into the forest, kinda

It’s an earlyish morning habit at the weekends to collect cacao shells and trim the trees. It has to be at the right time, after the daylight comes but before it gets too hot, around 8ish seems best. The timing has to be right because one doesn’t want to disturb any snakes on their way out or home. And the mosquitoes are worse at dawn and dusk, though in the forest they are a constant. I wear a sweatshirt, hood up and sleeves drawn over my hands, long trousers and my boots, so I need to go before it gets too hot: the smell of sweat draws even more mosquitoes. I go armed with my bucket and machete. It is always disorientating in the forest – getting in is easy, coming out is often a job as one giant tree or cacao is much like another and the light changes quite rapidly. Also walking in the forest is an exercise in consciousness – one has to be aware of where one is stepping and on what one is stepping and I am looking at trees and trimming and chopping or picking up old cacao as I go. And of course my direction changes like a butterfly’s as I see something interesting over there, or want to look at that tree, or inspect the cacao that was flowering last time . . . and so on until I fill my bucket, can’t take any more mosquitoes and head for home. Now what way did I come? It’s a lesson in careful observation while treading with equal care and usually combating a feeling of being lost in the jungle forever. The spiders I collect with the cacao are usually on their way up my arm at this point too, but they are only those stilt-walkers with the rust bobbin body and the long wobbly black legs and are harmless. Often the dogs will come to find me and look at me as if to say, just use your nose, it’s this way.
It’s not the real forest, it’s been transformed and farmed and then abandoned and slowly it’s reverting, there are no pumas, no wild pigs. But when you’re in there, surrounded by green and the wind doesn’t blow through and all you can hear is insect and bird noise and underfoot are ants and millipedes, frogs, spiders and scorpions and overhead are toucans, hawks and monkeys, it feels like the forest.
When I was a kid we would go into the highlands most weekends. We had a place beside one of the last forests, of pine and some birch. I spent many many hours in there enjoying its eery quiet, its darkness and stillness with sudden magical spots of bright sunlight where a tree had fallen. I lived by a redwood forest for several years, spending time with those giants who daunt you with their age and size and bring everything around them to their knees. The forest here is very different, it has none of the somber atmosphere, the mature trees are so high that you can’t tell what they are, looking up one sees only vines and creepers. Below is the shade loving cacao, twisted with age and transformed by the vines into great shaggy heaps with far too many shoots. Below this are the ferns, mosses and wild heliconias and the few saplings from the giants that have survived thus far. And below that the leaf litter which is the source of life in the forest. Layers of green life. I found a little hill and climbing it into the sunlight. On top I found myself in the lower canopy, how different the jungle looks from there, suddenly one is lifted into the active life, noise and bustle and movement.

early morning, easter sunday

The spider monkeys came through this morning as I was making pancakes. They travel in small troupes – the one I see the most often has 3 adults and one baby. They are very agile – almost running through the treetops, swinging and leaping with all limbs. This is very different from the Howlers who move slowly and steadily and seem to prefer to have two limbs connecting to branches, or to the white faced who jump and scurry paying attention to everything as they travel. The spiders have long thin limbs, almost gibbon-like, and a orange-red fur which backlit can look like an orange halo, especially along their torsos. They knocked the fruit from the cannonball tree as they went through and it bounced down the trunk exploding, sending seeds everywhere.

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visiting the cassava

river after storm

Garden Tour

The garden here is 8 years old with 4 much older trees. When the land was bought it was all lawn. We are steadily getting rid of the grass, replacing it with beds and trees. We are somewhere between 8 and 9 degrees north of the equator meaning we get roughly 12 hours of sunlight a day, though with our trees we have a lot of shade throughout. The garden runs roughly east west with the west end being ornamental, the middle the orchard and the east end the cottage garden.

Cottage Garden

The cottage garden is much younger, only three months. I began it this January and much of this writing will detail my experiences and experiments raising food in a tropical climate.

Orchard

This is probably the most stable part of the garden, short of taking care of the trees already here, not much changes.

Ornamental Garden

This is the most established and colorful part of the garden. The main pond is here and the space is beautifully rich and full of bright heliconias and stunning bromeliads. Two of the big trees define the space and their large twisting roots provide anchors for many of the bromeliads.

the mini and the mighty

Two different creatures caught my attention today. Two scarab beetles rolled a perfectly round ball of monkey scat amongst the bamboo leaves. They were a bronze color that shone green in the sunlight, about as big as my pinkie nail. When I moved a leaf out of the way to see them better they stopped for a few moments before restarting their journey. They looked identical but one was slightly larger and because of this doing most of the work. Such strong legs, thick and fairly long: the ball they rolled was at least 4 times as big as they were. I wonder where they were going?

The other creature was a magnificent male iguana, about 5 feet long with his tail. He was a gray silver orange colour with dark bands of orange and black on his tail. A living mosaic, each scale merging with the next to give him a skin as supple and as shimmering as – well I was going to say a mermaid’s, but who knows if their’s would be so beautiful? He had two larger perfectly round scales on his cheeks, just like the painted face of a clown, except his were a gray-green. His eyelids were scaled, the palms of his hands with their long black talons, his nose. He was on the ground, unusual they usually remain high in the canopy, and he was moving slowly his whole body swaying side to side, I guess he saw me. He disappeared into the brush behind the house.

soil

Went for a walk into the forest armed with my snake boots, long pants and sleeves and trusty machete, and my bucket. I’m slowly, slowly tending the cacao trees, removing water spouts and trimming ephiphytes and vines. The main harvest will be September and October, but there are fruits now here and there and none quite ripe yet. For now I’m watching and inspecting and gently clearing paths. My bucket is to gather last year’s pods which I use for compost. The soil here is a heavy clay and all life relies on a thin layer of leaf litter. This mulch is beautiful rich soil in the making. Tree roots spread out rather than dig deep making it quite a common thing to find fallen giants. These rot down over time and become soil. To find a fallen decomposing tree is exciting and allows us to harvest new compost and food for the garden. There is a fallen giant nearby and we have begun a serious mining operation to scoop out the beautiful dark organic matter from between seams of gray and red clay. I’ve taken about as much as I can just now and will have to wait for a bit more decay and a lot of weather and fungus before I can go further. Gardening takes time.

spring equinox

A big storm hit before dawn this morning. I woke at 4:30 to the Howlers, two troupes, one beside the house in the Fig tree, the other across the river, what a cacophony – they must have been heralding the storm, in the distance out over the ocean I could hear the thunder. After the monkeys came the loudest birdsong and most varied I’ve heard thus far. I was excited as yesterday I bought a field guide to Costa Rican birds and here they all were. Insect noise too, very strong and beautiful mixed with the birdsong. And then the rain came in, soft at first, I could hear it at the other end of the garden and then it hit my roof. It rained heavily for about 5 hours, overflowing the little pond, giving the tadpoles a rare opportunity to explore where they’ll soon be hopping.

