Jazz Cafe - 2nd Social Excursion

Today, on the 27th of February, we went on our second social excursion to the Jazz Café. Since our first excursion was so awesome (roller skating) I figured that this one would be just as good; and I was right! We went to the Jazz Café in Escazu to listen to Sonambulo, a "psicotropical" band that has a mixture of afro-latino, traditional American music, and modern music. They started at 10:30 and we left at 12:30. I had absolutely no clue what to expect except that they were supposed to be a really good band. In my dance class, our professor had been telling us that we should try to go out and see a live band sometime and enjoy the rich music culture, and what better way to do that than with an entire group of friends?

The Jazz Café was a rich-looking place with a second floor balcony and expensive food and drinks. We decided to sit on the second floor, right in the middle with a perfect view of the stage and dance floor. The food there was really good; I tried both the cheese sticks and quesadilla. I am a personal fan of the Costa Rican cheese (Tico Cheese), although it is not for everyone. As a cheese lover, this is a rich, fresh cheese that is delicious to eat plain or mixed with anything.

Finally, after a long anticipated wait, the band members took the stage. The first thing I noticed? They were loud. This, as I have learned, is a part of the music atmosphere. I don't go to many concerts, and I am not a connoisseur of music, but it seems to me that anywhere I go that there is music (live or DJ's), it will be loud. The second thing I noticed? They were really good. The music was lively with a good beat to dance to (with the dances I have learned from my dance classes) and all of the songs were in Spanish.

Sonambulo on Stage

 

The crowd was really getting into the music and dancing to it, more like a "stand in place" dance rather than the Latin dances that I learned, mostly because there was not enough room because this band drew such a huge crowd! Up in the balcony, we had plenty of room to move around, so a few of us began dancing Salsa to their songs. I couldn't tell which of their songs were Salsa, Bachata, or Merengue, but I danced to a few of them using whichever dance seemed appropriate. The crowd below us was singing along to the music, and if my Spanish were any better, I would have gladly joined them.

Sonambulo on Stage. Notice the man in the wheel chair on the bottom right of the stage?

 

In the middle of this show, they did something a little different. A man in a wheel chair was helped up onto the stage, out of the wheel chair into a chair near the front, was given an accordion, microphone for his accordion and for his voice, and he also held a trumpet. Then, when he was all set up, the music stopped and one of the band members began explaining to the crowd that this man had been playing in the street for over 12 years and they had been friends for at least 12 (they met while he was playing on the street). He still plays his accordion and trumpet downtown, but today, he got to play onstage with the band. [Excitedly, I understood most of what this band member was saying!] So, for a few songs, we were enchanted by this man's singing, accordion, and trumpet (he switched from one to another within the same song). I was impressed.

Here he is playing. So talented!

Finally, it was time to head home. I will admit, 12:30 was a bit late for me. With our 8am classes, I was ready for bed when we got home, but I wouldn't have missed this day for the world. What a cultural experience to listen to a Costa Rican band in one of their nice Jazz Café's!

Artesan Market and National Theater Tour

Well, looks like my plans fell through again. This weekend, the weekend of February 22nd, I was supposed to go to Guanacaste to see the turtles, but the trip got cancelled at the last minute. I tried to make plans to go somewhere else but it turns out that hostels really do get booked quickly. So, what did I do? I found friends and we went exploring in San Jose to all the places we haven`t had time to see but really wanted to.

First, we stopped by the artisan market. This is a large marketplace with many, many vendors with Costa Rican souvenirs of all shapes and sizes. They had colorful purses, jewelry, mugs, and hammocks among other things. One of my friends was able to get her sisters some nice purses there.

Then, we walked to the National Theater. We decided to go for a tour and learn about the history of the Theater and see the inside. What an experience! It is such a grand place; I really don`t know where to begin.

