Category: Atenas

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15th of September Post 5: FACES

Teen in one of the school bands

Okay. I’ll stop after this, though there are a lot more photos from the parade that I like. 🙂

I could have made this Faces post all children, but since I used some faces of them in Post 1 (children), and a cool youth face in Post 2 (bands), and another youth face in Post 3 (flags); this is mixed, even with adults.

I’ll go back to bugs and bird tomorrow, but Wednesday I head out for 4 nights in the Talamanca Mountains, so more new stuff then! Maybe a better photo of a Resplendent Quetzal! Then the following week to the Nicaragua border on Visa Run again. And the week after that to the Caribbean again. Never a dull moment! 🙂

And don’t you like the looks of the Atenas Ticos?

Do you not want me to make this photo?


“The face is a picture of the mind with the eyes as its interpreter.” 
― Marcus Tullius Cicero
Pura Vida!
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15th of September Post 3: FLAGS!

Colegio Liceo had the largest group of marching flags led by a Drum Majorette.

When they stopped they had a very intricate presentation of weaving the lines
in and out of each other to create a sea of red, white and blue – Colegio Liceo.

As usual I watched the parade from Gelly’s across from Parque Central.
Here Colegio Liceo is starting their presentation seen in second photo. 
Escuela Central Elementary School did great for younger kids!
And they had the coolest caps! Boys and girls marched in separate lines.
That’s elementary school for you!   🙂
Colegio San Rafael  was led by a drum major.

Though not as large as Liceo, San Rafael had impressive group & show!

Patriotism and color on 15 de septiembre is just as big as US 4th of July!
Just no mucho fireworks in Atenas. Another shot of Colegio San Rafael.
(There’s a big fireworks show in San Jose. But I like my little farm town!)
Unlabeled School (or I missed the sign) leave our area by the church.

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15th of September Post 2: BANDS!

Though the volume made you think there were more, there were only 4 full-size bands in the parade and they were mostly drums, since there are few teachers or classes for other instruments. They were scattered throughout the parade with several small ensembles in-between, like 3 to 8 persons with multiple instruments.  There were more flag bearers than band members. Bands are bandas in Spanish.

Banda Escuela de Musica is a community band for all ages (child-adult) that meets, learns and practices after school.
It includes my Spanish teacher, his son and son’s nanny, and another friend. I help raise money for their Panama trip.
Notice, like others, they are now all drums except for 2 saxophones and 3 xylophones called marimbas here.

I like their spiffy uniform shirts
which they are wanting to replace with “real” uniforms sometime.
It is a community activity requiring donated money not easily obtained.

It is an after-school, community music school that teaches how to read music,
how to play other instruments when they can be obtained, and the band will
add more instruments over time as they can. It could become big in Atenas. 

Banda de Colegio San Rafael is a suburban high school smaller than Liceo
but sharper looking uniforms. All drums because of lack of music teachers.

Ticos teens like to dress sharp and appreciate cool hats!

Banda de Colegio Liceo is the largest from the largest school with golf shirts
as uniforms and again mostly drums because of few music teachers. 
All drummers are cool and since nearly all of the band are drummers . . .
Boy! My band director would never have allowed sunglasses!  🙂
So maybe this is why Ticos are the happiest people on earth!?
They are followed by and overshadowed by the largest troop of flag bearers in the parade, also a part of Colegio Liceo.
More flag photos tomorrow! 

By now you may have learned that high schools are called “Colegio” in Spanish in Costa Rica. If not, that is your new Spanish word for today!   🙂

Unknown school with 8 boys on drums – what I was calling an “ensemble.”

Escuela Central Elementary School
As with the others, mostly drums with a few marimbas (xylophones);
smaller and less organized than high school bands.

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Lanterns Parade – desfile de linternas

The night before the Independence Day Celebration the children march in a parade with decorated lanterns that have now become elaborate works of art in some cases. With hovering Moms, it was a confusing mess and then the parade didn’t march down the street where I was waiting, but the other side of the park. So I grabbed a few shots as they dispersed and one on my way to town. Hope I do better tomorrow for the big parade with bands and flags!

As I walked to town I passed this family of 3 kids with their lanterns.
The kids all met at Escuela Central to start the parade, so I went to Central Park.

Many of the girls had “doll lanterns” (light inside) in traditional dress.
The boys had old fashion lanterns or oxcart lanterns mostly.