We’re on rainwater here, altogether we have 9 tanks of various sizes and moss cover. The storm gave us overflow. It’s so nice to see that overflow – showers all around! I cleaned the gutter that feeds the giant tank yesterday – full of dead flowers and leaves and the odd millipede, it was only cleaned two weeks ago, but we’re in a dry month and the trees are dropping leaves: I moved 14 barrowloads to a new bed last week, this week another 10.

Now it’s early afternoon and I’m bottling some plum jam. I picked the coco plums yesterday at the beach. They are very pretty, round as round can be and a rosy shade of purple, not like the northern hemisphere plums at all. They grow on low scrub bushes with light green shiny leaves on the shade side of coconut palms, hence the name. Their flesh is white and spongy and astringent, it draws the moisture from your mouth, inducing you to eat more in a mistaken attempt to replace lost moisture. When they are really ripe they become sweet and less astringent, it was these I picked. It reminded me of picking blackberries – the same eager search and joy at finding a dense cluster of purple hiding amongst the green. Yet these are more fun to pick – no thorns, no snags, no bloody fingers. They are about the same size as gobstoppers and have one stone, much like a plum pit, the flesh clings to it the same way too. I chopped them and put the whole fruit

in, the nut inside the stone is edible and nicely nutty. The shell is hard, too hard to eat, we’ll just have to deal with spitting it out.

The ginger beer I started yesterday is slower than usual, the storm has kept the temperature in the 70s, now the sun is peeping through and it’s becoming rather humid. It’ll be ready tonight. Such a simple recipe – a cup of sugar, ¼ teaspoon of yeast, juice of one lime and as much ginger as you can handle – all mixed in a 2 liter soda bottle and left somewhere warm for 24 hours or so. Here it sits out on the deck for a full day and then it goes into the fridge to stop the yeast. Really delicious. I put tumeric in sometimes when I want it extra healthy. The ginger, tumeric and limes come from the garden and the sugar is the raw tapa dulce we can get here from minimally processed sugar cane.

revamping

I live in the far southwest corner of Costa Rica, by the Caribbean. I live on an acre of land carved from an abandoned cacao plantation. The rainforest is re-establishing itself, growing out and through the cacao: Almendro, Fig, Naked Indian, Bloodwood, Cannonball Tree, Cecropia and Breadfruit are among the original shade trees and interlopers which are pushing through the low cacao. Bananas and heliconias fill sunny spots where trees have fallen. The garden is bordered on one side by a slow moving river, turtles, otters, Basilisk lizards and fish inhabit its waters, crabs move readily between the forest floor and the river shore. Overhead three types of monkeys, Howlers, Spider and White-faced Capuchins eat leaves and flowers, Three-Toed sloths move slowly through the canopy. On the other side a 12 foot tall hibiscus hedge provides a barrier against the forest. A house sits at either end of the long roughly rectangular garden. This is where we live.

The garden falls into three sections: ornamental, orchard and cottage garden, we have two ponds with lotus and water lilies, and lots of frogs. In this blog I hope to share our garden, its inhabitants and something of the surrounding rainforest and nearby beaches. I hope you enjoy it as much as we do.

picking plums with Maria

On Thursday Maria returns to Japan for a year. I will miss her and her soft spoken mum who was always anxious to drop her and hurry away to meet her young lover. She would return smiling, late and wearing different clothes. Today was our last class. We went to the beach and picked coco plums, very tart round purple plums which grow on scrubby bushes on the shady side of the coconut palms. They are all around the point which this week is littered with people from the city camping under tarps for Semana Santa, Holy Week. It’s a tent city complete with SUVs, blaring music and babies, paddling pools and beach fires. We were the only ones picking plums. Maria is fearless in her search for new foodstuffs wanting to try as many tings as I let her. Luckily most of the plants by the beach are edible: papaya, coconut, almond, ginger, plums, sea grapes and noni (well one could debate whether the vomit fruit is actually edible). The herbs while not always so tasty won’t harm with a nibble: blue snakeweed, life everlasting, hibiscus, mimosa, zornia. We stopped at George’s for coconut and an extra big kiss, I think there’s a lot of drinking going on this week. His house has been repainted a sunny shade of blue, it looks good. His neighbors did it while he was off for a clandestine weekend in Bocas. I promised I would visit properly sometime this week. I like George. His last name is Hansel – the Hansels were a big family round here, one of the points is named after them. I think they came from Jamaica at the beginning of the last century. George hasn’t got back that far in his stories yet, but he will. I like George and Mister Eddie and ol’ John Brown, old time Jamaicans with strong hands and big smiles who speak a patois English that sings. They still work their gardens and we sit and sip ginger beer and swap gardening tips and I listen. And they tell me what the weather will do tomorrow and what plants are good for the kidneys and I pay attention and feel totally bathed in another life. I brought home some akee. It’s so good, tastes a bit like peas straight off the vine. It was brought from Africa via Jamaica and not many people here eat it. Perhaps something to do with it being poisonous when unripe and toxic when overripe. But at the right time it’s delicious. It’s fairly easy to tell the right time – the fruit opens by itself and when it turns brown it’s no longer edible. The local name is vegetable brain for fairly obvious reasons.