From the outside, it is a grand but bleak building. The most exciting thing about the Theater from the outside is its` steeple and the three statues it has on its roof. What is amazing, though, is that the building cost $ 3,000,000 to build due to the extensive artwork and gold leaves on the inside as well as marble structures. It also has a rich history to rival its' interior decorations.



 

 The Steeple of the National Theater

The National Theater was built over a 6 year period and opened on October 21, 1897 at the request of the coffee planation owners. There was a famous opera singer Adelina Patti who refused to perform in Costa Rica because she didn't have a "suitable" place to perform, although she was one of many famous artists who refused to perform in Costa Rica for the same reason. The plantation owners said that an additional tax on their product could be implemented to pay for this new theater. As the budget for the theater grew past the original projected budget, general Costa Rican taxes began to be implemented to help pay for it. A fun fact is that Adelina Patti supposedly wanted to perform at the National Theater because it was so beautiful, but was told that she couldn't perform there by the Costa Ricans.

So, walking in, the first thing you notice is the richly decorated walls, lavish with gold leafing. There are also a number of statues and a variety of paintings that were imported from Europe. There are no fresco paintings there, only canvas. The most famous painting is displayed on the ceiling of the main entranceway just before entering the theater. This painting is displayed on their 5 colon bill (which is now just a souvenir, no longer in circulation). It shows their history and popular exports, although from a European perspective. The man holding the bananas? They were upside down and would usually be held over the shoulder in real life because they are too heavy. The style of dress? European as well. Still, it is a Costa Rican gem.

Right inside the Theater: One represents Comedy and the other Tragedy

Beautiful Interior

 

 Famous painting on the 5 colon bill

I loved all of the beautiful artwork, sculptures, and architecture. There was signs of the Free Masons in the reception room such as their eye and a face. That reception room also holds the coat of arms of each of the 7 provinces plus of Costa Rica.

Large canvas painting on ceiling of reception room. (1 of 3)

The inside of the Reception Room. This statue used to be on the steeple in the middle. They now have replicas on the outside to prevent the originals from getting destroyed.

Coat of Arms from, I believe, Limon. Complete with Free Mason's mark on top. 

Yet another photo of the magnificent Reception Room.

What really fascinated me, though, was their main performance hall. There is a presidential box for their president. The security for their president is no where near as strict as the security we have for our President. People who come to the theater when she is there can meet with her in the hallway and take a picture with her; no background check needed. Also, the stage is elevated above the main floor of the auditorium, but back in the day, the floor was moved up to the same level as the stage for dances. Now, they only move the floor for extremely special occasions, such as a new president or visiting president from another country.

Main Performance Hall

I decided to come back on a Thursday to view a concert that they held in the evenings in the reception room since the main stage is under renovations, to open the week after I leave to return to the US. Hopefully I can come back to Costa Rica to view one of their performances on the main stage.

Wood Plant Tour - Sr. y Sra. Ese

As many of you know, I love the wood products manufacturing business. My first job was at a small wood products manufacturing shop that makes wood products for the housing industry. My second job is at a wood products furniture manufacturing shop. So, you can guess that when my professor said that we were going to a jewelry and souvenir wood manufacturing shop in Costa Rica, I was ecstatic!

Sr. y Sra. Ese is a very famous wood jewelry and souvenir shop in Costa Rica that makes most of their souvenirs that are out of wood as well as exports many of their products as well. They also give bilingual tours. So, my class went with the Basic 2 class and had to interview an employee as part of the field trip assignment (it was a speech class taught in Spanish, so it worked as a perfect part of the hands-on curriculum).

Their process began with obtaining Costa Rican wood from around the country and drying it: 10 years outside and 5 years inside. Then, we saw their shop which had a lot of woodworking machines similar to the ones I've used or seen: Joiners, Sanders, large and small bandsaws, and a number of different lathes. That was just in the shop. There were 6 small band saws further in, along with an entire room filled with tumblers and an laser engraver.

 

A sampling of their drying wood - separated by specie and date 

Drying trunks for table tops 

 Bunny that stole the show - So Cute!

