What a Downpour!

Tuesday, July 24, 2012

I finally have access to the internet on my laptop! Jorge, the son of the people I live with, reconfigured the internet access and all is working as it should. I can't tell you how happy I am to say adios to the computers at school!

I learned a new word today: pipilaches. It's just a slang word that means something is basically a piece of crap. That is how I woud describe those computers. When a little child needs to go to the bathroom they have to hacer pi pi  (go pee pee--it sounds the same in Spanish.) So you can see part of the origin of pipilaches.

It was lightly raining when we left for school this morning. The bus ride into town was even more memorable than yesterday's. Imagine commuting in an overloaded washing machine. If you've ever put too many clothes in the washing machine, you know what I mean. We bumped and grinded, hopped and bopped up and down all the way to school. I don't know what was different about the roads today, but I almost fell out of my seat several times from all the action.

At lunch time, Kesa, a girl from Belgium whose name I can't remember, and I walked to San Pedro Mall to eat lunch. The Belgian girl wanted fast food, a hamburger to be exact. We had a choice of Burger King, McDonalds, and Wendy's. They were side by side on the 3rd floor of the mall. We unanimously chose Wendys. I ordered ensalada Cesar con pollo spicey (Spicey chicken Caesar salad.) It cracks me up that they just mix Spanish and English words together like that. Anyway, I'm glad we ate American fast food because I really couldn't handle one more dish of beans. I've eaten so many beans these past 4 days, I could personally power the electricity in this city of 2,000,000 people!

When we left the mall to return to the school it was pouring, I mean REALLY pouring rain. It was a true aguacero (downpour) complete with thunder and lightening. I felt like I was dodging lightening bolts the whole way back to school, praying that my metal umbrella wouldn't be too much of an attraction for the lightening. Even with my umbrella, I dragged into school looking like a wet dog. My jacket was soaking wet, my feet, my backpack--everything! It continued raining all afternoon. I unloaded my backpack when I got home this evening to dry everything out. No clothes dryers here. I guess my jacket will eventually dry...

I had another Latin Dance lesson today. I really think I'm hopelessly stiff, but I gave it my best shot. There were more women students than men today so I had to dance with a woman. And I thought it was weird dancing with young guys yesterday... Her name is Debra and she is a psychologist from the U.S. (How handy to have an LDS bishop in the neighborhood and psychologist at school!) She is probably my age and we were once again, the "old folks" in the class. She was the "man" for our dancing, and I got to be me. We had to change partners twice and I ended up with a young man from Suiza (Switzerland). He was very gracious about having to dance with an old lady. My next partner was Tyler from Austin, Texas. He was actually a fairly decent dancer and also very gracious about being stuck with me. I felt I did a little better dancing the Salsa with his guidance.

Afterwards, I had a conversation class. Those classes are very informal gatherings of a teacher and any students who want extra practice. At first, there was just one young lady and me. We were at about the same level and had some pleasant conversation with the teacher about ourselves and what we have noticed about the culture of Costa Rica. I learned about piropos.  Piropos are the cat calls that men (mostly Latinos) fire at pretty women as they pass. We have to pass by a construction area on the way to the Mall and the workers go all out when they see a girl pass by. No big surprise: I have had NO problems with piropos!

She left after a while and a young man joined us. I could not understand half of what he said. Sorry to sound critical, especially since I don't consider myself all that excellent in Spanish, but we were in an intermediate group and he definitely was not at that level. His pronunciation was horrendous and he just made up words as he went, refused to conjugate verbs (all verbs were in the infinitive form), and just about butchered the language. The teacher was infinitely patient, but I really wanted to grab him and slap some sense into him. It was painful to hear. If I, as a gringa, caught the mistakes and cringed at the pronunciation, one can only wonder how the native teacher was able to endure it. Whew! I had to get that off my chest. I will try very hard not to be so judgemental in the future.

We have a new student staying in the house now. Her name is Pauline and she is from France. She didn't like the cooking at the last place she was staying. I'm serious...you know how the French are about their food! She heard our home had good food so she moved in. During dinner she told us all about the good food in France and Italy! She is quite the world traveler and has plans to work in tourism. She speaks French and English fluently. Her Spanish is very good. She has studied Italian and plans to start Mandarin soon. I admire how many Europeans take the time and effort to learn multiple languages. She seems very sophisticated in both dress and manner for someone so young. It will be interesting getting to know her.

Here are a few pictures of the school. More later.

The entrance to the school



The courtyard.