I feel a desire to learn again and to share too. This afternoon on the way home from the store, two girls cycled behind me, a vulture was picking through garbage at the side of the road and they saw it and stopped to take pictures of the big bird. Was it important for them to know what it was? I don’t know, probably not. When one is traveling what is important? That one spends money where it’s needed? That one broadens one’s own horizons? That one shares one’s culture and takes interest in another’s? This is such an incredible place. I would like to guide. Nothing big, just something low-key with some cultural history and natural history and maybe a little responsible, conscious living thrown in. I wonder if anyone would be interested?

ants

I feel a little awkward sitting at my table, in the same way I think I would be if I had a cleaner in: you know that kind of not comfortable in your own home, not really able to relax, wondering if you should go out – I have house cleaner ants swarming everywhere. They are on every surface – ceiling, walls, floor, countertop. I’m glad I cleaned yesterday. They won’t find so much to do. They are walking right over the flour I spilt earlier, skirting the coffee that dripped from my mug, avoiding the teabag that just missed the compost bucket. They’re here for the insects. Flushing everything out before them. The lizards have left, a couple of big ones even that I’ve not seen before. I hope they deal with the scorpion under the sink. They’ve been here about an hour and a half, roughly half way through their visit. Ants are such incredible creatures, constantly moving and never going at a leisurely pace, always galloping about. The leaf cutter ants have a mini road within my path and at night they use it to go deeper into the jungle bringing out sections of leaves like sails. They don’t come this way during the day. There must be two shifts who work around the clock feeding their farms. These house cleaner ants were over at the big house yesterday, last night as I walked along in the dark my trusty wind up torch humming with the crickets I jumped through the mass of them half way here. They arrived this morning at 10am. Where did they sleep? Did they sleep? Where do they live? Will they go home again or are they on an endless journey?

. . .

It’s been a while since I’ve written. Not just the blog, but letters, articles and the big old book I’ve been working on. There was a three month period there when I spent at least 2 hours writing a day, often more like 4. But one day I woke up and that was that, I found I had nothing to say. Why, and does it matter anyway? The second answer is easier, no it doesn’t matter. The why requires a bit of self reflection and that seems hard just now. I have to wrestle myself into a position where I can look and god, I seem to not want that at all and will squirm and twist myself free with a million distractions and thoughts and sudden desires to do something else. There seems to be a cloud between myself and my ability to think clearly for any length of time. My head is full of dross, cloudy, fluffy swelling stuff that does nothing. I have a couch potato living inside my skull. I can’t express myself or describe anything, I’m tongue tied in prose. My sentence structure irritates me.

And life continues.


But I want to write, it’s a way to process, to catch or snag moments in time, I forget so readily that without writing it all slips by like a great thick oily river full of experiences and observations and incidents. In writing I dip my net in and pull moments or thoughts and lay them on the bank spluttering back into life. So please excuse me while I haul myself out of these waters and try to shake off the passing of time long enough to pause and reflect something. It might be ugly, or it might be banal. I feel I have to learn again.

ecosystem

Trees fall over all the time and when they do it’s surprising to see how shallow their root systems are. Big trees have enormous buttress or ariel roots to support the trunk which is usually amazingly thick at the bottom and tapers to a narrow top before widening out to form the canopy. I wonder if the canopy indicates how far the roots are spread. It rains here a lot, trees don’t need deep tap roots to find water.
When a tree falls it rots – quite quickly – and the rotting wood turns into the most beautiful soil full of mycelium and organisms. It gives back everything it took from the earth, air and sun.
When a tree is cut and cleared it gives back nothing – no new soil is made, the forest is robbed of the nutrients and matter it had saved up in the tree.
When a tree is cut and cleared there is nothing to protect the leaf litter below. First it is compacted and damaged by the men and machinery which remove the tree and then it is left at the mercy of hard direct rain and wind: it dissipates quickly.
The leaf litter and mulch is the only source of new soil, only source of ground nutrients in a rainforest. It’s very obvious. When we cut and remove trees we are not only destroying the natural process of growth, decay and regeneration, not only removing necessary habitat for other plants, insects, amphibians, reptiles, birds and mammals. We are actually destroying the very base on which all life on the rainforest depends – the earth itself.

feeling domestic

I think I’m feeling settled. I hesitate in saying it – I’ve been very wrong before countless times over – but I feel quite at home. Not borrowed, not visiting, not living on the surface, but actually stable. It feels good. Yet I’m still tentative. I was in San Jose at the weekend and I bought stuff ‘for the house’ – a few plates and bowls and chopsticks so I could return the awful plastic ones I borrowed from kindergarten. I suddenly have nice things. I feel like the time I leave this place will be the time I leave Costa Rica. Ooh, that feels strange and nice. This is my home. Perhaps if I keep saying it it will be. I made a vegetable garden yesterday. I cleared a corner of my space – a lovely sunny corner and mulched and composted it. It looks good. The soil here is very poor, all the life is in the leaf litter. This is I guess the same everywhere, but here it is very noticeable – under the 4 or 5 inches of leaf litter there’s heavy thick gray clay. To find garden soil one must look for rotting wood. There’s a huge tree stump behind the house in the jungle, armed with my trusty machete I clambered in there and hauled out 6 barrow loads of the most beautiful compost full of mycelium and earthworms. I have ginger and tumeric ready to plant out and cilantro and yams. I’d like some beans and pumpkin. The ground is too wet I think for root vegetables, even though my garden is all raised, hugelkulture style. I can make a taro and a yucca bed.

city trip

I just got back from a two night jaunt to the city. It’s only a brief 4 hour bus ride – going through a passport checkpoint, but I made it through. I’ve never been to San Jose proper before, just passed through overnight on the edges. I like it, it has the energy of a city while still feeling like a fairly small town. For those of you who know, it’s a bit like a big Paisley, but somehow it’s tattered and broken up appearance is justifiable, given it’s a developing nation. I went to a museum, some asian stores and somewhere to buy some decent crockery. We ate sushi and Indian food, I got mystery meat from street vendors and we rode lots of buses and did a lot of walking. It was fun. San Jose is in the central plateau and is high and dry and cold. There are mountains all around, quite beautiful. I heard church bells and saw familiar plants and went out at night. Though now I’m sitting writing this with my new rug beside me and my new wind chimes tinkling, listening to the sound of the frogs and insects and the ocean and it’s nice to be home. Did I say home, oh my.