Several just waited for the parade
holding their lanterns. 
Some were held high and others in their hands.
And some of the kids wore traditional clothing
making it colorful, though a confusing crowd of people
mostly parents hovering around their kids.

And no one ever seems to know the parade route in advance so you can get a good place to see. There were a hundred or more of us on the west side of the park waiting and they marched only on the east and north side! Grrrr!

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Preparing for 15 September

Escuela Central older students prepare for Independence Day Parade

This is the primary school and these were learning to march with flag poles (sans flags) which will be part of how their school participates in the 15 September Independence Day Parade. This morning at the same school the band was practice marching in this same place but I couldn’t stop, running late for my class. All the high school bands are preparing too as I can hear their drummers and we have a community band that will also participate in the parade next Tuesday morning.

On the night before there will be a lights parade with prizes given for the best decorated lanterns.

Hoy aprendo verbos saber y conocer en Aprendo Español en Atenas. 

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Tour de Atenas? And Bingo!

Some of the hundreds of bikes going by my house for more than an hour today.

I’m not sure what it is, but they don’t act like they are racing but rather completing a tour. For 30 minutes it was almost bumper to bumper bikes then the stragglers continued for an hour or two more. Participants are mostly Tico or local people with a few expats included. You see these large groups of spandex-clad bikers occasionally around here, usually on weekends and even out on the highways and rural roads. While during the week bikers are working people with baskets making deliveries or just getting to work, etc. Neither the town’s narrow streets or the narrow highways are safe for casual or transportation lone bikers, plus we are all hills which makes it difficult as well as dangerous. It is rare to see children biking the streets and neither kids nor teens bike to school. They all walk to school! Like me! 🙂 As much as I like biking, I think I will still to walking and maybe live longer.

After church online in Nashville I went to the Catholic church for another Bingo experience with other Su Espacio Spanish students. This time more students came, two tables full! A lot of fun. I report with photos in my new Español blog Aprendo Español en Atenas, titled Bingo a los números de práctica and I’m getting better with my numbers in spanish!

My table of 7 was one of two tables of students from Su Espacio this time.
Me and David are missing from the photo of this table.

Tico food and drinks are available for sale and this time I ate a big piece of pineapple cornbread with a Pepsi. Nope, I’m not doing without my sugar fixes here! Dulce is the name for sweets here.  🙂

They just call the numbers (No B-16, N-23 like in states) and we have a bowl of corn kernals on the table to mark our numbers. Susan was the only one of our group (1st on left above) who had a winning card but there were two winners and one prize. There was a drawing and she lost the draw. But the prizes are nothing to write home about!

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RAIN in the Garden!

Has the “Rainy Season” really started now? Afternoon rain for 2 days in a row! 🙂

Rain dripping off a Guarumo leaf.

Wet Palmetto leaf in my garden.

Wet Heliconia leaves in my garden. Camera doesn’t show rain, just wet!
My miniature rainforest in the rain; habitat of birds, butterflies, frogs, & lizards.
But you can’t see the rain in the photo.  🙂   Believe me. It is raining!
Babies!
My pride and joy, rare Maraca Plant (Shampoo Ginger), has 4 new sprouts!
Snapped this as rain stopped and I finished post. See ground cover filling in?
My garden is one of the best things about this house and done from scratch!
With a rare plant to boot! It came from being nice to the gardeners.  🙂

“Open up, heavens, and rain.
    Clouds, pour out buckets of my goodness!
Loosen up, earth, and bloom salvation;
    sprout right living.
    I, God, generate all this.”
Isaiah 45:8
The Message


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Fork-tailed Emerald Hummingbird

Back to my garden . . .