 

Basically, the process was: cut the wood into large blocks, dry them, cut them into tiny pieces to be used for jewelry, sort them by size to ensure that they were cut to a quality size, drill (teeny tiny) holes in each piece, send them into the tumblers, assemble. The tumblers had different resins and sand papers to polish the wood as well as different angles to alter the finished sizes and shapes. The pieces of wood would spend 5 hours in the tumblers, one hour per tumbler.

Tumbler - Imagine the noise these things make!

Each part of the process was performed by hand; no CNC equipment (automatic assembly-line type equipment) was used in this shop. The only thing that has changed in their process machine-wise since the inception of Sr. y Sra. Ese was the addition of their laser engraver. I could spend hours talking about this amazing experience, but there's too much information to put into one blog!

 



These are the smallest parts that they are drilling holes in.

 

And here's a few of the different shapes they make.

 

They made a variety of jewelry including bracelets, necklaces, and earrings. They also made pens, bowls, large carvings, mugs, model cars, key chains, saucers, and owl hanging decorations just to name a few. All of their products were amazing, colorful, and perfect works of art and examples of just how fabulous wood is as a material.

How beautiful! Sadly, this was not for sale.

But this was!

And these too!

But this wasn't. Although they had some just carvings in the store, this one just fascinated me.

 Here is just a sampling of the Costa Rican wood that they use. Yes, these colors are 100% natural.

My interview went very well and without many issues. I interviewed the guide on the manufacturing process, many of the questions he had answered in the tour so I simply reviewed those answers with him to be sure that I remembered them correctly. The rest, I asked like it was a regular interview, such as "what in your opinion is the hardest product that you make here?" It was nice knowing that I could understand him; I could see my Spanish improving!

Sadly, I had to leave this amazing manufacturing facility behind, but all the Spanish and Manufacturing that I learned (as well as souvenirs that I bought) would remain with me. On to my last week of this Speech course and my upcoming trips!

Second Poas Excursion

On February 15th, I was supposed to go to the beach with a group, but plans fell through so I decided to stay in San Jose and catch up on homework. There was a lot more homework and projects in my Speech class than in my last course!

On Friday, a friend asked me to join her and another friend of ours to go to Poas Volcano. I had already been there, but since I didn't see the crater or the lagoon the first time, I decided to go again and try my luck. Besides, I was looking forward to a day hanging out with my friends instead of doing my homework the entire time. So, we left early on Saturday morning to head over, via public bus.

As I mentioned in another post, there are a number of different bus stations in San Jose. My friend led us to the bus station, a different one from the Coca-Cola station I took to Jaco, and we had to ask a few people to figure out which bus we needed to get on. It turns out, to go to Poas, we had to go to Alajuela first, so we jumped on a bus there. This bus was a bus that you pay as you enter the bus; you can't get a ticket ahead of time. There is a sensor on the bus that counts the number of people who enter and exit the bus. You need to be aware of that sensor because you can't stand on that step otherwise the sensor will count you twice and the driver is responsible for each "count" of the sensor.

One of the people we talked to to find our bus was a young gentleman and waiter at one of San Jose`s 5 star hotels, who spoke some English. Probably the same amount of English as I speak of Spanish right now, meaning that he knew what he wanted to say, and knew the words about 75% of the time. The rest of the time, he was able to work around the word that he couldn`t remember. He lived in Alajuela, so he rode the first bus with us and then took us to the bus station that went from Alajuela to Poas. Turns out, there were two other groups with us, one from the United States and one from Germany, so he led the entire group of us to the bus station. Then, he waited with us until it was time to board. How nice! It was amazing seeing a local who was willing and able to take the time to help some tourists.

