatbelt. Safety First!” That got more laughter. No one else put on their seatbelt.

The bus ride was rather insane. Our group was overexcited to be finally getting back into civilization, so they wear screaming in Spanish all around me. I was a bit overtired and so I preferred to watch out the window.

Our first stop was the National Theatre, which was beautiful—full of gold and marble. A delegate from Costa Rica told me that the government many years ago imposed a levy on coffee exports in order to pay for the theatre. I’m sure they raised the necessary funds in no time with all the coffee that is grown here. There was a lot of restoration work going on in the theatre, though it looked pretty good the way it was.

[Note: whoops… I started writing this entry 2 nights ago and still haven’t finished it. We’ve been very busy! I’ll try to wrap it up tonight so I can give an update on the latest happenings]

Next we went to a market of tourist-oriented craft stands. Dark memories of aggressive Thai merchants filled me as I entered the area, but actually it was pretty good. Although the merchants were definitely eager to sell their wares, they weren’t overly aggressive and their prices were reasonable so I didn’t feel like I needed to really haggle a lot. I didn’t particularly want anything, but I did come away with a beautiful wine bottle holder made out of some lovely wood. (Five dollars!) I’m pretty happy with it.

Next we went to a supermarket where I LOADED up on coffee, and coffee-related products. I stood in front of the coffee aisle and just asked Costa Ricans what their favourite brands of coffee were. There were conflicting opinions, so I just bought all of them! Mmmm coffee…. Then I bought chocolate covered coffee beans, chocolate covered dried fruit, etc. Much money was spent.

By that time the boys were starving, so we made our way back to the museum area, which was surrounded with fast food outlets. San Jose seems to have every fast food outlet from Canada. Of course it has the ubiquitous McDonald’s and KFC, but it also has Subway, Quiznos, Burger King, Pizza Hut, etc etc. I’ve even seen Office Depot! Some people decided to forgo food in favour of drinks at a bar, but I headed to McDonald’s in hopes of seeing what interesting specialties the Costa Rican McDonald’s had to offer. Before entering the restaurant though, Cata gave us this big warning lecture about not getting prayed upon. Poor girl. She was obviously terrified we were going to get mugged. She was like (in Spanish) “make sure you keep your camera close to you! And keep your backpacks in front! And if you have to ask someone for something, be polite but don’t sound like a tourist! And, and….!” I was clearly the most blatant tourist of the group. Camera at my side, bright blonde hair, sandals and flowy shirt—yah, I stood out.

I was disappointed to discover that the McDonald’s didn’t seem to have anything unique to offer. I got a chicken burger in the hopes that it would have some kind of unique seasoning, but as far as I could tell it was essentially the same as anything I could get in Canada. Prices were pretty comparable, too, but Johanna from Paraguay was rather shocked at how much more the meals cost here. On the plus side, the bathroom was beautiful! After the girls I was with finished eating, we went to find the boys who had gone around the corner to the KFC. Again, same as Canada, I think, but they said that things were a bit different than in their countries. Perhaps the rest of the group stood out more than I thought, because as I walked in to the restaurant they had a KFC staff member taking a group photo of their table!

As we walked back to the center tourist square where we were supposed to meet the bus, I had a bit of a fright. We were walking, chatting, walking, not paying a lot of attention (actually, I was deep in conversation with Johanna from Paraguay, who was telling me all about the Canadian character from this anime cartoon that had a Canadian character in it, which I apparently resembled greatly). All of a sudden, this guy who was walking towards me lunged and my chest/camera (didn’t actually touch me) and yelled in my face, then continued on his way. I screamed, then burst into giggles (as did the rest of my group). Perhaps I was clutching my camera a bit too obviously? Random. The incident is still being brought up today by everyone who was there at the time. Oh Canada—always the brunt of the teasing. =)

We had a tiny bit of extra time, and I noticed that we were passing a department store. I had one thought in mind: PANTS!!!! I had been wearing same, thin pair of khaki pants every… single… day… and I still had four more days to go. I rushed into the store, grabbed a pair of jeans, and, lo and behold, perfect fit! And only $12US! I actually wish I could go back and buy some more, frankly. I find it impossible to find jeans that fit me.

Well that did it. I had pants! Jeans, no less! When we met up with the rest of the group again I ran up and excitedly exclaimed to everyone, waving my bag in their faces, “PANTS! I got pants!” Coffee, elegant wine holders, and new pants: now THAT’s good day.

The bus ride back to camp was hilarious. As our bus bottomed out on every single switch-back turn up the mountain, the youth around me were screaming Spanish Scouting songs. Naughty, naughty songs, actually. Wow. Note to self: avoid Venezuelan Scouting events, at least alone! (just kidding)

Overall: fun.

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