Tarbaca: Donde La Vida Nace (3/15/09)

Now the real adventure begins. After one more day of information overload, we were finally let lose to our host communities. I was assigned to Tarbaca with three other CED volunteers at my same language level. There are four CED communities clustered together in the mountains between 20 and 26 kilometers from San Jose, though it takes about an hour by bus because of the roads and how many stops they make. Tarbaca is the closest, followed by San Gabriel, Vuelta de Jorco, and Acosta. Acosta is the only community with amenities such as a bank, phone cards, and the Internet, so I am writing these entries in Word on my laptop and will post them all next time I have access to wireless. So yes, this is the beginning of my disconnectedness, and so far it feels okay. Let’s just hope that feeling can last for the next two years…

So Mark, James, Brigette and I were dropped off first in Tarbaca around 12:30 this afternoon and greeted by a bunch of really cute little kids waiting for us on the steps of the church. The church and the school are the center of town, so all addresses are based around these landmarks. Mine, for example, is 200 mts north of the church. We are right next door to the pulperia, which sells every kind of packaged food you can imagine and more. The town also has two restaurants and an organic coffee shop and that’s about it.

I was soon greeted by Vanessa, my host mother, and Yazmin, my 15-year-old host sister. They wore big smiles and we immediately embraced and they insisted on lugging my embarrassingly large suitcases all the way home, which was fortunately only 200 meters away. Back at the house I also met Jorge, my host father, and Eduardo, my 8-year-old host brother. That sums up the nuclear family, although I later discovered through a photo-sharing session that the extended family is literally infinite. Jorge also has a son who does not live at home but came by to say hello with his 11-month-old son as well.

I was shown to my room in the front of the house, which is probably about the same size as my NYC apartment, except there is a twin bed so there is room for a giant bookshelf. Vanessa is a teacher of primary and secondary school, so she has a TON of books, some of which may be at my reading level. After a very filling and delicious lunch of rice, beans, salad, chicken, and some sort of potato and cheese casserole, I finally got to unpack my belongings, which felt great after living out of a backpack for the past five nights. Their home is very warm and comfortable and they immediately made me feel at ease and emphasized that their home is my home, and I really felt like they meant it. They have hosted two Peace Corps volunteers before, so it is clearly an experience they enjoy and have been successful at, which is comforting.

After unpacking, Jorge and Yazmin gave me a tour of Tarbaca, which really meant driving up the street. We ended at the giant sod soccer field, and then on our way back we stopped at one of their neighbors’ homes. The woman is a dressmaker, and Yazmin’s confirmation is this Saturday, so she needed to get her dress fitted. They have a beautiful home and two adorable daughters and a great-grandmother who spent time in California and speaks English. The daughters showed me their backyard, where they grow lots of their own fruits and vegetables and have a host of farm animals, including chickens, geese, cows, rabbits and a pet dog. Pretty cool. So far, it seems that the people here (at least in this town) love to eat lots of different types of fruits and vegetables, which I am very excited about, even if they are always served with rice and beans. I tried a sweet lemon this afternoon, which tasted like watered-down lemonade, in a good way. We spent about 45 minutes talking with the neighbors and then came back and Vanessa showed me a little more around the house and told me how everything works, and then we exchanged photo albums and stories, of which Vanessa had MANY more.

Before I knew it it was time to eat AGAIN (Vanessa has emphasized this is a major activity in their household and Costa Rican culture in general), but dinner is a smaller, lighter meal, thankfully. Now it is 9:20 and everyone is getting ready for bed, my kind of schedule! I am going to get up in the morning and go for a run and explore a bit. Unfortunately we are in the mountains so it seems there is no way to avoid hilliness, so we’ll see how long I last. After that begins the next 11 weeks of intensive training, starting with ALL DAY Spanish class tomorrow at 8. I am going to have homework again! And yes, to me this is very exciting…