Life is just beachy;-)

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Sometimes things happen and a person just has to shake their head and ask, “How the…and why the …am I so lucky.”
As you’ve read in our last entry I have accepted a job at a private school. Prior to making the decision I went and visited two private schools in the Playa Flamingo area. Unfortunately both had fulfilled their staffing needs for the time being. However, my visit to Country Day School turned out to be a rather excellent experience. First I must tell you that the campus has just had a two million dollar renovation. I guess at 15K per student for a year of school they can afford it. Owen will not be attending!!!

I had shown up unannounced and was curious as to why there was so many people driving up as I walked down the lane. My purpose for visiting was to introduce myself to the director and perhaps have a short meeting or arrange one for another time. After a couple of inquiries I found the director and it was as if he was waiting for me. He was standing in front of his office looking like he was waiting for someone. Of course it wasn’t me, but rather he was waiting for renowned anthropologist Jane Goodall. The school was hosting her as part of an educational program she is promoting throughout the world. I introduced myself and asked politely if I could stay and listen to her talk. It was rather amazing to hear her speak and I must note that she does a pretty wicked chimpanzee imitation. I did make an appointment with the director for the next day and it was interesting to hear about running an American school in Costa Rica. He also informed me that the end of November was the time when they usually needed more teachers of tutors for those students who weren’t keeping up because of their English.

With our having committed to Sanctus Spiritus in Esparsa for the remainder of their school year, there was really only one thing for us to do with our time in Playa Flamingo. Explore, relax, and enjoy the beach and pool. We met some great people over the next couple of days. Benjamin made friends with a five-year old boy named Mariano. Marionao’s father, Alonso, works for one of the property developments in the area and they are long-term residents at the apartments. It was nice to visit with Alonso and learn about life in Costa Rica. His English was perfect and he had a great amount of perspective on the challenges facing Costa Rica in the face of all the increased development. We also met another family who has been living at the apartments for the past six years. Kim is an ex-pat from Florida via Puerto. Kim is a 52 year old guy whose company builds swimming pools. Needless to say he is very busy. He was very gracious and he let me use his high speed internet connection and served us some unbelievable sushi. Fresh tuna, caught that morning, with soy sauce. He says that is the only “meat” he eats here. We had a great visit poolside about life in Costa Rica as a contractor and, of course, talked football. For those of you who don’t really like football, especially the NFL, I must say it is worth knowing just a little bit about if only as a source of common ground when you meet Americans abroad. Of course you could follow NASCAR but you wouldn’t likely meet any of those fans abroad as the only know how to turn left and that makes getting to the airport difficult.

We rented a car one day and because I left my license in Alajuela Nataghia was the driver. It was a little unnerving as I’m used to driving but she was stellar and we visited Tamarindo the infamous surfing destination. It was a large construction zone with a definite American feel. Not that there is anything wrong with that…but we are here to experience the Costa Rican feel. We were going to explore some other beaches further North but the rain came and the roads had several spots where the water was flowing about three to six inches deep and three to twenty feet wide across the road. Since we had a compact car we decided to stay close to home and drove into Playa Flamingo proper and went out for dinner. We were sad to have to leave on Sunday morning but were happy that we secured direct tickets to Alajuela. The trip took us 5.5 hours right to the doors of Vida Tropical. It was much better than the 5.5 hours adventure we took to get half the distance the previous Sunday. I was totally impressed with the time we made and the cost was $24 for the whole family. I was further impressed because I listened to the Rider game on broadband when we arrived and I didn’t even miss the opening kick-off. Too bad about the results, but I guess they have to lose sometimes and losing to the other first place team is better than losing to Hamilton or Edmonton.

I’m wiped and I’m not even caught up on my journal…ugh! I’ll make sure to get caught up this weekend as we all have been very exhausted since getting back to school. Love the comments and private messages. We hope everyone is doing well and enjoying the frosty mornings...we kind of miss them. Well I do. I’m all hot and sweaty after I walk to work everyday. BUT that story is for another day. Pura Vida!

P.S. I thumbed my pictures to the wrong size so I will post them as a separate entry when I get it sorted out. My brain is fried these days.

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Comments

[Terry]

Having Fun Yet!
Hi again, I screwed up on my first attempt, as I thought I could try out the spelling corrector, but that didn't work. Anyway, looks like you and the family are off too a great year or whatever. I thought I would just give a quick hello to everybody and hugs also, as I am heading back to Yemen on Sunday. A 4-week stint this time, so hopefully I can get your blogs forwarded by Diane. Diane and I are really looking forward to coming down in February. Anyway take care. Terry