Costa Rica

The smallest of a bumper crop of Central American nations that gained their independence on 15 September, 1821, when they broke away from Spain to subsequently join first the Mexican Empire and then the Federal Republic of Central America before becoming an independent nation, the Costa Rica we know and love today. If you’ve been following my posts over the year, or checking my other blog, you’ll know that I spent a few weeks in Costa Rica a few months ago. I loved it. Which is not to play favourites—I’ve loved every country I’ve been to, and I want to go to every country I haven’t been to.

Now, Costa Rica is a hub of eco-tourism these days (and we know that anything with the prefix “eco-” is hot, right?) so I’m pleased to note that its improved its position on the Environmental Performance Index from number 15 in 2006 to number 5 this year. And Costa Rica’s government is serious about this environmental thing—they want to be the first country to become carbon neutral by 2021. I know that eco-tourism is where their bread it buttered, so to speak (rice and beans are the very yummy staples in this region of the world), and so it makes sense to make these moves, but I’m just excited to see how serious they are about it.

When I was in Costa Rica I had one adventure on what turned out to be a very long day—though they’re exhausting, and I certainly couldn’t have them everyday, these are my favourite things about travelling. While Costa Rica doesn’t have the spectacular pre-Columbian sites of some other places in Latin America, it shouldn’t be scoffed at. (I’m from Australia. Most ruins impress me.) I thought I’d go to Costa Rica’s largest archaeological site at Guayabo—a few different buses, with some serious waiting in between, and a long walk uphill because I foolishly got off the bus early. Now, while there’s a lot that we don’t know about this site, it looks like it was inhabited from around 1000 BCE, and then abandoned in 1400 CE. At its peak it had about 10,000 people living there. And—there is an aqueduct that still works. Given the plumbing I’ve encountered in all sorts of places, this impresses me no end. To complete the tale of my adventure, I will tell you that it started raining, heavily, just as I was leaving. I had an umbrella that—fell apart. And I thought, yes, there’ll be somewhere I can sit and drink coffee and read for three hours while waiting for the bus—except there wasn’t. Apparently no-one actually goes to Guayabo—and if they do, they don’t go mid-week in the off-season. Fine. Eventually I found a lady who ran a kind of general store from her house, and bought some corn chips. She was amazing—she asked me in, made me coffee, offered me lunch. She spoke no English, and my Spanish is—well, rudimentary is putting it mildly. I learned a decent amount—to get directions—and hoped that I would be able to use my Italian to communicate. So, we spoke in fits of understanding followed by misunderstanding, as she showed me pictures of her family, introduced me to her dog, and—oddly—watched cartoons. When I have these days that are in the middle of nowhere, when I don’t meet a single other tourist, I feel like I’ve had some sort of experience that I will cherish. And because this was so positive—this lovely lady opened her home to me—I will always remember Costa Rica as a beautiful place. Not just an eco-tourism wonderland of turtles and jaguars (not to mention the fact that I saw my first active volcano erupting in Costa Rica, and swam in volcanic hot springs for the first time there) being two buses and three hours from the capital, sitting in this house drinking coffee, and trying to talk as best I could with this amazingly kind stranger. And since this was a narrative of the kindness of strangers, I guess you can just call me Blanch DuBois.

Do read up on Costa Rica. And in the mean time, read a Costa Rican poet. This poem is by Jorge Debravo. I found it online here.

The Lovers

They are impressive, fortunate, made of moon, in
the middle of the night.
They burn like timber. They exude fresh and
delicious water, like the sap of large trees.

They don’t seem to come from terrestrial rocks: we
imagine them sprouting from caves more savage and
deep. Or rising perhaps from an oceanic pit
where from sirens they have learned the art of embracing
until arms achieve the transformation into snakes.

If they had names like us, we would not
believe them to be human. We would think of them as inhabitants of
stars unknown, from planets of wheat.

Among shadows they mingle, sometimes, with the
gods. They slip and are frightened like animals, which is
another way of appearing like gods.

They don’t dare use the word: they moan and coo. The
shortest words on the earth and more words,
nevertheless.

When I return home I will ask Death not to
come for them. Beautiful it would be for them to be free for
ever and for them to emerge out into the streets joined, like
prophets of a powerful and vegetative ritual.

We would sing them songs of joy and we
would dress them with garlands of fresh leaves. Large garlands
that would comfort them when they find themselves
without pillows in some bitter place upon the
earth.


—Jorge Debravo
translated from the Spanish by Oscar Fernández