making ends meet

I’m beginning to write for an online thingummy. I say that because I’m not quite sure what it is: a place where one can gather information on all sorts of things from cat care to starships to current events. It’s a little like about.com, I guess it’s the Canadian version. I am contracted to supply 10 articles each 3 month period. Fine and dandy. I needed to find a way to put money on my skype account so I can call regular phones and I’m hoping this is it, they’ll pay me through an online account I believe I can then transfer (thanks Jon). I don’t get paid for the articles, rather I will some percentage generated through the advertisers depending on the number of people who a) read my articles and b) visit the sites of the advertisers who appear by my articles. Sounds convoluted, we’ll see. I’m surprised that people visit advertisers this way, but hopefully they do. I’m excited by the idea anyway. Oh it’s called www.suite101.com

monkey to monkey

I’ve been truly blessed in my life with some wonderful wildlife experiences, this morning I had a good one. There’s a troupe of white faced capuchins come through the garden, howler and spider monkeys too. In the treehouse I was neighbours with the howlers who slept in the tree a couple of times a week. But until now I haven’t had any real experience with white faced, the spider I’ve only seen a couple of times. This morning, just after 7, the white faced were in the bamboo that bends over my roof. They are beautiful, furry dark and strong the males about 2 foot high at tops, and they all have a lovely creamy white mantle that begins over the shoulders and chest and thins out around their faces. They don’t have naked faces really, but the hair is short and they look quite pink. They look like us, short quick gnomish us. Big round brown eyes, 4 fingers and a thumb, watching, thinking, nervous but driven by curiosity and interest. Thick tails which are prehensile and work as well as any limb, curling long and gracefully around branches. There were 9 in the troupe, only two young ones, no babies and I’m not sure how many males there were. Every face was different, of course, different expressions. They were quite noisy, barking, cooing, almost hissing and chattering as the dogs sat and watched them from the ground. The one which I think was the oldest and male, at least he looked the oldest came close. He grimaced a lot and they have fairly big fangs – the white faced are omnivorous like us and eat lizards, birds, squirrels – the teeth were quite menacing. They open their mouths as if to bite and curl back their lips and open their eyes wide – how I imagine the Maoris did, except no tongues. And they bounce and shriek. And they throw branches. It’s true, it was fun to watch them throw sticks at the dogs, and at me – a pretty big stick too. They hold a branch with their tail, pushing against it with their feet and use the momentum of their bodies bouncing to break off large termite munched branches and then they eat the insects. I thought they were like arboreal gardeners – even more gnomish. I had 2 ripe bananas so I stood on a stool with my arms up holding the banana. He wanted it very badly. And he came close – within 6 feet, but nope, not yet, though we danced like this for 20 minutes. He lay on a branch and watched me, arms folded beneath his head, feet dangling and we hung out. I peeled the banana, broke it in half and left it on the water tank, climbing down to sit on the stool to watch him. almost as soon as I sat down he came down and got a half in each hand, went to the next branch and slowly ate both pieces. He chewed with his mouth open and slurped. I was surprised no one came to see what he had. When he finished he stayed put. I put the other banana on the house roof and waited. This was trickier – it meant he had to momentarily leave the tree. It took longer, but he did it. In our time together I touched my face 3 times and he copied me. He absolutely copied me. Same hand, same spot. This was amazing for me, it felt like we had communicated somehow, shared something. Earth monkey to white faced capuchin monkey. Beautiful.

happy new year

Happy New Year!

May it be a good one, full of pleasure, laughter, peace and hope.

I’ve had a great start to 2008 though it did give me some angst at the very beginning. I grew up being told that whatever I did on new year’s eve would be what I did for the year – what a lot of pressure and stress that created! The house had to be beyond spotless, clothes new, the body scrubbed fresh and still wet from the shower, pockets full of money and heads full of anticipation mixed with regret and fear. So this new year I deliberately went mellow: came home early from a party and sat outside watching the stars as the time moved forwards. The house was clean but the bin was full of trash, I didn’t have money on me, nor was I busy wishing others well. I have to say it was a struggle to put aside my conditioning, feelings of me doing it wrong returned several times. But what to do. I spent it the way I would like to spend the year – at peace, out under a beautiful sky breathing in fresh night air full of crickets and bats, with my dogs and with a full heart and a sweet home.

The next night was a party night going out to celebrate a birthday, dancing to a great band from San Jose, drinking and eating, swimming at midnight. Best of both worlds I guess. And since then it’s been nice. I’m trying to come down from a very social last two weeks, finding it a little hard to wean myself from the doing nipple, but it’s settling down.

I’m making ginger beer for my friends’ café and just now am sipping on one that kept on fermenting, feeling a little buzzed and cooking. Had a close encounter with one of my huge house spiders earlier – don’t know who was more scared, her or I, but for sure I made the weirder noise – a sort of whinny. It’s a big spider. And now I’m chomping down on my latest craze – curried banana flower. Who would’ve thought it? it’s fantastic and they’ve been eating it in Asia for centuries of course, but for me it’s brand new. It’s bitter but delicious.

Postscript
Tried again with the banana flower this time soaking it in salted lime water for an hour. Bitterness gone, super delicious! Took some over to Ray and Ron’s and they fried up some coconut, just little pieces straight off the shell then tossed with soy sauce and brewers yeast. Incredibly this looks, smells and tastes like pork! Hard to believe but true. What a discovery.

christmas

It’s Christmas morning. It’s pouring down rain, I’m wrapped in a damp shawl sitting at the table on my new deck wondering when the rain will stop. This is the fourth day and I’m wishing to see some sun. As I write this the rain becomes harder and clouds rumble overhead. I have guests and I wish for their sake that the sun makes his glorious appearance. Not least because coming up the road last night we took a detour into the ditch and I’m worried about the level of water around the car. This morning it was above the tailpipe. I don’t think that’s good.

But it is what is. And so worries aside I’m sitting here watching the rain and the lizard who’s enjoying his Christmas breakfast of fruit flies around the cacao. He’s very beautiful: a dark red colour, about 5 inches long and he holds himself just like a tiny komodo dragon – very statuesque. This might be his first experience with plastic as he’s trying to snap the fruit flies through the container. I wonder if he’ll work it out.

