When living in a foreign country I always prefer to do things just like the locals. I always take public buses; I speak as much Spanish as possible and almost always do things on my own. A lot of people here when they find out I’m from the US will ask me who I came with, thinking that I’m with a tourist group or some big group from the US. I’m always confused by that question because it never crosses my mind as a question that might come up. In the US when you meet a foreign exchange student, they are usually there by themselves, not with a big tourist group. I guess though when your country is known for tourism, ppl think to ask that question more often. I’d compare this question to the “where do you work/study” question of the US. Usually it is the 2nd or 3rd question asked when getting to know someone in the US as our jobs are a bigger part of our lives. That being said I made a major break through the other week when one of my friends from my salsa class told me that he thought that I was Costa Rican. I was pretty impressed with myself as I had talked to him before and asked him about where he worked and such. Usually I’m a dead give away even before I speak, usually due to the t-shirts that I wear advertising some fundraiser that happened three years ago. The only other time I had made a semi-breakthrough was when I was leaving Costa Rica for the first time and I got to the airport and a taxi driver asked me if I wanted a taxi and I told him I needed a plane, to which he replied asking if I was going to Spain.
In my quest to blend in I requested to live with a host family while doing my volunteer work. It has been pretty nice, they take good care of me. Making sure to serve me three meals a day, wash my sheets and clothes each week, and occasionally we’ll go out and do something like visit a volcano. Within my house though it is definitively very macho. Macho, as in machismo or male dominated I guess. It’s not always very noticeable but the women culturally have the responsibility of anything that relates to the daily operation of the house. It’s not like their enslaved by their spouses but it’s more little things that don’t always make sense to me. For example; we always eat dinner and then the dogs are fed by my host mother. Sometimes we finish eating and me and my host dad we’ll be watching tv in the room adjacent to the kitchen while my host mom is upstairs studying (she never graduated high school and is now going back to finish). Anyways the dogs start whining for food and all my host dad will do is announce to the upstairs that “Laura, the dogs are hungry.” Eventually she will come down and feed them but why couldn’t he just feed them? What’s funny is that they think nothing of it as it is part of their culture, while I’m sitting there about to get up and feed them myself. That is just a typical example of the machismo here. I have to say though my host dad has assumed all responsibility for sweeping and mopping the floor, which he does 3-4 times a day. Yeah, they also find it weird that we (college aged kids) can go weeks without vacuuming or cleaning bathrooms, when they do it almost every day. I should point out though that both my host parents work at home, the dad painting and finishing the construction of the house while the mother bakes bread to sell at the bakery and does the domestic goddess thing.
Last Thursday I went on my first Latin dance outing in Costa Rica. Since Mother’s day was last Friday, there was a big dance at La Rumba, a big dance hall/bar-restaurant in a pretty nice part of Alajuela. As big as the dance floor was though, it filled up quickly to the point where there was no room. That is what I hate most about going out and dancing. There never is enough room to display your full repertoire of combinations without hitting anyone. It is even more nerve-racking for the guy as it is his responsibility to protect his partner from getting stepped on. One cool/funny part of the evening was when they invited a Mexican Mariachi band to the stage. The cool part was they were really good and had a saxophonist who played one note for about 5min without stopping. The funny part was the whole dance floor cleared out for them. Nobody danced while they played. I don’t know if it was more as a sign of respect or that no one knew how to dance to Mariachi. I think it was more of the latter; ticos don’t dance to Mariachi but rather sing karaoke to it.
That was fun, was out till 1:30am but thankfully I was in Costa Rica and everybody gets the day off for Mother’s Day so I didn’t have to worry about getting up and going to work the next day. With the extended weekend I decided to hang around in Alajuela as one of my co-workers was getting married that weekend. I’d never been to a foreign wedding and even though it was catholic it still varied from a little from US weddings. I only went to the mass as they were having a small party later for family members. What I liked most about the wedding was that it was a lot simpler. I don’t know if that was because of custom or lack of money but it worked for me. There wasn’t 4-5 bridesmaids and groomsmen all dressed to match and those who came to the wedding were dressed more laid back than what I was used to. The mass went pretty well with only two awkward moments, one being when the bride was supposed to say I do, but forgot that she was supposed to say it then, so there was a hold your breath moment. Also at the end of mass it just kind of abruptly ended. They didn’t even have an exit song. The mass just ended and they started taking pictures. Kind of awkward for me but not so much for them I guess. Two emotions that I always experience when I’m at weddings; one is I start to imagine how my wedding is going to be, how I’ll have to get married twice, once in the US and once in my bride’s country…, and how big/small my parties are going to be etc. After that emotion passes though the next feeling I have is one of total immaturity where I sit there and almost laugh to myself as I watch the bride and groom promise to be together forever. I mean that is a long time. How nervous they seem to me, it’s like there getting their ball and chain fitted instead of the wedding ring. Usually right then I realize that I’m definitively not ready to get married anytime soon.
