Christmas

Christmas in Costa Rica seems pretty much like any other day, except that many Ticos head to the beaches with their families for overnight camping or an all day picnic. Decorations are simple with the most elaborate being fake Christmas trees decorated with tinsel garlands, ribbons or balls and an occasional string of colored lights. Most of the homes put their tree on the front porch next to the front door. Occasionally a home will also have a string of tinsel in the window. Stores, streets and parks in San Isidro are not decorated and we didn’t see any Christmas lights downtown. San Jose had decorations in the largest park along Avenida Central. Despite being an overwhelmingly Catholic nation, we also saw few nativity scenes. We are told the main holiday is Easter.

The radio station that we like – and the only one that we can get that’s in English – plays rock and roll from the 1960s and ‘70s, mostly by obscure artists with an occasional Rolling Stones song thrown in to keep us listening. For the past week this station has also played a Christmas song over and over and over. Incessantly, as in every other song. This song is in Spanish, sung by chipmunks or some other type of rodent, and is set to a tune that we’re not familiar with but we do recognize the words Feliz Navidad – heard over and over and over. Christmas doesn’t feel like Christmas. I’m glad that we celebrated with everyone at Thanksgiving, especially as all of my children and Pecos’s son and their families were present.

Because it has finally stopped raining, we decide to head to the beach. As we’re getting ready our landlord Miguel comes over. We hadn’t met him before. We tell him we like music and he sashays around our (his) living room. He tells us he has 20 cows, two horses and no wife. We immediately like him.

The highway off the mountain to San Isidro has plenty of traffic for it being Christmas Eve. I’d thought that everyone would be home visiting or in church. We left the city and headed straight west to Dominical, famed Pacific surfing town of gringos and gringas. On the way we stopped at a well-known reptile park where we viewed assorted poisonous lizards and snakes – an unnerving experience that we thought necessary in case of encounter. On to Dominical. We found this dirt-laned seaside town crowded as ever with bronzed, buff Americans and Canadians who wear very little and who carry big surfboards. Driving on south, we came to Uvita, seaside village not yet overrun with touristas.

The internet café at Uvita that I knew about was closed for the holiday! Oh, no! I was devastated as I’d planned to send email messages to my kids and mom. I had written them at home and put them on my jump-drive so that I wouldn’t have to worry about leaving my laptop on the beach or in a hotel. How could Christmas go by without greetings to my family?

We saw a house with nice looking cabinas alongside it – and a sign that said wi-fi! An immaculate room with private bath and air conditioning was available for $18. No hot water we learned later (and forgot to ask), but that seems to be a luxury that is not available everywhere. The temperatures are so consistently warm that a hot shower is not a necessity. I asked the owner if he had a computer for public use. When he said no, I must have looked pitiful as he quickly said I could use the one belonging to his grand-daughter. He set me up at her desk in her bedroom and left. I felt funny sitting at her desk surrounded by stuffed animals and other toys.

When I turned on the computer – disaster! The screen was sideways and I didn’t know how to put it upright. Everything was in Spanish, including the keyboard. It took me a good while to translate the instructions by hit and miss at the 90-degree angle and to upload the messages. The ‘@’ symbol was hiding and it took forever to figure out what key to hit to make it come up. I typed hurriedly and sent everything off. Meanwhile, the living room had filled up with guests who came to visit my hosts. When I stepped out, all of the noisy chatter stopped and everyone stared at me. I mumbled my thanks to my hostess. Our host was lying flat on his back on the colorful tiled floor of his patio out front, reading a newspaper. The place was so clean and pleasant, just a short distance from the beach. We will stay there again.

From my children’s family farm, you can look down a distance of about five miles to the Pacific. A sandy peninsula extends out from Uvita. It is called The Whale’s Tale due to its shape and serves as the northern area for Playa Bellana National Park, an incredibly beautiful protected area extending from Uvita to 15 kilometers south. There were about 25 other people at our mile-long beach cove who were having family picnics. Pecos alternately waded in the water and visited with locals while I alternately swam and got tossed up on the sandy shore by the pounding waves. We could see surfers far to the north. The water was clear and tinged with streaks of azure and turquoise as the waves crested high. Pelicans dove in the waves for fish. Coconut palms provided shade. We met a world-traveling couple from Holland who own a hotel in France and we exchanged contact information. This is their second trip to Costa Rica and they plan a yearly escape and eventual land purchase here, too. They will visit us in Oregon. 