Christmas. Last night I was with a family and as we ate dinner we spoke about Father Christmas and listened to carols. It was very nice and reminded me of my childhood where Christmas was all about anticipation and the idea that some complete stranger would just give you what you wanted – and more. Isabella and I had made toffee and as she wrapped it and left it out for santa claus I remembered leaving carrots out for his reindeer and the excitement at reading the note he always left in response to my letter. One year the reindeer didn’t eat the carrots and I was very sad to hear that they were sick. It was a wonderful time with this strange fat old fellow who seemingly knew about everything you did and would reward you. Perhaps he was the closest thing to god growing up in my house – though his realm of influence only lasted through December and was promptly over as soon as the wrapping paper was tidied away. But I think that was enough – just the idea that somewhere there was a benevolent, kindly, magical soul who knew me and gave me gifts was heartening and shaped my understanding of the world: Santa was always there and he was happy. An enlightened being who dealt in consumables and material goods to get his point across. And what was his point? That anticipation, excitement and sharing are gifts. Perhaps.

Christmas as a child is a lesson and encouragement in manifestation – what we ask for we receive. If only we could remember this our whole lives.

So this Christmas what gift would santa give me? What do I ask for and give myself? I want to give myself the gift of love: to see myself as worthy, to value, trust and listen to, to respect and care for and love.

I went for a walk on the beach this morning. It was raining, I was in my pajamas (I’m much closer to the beach now), and the dogs were having such a great time. The ocean gave me a gift: a beautiful heart shaped seed. I sang all the Christmas songs I know belting them out to the wind and the rain and the waves. It was fun. The rain is easing just a little and a hummingbird feeds from the hibiscus.

Peace on earth and goodwill to every living being.

moved

i found somewhere the day after i heard i had to move. it's interesting how life is. . .

My new pad is adorable and I want to be here for a while. it's further into the jungle, by a river closer to a beautiful beach. it's 2 rooms, an outdoor bathroom and has a comfortable deck. it's the caretakers cottage for a larger house owned by a wonderful couple from Humbolt. What are the chances? but then there's no such thing as chance. the garden is full of fruit trees, the river has otters, there are spider monkeys as well as white faced and howler. it's good. it's all good.

sloths

The first time I saw a sloth it frightened me: it was so human and alien like and so utterly different that it sent a momentary pang of fear and distrust through me. The day after I found an arm in the orchard: fur and skin gone just muscles and sinews left and those three long talons. It was as long as my arm, but it took away my feelings of otherness.

They move so slowly, they really do. Watching them is a lesson. A lesson in beauty: they themselves are not ‘beautiful’ creatures, their coats are green with algae and their long limbs, tiny heads and awkwardly smiling mouths and long long talons do not make them pin ups in the animal world. But they are beautiful in their movements: each gesture takes time; the reach for a leaf; the slow process along a branch; the turn of the head, the shift of position. The sloth has eternity and each moment lasts a lifetime, each moment is all there is. I learn from the sloth not only to take my time, but that each moment is worthy of my attention, my consciousness. Closing my eyes to shut out distractions, and moving as a sloth feeling my muscles, the weight of my limbs, the energy around my skin, brings a feeling of deep relaxation and awareness.

no spend days

I’ve been keeping track of days in which I buy nothing, I usually average 3 or 4 per week. I’m thinking this is pointless activity: it would be easier for me to just do all my shopping on one day if I had a way to bring it all home in one go. It’s not how often one spends that’s important, it’s what one spends it on. Maybe that’s not true, maybe it’s the consumerism itself, the daily visit to the shop. Yet the daily visit to the ship is a ritualized social experience, one exchanges pleasantries, one may meet a friend, one participates in one’s community. This is the bigger problem – consumerism is a means to an end, it’s the desire to participate in activity with others that drives people to the stores. How many times have you got home with your purchase and realized you don’t want or need it? It was the act of being in the throng that had the juices flowing.

I was keeping track I think as a way to check my interaction with money. I would like to limit this. Not because I’m against money or think it’s evil, but because I find it becomes consuming. I find myself in a position where I can trade and for me this is liberating and fun. Tutoring for laundry and fresh bread, tutoring for local plant identification and uses, yams for plants, cacao for coconut. I’m still consuming, I’m still getting something. The only difference is that I’m giving something different in exchange, not a promissory note, but something somehow more tangible.

saturday night

What a life I lead. It’s Saturday night, I’ve just finished picking sun dried maggots off my cacao beans, now I’m making soursop jam. Tomorrow I’m excited about picking more cacao and planting out my bean sprouts (yeah, I finally got some to sprout!).

Yes. Here we are. It’s just gone 6pm, it’s a Wednesday evening. Dark, warm, there is a little haze covering the new moon. I’m tired and sweaty having just returned from a ride. Hoss, Lady J, Molly, Magellan, Tabitha, Baba and I are enjoying a sprouted coconut picked near the beach this afternoon. I’m surprised the cats like it, but it’s such an amazing piece of superfood I shouldn’t be so surprised at all.

This one is just perfect. The sprout is about 4 inches long, it smells good, I think we can cook it. Inside the coconut is filled with what looks like a ball of polysterene or the pith of a grapefruit. This is what happens to the coconut water as the coconut matures and begins to sprout. It tastes like coconut but sweeter and with a slightly alkaline undertaste. The sprout grows directly from this ball of super powerful, super fresh, super sweet goodness. Inside the shell there’s a good ½ inch of coconut meat. The dogs are gnawing on a good size chink of coconut meat and husk each. They love it. They love papaya and banana too.

