A day in the life of a minority

As someone who identifies as Caucasian, it's not hard for me to find people who look like me in most parts of the world. However, people of northern European decent are not particularly common in Costa Rica. While it's true that nearly everyone in this country can trace their lineage to Spain, or perhaps Italy--although there are dark-skinned afrocaribbean people as well as a large Asian minority--most everyone has beautifully colored tan skin (the kind that those creepy orange girls can't hope to emulate) with dark hair and eyes. So me and my coloring are fairly rare. But at least I'm not blonde--blondes are quite popular here and I hear they get "heckled" the most. (Most men who heckle here aren't rude or creepy about it--they're just expressing verbally or with whistles that they like what they see--so the world heckle is a bit strong.)

My story as a minority needs some background.

Today I went to the Museo Nacional de Costa Rica. As far as museums go, it wasn't that awesome, but it was only $4 and they had a butterfly garden right at the entrance. Unfortunately I didn't have cash and they didn't take cards, so I had to find an ATM. The closest one wouldn't read my card, so I walked up the street another 10 minutes until I found another bank of ATMs. The first ATM I tried also didn't want to read my card. So I tried the one right next to it and it finally worked. Then I walked back to the museum. On my way there I heard bells ringing and could see the top of an old church. I decided to go there after the museum.

The museum had a room of precolombian artifacts, one of really old gold trinkets, and some model rooms from the colonial area. The building that the museum is housed in is very old and used to be used by the military. There's a part that they left halfway how it used to be, including a guard tower with tiny windows for shooting out of and prison cells, complete with 60-year-old prisoner graffiti. The coolest thing was probably the butterflies, to be honest.

When I left the museum the sun was out and it was a bit warm. I walked towards the church, which I don't really know much about, except that it's old. I took some pictures and noticed across the street were some shops. I was thirsty so I was on the hunt for water... but there was a Pop's so I got ice cream and water.

Now to the minority part.

I didn't want to walk around and try to eat the ice cream, as I got two scoops and they were larger than I anticipated. So I found a bench and sat in the sun eating my ice cream. The area I was in was only for pedestrians, so there was a constant stream of people going by. I kinda felt like a zoo animal. The kids stared at me because I had ice cream. The men looked at me as they walked by simply because I was a young woman. Sometimes the women looked too, just to see what their partners/children were looking at. Too many people looking at me! It's just ice cream! You can't even see my shoulders or my cleavage!

Americans might say that many Latinos have "low standards" but I prefer to think that they are more open-minded to all types of beauty. Women don't have to be particularly young or sexily dressed to hear something directed at them. Last week I walked to the grocery store wearing jeans, a t-shirt and tennis shoes. My hair was in a ponytail. A vision of lust, no? Well, I still got one whistle that day. sheesh! One interesting thing that I have noticed about the cat calls/whistles is that usually the men are older, maybe mid 30s and up. Guys who look to be around my age usually keep their mouths shut, thank goodness.

It's interesting to think about what each culture sees as different or interesting. In the States I'm only a little different. Maybe I catch people's attention in America because I blind them with my ridiculously pale legs. But otherwise I'd say I blend in with the majority pretty well.

El Mercado Central y el Mercado Artesanía

Today my class played hooky for most of the class period even though the program director explicitly stated that no field trips were allowed since we lost 2 class days to national holidays.

Well, we went anyway. My class (of four) went with another class (of two) and the two professors. The 8 of us squeezed into two taxis and drove most of the way there. We got out when the maria (taxi meter) read 2000 colones, and we each paid 500 ($1). After getting out, we walked a few blocks to the entrance and waited for the other half of our group to join us. Here's a crappy picture of the main entrance that I took while crossing the street and not looking at my camera:

My professor handed out a sheet of paper to the four of us in her class. It had a bunch of questions on it that we had to ask various vendors. The questions (translated) were:

• What year was the market built? 1880.
• What is the most sought-after food in the market? Casados or gallo pinto.
• Find a vendor that sells medicinal plants and write down six names of unfamiliar plants.
• Find three new fruits. Tiquizque, Ñampi, Arracache. (pictures later)
• Write down the names of three new flowers. Girasoles (sunflower), anturios, elecorrñas. (spelling is very, very, approximate!)

There were some others questions but they don't neatly translate. One was a list of names and we had to ask Ticos what the nicknames of those names were. The market reminded me a lot of Pike Place Market but more twisty-twiny and all the passageways were narrow. There really wasn't a main walkway. And there was no water view. But they had a bunch of mini restaurants, innumerable meat and seafood counters, spices, cheeses, herbal medicines, fresh flowers, souvenirs, and at least two pet stores.

I have no idea what this is, how it's cooked, or what it tastes like. But I know it looks like a really ugly coconut on the outside and has a funny name.

Camote is sweet potato. And a term of endearment. Ñampi is just fun to say.

This is pejibaye. I don't know what is tastes like but it can be cooked in a pressure cooker, peeled, quartered, and tastefully squirted with mayonnaise. My professor loves them and one time last month my host family made them for some friends they invited over.

The fruit on the left is prickly like velcro. The shell is about the consistency of an avocado. Inside hides a grape-like white flesh and a rather large seed. The fruit on the right I don't know much about, other than it looks like a pink artichoke.

Anecdote: while walking through a tight passageway in the market I squeezed passed a Tico, saying, "permiso" (pardon me). He replied in English, "very good". Hmmm. This is not the standard response. I guess I was complemented on my correct use of Spanish?

At the market I bought these very cute hand made leather shoes for $12 and a hand made sling shot for Rey that only cost $3.80. I also bought 10 postcards.

