Pixie in Paradise

Remember what I said in the last post? 

“There’s still parts of me that are very much North American/Western Culture, but these new parts, the Central American ones, haven’t had time to fully develop or integrate themselves yet, which will in turn shape me into a better, more well-rounded human… There are a ton of lessons in all of this and I am absolutely here and present for them. ALL of them.” 

Christ on a cracker, what was I thinking? I said that I was here and present for all of them? Well, a few hours ago that meant sitting in my new Airbnb rental philosophizing with Johnny the handyman about life and relationships, with a toilet full of my poop. I arrived late Saturday night and by Sunday at noon I discovered the kitchen faucet leaked down into the cabinet below, there was minimal water pressure everywhere, the bathroom faucet worked but was broken – it had apparently lost its tail; and, the toilet stopped working at a very inopportune and disgusting time. Keep in mind it did that two days in a row on separate occasions, he would quick-fix the problem. The Airbnb host lives directly behind this casita; in fact, we share a wall. She cleans the place (hopefully) between guests and I’d love to ask her how she thought all of this shoddy plumbing was sufficient for the exorbitant monthly rental. It’s not like I’m going to be here for a night or two, I am a long term tenant desperate for peace and quiet with no distractions.

I’ve learned that doesn’t happen anywhere in Central America – maybe anywhere – unless you’re out in a rural setting, with the exception of the modern luxury apartment I rented in October for three nights in San Jose. The building was gorgeous and unless the door to the 12th floor balcony was open, all city noise was blocked. Resting, writing and cooking were all easily done with a fully furnished and stocked apartment. All of the places I’ve stayed at have very different definitions of “fully furnished.” My current space has two small pans, minimal dishware and cookware, lacking scissors and only one dish towel. Of the six or seven places I’ve stayed this is the second that doesn’t have any hot water heater and prior to this it was only short stays. This is for a month, through Christmas, and I am planning on washing my hair in the deep kitchen sink. It’s impossible for me to wash my hair in a cold shower. I’d pass out before soap could get in or be rinsed. I’m not being dramatic, this comes from experience! I’ve also booked an absolutely stunning earthen home near San Jose with full amenities and then some, for New Year’s and my upcoming birthday, so I’m trying my very hardest to go with the flow while in southern Costa Rica. The beaches and surroundings are incredible and my house is within walking distance of absolutely everything so if it means my hair stinks and my legs stay a little hairy, so be it. But I am getting ahead of myself. You might find the story entertaining as to how I made it to this little beach town right above Panama, from my island in Belize.

It took two days. Like all journeys to and through Central America lately it has been an adventure. By now you realize when I use the word, “adventure,” it can mean absolutely anything has happened. Leaving ⅔ of my belongings behind on Friday still meant I was carrying 100 pounds or more: a 65-pound suitcase, a 35-pound carry-on and a 25-pound (at least) backpack. While bus and taxi drivers are usually extremely helpful with baggage there were still a lot of instances where that luggage needed to be moved. 

First, it had to be moved down the stairs from my apartment in Belize to the golf cart that took me to the water taxi. The water taxi guys are fantastic and load and unload baggage extremely efficiently. My landlord’s husband carried the heavy suitcases down from my apartment onto their golf cart and then she took me to the water taxi. From there, the one-hour boat ride to Belize City then straight to a wonderful taxi driver who handled all the luggage until I was dropped off at the airport. During that 20-minute ride we talked about life and culture and differences there and in the US. This Rastafarian taxi driver was living in Florida for 30 years and had returned. We didn’t have enough time to delve into why, but I know his whole family has left Belize and lives in the US, including three grown children. Such is life.

I manhandled the luggage through the airport a short ways and checked in the large suitcase – which he informed me was forty pounds (or kilos?) over the limit – paying the $100 USD heavy luggage fee. I think maybe he was telling me “fourteen,” not forty. My first stop was Panama City but it was checked all the way to San Jose, Costa Rica where I would arrive in the morning.

There was a ten-hour layover in Panama City so I took an Uber from the airport to the closest upscale hotel. I would love to know what scale I thought I would find this lodging on but it wasn’t “up.” It was not to my liking for the huge amount of money spent for just six hours – and the food was bad but at least I was fed and they had hot water which is not a guarantee in Central America. 

*(When you book lodging, on Airbnb especially, scroll carefully through the Amenities section to the very bottom to make sure “hot water” isn’t crossed off. If they do have hot water it is usually listed under the Bathroom amenities section near the top, but you can usually catch the bottom line, well, at the bottom). 