I had a good ride. I was out on the arab mix who has not yet revealed his name, for now he’s guappo. We went along the beach but the tide was in and the waves were high and he was nervous. The horses come from Guapiles, which is foothill country: this was the second time he’s seen the ocean. So we did a lot of crashing through scrub avoiding palms and almonds and those trees with the big round leaves that burn and have toxic caterpillars dangling from them ready to fall down shirts. To say it was great fun would actually be true. Anytime I’m out on a horse is great fun (except that one time in the dark in torrential rain, but that was an adventure). It was fun. I had 5 dogs with me and we went happily crashing along, coming repeatedly back onto the beach holding him steady so he could watch the water and relax. It was interesting to see him watch the dogs and where they went through the water he followed. Clever boy. There’s something so special about being with horses and dogs. It really must be multiple past life experiences I think. To ride out of the trees and see the expansion of ocean before you, the waves crashing, picking one’s way through driftwood. It’s perfect. Bending over his neck as he goes below branches, rising again and seeing the forest from another perspective, another viewpoint: it’s being lifted literally out of the ordinary into a different experience of community, communication with not only another being but with nature. Suddenly fruit is within easy reach, suddenly a butterfly appears at face level, suddenly one is free from worrying about treading on ants . . .

I decided to come back along the road, thinking that if he was nervous he might make a run through the woods and take my head off on a branch. He was nervous on the road too but seemed fine with the traffic. In his old life he worked herding horse herds – not too much traffic experience. We turned into the driveway and I let him run. He runs so nicely. I should have held him back. He took wind and raced towards the beach – fine until he saw the waves and then he went crashing into the trees. I just kept turning him. They were worked with bits before and their mouths are free now, we’re riding with halters, so stopping him would have been too hard. Let’s just say it was very exciting for a moment. Turning him worked and he stood. I waited for a few minutes just talking and stroking him and then dismounted and we walked very calmly and slowly back to the house. He’s going to take a lot of work.

It’s a funny thing when a horse takes off like that. Everything becomes instinct. Fear says ‘I’m going to fall’, but then another voice comes in and says nothing, just breathes and looks for a way to fix the situation. My feet were out of the stirrups. I don’t know how this happens but I know I feel better when I’m holding with my legs and not relying on the stirrups. I’m sure it’s past life experiences, I feel better riding bareback. Perhaps it’s as simple as survival: if I don’t keep my balance and stay focused I’m going to get hurt. Perhaps, but I much prefer the idea that it’s some distant memory of how to ride through difficult situations. When we stopped I noticed I didn’t feel a lot of adrenalin, the main sensation was feeling the muscles in my legs relax from holding him. I felt good.

Learning differences II

The indigenous boy from the preliterate family leaves the school tomorrow. His mother is having trouble with her health and they are returning to their community so she can be treated traditionally. I wonder what will happen to him, if he’ll ever receive more schooling. I say schooling rather than education, for he’ll certainly receive education. Just different. I have mixed feelings about his leaving: on one hand I think it will be better for him to stop now while he still has his self belief and his curiosity and his joy, yet I wonder about his life and who he will become, whether leaving now will consign him to a life in the forest, whether as a man he will come back again and work as a laborer. I wonder what this experience was like for him, what it brought him. and I think about what he brought to us, this beautiful boy so far out of even our box.

We were told yesterday afternoon tomorrow would be his last day. The news came in a typed letter, obviously dictated by his father, Erling’s name was misspelled.

For me it brings up the question again: what are we doing with this school business?

At the little celebration we had for Erling today, he wept. He cried really hard. I think this was the schooling he’ll get.

What does school mean for a kid? Friendship, play, attention, recognition, being part of something, becoming part of something larger? That’s what we should be focusing on - community, the individual’s strengths in community.

Fallen fruit

Yes. Here we are. It’s just gone 6pm, it’s a Wednesday evening. Dark, warm, there is a little haze covering the new moon. I’m tired and sweaty having just returned from a ride. Hoss, Lady J, Molly, Magellan, Tabitha, Baba and I are enjoying a sprouted coconut picked near the beach this afternoon. I’m surprised the cats like it, but it’s such an amazing piece of superfood I shouldn’t be so surprised at all.

This one is just perfect. The sprout is about 4 inches long, it smells good, I think we can cook it. Inside the coconut is filled with what looks like a ball of polysterene or the pith of a grapefruit. This is what happens to the coconut water as the coconut matures and begins to sprout. It tastes like coconut but sweeter and with a slightly alkaline undertaste. The sprout grows directly from this ball of super powerful, super fresh, super sweet goodness. Inside the shell there’s a good ½ inch of coconut meat. The dogs are gnawing on a good size chink of coconut meat and husk each. They love it. They love papaya and banana too.

I had a good ride. I was out on the arab mix who has not yet revealed his name, for now he’s guappo. We went along the beach but the tide was in and the waves were high and he was nervous. The horses come from Guapiles, which is foothill country: this was the second time he’s seen the ocean. So we did a lot of crashing through scrub avoiding palms and almonds and those trees with the big round leaves that burn and have toxic caterpillars dangling from them ready to fall down shirts. To say it was great fun would actually be true. Anytime I’m out on a horse is great fun (except that one time in the dark in torrential rain, but that was an adventure). It was fun. I had 5 dogs with me and we went happily crashing along, coming repeatedly back onto the beach holding him steady so he could watch the water and relax. It was interesting to see him watch the dogs and where they went through the water he followed. Clever boy. There’s something so special about being with horses and dogs. It really must be multiple past life experiences I think. To ride out of the trees and see the expansion of ocean before you, the waves crashing, picking one’s way through driftwood. It’s perfect. Bending over his neck as he goes below branches, rising again and seeing the forest from another perspective, another viewpoint: it’s being lifted literally out of the ordinary into a different experience of community, communication with not only another being but with nature. Suddenly fruit is within easy reach, suddenly a butterfly appears at face level, suddenly one is free from worrying about treading on ants . . .

I decided to come back along the road, thinking that if he was nervous he might make a run through the woods and take my head off on a branch. He was nervous on the road too but seemed fine with the traffic. In his old life he worked herding horse herds – not too much traffic experience. We turned into the driveway and I let him run. He runs so nicely. I should have held him back. He took wind and raced towards the beach – fine until he saw the waves and then he went crashing into the trees. I just kept turning him. They were worked with bits before and their mouths are free now, we’re riding with halters, so stopping him would have been too hard. Let’s just say it was very exciting for a moment. Turning him worked and he stood. I waited for a few minutes just talking and stroking him and then dismounted and we walked very calmly and slowly back to the house. He’s going to take a lot of work.

