First Days

So I've had two embarrassing moments so far. And since embarrassing moments usually make the best stories, I'll start with those.

First: Some extended family came down from San José yesterday. Among them was a young boy and a really young girl. I asked the boy's name, and after a few tries, I finally understood what it was: Sebastian (he said it like "say-boss-tee-an" quickly and I wasn't sure what he said for awhile.) Then I asked the parents what the name of the little girl was, and they said "Mañana." I thought that it was an interesting name, since it means either "morning" or "tomorrow." Mañana = tomorrow; la mañana = the morning. So I thought it was interesting but didn't give it much thought. Not too much later, to make some more small talk, I asked them something like "Es su nombre cómo mañana, cómo ayer? O es cómo la mañana?" I don't know if I said it that well, and I don't even know if that is correct. But basically, what I asked was "Is her name like tomorrow, similar to yesterday?  Or is it like the morning?" I just wanted to know which they meant to be the main focus of her name. After asking them, however, they corrected me by saying her name was Marianna. If you say that name quickly and in a thick Costa Rican accent, it sounds a LOT like mañana, at least to a gringo like myself. I felt stupid but had to laugh and I think they thought it was funny as well.

Second: I went out to a local bar with Max last night, one of the three brothers in the family. He was really nice and bought me some beer. I of course wanted to try the local beer, Imperial. It was realllly good beer. It was a lot smoother than most American beers (similar to Blue Moon but even smoother), and since I don't really like the hops-filled, bitter beers, it went down so easy. On top of that, their custom is to drink beer out of a cup with ice, which I LOVED because I like everything I drink to be as cold as possible. Perhaps as a result of the beer, or perhaps because of earlier liquids, after awhile I had to go to the bathroom. From the bar, I saw in plain sight the women's restroom, with a picture of the iconic bathroom female and the word "Damas." I didn't see the men's, however. I got up, telling Max, "Voy al baño" (I'm going to the bathroom) and feeling confident I knew exactly how to say it (since most often I am sort of stumbling over words and sentences). That feeling of confidence quickly vanished, however. I went to go look for the men's bathroom around the corner, but I didn't see it. I opened a door that I assumed must be it but there was just a tiled bench in there. I then looked around a little more and all I saw was the storage area for the bar, where the customers aren't even supposed to go. I was confused. So awkwardly, I go back and say something like "A la derecha?" (To the right?) to the people there (two bartenders, Max, and another guy who showed up and was talking to Max). One of the bartenders says "A la izquierda" (To the left). I'm really confused now because to the left is the exit. So I point to the left and say "A la izquierda?" and he says no. At the time, I just thought, "What the hell, I don't get this, so I'll just look again," although thinking about it now, I have realized that I think he meant that once you turn the corner, then it's on your left, even though he didn't say that. Either way, I looked again, and once again, all I saw was that stupid room with a tiled bench (maybe it's a shower stall without a shower head?) and the back room for storage. So I go back and bare my face one more time, and say "No puedo encontrarlo" (I can't find it), so the guy gets up this time and walks over to help me. He walks right up to the room with a bench (which is on the left after you turn the corner), opens it, and tells me that it's the bathroom. I now feel so INCREDIBLY stupid, especially because I've already opened it and looked into it TWICE. He must have been like, what the hell, why doesn't he see it?! I take another look at the bench and I realize that it's angled backwards and that there is a strange looking drain on one end. AH. NOW I get it. It's like those trough-like urinals they have at stadiums. Only, it looks almost exactly like a tiled bench and not at all like somewhere to pee. But, as is best to do in these situations, I laughed it off and he laughed as well. Later in the night, I brought it up again, attempting to say "It's very different than what I've seen" and "Hopefully I can find it this time," and even though I may not have said it exactly right, it got a good laugh out of the guys and I felt kind of cool. So good, I regained my confidence . . . somewhat.

Everyone has been really nice here overall. They're a very polite people. It's good that I know the basic greetings and stuff because even if I can't speak Spanish too well, I am always fine asking "Como está?" and when I meet someone, I am fine asking their name and you always say "Mucho gusto" after you meet someone (sort of like "nice to meet you.") Now even though I often feel like I don't know a lot, I definitely am understanding a fair amount and speaking pretty well given the fact that I haven't practiced much at all since I last took a Spanish class in 2005. I have already had two people tell me "su español es muy bueno" which has made me feel very good. I can talk about where people are from, the weather (somewhat), where people have been around the world, and some other things like that. It feels REALLY good to actually have sort of a conversation with someone in a completely different language!