Up at 4am to head through security and any Customs search as a foreign traveler they might want me to step through, and by 8am I was in Immigration and Customs lines in San Jose. By this time I’ve had the thought that it is very apparent I won’t be back home getting the scheduled autumn flu vaccine or any forthcoming covid vaccinations (and really, can’t I stop at four though?) but considering the amount of public transportation I’ve endured over the last few weeks, surely it has boosted my immune system. That’s how it works, right?

Luggage retrieved by 9am, I have until 2pm until a shuttle bus picks me up outside the ground level airport exit, to head to Puerto Viejo. By now I am extremely hungry and in an absolute lather for Costa Rican coffee. During my time in Belize I drank mostly tea, hot tea during those last couple rainy weeks and mixed with lemon juice and honey over ice before that. My new favorite drink is Earl Grey tea lemonade, but now it’s time to get back to my beloved drink of choice.

I don’t really need to set the scene much more than has already been done but here are the takeaways: I’ve unexpectedly left my home much sooner than planned under challenging circumstances (which I will get into eventually); it’s 24 hours after I started traveling – with twelve more to go – touching down and maneuvering through three airports in three countries; my luggage is much heavier than someone my size and level of strength can handle without some serious muscle strains; I’ve had to switch back to Spanish because English is not widely spoken where I’m headed; I am dirty, hungry and in desperate need of GOOD coffee.

As I walk out the ground level airport exit, a dry run for later, I had been told there were restaurants that I’d have access to. My plan was to stay there, eat, relax and wait six hours for that shuttle. What was actually there was one deli counter selling dry pastries and a security guard who said all restaurants were back up on the third floor and now that I’ve left the airport I have no access to said food establishments. Well fuck. This throws me a bit and keep in mind I am heavily medicated with motion sickness drugs so as much as I want food and coffee, I equally and as fervently want to go to sleep. 

I am not charming at this point but decide to order a coffee, contemplating my next move. Anticipating a great cup of coffee, to welcome me back to Costa Rica I sit down, take one sip and gag. This “coffee” tastes like cheap hot chocolate and I return to the counter and tell her I don’t like the sweetness in my coffee. She makes me another and as I Iook up to where she’s preparing hot beverages, it is not an Italian espresso machine but rather a Nescafé automatic – push the button and out comes a fake drink. No es autentico. This is not real, there’s no artisanal pride or magic involved. She pushed a button and hot water mixed with some sort of powder or instant coffee. At this moment most of my hopes and dreams get washed away. Not really, but seriously, in Costa Rica? I take a sip of the new cup she makes me and it tastes exactly the same. Inside, I am losing my shit, outside I shake my head and firmly say, “No,” and hand her the full cup of coffee back. It cost me $6 USD that she didn’t refund. Side note: no one refunds anything in Central America. It’s not like Walmart and Target where you could return a box of used baby diapers and they’d be like, “Cool. Leave it up front and go get a new box.”

My only option is to get off the airport property to get food and coffee. HOWEVER, with Uber – which is the very best option for transportation in San Jose, there’s a rule forbidding Uber drivers to get within ¼ mile of the airport doors. That space is reserved for taxi drivers and the occasional shuttle. I learned during the last visit to San Jose that taxi drivers there are very aggressive and if you say no to them they get even worse. Witnessing that made me even more grateful for Uber. With Uber you can tell who is supposed to pick you up, see exactly where they’re at, where they’re taking you, how long it will take and the price. There is no meter, like there is in taxis so the price is fixed – which is invaluable when traveling through a city you don’t know.