It’s a funny thing when a horse takes off like that. Everything becomes instinct. Fear says ‘I’m going to fall’, but then another voice comes in and says nothing, just breathes and looks for a way to fix the situation. My feet were out of the stirrups. I don’t know how this happens but I know I feel better when I’m holding with my legs and not relying on the stirrups. I’m sure it’s past life experiences, I feel better riding bareback. Perhaps it’s as simple as survival: if I don’t keep my balance and stay focused I’m going to get hurt. Perhaps, but I much prefer the idea that it’s some distant memory of how to ride through difficult situations. When we stopped I noticed I didn’t feel a lot of adrenalin, the main sensation was feeling the muscles in my legs relax from holding him. I felt good. The indigenous boy from the preliterate family leaves the school tomorrow. His mother is having trouble with her health and they are returning to their community so she can be treated traditionally. I wonder what will happen to him, if he’ll ever receive more schooling. I say schooling rather than education, for he’ll certainly receive education. Just different. I have mixed feelings about his leaving: on one hand I think it will be better for him to stop now while he still has his self belief and his curiosity and his joy, yet I wonder about his life and who he will become, whether leaving now will consign him to a life in the forest, whether as a man he will come back again and work as a laborer. I wonder what this experience was like for him, what it brought him. and I think about what he brought to us, this beautiful boy so far out of even our box.

We were told yesterday afternoon tomorrow would be his last day. The news came in a typed letter, obviously dictated by his father, Erling’s name was misspelled.

For me it brings up the question again: what are we doing with this school business?

At the little celebration we had for Erling today, he wept. He cried really hard. I think this was the schooling he’ll get.

What does school mean for a kid? Friendship, play, attention, recognition, being part of something, becoming part of something larger? That’s what we should be focusing on - community, the individual’s strengths in community.

In the rains last week a lot of banana trees came down. At the bottom of the hill there was actually considered chasing him off. But last week I had a dream about shooing away a lion which actually wouldn’t be shooed and attacked me instead. So, given he was a pretty big brahma bull and with his herd, I watched. He seemed to enjoy them, sharing them with a very pretty cow. Later I went out to cut some flowers and found another downed tree with unripe bananas. As it lay about 30 feet from the door I figured it was safe to leave the bunch in place. But imagine my surprise yesterday when the ‘gardeners’ (more slash and burners, there’s nothing left), cleared all the trees and the unripe bananas. My lesson? Think like a squirrel, or maybe just some things aren’t meant to be.

Today I gathered a sprouted coconut, 5 oranges and a breadfruit. The breadfruit is cooking, we ate the coconut and I’ll have orange juice tomorrow. Nice.

Bin raker

My flatmate doesn’t recycle, I’m not sure why. Her English is about as good as my Spanish so our communication is fairly light and limited. I go through the bin every other day and pull out all the recyclables and food scraps and put them in their places, which oddly enough is right beside the ‘normal’ trash. She’s away for the weekend. Imagine my surprise, and delight, when I found a third of a chocolate cake in a recyclable wrapper in the trash. Very nice it is too. I wonder if she put it in there deliberately? She knows I go through the trash. Must be one of those things which seem to puzzle her, like why I cook from scratch and why there’s always plastic bags drying from the line. As I sit here enjoying the cake from the bin (okay it had a tiny bit of ash on it), I wonder what she would think. I ask myself what I think – I feel no qualms. My grandmother swore she was part gypsy – harvest where you can.

What???

So I’ve been trying to sprout garbanzo, lentils, black and white beans since I got here. Without luck. I’ve been thinking that it was my method: balance between wet and dry, too much light, too high humidity . . . I had no problem sprouting in the States. I asked many friends, posted the question online . . . I was doing what everyone recommended. I was speaking to a new friend this morning about gardening here, he hasn’t had any luck sprouting either. And then another question came – what the hell am I eating?

Are these Montsano beans? Am I trying to live as simply and as naturally as I can while feeding myself and my dogs GMO pulses? So I’m still supporting those companies? What the hell is going on???

I’m going to try sprouting my rice, it’s not organic, but it’s from an organic producer.

Never ending quest

In my never ending quest to harvest more of my food I just went out to see if the two patches of bamboo in the garden were sprouting. Nope, but I did find a snake lying flat against a bamboo blade. Thank goodness I didn’t see a sprout under it first. Things happen for a reason huh? I saw an eyelash viper a couple of weeks ago, laying on a termite nest on the side of a tree. Beautiful, thin, short bright yellow snake with raised yellow horned ridges where eyebrows would be. Beautiful to look at but not so nice to meet at close range.

Harvest

It looks like I’m slightly obsessed with harvesting. It certainly seems to be a hobby. Today I opened the soursop that’s been ripening on the table since Monday. It’s a big fruit – about 3 pounds in weight and about 10 inches long and maybe 5 inches wide. I picked it hard and now it’s soft to the touch and the insects are beginning to take an interest, so I guess it’s ripe. It’s white and very juicy with dark pretty seeds. It’s sour and sweet together, definitely more sour. The juice is thick and the flesh is really chewy, the seeds are too hard to eat. Hoss likes the taste but not enough to eat a lot, Lady J isn’t so keen. I took out the seeds and threw the rest in the blender with a little water, makes a very thick smoothie. The taste is too strong to eat much straight, but in a juice with papaya it tastes great. It would make a wonderful sorbet. It gives a great jam.

Dengue

We had to evacuate our classroom today – too many dengue mosquitoes. They are easily identified – big, slow and with white striped legs. What does this mean? Do we have dengue days here like snow days in the north?

I’m feeling somewhat plagued by insects this morning. There are dozens of mosquitoes, some of them dengue; I just pulled a tick out of LJ’s nose; black wasps are buzzing the bunch of bananas; a colony of ants is dismembering a big beetle, and there are hundreds of fruit flies on the cacao.