Fork-tailed Emerald Hummingbird
In my garden, Roca Verde house, Atenas, Costa Rica

This is my second time to photograph this species in my garden. Both times the light is not good for a clear and colorful photo. He/she is an iridescent green all over except for the dark, forked tail. The first time was no better.  What I need is sunlight shining directly on the bird!  🙂

SPANISH LANGUAGE UPDATE
My progress has been so very slow. ¡Aprendo poco a poco español! (I learn Spanish little by little.) Is what I say to some people. So I have joined a second class that meets only once a week at the little evangelical church I have attended some, Iglesia Biblical. It provides a text book and workbook for homework and it is too early to see if it will help me learn faster, though every effort is of some value! What I need most is to just talk more in Spanish, ignoring the embarrassment of doing it wrong. That is what David Castillo at Su Espacio is trying to get me to do. We are down to just two in his class right now, so it is almost like tutoring. I also try to do one little activity each day on duolingo.com which is a great free language learning site! And I just ordered another CD-based course. So I’m trying! ¡Pero es difícil! (But it is difficult!) Or slow! David suggested I do this blog in Spanish, but that would leave too many of you out, so I won’t. Maybe a separate blog in Spanish?
DROUGHT
This has been one of the driest “Rainy Seasons” on record for the Central Valley and I have to water my garden and new trees every other day. Everyone says the rain should really come in September and October. We’ll see! It is cloudy and thundering right now, but that often means little or nothing!

The only exception to the drought has been the Caribbean side of the country and a few places in the north. It rained every day we were at Yorkin. The northwest or Guanacaste  area is always the driest part of the country and it is even drier this year. It is really hard on farmers!

 Time flies, but not backwards, like a hummingbird can.
(-:


Good night from Atenas, Costa Rica! The little bit of rain passed fast and gave us fog. Pura Vida!
View from my balcony of course!


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Church Bingo, Stuffed Grapefruit, and Indian Village!

David invited estudiantes del español to the church bingo Sunday afternoon.
Not many of us showed up to practice our números in a fun way. Our table.
We were given corn kernels with our cards to lay on the numbers.
A card cost 1 mil colones ($2) as fundraiser for the church.
None on our table won a prize, though Corinna had a winning card.
Plus food was for sale! We shared tortillas with cream cheese.
Ticos use cream cheese instead of butter for lots of things.
Bingo & Lunch for sale was right after 11 AM Mass.
That is not when this older photo was made.
That Mass is a packed house!
–
Stuffed Grapefruit!
copied from web
I forgot to report the other day my experience eating a stuffed grapefruit, a Costa Rican specialty! The whole grapefruit is cooked and somehow candied and mine was stuffed with cream cheese, a dearly beloved by-product of milk or the cream here, which is why it is hard to find local butter. They use most of the cream for cream cheese! I told you that Ticos have more of a sweet tooth than me!  🙂

Here is one online recipe that doesn’t use cream cheese but a condensed milk and sugar filling. That is all I could find online. I guess it is just too local!”The place where I bought it used the name “Ronja Rellenos” for them, which I can’t find on the web. Another new experience!

copied from Google images

SERENDIPITY TRIP TOMORROW! Caribbean Coast and 3 nights in BriBri Indian Village.

The birding club had this trip planned for awhile with limited space in the humble lodging. I was on the waiting list. Well, last night there was a last minute cancellation and I decided to take it without any of my usual long range planning! Am I getting impulsive?

I have a 4W Drive vehicle reserved for in the morning. I’ll drive to the coast and to a hotel in Puerto Viejo de Talamanca called Cariblue, very nice and on the beach! Meeting some club members for dinner there.

copied from Casa de Las Mujeres site

Then friday morning we caravan drive through the jungle through Bribri to Bambu on dirt and gravel roads, fording streams. At Bambu we pay someone to watch our cars and we take our “pack light” bags on a small boat for an hour floating trip to the village on Yorkin River in the Bribri Yorkin Reservation where we will stay 3 nights with no electricity at night (limited in day).

The Bribri are our hosts and will serve all meals, take us birding in the mornings and evenings with free time in the village and surrounding area with a waterfall and a hot springs. It will of course be a cultural experience with some of the few indigenous peoples left in Costa Rica. It is intentionally not promoted as a tourist destination. There’s only a half page in the Lonely Planet Costa Rica travel guide book about Yorkin. It is where people live and work and not equipped to handle tourists. Birders are different of course!  🙂

copied from Google images

The only websites on the village are by the various tour companies who take small groups there. I’m linking to Casa de Las Mujeres Yorkin because they have this good map. We are not using any tour company. Our birding guide has worked directly with the village elders and they are providing our boat transportation, meals, housing and guides into the forest in search of birds. So we are totally supporting the indigenous community.

A dream trip for me! How often do you have indigenous people taking you into an ancient forest looking for birds?

copied from Google images
“The world is a book and those who do not travel read only one page.” 
― Augustine of Hippo