Costa Rica part three
Monday, Mar. 20, 2006 - 20:08

Monday Feb ?
bedtime

Puerto Viejo - we're on the Caribbean coast and it's a whole nother side of the country and if the flesh-eating bacteria doesn't kill me the Bob Marley surely will. What I wouldn't give for a buttrock guitar solo right now, or a cello, or a banjo.

Tonight at dinner I was attacked by a cat who jumped into my chair with me and scared the crap out of me - a mai tai on an empty stomach.

I barely survived.

As it turns out we were both just lonely.

But first let's wrap some things up from good old Dominical. Dominical, with its perfect waves, its persistent Tico men, its expatriates sitting at open-air bars listening to the Eagles and Fleetwood Mac. The storyline with Miguel officially ends with this sentence: And then Becca and I got on an early-morning bus - 6 a.m. is really nice, I should have gotten up then all the time - to San Isidro, up a winding mountain road, standing in the overflowing aisle hanging on, passing two men on one side of the road eating tuna from a can, on the other side their freshly-overturned Suzuki next to a backpack; a woman in the seat next to me who I decided was a hermaphrodite, based on her ugly mullet, her pink fingernail polish, her large nose, and the book I just started reading.

You go up into the mountains, it gets less humid and cools off. San Jose is in a valley but still up high - look at a topographical map of Costa Rica for accurate information about this, I'm just making it up - but then as you go toward the coast - either coast - you go over the mountains, you round a corner and you can feel the wall of heat and humidity meet you.

But over here, at least tonight, it's not quite as humid and not quite as hot. I even used some hot water in my shower tonight.

In Dominical I saw: one monkey, in a store; one frog, dead; one eel, dead; one half dolphin skull, or maybe that of a giant prehistoric bird, or maybe a human, badly deformed.

Today was the first day without swimming. I was a mess, my head hair face - disgusting. Buses, dust, etc.

Got my passport checked by a policeman. Badass.

Got on the bus to Puerto Viejo - it was full of English speakers, tourists. All the other buses, we were the only whiteys. Puerto Viejo is a big tourist place.

We're staying at the raddest place - gardens and paths and cats and things. Such a nice atmosphere. Mosquito nets! = princess.

But seriously, I can only take so much Bob Marley. I've already heard No Woman No Cry twice, and that other one whose name I don't know - it's stuck in my head.

Tuesday
before sunset

I kind of hate to say it but Puerto Viejo smells like garbage and although the black sand of Playa Negra is sparkly and heavy I liked the beach at Dominical much better. The water here is greener but murkier, the break is all crazy, and - are there tides? Because it's been up the entire time. There are many more people here and consequently, as referred to earlier, stinky garbage.

There are pregnant ladies with brown bellies, dogs with fleas, schoolkids with bellbottoms, and this one disgusting old guy with a brown pregnant belly himself. And his hair: what's currently growing out of his head is sparse and gray, but he also somehow still has a coil attached of brown hair from the last decade. And a big gross beard of course. He and his woman came to the beach, sacrificed a coconut, marched in a circle around the coconut clapping (and probably chanting let us assume, although I couldn't hear) and then left.

Also, my tragic impatience has brought about another sunburn, this time on my chest.

Also, there's a kink in my neck and I look like a car accident victim with fused vertebrae because I have to rotate my entire torso to do anything.

Also, I woke up to discover a mosquito had spent the night with me inside my mosquito net. Mosquito net ¹ princess. I killed the bastard, and although I couldn't and still can't find any mosquito bite on me we all know that the blood on my hands after the murderous deed was my own.

[after dinner] I remain astonishingly brilliant and am more sunburned now than I was in Dominical. I am a glowing furnace - my entirety is fiery.

Lost: one pillowcase (always travel with earplugs and a pillowcase)
Begun: one period (why couldn't this have been a month to be late or to have skipped entirely?)
Worn: all my underwear except one white pair - obviously not an option given the last point (how many bodies do I have to have gone through so many pairs of underwear?)
Heard today: Ben Harper thank god and early this morning this lovely fantastic countryish Patsy Cliney music. Only one Bob Marley song!
Fingernails: getting longer and consequently more dangerous - I don't bite them when I'm happy or traveling.

Wednesday March 1
after breakfast

Our bike ride to Manzanillo is on indefinite hold due to rain. Yesterday morning was cloudy and then cleared off around 11. But this rain - it just started pouring. Pouring. Which is nice, actually. I'm in a hammock and this reminds me of camping in the summer because when I was a kid it rained all the time.

It's raining even harder now.

Another mosquito spent the night with me and this time there's evidence - a red bite on my finger - so the killing that took place shortly after the discovery was in self-defense. And revenge. Justified, either way.

Dream: I was someplace, we were going down to the river, called the dogs but some of the puppies were too busy playing to come.

Rain is nice because it makes you stop.

[bedtime] It eventually stopped raining so we rode to Manzanillo and it is much nicer outside of Puerto Viejo. Puerto Viejo, frankly, is a dump. Although tonight we ate at Miss Lidia's and Miss Lidia is a doll.

We saw a sloth. It looked like a mini bigfoot. There was a dead iguana in the road and numerous mudpuddles, very deep, aka potholes. Lo, off in the jungle an elephant roars, or something.

The ride was nice and Manzanillo is lovely and tomorrow we go to [terrible place which shall remain nameless].

my feet in a hammock