Rojo, blanco, y azul… Amurrica

(written on 7/5/2011)

Well yesterday was just about the best day ever. We woke up early for breakfast, then Allie and I laid out by our hotels pool which was actually a fountain, joined by Kristena and some vino, and then we all met up around noon to get some lunch. We went to the bar we had gone to two nights before, which was this smoky hole-in-the-wall heavily populated by old, washed-up, permanently drunk fishermen. There are vintage maps and boating pictures covering the walls, one of which features Mel Gibson. When we went there the other night it was basically just 8 old dudes and our group of ~10, plus these three gorgeous machos from Denmark. Anyway, the quiet spot was really cool for us all to go to when we weren’t trying to rage but rather chill out together.

Alle and Casi.

Anyway, since this bar is pretty Americano, yesterday they served free hot dogs (free’s my favorite flavor), which a man was casually grilling on the sidewalk by the door. They also had Old Milwaukee’s for super cheap, so Tyler, Kelsey, Leah and I took turns buying rounds for each other. We made a pretty impressive pyramid with the cans, and I’m going to give a special shout out to Sleaze who supplied us with the majority of the building materials. After Marshall’s token toast, we all went around the table saying one reason why we love America. Evidently, people are missing their fast food.

Patriotism in its finest.

After the bar, we all went back to the hotel for a quick hot tub sesh, even though it didn’t heat up until we all had to get out and shower (circa the time that Marshall peed in it—jk!). We got ready for dinner in a very dysfunctional manner, as some roomie facebook hacking was involved. Dinner was kind of a bust since the waitress brought out half of the group’s plates and then took four of our orders for the second time… We headed back to the hotel and Tyler and I had a jam sesh and sang Marshall into a little cat-nap. Tyler and Carla bought these beautiful handmade acoustic guitars in the market yesterday morning. I’ll post a picture of it soon! (As soon as we get our cameras charged with Leah’s janky “universal” charger… not). Our naturalist friends Frank and Luke came to visit and brought some friends from their hostel, and Carla got in touch with our rafting guides from the day before and they came all the way into the city to go out with us too! Their names were Danny (the guide of my raft), Pingo/Ping Pong who is one of Ashley’s many “boyfriends” and has dreadlocks, and then this guy we dubbed “Braceface.” Side note: even though braces on people in their 20s is super un-couth, it’s kind of the opposite here because straight teeth on ticos are about as easy to find as a full set on a West Virginian. (Love you, Brent!) We all followed these three amigos about 97 blocks to this AMAZING bar/nightclub. All of the boys had to pay ~4000 colones and get frisked before entering, but the ladies got in free with no checks, oops! This was seriously one of the most fun nights. It was so chic and CLEAN, and there was a live band that played all kinds of amazing reggae music. I kid you not, we CUT. THE. RUG. As a rule, Costa Ricans LOVE to dance, and LOVE the machas (blondes), so we felt like princesses. Especially when Leah and I got pulled up on stage to dance with the band. I felt so famous, and at the end of the night they came and gave me a hug goodbye!

Everyone had the best time. Well almost everyone. Braceface got his feelings hurt when Tamara turned him down. He told her she was a “microwave” because she got him all heated up and then shut him down. Hmmmm… I don’t think I’ve ever seen Ashley so happy as she was with her boyfriend of the night, this GORGEOUS Australian named Liam. There was an awesome group of Argentines that Carla had so much fun dancing with… Tyler spent $55, Kelsea, Leah and I had authentic Spanish conversations with countless locals, leaving Sarah in the dust... on a scale of 1-10 Quatro (Frank) was sweating at a 17… Our guy friends in the group are so sweet and are really amazing at stepping in to help if we ever find ourselves in a bind. Unfortunately the club didn’t play any meringue, but that didn’t stop my dance partner Luke and me from breaking it down while we all walked home. This decision to walk was probably a faulty judgment on our part, since it’s super dangerous to walk anywhere in the city after dark. There are super shady nocturnal characters that come out at night... I’m always so awkward and can’t help but stare. But we made it back unscathed last night, thankfully.

When we got back Leah, Kelsea Tyler and I decided to venture back out to find somewhere to satiate our late night hunger. The door man of our hotel gave us directions to the one place that was open at the hour of 2:30am, and that walk was sketchy. One man jumped in front of us on the sidewalk trying to sell us drugs, and instead of ignoring him, Tyler asked, “Hey buddy! Can you point us in the direction of this restaurant?!” Kelsea was threatening to leave him, but thankfully we were only steps away from the restaurant. This was another experience. It was like a Costa Rican version of Eat Hibachi, with tons of dysfunctional drunkards, but with Waffle House food. Our waitress was super comfortable with us, as in she brushed off the scrambled eggs in Tyler’s lap. She was overweight and had her button down tucked into her pants, exept the bottom two buttons were unbuttoned. There was an old man PASSED OUT sprawled across a table, and another girl that fell asleep nearly in her plate midway through her meal. I can only describe the guy sitting behind us as identical to Jafar in Aladdin, when he’s disguised as the old scraggly man who visits Aladdin in jail. He was just sitting there with his crooked teeth cackling, and then crawls over to our table and goes “Some people are crazzzzzy!” Another man that was sitting next to us kept meowing sporadically, and sounded EXACTLY like a cat, and he had some ventriloquist skill because we couldn’t see him making the sounds. When he got up from his table and went outside to talk to the “guard”, he had one of those invisible pet leashes that Six Flags sells, and kept meowing and staring at the four of us. Kelsey stole the dinner knife for our walk back—very resourceful.

We had a rough wake-up this morning and are currently driving into the town of Arenal. This was another GORGEOUS drive through miles of countryside. Such a relieving sight after being in the dirty city of San Jose. I wish the pictures I take from the bus window would do it justice. There are these bright green pastures with ranges of cattle and gorgeous flower bushes all over. Right now I’m looking out the window to my right and see this huge volcano… No big deal. I can’t wait to go horseback riding along it tomorrow! We’re almost to our hotel where we’ll have lunch and then go to the hot springs. Woohoo!

We stopped for a bathroom break about an hour ago and I finally found and bought a Costa Rica soccer jersey.. Put me in, coach. I have two souvenirs that I’m hoping to bring back to the States, one being the jersey and the other a vintage map that I can frame.

Marshall reading a scandalous excerpt from Cosmo.

Time to go!!! Ciao, pura vida.