On our bus to Poas, the bus stopped about an hour into the bus ride. My friend and I were a bit nervous becuase it is an hour ride by car, maybe an hour and a half. We stopped at a small shop on the way up, about an hour and a half into the trip in total, and were really confused. Why was the bus stopping on a 1 hour trip? Turns out, the tiny town that we stopped at was known for its food and many visitors got food there to eat at the volcano since the cafe at the volcano doesn`t have alot of options. Finally, we made it to Poas. Now, the fun began.

Last time I came to Poas, we couldn`t see anything because there was too many clouds. Not this time! We saw EVERYTHING! The crater, the lagoon, and even the tiny lake in the middle of the crater. This was so worth going to see! So, we spent the day walking around the crater, the path to the lagoon, and back to the lodge getting food, which was mediocre sandwiches. The sun was shining, it was warm, it didn`t rain, and was a perfect day to hang out with friends.

 

Crater at Volcan Poas 

Crater at Volcan Poas 

Path up to Lagoon 

Tunnel through Trees on the Path to the Lagoon 

 Water Drainage next to Path up to Lagoon

 

Lagoon!

Sunday I spent in my room, finally working on homework and relaxing (again). What a grand weekend!

Frozen and the Beach

Last weekend, I decided that I needed to get out of San Jose and go somewhere, so I decided to go to Jaco, a local beach about 2 hours by bus, on Sunday. In my free time on Saturday, I went with some friends to the San Pedro Mall to see the movie Frozen in Spanish. I understood everything, it was really cool! Well, not all the words, per se, but I understood what was happening and why. I want to understand all the words soon, but that will only come with time and practice. I'm still a long way from fluent thanks to vocabulary and pronunciation issues.

On Sunday, I went to Jaco for the entire day on my own. It was great! Usually, I don't take a day to simply relax and not think about all the things I have to do, but on Sunday, that's exactly what I did. I walked the 50 minute walk to the bus station since it was a nice morning and I wasn't in too much of a hurry. I bought my ticket the day before for their 9:00 bus and my return ticket for 5:00. I got to see the national theater again since I waked past the Central Cultural Square where it is located and arrived at the bus station about a half an hour early, which was more than enough time to find my bus departure lane and wait for the 9:00 bus to arrive.

While I was at the bus station, I saw some Ticos who asked me, in Spanish, when the bus would arrive. I was able to completely understand them and respond to them fluently, which was great! Just a quick note on the bus system in Costa Rica: there is no central bus station. There are a bunch of tiny bus stations that travel throughout Costa Rica and to Nicaragua and Panama from San Jose, but the terminals are a few bocks apart, so you need to make sure ahead of time that you know where which bus station you need. Also, the bus routes are not published online, so talking to locals and checking at your bus station is your best idea. Some busses require a ticket ahead of time and others you pay as you enter the bus. The busses are not expensive here, as well.

When I got to Jaco, the day was spent enjoying the warm ocean, grabbing a small lunch, and just before I left, I had ice cream. I was not able to find my friend who was already there, but that was fine. I really liked the weather. It was warm, but the water was a perfect temperature. And there was a slight wind to keep things cool. There was also a surfing competition, so I got to watch a lot of surfers on he waves. I'd really like to learn how to surf one of these days.

While I was there, I saw some boats in the distance and decided to follow one with my camera to try to get it and a wave breaking in the same photo. I am super proud of the two that I took; third and fourth pictures from the bottom.

And as quickly as my trip to Jaco started, it was over. I caught a bus back to San Jose at 5 and then a taxi home. I really want to go back to the beach again. It was a great experience!

Roller Skating Party!

On Thursday the 13th, We had an awesome "social excursion" included as part of our CISabroad Costa Rica package. It was really cool. We went over to the Roller Skating Rink in San Pedro at around 8 at night. At first, all of the lights in the place were on, but as time went on, they dimmed the lights and turned on a disco ball. The music they played was great and I really caught on fast. I figured it was going to be like ice skating, which it was, so I didn`t hold onto the railing at all. My center of balance was a little different on roller skates than ice skates, but that didn`t slow me down!

