Through the Holidaze

All right, this post will be a little higher in visual content and a little lower in the word count!  I keep thinking about writing something longer, but not only is this a pretty dated communication form (LiveJournal, anyone?), but Facebook does its absolute level best to promote ads and hacked account spam and to bury most meaningful content.

I've been actively procrastinating on writing a new post, largely because it feels like more of undertaking when so much time has gone by since the last one.  Two months have flown by - and, at the same time, the months have been full of conversations, plans, some adventures, a trip back to the States, and plenty of lesson planning!

Teaching ESL

She got the glint of my scalp just right.

We're out of the rainy season, but still have moments!

My classroom.  Kind of neat to be able to say that phrase.

 

Planning for the future with my Saturday morning adults.

 

 

Teaching English to Ticos (children and adults, A1-B2 levels) has proven both difficult and rewarding.  Much of the difficulty is due to the newness of having to plan lessons on my own time and come up with meaningful (and occasionally entertaining) activities, especially for my younger students.  But beyond the nagging perfectionism and procrastination, in the classroom itself - generally speaking, it has been a lot of fun!  I don't know yet if ESL is a stepping stone to another career direction or if it will evolve into a vocation of its own for me, but for now it just feels good to teach.

 

 

Christmas

Plenty of European Christmas traditions down here - just odd to see when it's 90 degrees F outside!

 

Liberia's Festival de Luz.

 

Churros!

 

Our friend Fabiola put together this spread for us for a little pre-Christmas gathering.

 

One of the only photos I took back in the States.  It's not that there wasn't anything to take pictures of, but more that my siblings were already on top of it, for the most part!

 

Some of the back-to-CR haul.

 

After a moody Thanksgiving, it was really refreshing to be invited over to a friend's place here for some food and connection.  The trip back to Montana (Oregon wasn't in the cards this trip) felt short, with long travel days, layovers overnight in Dallas with weird noises and bad food, and the general frenzy of Christmas travel and seeing everyone all at once.  That said, it was wonderful to see the Sweeney side of the family, including spouses, nieces, and nephew.

Exploring Around

 

The above are all from our first trip to Rincón de la Vieja.  We learned two important things: 1) We wanted to go back for a bigger hike, and 2) Taking an Uber was probably not the best way to get there!

Views from Playa Ocotal - a very small and intimate beach, which suited us just fine.

Teachers' and Estelar staff trip down to Puntarenas.  Pretty serious day trip, but it was my first real sunset in CR and the aquarium had some neat critters.

Our neighborhood restaurant - excellent "fajitas" (most foods down here that SOUND familiar from Mexican fare up north are usually pretty different - for example, most tortillas are hand-pressed and thick, or - and this is more likely - they are replaced altogether with smashed plantain patacones) and arroz con pollo.

At Playa Hermosa, our beautiful go-to.  The waves are gentle, so not popular for surfing, but excellent for relaxing.  Much of the sand is black, and I also discovered that it's ferrous - I keep bringing home gobs of sand that won't let go of the little magnet on my backpack for my reservoir hose.

 

Playa Ocotal again.  I took a jaunt around the peninsula to the west and found some great spots for snorkeling amongst the rocks - I might need to invest in some equipment to actually do a bit of that.

And back to Rincón de la Vieja, this time via rental car and a solid hike to the Cangreja waterfall.  We were blessed to encounter a troupe of capuchins mosey through the trees above and around us at one point, and I was able to add a crested guan and long-tailed manakin to my life list as well.  Today, our legs are feeling the move away from our hiking lifestyle in Bend!

 

As some of you know, being in Costa Rica has been a challenge in many respects, and it's been a far cry from a steady stream of wildlife and margaritas.  That said, we've been forced to take some time recently to reflect on the fact that we chose to move to CR not for the ease (ha) or the good-paying job (ha ha), but for the opportunities - both for my career and for our life experience in a beautiful country chock-full of postcard natural landscapes and incredible biodiversity.  We've gotten to see things that some people only ever get to daydream about, so I want to make sure that I stay grateful in the midst of the very real difficulties of making a life in another country and another language, away from many of the comforts and things so easily taken for granted back in the States.

 

I'm hoping to make another post soon with some of our reflections on the move here - what we did right, what we did, uh, less right, and some of what we've learned through the process.  But that's the summary for now!  As always, please feel free to leave a comment or send a message to me directly if you have any thoughts or questions (or just want to say hi)!