7/1/2011

10:15am

I am sitting alone in my host house, eating breakfast. My mama tica is such a sweetheart, she left my fruit out for me, under a plastic container so it wouldn't go off. I have no idea where she is, though.

A fair bit has happened, but I'll try to start from the beginning....

First, my ambiguous note on Monopoly: we played a Spanish edition the other night with our host brother, and he absolutely dominated. I'm not sure if he actually lives here when mama tica isn't hosting students, or if it's just their extremely family-oriented culture, but he comes over every night for dinner, and so far has been an entertaining addition to the home stay, knowing enough English to crack a number of jokes.

My mama tica is also lovely. I don't think I could have asked for a better home stay while here in Heredia. We had our cooking class yesterday, learning how to make some traditional Spanish (NB: well, Costa Rican) food, and as she is the teacher, she was so excited to see me there, and got me to help prepare the food. We made fried plantain fritter with guacamole. Plantains are huge bananas but you can't eat them raw, they have to be cooked. The whole thing was delicious.

I've realised just how lucky I got when being put with our families. At the Spanish school we all like to discuss our different circumstances, and I actually feel sorry for some people, who've been placed with older, stricter families, or ones that know considerably less English, or have lot of rules to follow. I'm having such a good time, I chose to stay in Heredia this weekend instead of going on a trip away the school organised. Much of it's activities are a double up on the adventure tour so I don't think I'll be missing much.

I also broke another one of my detox goals last night. Our host brother took us to a discotheque, and lets just say I'm a slave for tequila!

The Costa Rican night club was strange: such a scene felt so familiar, but certain aspects stuck out, reminding me that the experience was completely foreign. For starters, smoke was allowed inside, though the venue was only half-enclosed and well ventilated so it wasn't exactly choked with smoke. And for some scandalous reason, they didn't have bourbon!

It was ladies night at the club, and apart from my brother, I was the only boy in our group. The girls were lovely, getting me a few free drinks, but after a while management caught on so they had to stop. I started to get a little frustrated at that point (the fact I was at a ladies night that wasn't Moist at ARQ was unbelievable enough in itself), and began blaming it on the country itself for that. I went to the bathroom to try and cool off and think about it all. I realised that I was starting to be one of those people who cannot have fun unless they're drinking/drunk. So I tried to overcome that, and just enjoy all the cultural differences. There was a live band playing some amazing music throughout the night, as well as time when a DJ was playing all the same music we go clubbing to back home.

So we all danced and had fun, even while paying for our drinks (1000 colones, or US$2 for a tequila slammer is nothing to shake a stick at). There was a bit of confusion when someone lost their phone, and some of the girls wanted to go somewhere else, but I knew I had to stay once the male strippers got on stage. I'd been looking after drunk girls all night, so dear God I deserved that.

Their presence made me realise that for most of this trip I've been living in the closet. I'd be lying if I said I wasn't hiding it, said that it just never came up. There were plenty of places where I could have slipped it into the conversation, but I've tended to steer away from it. I know lots of of people here are heavily religious, and I guess I didn't want to ruin any bonds or connections I was making. But I was almost relieved when one of the Australian girls asked me outright last night (my dancing gave it away). It was almost like taking a leash off, and I consequently went down to fan-boy scream at the ripped male torso's on stage.

I'm going to have to continue this later, as I need to wash up and get ready for class.