Part way through the night, they started "partner skate" which was where everyone had to hold hands in groups of two or three. Some of the less experienced skaters left at this point since it was about to get crazy, but I stayed with my program director and one of the other students in our program as a group of 3. We had to squat and skate while squatting, then stand and repeat. We changed directions as a group as well, which is really difficult. Over time, we switched who was in the middle, and I almost made the three of us fall a few times, although we never did. The pace of our skating increased and overall got alot more hilarious. Thankfully, I didn`t fall once, either alone or with partners.

This was quite a fun time that I would recommend anyone in San Jose (or where ever there is a skating rink) to visit. This was also the last day that I would see my friend and skating partner since she was leaving, but I think it was an ideal way to go out with a bang. :D

 Disco Ball Photo #1

 Disco Ball Photo #2

 

 The skating rink with the lights on

 

How do I stand in these skates, again?

 

Yes, the awesome guy who worked at the Skating Rink posed for a picture with me!

 

My First Course Abroad: A Review

My First Course Abroad: A Review

At Universidad Veritas, the language program here for study abroad students is an intensive language course. We are in class for 3 and a half hours a day, five days a week, from 8am to noon, with a half hour break at 10. We take a different course each month, and for Grand Valley, each course transferred as 5 credits each. Before I came to Costa Rica, I took a written exam (multiple choice, timed) and an oral interview over Skype with a Universidad Veritas professor. Some students didn't do their oral interview until after they arrived in Costa Rica. All of the course sizes are small, with a maximum of 10 students per class (this only applies to the intensive language courses, although the elective courses are small as well. I haven't found an elective course with more than 15 or 20 students; my elective has 11, but I'll talk more about electives in a later post). The professors are really nice, know the material, and know how to teach foreign students.

My course for the month of January was Advanced 1. This course concentrated on the various uses of the subjunctive tense as well as the conditional. It was a good review course for me, especially since the subjunctive is hard for me since it does not exist in English. It is used when you are in doubt or uncertain about what you are saying. Our professor used her own book, which was well made and a good guide with our lessons. We learned about the culture of Costa Rica, Columbia, Panama, and Peru as well as some of their landmarks and phrases that are only used in those countries. We read three stories throughout this course and learned over 80 new vocabulary words, 20 each week. My professor didn't assign a lot of homework, which was nice.

My favorite thing about this class was that the first week on Friday, we saw a movie called, "Gestacion" which was a historically based movie in Costa Rica where a girl, about 16 years old, had a child with her 17 year old boyfriend, Teo. They only had sex once, but that was all it took. The story followed her struggles with her relationship with Teo and her mother as well as his relationship with his mother. The focal point of the story, however, was her relationship with her private, Catholic, school. The school allowed her to continue attending while she was pregnant, but she could not wear the uniform, could not attend class with her classmates (private tutoring), could not eat lunch with them or go out to recess with them. In the end, the lawmakers of Costa Rica decided that she could not be discriminated against due to her pregnancy. It was a very interesting movie that I would recommend watching.

The second week Friday we had our midterms and the third week Friday we went to the Children's Museum in San Jose. That was a cool trip! The Children's Museum was made for locals and had a lot of interactive exhibits showing the history of Costa Rica, the history and modern day harvesting of bananas and coffee, light, space, bubbles, airplanes, and many others! It was cool to go since I got to speak to the guides in Spanish and also learned how glass is made. Also, the building of he museum used to be a penitentiary, so of course the architecture is different. The fourth week Friday was our Final Exam.

 

 

We had two presentations in this course, each on the Thursday before an exam. My first presentation was on the Great Lakes and my second was on the history of Costa Rica in the colonial era. Both went really well but were hard to do in Spanish.

Overall, it was a really good course. I didn't think there was a big difference in processing the language here as an "intensive language" course than I have had with a 16 week long course back in the US. Sitting in the classroom for 3 and a half hours got boring after awhile and I think that two breaks of 15 minutes may have been better, but since it was an interactive course, it kept my attention throughout. I would recommend studying here for Spanish since it has been a wonderful experience so far.