But, I had to use one of these orange airport taxis to at least get off the property. I tried to explain I wanted to go to a particular cafe. He drove away and we ended up at three different locations, none of which was the cafe I wanted to go to. He’d ask someone standing outside if we were in the right location and they’d say something in Spanish way too fast for me to understand, then we’d go someplace else. The driver would say the cafe used to be there but moved. I let him get away with this three times then told him to let me out. We were parked in front of what looked like a house where he said the cafe was supposed to be at. There was a man trimming a tree in the front and an elderly lady supervising on the ground. She saw us get out of the car and came down to greet us. She spoke with the taxi driver but I couldn’t keep up and I was starting to get a bit bewildered and angry at the driver’s bullshit. The woman spoke absolutely no English but I let them talk while I quickly opened my Uber app. Hoping I would have stable internet service long enough to request a ride to an actual cafe, I waited until it popped up and gave me the name of an Uber driver, pinpointing my location. Once it did that I threw $4 at the taxi driver and told him to leave. Then it started to drizzle. The old woman could tell I was frazzled and stayed with me, speaking rapid Spanish the whole time. I explained to her that she needed to slow down and several times I just told her that I couldn’t understand anything she was saying. Then, my internet dropped, automatically canceling my Uber request. That is when some real panic set in, but I had to try again. I was not going to stay on this freeway service road with all of my luggage at the end of someone’s driveway! Uber had to work, there were no other options. One more try on Uber proved successful and ten minutes later I was in a tiny car with a large man that spoke no English. I was so relieved to be in his car, that I cried a little. This concerned him but I said I was okay and in both languages I launched into a ton of Spanglish, including some choice swear words about my thoughts on San Jose taxis and how much I loved Uber. The driver looked shocked and asked if I knew what “pinche” meant. I said of course I fucking did. (I’d just used it like six times). I will never get into an orange airport taxi in San Jose or any of Costa Rican red taxis (painted those colors by law) unless I am really emotionally ready for an extra layer of fuckery and adventure with money to blow. (So…basically my whole travel abroad experience minus the extra money part)! Uber got me to and from a wonderful cafe twenty minutes from the airport and I got back half an hour early to hop onto the 2pm shuttle.

If that wasn’t exciting enough, the shuttle didn’t arrive until 2:37pm. By that time I was in an absolute frenzy. If there had been a ceiling outside, above that airport sidewalk, you couldn’t have pried me off of it. I had delayed my departure from San Jose by five hours just to pay $50 instead of $300 for the price of the six hour journey to Puerto Viejo. Now it looked like the shuttle wasn’t even coming for me. I was horrified and the shuttle booking company had no way to immediately get hold of them so I had to send an SOS email – which they didn’t respond to until four hours later.

Like I said Carlos and his purple shuttle van e-braked in at 2:37pm, thankfully, and I was so pissed but so relieved. He got out and looked like a disheveled surfer, long dishwater blonde hair, thin, half-buttoned shirt and baggy shorts. He threw my suitcases in the back with everyone else’s and told me to sit in front next to him. This turned out to be his smartest decision because he drove like a bat out of hell, a common theme in Central American public transportation. Even though I take meclizine every twelve hours when traveling, I had to pop an extra one early on in our journey as well as pass two back to the English kids (30-year-olds) behind me. They were from Manchester and loved Carlos’ music choices. We were getting a huge dose of Queen, The Doors, The Who, Black Sabbath, Led Zeppelin and other famous bands from the 60’s, 70’s and 80’s.

Carlos drummed on the steering wheel and whistled through his teeth waking me up when I got sleepy enough to drift off but it was a welcome noise compared to the 45 minutes of concrete jackhammering I listened to at the airport while waiting for him. We talked about music trivia and other very random topics. He and the Manchester kids discussed the 27 Club of sorts amongst great musicians: so many of them died at age 27, including Janice Joplin, Jim Morrison, Amy Winehouse, Kurt Cobain, Jimi Hendrix and many others. We thought about the possibilities as to why this phenomenon occurs and my health care worker brain kicked in finally and explained that most of them lived life hard with substance abuse and intense pressures of fame and that most likely their bodies would just give out at that age, unable to endure any more abuse. That was the moment I realized my brother had also died at 27 of an accidental heroin overdose because Carlos was wondering why it was just famous people and I said this is a phenomenon but not just in famous people. Such a spooky thing to realize.We moved from this discussion to focusing on the traffic coming to a complete stop on a windy road in a downpour in the dark, because there was a horse in the middle of the road. Someone walked the horse over to safety and we continued on to a soda (Costa Rican name for a cafe serving local cuisine), and had a small dinner before the final push to our destination. Inside this rather large soda were three restaurants: two serving local fare and one with an Asian fusion menu. It was cool and rainy so I opted for a ramen bowl topped with fresh tuna. It was so amazing, rice noodles, seaweed, sesame, vegetables, shrimp and quick-seared raw tuna. I took half to go, knowing there was a few hours to go with Carlos’ driving and no one needs a full stomach for that.

Pura vida.

The book room at one of my favorite cafes, all 3 to 5 minutes’ walking distance from my house!

Get ready for lots of tuk tuk photos, the best way to get around Puerto Viejo.

No hot water here so hair gets washed while standing over the kitchen sink. Currently drying my head on the front patio next to my undies on the clothesline.