Early wake time this morning; 6 am. Howler monkeys, waterfall sound from the broken hot water tank next door and then the boys who came to fix it, plus the sticky heat were all contributers. Ah, well. I seem to have more energy for that here, despite the walking walking walking that we do. Back's not particularly sore, either.
Left a note and the keys and went to Robin's to borrow her phone to call Sheri, see if we can set up a date for tomorrow to go to her garden. I'm looking forward to that. She gave directions and instructions to bring bathing suits so we can walk up to the waterfall. who says networking isn't fun?
I took my laptop and found that I can access the signal from Robins. An email from Jessie asked for me to call her, she needs to talk. It's the office # she gave me, and they told me Jessie's across the street, which is only about 5 minutes away. Running down there to catch her, I found Braeme with their little boy and Jessie sitting, waiting for breakfast. Big smiles and a hug.
The reason for her needing me to contact her is that the dump is on fire, their house is downwind from it, and she'd waited as long as she could to meet me today, but has to go to San Jose to stay with her mother. Hoo, man, I can understand that, having spent only one night with the smoke seeping in thru the boards in our house! Poor little guy, he's only 18 months and teething, plus, the smoke. She's going to see if she can inspire some action with the newspapers, gov't and health board. They have no money to do anything, yet the dump would burn for months!
We speak quickly about a few ideas each of us has had re the garden, then she's off to catch a plane.
Mine- The True Colours course I'd like to work on with the families who'll garden, meeting and and discussion with Ryan, fact finding, making sure she and I have open communication so that the final decisions are made by the school's owners.
Jessie-She'd like to contact one or more of the universities that Costa Rica has, to see if any of the students can use this project for their practicum. An awesome idea! Jessie also assures me that the Principal of the school is willing to act as my liaison.
We agreed to be in touch via email. and phone if need be.
Plans are changed. Today, we hang again, and kill time. Time to learn.
Meandering into a gift shop, we found the same smiling face as we did the other day. The Tico girl's name is Eileen, and she expressed pleasure at my attempt at telling her in Spanish that we are staying 2 months (Me quedo dos meses). For my efforts, I receive a full page of the bus schedule to Nicoya, then to Samara, where I can exchange more money, and visit bigger stores. It takes about an hour and costs only 1100 colones, roughly $2 USD! A far cry from the $55 that we were told (I'm thinking all newbies are told this. Perhaps the thought is that most N. Americans would want to rent, rather than ride a bus).
Regardless, YEE HAW! Our $ is stretched a bit further!
My stretch of good things continues when passing the door into the ibm, I decided to check one more time to see if I could make my card work. Yep, it worked! What I did wrong before was to assume I could withdraw any denomination, and I'd tried 6000 colones. At home, the idiot filter makes a box pop up on screen, telling me that it must be in increments of $20. Here, the ibm tells me only that the order was cancelled.
2 comments:
Wow, Margot, and I'm very curious about the ease in your back. Not surprised by it, just curious about it. I wonder what you are not carrying, so that your pain is eased?
I, too, have been trying to figure it out. The humidity isn't supposed to help, I thought. We are doing a lot of walking, which has always been a good thing for me, in all sorts of ways. It's up there for stress relief.
Your word "carrying" makes me think of emotional stuff, rather than physical. Our daily lives can become too much to carry. I've put down a lot of things to come here.
There's a Costa Rican term "Pura Vida"....Pure living. I like to think that it's a medicine of sorts:)
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