We met up again at 11:30 and were released from "class". The other students were taking the bus somewhere and I planned on taking a taxi to the artisan's market. The two professors were returning to the University and told me they would drop me off at the artisan's market.

At the market I walked to the far end and worked my way back to the front, which was where they dropped me off and the shorter way home. I spent at least two hours there but I only bought a bag, a wine bottle holder, and a pair of elephant earrings. Here's all my treasures for the day:

The first thing I bought was this beautiful bag. Their construction had caught my eye the first time I went to the market. It was there that I decided to buy one at a later date. Today I looked at all the designs and decided on one with a deer that maybe isn't a deer. The leather is reddish in color and has patterns stamped into it. I bought it for $32. Here are some pictures:

Yay, it says Costa Rica on it!

Do you see these ridiculously tiny, perfect stitches? Incredible!

The back bottom edge.

The back top edge.

Even the bottom is decorated!

I also bought this curved wine bottle holder and these elephant earrings. They were different and only $2 so I couldn't resist.



I spent a decent amount of money ($60) and plan on spending more. Things that I didn't buy that I'd really like to:

• Custom you-name-here wooden keychains ($3)
• A few more bags--if I can get good deals. I have my eyes on a certain style that's heavily embroidered, sometimes by hand, and one vendor had bags with Ganesh and oms on them. I know three or maybe four bags are a lot to buy, but I can see myself using one often, and since they're hand made they're more likely to disintegrate with use. I want to hold on to my memories from my trip for as long as possible. I also want to be the girl with the cool bag that she purchased in a foreign country.
• Another pair (or two) of those cool leather shoes. At the art market a vendor sold shoes that were extremely similar to the ones I bought at el Mercado Central but they were painted pretty colors and had a small wedge heel instead of being completely flat. The vendor there told me he could sell them to me for c8000 or two for c15000 ($16/$30). Same thinking here. More = better because they're likely to fall apart as I wear them. And it's not possible to get cool shoes like that in the States.
• I've got my eye on something for my dad, but emailed him to see if perhaps he would even like it first.
• I'm pretty sure my aunt will throw a fit if I don't buy her something, so I'm going to do that. Plus my grandma and uncle that live with her. I think my college friends will be disappointed if I don't bring them back something but no one insisted and they're on the bottom of my to-buy-for list.

I think this last week will be very busy for me. I need to finish up my purchases, hit up the museums, pack, make a final presentation and take a final exam.

A new addition to the family...

My host mom had to put down her very old dog, Luna. This may have been what prompted her daughter and son-in-law to get a puppy. Her name is Mocha and she sure is cute. Other than her yipping interrupting my occasional afternoon naps, I think she's adorably precious.... and the perfect size to fit in my carry on. She's helped me feel a little bit better about returning home and finding Pedro almost fully grown. I think he'll be about 6 months old.

I've taken this opportunity to try and learn some commands for dogs. Maybe this is a bit odd but I think it would be hilarious if Rey's dog Pedro was bilingual. His name is Pedro and I do speak (some) Spanish. I really only know for sure that venga means "come" and abajo means "down". I can postulate that "sit" is siéntente but I'm not sure if that's quite the right version of sentar (to sit)*. Mocha's a bit young to be learning sit. She probably is only 6 or 8 weeks old... however many weeks a dog can have when it's okay to take them away from their mothers.

*This link looks helpful... I can probably patch together a list of what's correct and use it on Pedro.

Sleeping & homework > blogging

Hello, my loyal readers. All three of you.

I've been quite remiss in keeping my blog up-to-date. It's been rather difficult to muster up the energy to write about all of the amazing experiences I've had because all of those said amazing experiences leave me mentally and physically tired. So, to make sure that you know that I know I owe you a lot of updating, here's a list of upcoming blog entries. I will add links as I complete them. Depending on the order of events, the blogs may be posted date-wise before this one. To be sure not to miss anything, double check the list of posts to the left. And thanks for reading, Mom and Dad and Judy. ;-)

• Food here is different--it has more sugar. I've given up ketchup. [link]
• More academic details. I have not been very clear about details concerning my school, the structure of classes, what we do, etc. Also my grade from last month (A-. [ooops, ruined the surprise.])
• The sounds of Costa Rica as heard from my room (kind of interesting, I promise) [link]
• Spanglish ... gah!
• My new obsession with passport stamps [link]
• Round two of classes, with a touch of homesickness
• The crazy lightning and thunder that almost gave me a heart attack and ensured that I could not take a shower the next morning [link]
• My trip to Panama last weekend
• My trip to Monteverde this past weekend
• My plans for this upcoming weekend

Passport stamps: Gotta catch 'em all!

That was a Pokemon reference if you didn't get it.

Before I went to Panama I decided that I wanted to attempt to fill up one page in my passport before I went back to school this year. I know that one page has four blanks for stamps and such. I already had one for El Salvador and one from Costa Rica. I knew Panama would make one more. So then I started thinking... could I convince Rey to take a mini vacation in Vancouver or Victoria just so I could get another stamp? I've only been to Canada once, and that was before passports were required, so now that they are they must stamp them, right? Well, that was my logic before crossing the border into Panama.

I received a Costa Rican exit stamp, then a Panamanian stamp, and a Panamanian sticker. Woah! Lotsa cool stuff! I'm onto my second passport page!

When we left Panama, I got a Panamanian exit stamp and seal (carelessly stapled into my passport... gotta fix that) and a Costa Rican entrance stamp. Wowee! So this is what my passport looks like now:

It's sideways, but gimme a break. Two pages will be complete when I leave Costa Rica via the airport and get one last exit stamp. A sad day for Costa Rica and me, but a happy day for me and my passport stamp obsession.