I will begin with last night. I was having a pleasant conversation with a British couple in my bed and breakfast only to realize after a few minutes that I was speaking English. It really felt strange, those familiar words of my mother tongue spilling clumsily from my mouth and I thought I could hear an accent in my voice. When I was interpreting for them with the mother of the family here, who speaks only Spanish, I had to stop myself from speaking to the Brits in Spanish. We were getting information about restaurants in the area as they wanted to celebrate their last night here in a reasonably elegant joint.
Back in my room I discovered that one of my pens had gone missing. It hadn´t fallen under the bed nor anywhere else and I am fairly certain that it likely found a new home in the chambemaid´s pocket. Then the jerks at the next hotel decided to have another party and not even my earplugs could block out the noise as I struggled to get to sleep. Finally, I got up, got dressed and walked over to reception and the manager, who is the eldest son of the family who owns the bed and breakfast here, phoned them to ask them to turn the music down, which they did. They don´t like the people in the next hotel either, it seems and we are unanimous that people like them ought to stay in San Jose, since the natural beauty of Monteverde seems wasted on them.
I didn´t have the greatest sleep last night, but I really don´t know if it was from the stress, since I often tend to sleep poorly anyway and I just do what I can to work around it. This morning a hummingbird was singing from a small branch on the azalea bush just outside my door. When I returned from breakfast he was still there, singing his heart out. Maybe he wants me to draw him. The bed and breakfast manager´s little niece, whom I think is around four or five, showed me another one of her drawings, a colourful abstract of geometric forms and very advanced for a kid so young. She gave it to me as a gift and in exchange she accepted one of my hummingbird drawings. This was all done in Spanish, by the way.
I spent an unusually pleasant two hours drawing in Cafe Cabure, that pricey joint with the huge balcony and wonderful view of the forest. No badly behaved kids this time and no stinky old men right next to me who seem allergic to deodarant and soap. By the way, do you know what old men smell like? Depends.
While walking I started chatting with a mature Argentinian couple in Spanish. They live in Bariloche, which is kind of like the Whistler of Argentina. I helped them find their way to the butterfly museum. They seemed a bit hesitant when I showed them a shortcut, and I suppose I shouldn´t blame them, given that I´m a complete stranger and blah, blah, blah. We all were intrigued by a green circular stadium nearby and we wondered if it is used for bullfighting. I thought that this might be one of those secrets that places that are popular with international tourists would want to keep under wraps. I just asked the manager of the bed and breakfast and he confirmed that bullfighting does occur here in the stadium in April. The good news is the bulls aren´t killed or mistreated, since that´s illegal in Costa Rica. On the other hand, I´m sure there are other things the bulls would rather be doing in their spare time.
With some amusement I have been observing here the kind of toxic masculinity that Latin American countries are famous for. A lot of the men walk as though they are wearing stainless steal jockey shorts (well, maybe not totally stainless!) And a lot of the dare devil risk-taking, such as my observations in a recent post of how they carelessly ride side saddle on the backs of pick up trucks bumping along on rough rock and dirt roads. Today, I saw more of this, the way this guy was slowly backing his tanker truck full of natural gas, on a narrow dirt and rock road, all the while yapping on his phone as though he didn´t have a care in the world. There were three of these gas tanker trucks altogether, each trying to negotiate space on the narrow road and for a while I got caught between them. Who knows what might have unfolded if worst case scenario happened.
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