From the work standpoint things have kind of stalled as of late. Habitat in Costa Rica works as the bridge between the government agencies and the people that apply for gov. housing. You wouldn’t believe the number of tramites (steps) that one has to go through to build a house. They have job positions down here called tramitadoras, which basically is someone who runs around and does all the paperwork and permitting because it is a chore. Things have slown down as of late because the gov org that gives out the housing vouchers has suspended this activity as they are revising their budgets to determine how much money they don’t have I would assume. With construction costs doubling in the last year and the colon (Costa Rica’s currency) getting weaker has caused the vouchers to be issued for more money than in the past and now there is less money to go around. So for the moment we haven’t started construction on any new houses in the past two weeks. Today I heard on the news that 43 thousand people live in slums in Costa Rica and that the President promised to construct homes for at least 20 thousand living in slums, but he hasn’t done anything yet since he was elected 2 years ago. So business should be booming, right?
Yesterday I went and visited a project of 60 houses (see photo). We got there and they had about 40 completed, 5-10 half way done and the rest had yet to be constructed. What I don’t understand is some of these houses have been completed for months but nobody has moved into them yet. We were supposed to go and interview ppl for the houses this month but I doubt that is happening anytime soon. I don’t understand why families who live in substandard housing must remain like that, even though there are decent homes available that sit vacant. They say they have to take out a loan and do all the paper work and a lot of ppl don’t qualify and blah blah blah. I don’t know, maybe I’m missing a big chunk of the story but it kind of boggles my mind. Tomorrow I am going back to the project with a bunch of major/potential donors from the US and other countries to plant some trees at the project site so I’m sure more of the story will come to life. I mean, we’ve even started projects without permits before (ok we did it once, and that was because we had a huge US group coming and didn’t have any other sites available to send them to) so I don’t know why these houses remain empty. Maybe we need another kick in the behind from the US?
P.S. I haven’t officially given up on my US citizenship; it just makes more sense to refer to the US as the US when I’m not in the country. However, I think I’m completing already 8 weeks in Costa Rica this week. I lost track about 6 weeks ago but thankfully my host family is good at remembering for me ;)
In my quest to blend in I requested to live with a host family while doing my volunteer work. It has been pretty nice, they take good care of me. Making sure to serve me three meals a day, wash my sheets and clothes each week, and occasionally we’ll go out and do something like visit a volcano. Within my house though it is definitively very macho. Macho, as in machismo or male dominated I guess. It’s not always very noticeable but the women culturally have the responsibility of anything that relates to the daily operation of the house. It’s not like their enslaved by their spouses but it’s more little things that don’t always make sense to me. For example; we always eat dinner and then the dogs are fed by my host mother. Sometimes we finish eating and me and my host dad we’ll be watching tv in the room adjacent to the kitchen while my host mom is upstairs studying (she never graduated high school and is now going back to finish). Anyways the dogs start whining for food and all my host dad will do is announce to the upstairs that “Laura, the dogs are hungry.” Eventually she will come down and feed them but why couldn’t he just feed them? What’s funny is that they think nothing of it as it is part of their culture, while I’m sitting there about to get up and feed them myself. That is just a typical example of the machismo here. I have to say though my host dad has assumed all responsibility for sweeping and mopping the floor, which he does 3-4 times a day. Yeah, they also find it weird that we (college aged kids) can go weeks without vacuuming or cleaning bathrooms, when they do it almost every day. I should point out though that both my host parents work at home, the dad painting and finishing the construction of the house while the mother bakes bread to sell at the bakery and does the domestic goddess thing.
