Pura Vida!

Your favorite gringo is back on the trail! I’ve just completed the first week of my latest adventure in Costa Rica and have been loving every minute of it. I've taken the first couple of days to get settled in with my host family, orient myself to San Jose and start work at the hospital.

My host family is fabulous. They live just west of the center of San Jose conveniently located near four different American fast food chains (Quiznos, Wendy’s, Taco Bell and Pizza Hut), specifically for my pleasure... My family is used to having students from the U of MN and I’m currently living with Katie, a classmate of mine. My host mother talks constantly about Sam (also a classmate), who stayed here before me and what a great guy he is, so I’ve got big shoes to fill. :) As with my previous host stays my mother is always concerned that I’m enjoying her meals and that everything is “todo bien?” My host father and I have bonded over billiards. We play Bola Negra, the Costa Rican equivalent of 8-ball with one additional rule. The player hitting stripes must hit the 15 ball into the right side pocket while the player with solids must hit the 1 ball into the left side pocket. It’s fun and adds an extra challenge. My host father is hilarious as he can never keep the 9 ball straight and is constantly asking whether it is the 9 or the 6.

Work at the Hospital Clinica Biblica has been slow to start. I’m working with a pediatrician in Urgencias which is just like it sounds, lots of runny noses and children with diarrhea. We have had a couple of good learning cases and I’m gaining a bunch of new Spanish as the docs are very patient and willing to explain anything I don’t understand. I’ll be working in Urgencias for one more week and then on to an Ebais in La Carpio. This is a small clinic in one of the poorer areas of town that serves all ages free of charge. From what Katie has told me, the clinic sounds a lot like my experience in Guayaquil so I’m excited to compare the two.

The evenings have been busy! Tuesday I went with Katie and my friend Rula from NYU (who also happens to be here studying medical Spanish) to live music at the Jazz Café. The band was a Latin fusion group complete with French horn and flute. The only thing that was missing was more cow bell! Ok just kidding, there was lots of that too… ;) Wednesday the three of us attended an album release party for a local rapper named Sirius. His album titled Get Sirius has tracks in both English and Spanish, sometimes interchanging between the two during the same song. The opening DJ played tons of early 90s hip-hop which took me back. Sirius was fun but you could tell he was still new to the rap scene. His mic kept cutting out and yet the vocals played on… He also had a couple of hip-hop dancers for added entertainment that were dressed in sliver baseball caps worn backwards and white sneakers. What a hoot!

My weekend in Puerto Viejo was a blast. There's more to say than I have time for at the moment as I'm off to see Shakira (!!!!!!!!) but I'll post again soon! Thanks for reading. :)