Relaxing Weekend in San Jose

This weekend, I stayed in San Jose for the first time all weekend. I went to the San Pedro Mall last Friday, which is a 3 story mall about a 15 minute walk from campus. They have a giant food court with both American and Costa Rican food, clothing stores, she stores, bakeries, Mrs. Fields, a movie thater... everything you would expect to find in a mall. I went with a friend who was on her one month program and was leaving the next day, Saturday, to return home. After walking the mall and grabbing lunch, we decided to see "The Book Thief", which was in English with Spanish subtitles. I heard about that movie, but never saw it or read it, and didn't know what to expect. Overall, it was an amazing movie, but what I liked best was that with the Spanish subtitles, I could usually read what they were going to say just before they said it!

On Saturday, I waked to San Jose to get a Tour of the National Theater and Gold Museum. I decided to do the Gold Museum first, which was good since I wouldn't have had enough time to go to the theater! The gold  museum is basically two different museums. The bottom two floors are pre-Columbian gold exhibits along with stories of the pre-Columbian tribes and some of their rituals, such as the burial ritual, and how they made clay pots and gold figures. The other half of the museum was on the first floor and was the half that I was most interested in. It was a history of Costa Rican currency since the 1500's and the arrial of the Spanish. Both exhibits were written in English and Spanish, so I took a lot of time to read the Spanish, understand it, and reference the English to make sure I understood it. It was interesting to see how their money has developed over the years. The two most interesting types of money they have had was when they did not have their own method of making coins, usually from lack of material, so in the 1700's they used coffee beans as a form of currency. Later, they took foreign currency an stamped their own symbol on it, making it their own. They also drilled one small hole in each coin, whose metal was used to pay the stamping workers.

They also had a small exhibit that descrbed the creation of the museum since it is three stories underground. From an architectural viewpoint, it was really cool since they put up tilted walls (which are clearly visible from inside) to keep the structure stable and then built the plumbing, electrical, support beams, and additional walls at the same time; talk about a joint effort! The museum also has a spiral staircase that was apparently quite a feat to build as well.

 

On my way back, I managed to get lost in San Jose for about two and a half hours, which was fine since it was daylight, but did get frustrating after awhile! I was following their street signs since I knew the streets of the school (all street numers go east and west and all avenes go north and south) but what I didn't know was that odd roads are on one side of San Jose and even roads are on the other. As soon as I figured out that and figured out where I was I had no major problems. Needless to say, I was super happy to see the school again.

On Sunday, they had their National elections for their president and entire legislature. They use a direct vote system for president, so whichever candidate gets 40 percent or more of the votes wins the election. This year there were thirteen candidates and no candidate got all forty prevent of the vote.  So, the top two candidates will go into a second voting round, taking place in the first week of April, and whomever gets the most votes, even by one vote, wins. I went with my host family to the polls to vote and then I went to the South Mall with them afterward. In the evening, they went to the children's vote at the East Multi-plaza, just for fun, but it seems to me that everyone in Costa Rica has their children vote as well. Talk about national pride! I liked that. There were a lot of kids there and the line to vote was really long. I saw a lot of children's games there as well and got to see a new mall. This one was a little fancier than the others I had been to, and was about a mile and a half walk, so I probably won't be going their much, but I hope to go back at least once.

Monday, we didn't have school since some people were out of the country for their mandatory 72 hour time period to renew their visas. I hung out with another friend on Monday and we went to a supercenter to buy some groceries and then to the South Mall to grab ice cream I met her Momma Tica, a very nice grandmother who only speaks Spanish that I'm pretty sure has had many study abroad students before. In fact, I believe there was another blog that I read before coming here that took place in her house. There are three students lving there.

Tuesday was time to start my new Spanish Course, Techniques of Oral Expression, which I will write about more in a future blog post. Pura Vida!