Parade of Faroles

If you look closely, you can see the candle inside the farole,

Costa Rica coffee – put a sock in it (or put it in a sock!)

If you are a coffee lover, you’ll enjoy every cup you drink in Costa Rica, whether at an upscale hotel or local soda (small restaurant).  While you may have to go to specialty coffee shops in the US to get strong coffee (although many of these places do their own roasting and burn the coffee beans), anywhere you go here, you are served a full-bodied, freshly roasted cup of coffee.  Arabica, considered one of the premier coffee beans in the world, is the only variety allowed to be cultivated in Costa Rica according to a law passed in 1989.  Rich in flavor and low in caffeine, Arabica coffee grows best at elevations of 4200-5000 feet.  But what do you do with these heavenly beans to brew the perfect cup?  The traditional way of making coffee is to use a chorreador.  This is a simple stand made of wood or metal that holds a bag resembling the toe of a sock.  To make the coffee, you put the coffee in the “sock” in proportions to suit your taste, place the sock in the stand and slowly pour water that has come to a boil – but stopped boiling – through the sock into a recipient below.  Chorreadors and extra socks are available in grocery stores and markets.  To wash the sock, sprinkle it with salt and rub it between your fingers.  It is best if you start with a dry sock each time, so you may want to have extras on hand.  If you want to drink it the way most Costa Ricans do, you’ll add 2-3 teaspoons of sugar and some milk.  Little children love it and get their first taste in baby bottles!

Costa Rica Health Care – Smoke gets in your EARS

Have you ever tried lighting a cigarette with it placed in your ear? I haven’t, but many ticos have done just that. This is a common folk remedy performed when someone is having trouble with their hearing, experiencing pain in their ears or feeling something isn’t quite right with their ears/hearing. This “treatment” is intended to remove air that has accumulated in the ear canal and is creating a problem.  (I’m just reporting what I’ve been told. I didn’t know air got into your ears. I’ve only had a problem with water getting in mine. Also, a bug one time, but that’s another story.) The cigarette treatment: Place an unlit cigarette in the ear with the filter in the ear. Hold a match to the cigarette. The claim is that the air in the ear will light the cigarette and the offending air will be sucked out by the cigarette. The newspaper treatment: Roll a newspaper into a tube and place one end in the ear. Light the other end with a match. A cautionary note: Be sure the paper is long enough so your hair won’t ignite.  Try at your own risk.

Costa Rica Health Care – PEGA

Have you ever noticed anyone with bruises on their upper arms? If you have, you may have seen someone who has been treated recently for a stomach ache or intestinal problem. Costa Rica practices several non-traditional methods of health care along with traditional “western” medicine. One of the more unusual forms of treatment for gastrointestinal disorders is “pega.” This treatment involves deep, often painful, rubbing on certain areas of the body considered to be pressure/release points, such as the upper arms. The vigorous massaging of these points is believed to force movement and release of toxins within the body’s circulatory system, causing everything to begin flowing smoothly once again and affording relief to the person in distress. Once when I had a stomach ache (no doubt there are more definitive and correct words for my malady and its location, but I consider the stomach to be nearly everything a few inches above and below the belly button), a tica friend of mine ordered me to lie down on a large chest-type freezer in the kitchen of her restaurant. She started massaging my stomach, which was uncomfortable (have you ever tried to lie down on a freezer?) and painful (my stomach was very tender) and caused my “innards” to make all sorts of peculiar, rebellious noises. With her “hmms” and “uh-huhs” I assumed she was making a diagnosis and going to the heart of the problem. However, I couldn’t tolerate the discomfort and pain and aborted the treatment.  I may never know if pega works, but ask any tico and they’ll swear by it.

Community festivals

Each community in Costa Rica has an annual celebration of some sort under the guise of recognizing a patron saint, fruit, vegetable, harvest, horse, you name it. These celebrations can be a few days or a few weeks and are often accompanied by processions throughout the neighborhood led by a priest chanting over a megaphone at 5:00 AM! (Yes, at 5:00 AM.) The larger festivals have several food booths offering delicious ethnic foods and beer tents serving up local libations such as Imperial, Pilsen, Heineken, Bavaria and Rock Ice. For those who like their beverages a little “harder,” there is always guaro, a clear, potent liquid best consumed in small quantities (if consumed in large quantities you won’t remember doing so, I’ve been told). Our little barrio is having a celebration right now. Amusement park rides and food stands have been set up on the soccer field in front of the church. Because it is the rainy season, there are large ruts in the newly sodded “cancha” (field). Although I live more than a block away, I can hear the music (kumbia at the moment) as if it were in my own home. Fortunately, the city makes it stop at 11:00 PM. By then you are more than ready to pull the plug on the generator feeding juice to the sound system.

Our community in the US had an annual celebration to recognize the defeat of Jesse James (how many towns can claim that honor?!). Each year the “townies” would walk among the food booths in the evenings, reconnecting with friends they hadn’t seen since the previous celebration. Sharing greasy food (corndogs, onion rings and funnel cakes), stories and laughter was a tradition not to be missed. The Lions club served turkey legs, the Knights of Columbus dipped corndogs, Kiwanians served tacos and the Legion Club managed the ever-popular bingo tent. It always made me smile to see all ages rubbing shoulders as they sat on recently constructed benches made of boards and concrete blocks. No matter their ages, they all listened intently for their numbers to be called so they could be the one to shout “bingo.” On Sunday there was an enormous parade that lasted over two hours and was attended by people from all over the state. Americana at its finest. I imagine the people here look forward to their festivals with the same anticipation and back on them with the same nostalgia. Tiquicia at its finest. 

The Land of the Lost ….. shoe!

You can find and buy beautiful real estate in Costa Rica, but what can you get for free? Shoes!!! Yes, look around you and you’ll see a sandal here, a boot there or a tennis shoe somewhere else. Since my first day in Costa Rica, I have marveled at the abundance of abandoned shoes. Each time I see another woman’s high heel or man’s work boot, I wonder how someone could lose a shoe and not notice. (I’ve even seen PAIRS of shoes along the side of the road – shoes that still had miles left in them.) Each time I see another one of these lost mates, I wish I had done what I thought of doing when I first noticed the accumulation of shoes: create a wall of shoes a la Christo. Think of the “artistic statement” it would make and what a time capsule it would be with shoes of all shapes, sizes and styles – shoes with pointed toes, round toes, spike heels, wedgies, straps, open toes, laces and buckles. Shoes that slipped on, tied on or buckled up! Each style and material would hearken back to a particular time in history. Imagine archeologists centuries from now discovering the wall, long since buried in dirt, jungle, concrete, lava (maybe!) and the detritus of a lost society. Can’t you picture them contemplating the significance of a Nike swoop? Each year Manuel Antonio, Arenal and the beaches lure more tourists to Costa Rica. Why not the Wall of Shoes?