Unrelated sidenote: I am actually sitting in a hammock right now outside the house underneath a Cas tree. The weather is great now (it was really hot earlier) and I keep hearing a rooster crow about 20 feet away. The rooster's crow here is not "cock-a-doodle-doo," it's "qui-qui-ri-qui," which is pronounced "kee-kee-ree-kee." I also found out that the dog sound is "guau guau," which sounds basically like "wow wow" since the "g" is hardly pronounced.

I had my first day at the school today. It. Is. BEAUTIFUL!!!!!!!!!!! The school itself isn't too amazing, but it's very small, with only about 6 or 7 classrooms and a preschool section. There are many things that make it beautiful though. First of all, it is inside/outside. The only things that are inside are the classrooms. Nothing else. There are no hallways or lunchrooms or anything. The "lunchroom" is just a table outside of the classrooms. And instead of hallways are sidewalks adjacent to the classrooms. The preschool doesn't even really have doors. It's all open with just a roof. And the other classrooms leave their doors open all the time. The most amazing thing about it though is the view from the school. I can literally step right outside of the office or a classroom and look out to a view of lush plant life, a few streets, and many, many hills. But they're more than hills. They're not mountains but they're big and beautiful. After all, it is called "Atenas Preschool y Escueala Colina Azul" (Atenas Preschool and Primary School on a Blue Hill.) It's just such a change going from an Indiana school - which is completely closed, and when I go outside, all I see is roads, some trees, and flat landscape - to being here in this tiny outside school on a hill that feels very open and has an AMAZING view.

I love Cas juice. Mmmmm. Very good. I had a bite of raw Cas as well, and it was VERY sour but good. Sort of like a lemon, but with a very different consistency. The consistency is more like a pear but it looks kind of like a green orange or lemon. But the juice (called "fresco") is really good and they sweeten it up nice and dandy. And Iris (the homestay mother) makes it fresh all the time.

It was funny because I played Nintendo with Sebastian. He had Mario Party on his Nintendo DS and he was showing me some of the minigames on it. It was funny because I think he thought I didn't really know how to play video games (haha yeah right) because he never let me play a new minigame first. He would always say "espera" (wait), show me how to play it, explain how to play it in a bunch of Spanish I didn't understand, then give it to me to try. The game was in English, so all I would have to do is read the instructions, but he would always skip through them. So sometimes I actually didn't know how to play so it made it look like I wasn't good at videogames! Eventually, I started saying "espera" when we got to the instruction screen so I could read it and know how to play. He still wouldn't let me play before he showed me how though, haha. But all in all, playing with him got me to practice listening and sort of speaking a lot of Spanish. So who said videogames aren't educational?

After Nintendo, he took out his massive quantities of Pokemon figurines and showed me. Man, he had SO many in this backpack he used especially for them. I think he said there were 48. He then told me each one cost about 1,000 colones, which is about $2, which adds up to about $100. Man! He said "escoge seis" (choose six). So I did, but then I had no idea what to do. He kept trying to explain how each of them had a different class, like some were "rock" and some were "fire" and some were "water" and that each of them had different attack moves. I FINALLY started getting the gist but it took a long time. But then I told me to pick an attack to do with one or something, but I didn't know any. So he told me some and even that took a long time, because he kept saying "roca tumba" or something and I had NO idea what that was. Turns out it was simply "rock tomb." I don't even know what that is in ENGLISH let alone Spanish. It would have helped IMMENSELY had I played any sort of Pokemon game before. But alas, I haven't. So I thought, well, he has Pokemon cards as well and that looks like it will be easier than using these weird figurines. So I ask "podemos usar las tarjetas?" (can we use the cards?) He says yes and goes and gets them. Oh man. Not any easier. There were all these rules and symbols on the cards and I had no idea what they meant. After a long, futile, explanation from Sebastian, I eventually just gave up and got my computer to read the instructions on how to play. In a way, though, this made it even harder! Because as I was reading them, there were tons of rules and stuff that applied to the cards, but when I tried to confirm with him that I understood, he most often would say that it wasn't right. But what I think was happening was that pretty much the only rule he used was that the "attack points" of one character card would subtract a certain amount of points from the "health points" of the character being attacked, depending on how good the "defense points" of the latter character were. This is all fine and dandy, but it made for a very shallow, unfun, game because it was basically like seeing a number 50 and attacking it with a number 60. Or having a 90 and getting attacked by 70, so you have 20 points left. It's an addition/subtraction lesson! Eventually, after going through our hands of cards, Sebastian won of course, since I still didn't really understand the rules. Overall, though, as with the videogame, it was a good lesson in Spanish to try to keep up with him. Most people here slow down to talk to gringos, but I don't think kids realize that it helps us to understand them, so he was BLAZIN'.

Es todo. Hasta luego.

Whit (or as they pronounce it, "Weet")