Last Thursday I went on my first Latin dance outing in Costa Rica. Since Mother’s day was last Friday, there was a big dance at La Rumba, a big dance hall/bar-restaurant in a pretty nice part of Alajuela. As big as the dance floor was though, it filled up quickly to the point where there was no room. That is what I hate most about going out and dancing. There never is enough room to display your full repertoire of combinations without hitting anyone. It is even more nerve-racking for the guy as it is his responsibility to protect his partner from getting stepped on. One cool/funny part of the evening was when they invited a Mexican Mariachi band to the stage. The cool part was they were really good and had a saxophonist who played one note for about 5min without stopping. The funny part was the whole dance floor cleared out for them. Nobody danced while they played. I don’t know if it was more as a sign of respect or that no one knew how to dance to Mariachi. I think it was more of the latter; ticos don’t dance to Mariachi but rather sing karaoke to it.
That was fun, was out till 1:30am but thankfully I was in Costa Rica and everybody gets the day off for Mother’s Day so I didn’t have to worry about getting up and going to work the next day. With the extended weekend I decided to hang around in Alajuela as one of my co-workers was getting married that weekend. I’d never been to a foreign wedding and even though it was catholic it still varied from a little from US weddings. I only went to the mass as they were having a small party later for family members. What I liked most about the wedding was that it was a lot simpler. I don’t know if that was because of custom or lack of money but it worked for me. There wasn’t 4-5 bridesmaids and groomsmen all dressed to match and those who came to the wedding were dressed more laid back than what I was used to. The mass went pretty well with only two awkward moments, one being when the bride was supposed to say I do, but forgot that she was supposed to say it then, so there was a hold your breath moment. Also at the end of mass it just kind of abruptly ended. They didn’t even have an exit song. The mass just ended and they started taking pictures. Kind of awkward for me but not so much for them I guess. Two emotions that I always experience when I’m at weddings; one is I start to imagine how my wedding is going to be, how I’ll have to get married twice, once in the US and once in my bride’s country…, and how big/small my parties are going to be etc. After that emotion passes though the next feeling I have is one of total immaturity where I sit there and almost laugh to myself as I watch the bride and groom promise to be together forever. I mean that is a long time. How nervous they seem to me, it’s like there getting their ball and chain fitted instead of the wedding ring. Usually right then I realize that I’m definitively not ready to get married anytime soon.
From the work standpoint things have kind of stalled as of late. Habitat in Costa Rica works as the bridge between the government agencies and the people that apply for gov. housing. You wouldn’t believe the number of tramites (steps) that one has to go through to build a house. They have job positions down here called tramitadoras, which basically is someone who runs around and does all the paperwork and permitting because it is a chore. Things have slown down as of late because the gov org that gives out the housing vouchers has suspended this activity as they are revising their budgets to determine how much money they don’t have I would assume. With construction costs doubling in the last year and the colon (Costa Rica’s currency) getting weaker has caused the vouchers to be issued for more money than in the past and now there is less money to go around. So for the moment we haven’t started construction on any new houses in the past two weeks. Today I heard on the news that 43 thousand people live in slums in Costa Rica and that the President promised to construct homes for at least 20 thousand living in slums, but he hasn’t done anything yet since he was elected 2 years ago. So business should be booming, right?
Yesterday I went and visited a project of 60 houses (see photo). We got there and they had about 40 completed, 5-10 half way done and the rest had yet to be constructed. What I don’t understand is some of these houses have been completed for months but nobody has moved into them yet. We were supposed to go and interview ppl for the houses this month but I doubt that is happening anytime soon. I don’t understand why families who live in substandard housing must remain like that, even though there are decent homes available that sit vacant. They say they have to take out a loan and do all the paper work and a lot of ppl don’t qualify and blah blah blah. I don’t know, maybe I’m missing a big chunk of the story but it kind of boggles my mind. Tomorrow I am going back to the project with a bunch of major/potential donors from the US and other countries to plant some trees at the project site so I’m sure more of the story will come to life. I mean, we’ve even started projects without permits before (ok we did it once, and that was because we had a huge US group coming and didn’t have any other sites available to send them to) so I don’t know why these houses remain empty. Maybe we need another kick in the behind from the US?
P.S. I haven’t officially given up on my US citizenship; it just makes more sense to refer to the US as the US when I’m not in the country. However, I think I’m completing already 8 weeks in Costa Rica this week. I lost track about 6 weeks ago but thankfully my host family is good at remembering for me ;)
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