Shopping is a complicated business. Even though I try to have more non-spending days in a week than spending days, and even though I live simply, shopping takes a long time. There are many things to consider:

• Is it local? I want to support local farmers and the community I live in. The average piece of produce in a US supermarket has traveled 1500 miles from farm to store. That’s a lot of fossil fuels and that’s not taking processing, sorting, cleaning, packaging and distribution into account. I’d rather my food didn’t come with a high carbon bill. Also local equals fresh.
• Is it native? It just feels better eating food that would grow naturally in my area: my gut feeling is that native foods have a stronger connection to the soil, to the animals and insects in this environment and are therefore healthier for me. (I found a tahini made from Nicaraguan sesame!) Also, is it in season?
• Is it organic? Obvious, even better Biodynamic. But read ‘Omnivores Dilemma’ for industrial organic versus local farmers.
• How is it packaged? Can I recycle or reuse the container? While we can recycle plastic bags here, we can’t yet recycle tins. Bioland the only organic producer in Costa Rica uses a lot of packaging that cannot be recycled, and they use a lot of packaging.
• Can I afford it? This question has to bring in all of the above – do I balance price and recyclable packaging against organic?
• Do I actually need it?

I sometimes wonder why I’m living here. Why Costa Rica? I came here on the flimsiest premise: that I might meet some friends a year after moving, of course that didn’t happen, yet I came and I’m still here and I love it. I knew nothing about the country, except it was beautiful and didn’t have an army. I knew no Spanish at all. Today I translated my first meeting. This is an achievement for me, and I give myself a pat on the back. It was an all school parent meeting and I translated the Spanish into English. I’m actually proud of myself. I did a good job, not only did I get across all the points, I used humour to enliven the points. Okay so it wasn’t direct word for word translation, but it was good. I had no idea I could do this, and when asked, at the beginning of the meeting, I was very hesitant. But it worked. And then I gave another parent meeting in English afterwards. I’m tired, that was a lot of concentrating at the end of a school day. Hurrah!

Rain

It’s rained straight for the past 4 days. And by straight I mean straight, with maybe 2 hours rest and that at 5 am this morning. The first two days I couldn’t stand it, the noise of the rain drowns out conversation, makes me groggy as I return to the endless rainy weekends of my childhood, stuck in the house or the cabin nothing to do but watch the puddles grow. I’ve been moving away from the rain (so why am I in a rainforest?). Yesterday I finally began to come to peace with it – a little anyway. As I sat in the Mate Latte coffeehouse giving a math tutorial sipping an extremely wonderful latte flavoured with cardamon, it began to feel like November, I began to think how cosy it was indoors with the rain lashing down outside (even though the only thing separating indoors and outdoors is a wooden lattice). Pictures of Christmas trees and toffees kept drifting into my mind, busy shopping streets filled with umbrellas and bulky bags. The momentary annoyance and quick relief of shaking off wet clothes as one enters the steamy, brightly lit shops full of people intent on consuming.

I’ve been thinking about Christmas a lot recently. I didn’t celebrate it last year, I was in a silent retreat, making this my first Christmas away from winter. Maybe I’m homesick? For where? For a season? But it’s not just the season, it’s all that comes with winter: the retreat inwards, the self reflection, the sharing, the preparation, the bundling up and eating extra fats. Ah-ha! Perhaps this is why I’m craving fats so much just now, perhaps my body is trying to prepare for the winter? How does one celebrate Christmas in the tropics? Why do I celebrate Christmas? What is my relationship to this time of year, solstice, christianty, darkness?

It’s cold, this morning I put on socks. I’m sitting with a steaming mug of milky tea and some biscuits wrapped up in cosy sweats and hoodie watching the rain. It’s coming straight down, has been for the last 5 hours. I went out to feed the horses and pick up a sprouting coconut (delicious). There are many banana trees down, they really have no discernible root system and fall over easily when the ground gets waterlogged. Shame, because three of them had bananas which aren’t quite big enough. I picked some, hopefully they’ll ripen. The horses will eat them I’m sure. I cut some flowers to give the deck colour – big orange, red, pink ones, now that I see them sitting in the corner they look like a fire – winter again? Tonight’s lentil stew is beginning to smell good in the kitchen.

I find myself wanting to nest, to surround myself with homey things. This must be a seasonal thing too. This morning I caught myself looking longingly at some white tin IKEA lanterns on Vanessa’s deck, last night I rearranged my room trying to make it look as though someone lives here and isn’t just passing through. On thurday I dreamt I was pregnant. What’s going on?

learning differences II

The indigenous boy from the preliterate family leaves the school tomorrow. His mother is having trouble with her health and they are returning to their community so she can be treated traditionally. I wonder what will happen to him, if he’ll ever receive more schooling. I say schooling rather than education, for he’ll certainly receive education. Just different. I have mixed feelings about his leaving: on one hand I think it will be better for him to stop now while he still has his self belief and his curiosity and his joy, yet I wonder about his life and who he will become, whether leaving now will consign him to a life in the forest, whether as a man he will come back again and work as a laborer. I wonder what this experience was like for him, what it brought him. and I think about what he brought to us, this beautiful boy so far out of even our box.

We were told yesterday afternoon tomorrow would be his last day. The news came in a typed letter, obviously dictated by his father, Erling’s name was misspelled.

For me it brings up the question again: what are we doing with this school business?

Cacao

The cacao is looking kinda horrific, at least to my westernized sense of food hygiene (and I’m fairly lax about that). For cacao to taste like chocolate it has to ferment and then be roasted. The gooey white coating on the beans is a fermenting agent, all one does is take it out the husk and leave it somewhere, turning it occasionally, for 6 days or so and then dry and roast it. Traditionally they are left in a big pile on some banana leaves. I’m keeping mine in a partially covered Tupperware on the deck (I tried it before in a closed container and it just grew fungus). So I have a pile of fermenting fruit in an open container. Fruit flies, wasps and a big beetle have become part of the fermentation process. When I turn the beans clouds of fruit flies engulf me.

So basically chocolate is a fermented food which partially decomposes in its own compost pile in the first step of its process from bean to bar. News to me. I have another day for the first batch of 5 pods. They look almost ready, the white goop has gone and the beans are darker and smell fermented. The second batch is now 3 days old, today I’ll start another one.

tropical living 3

My clothes are a little moldy today. They’ve been in a clean laundry pile for a week or so and they smell foosty. Not too bad. They don’t have white fungus growing on them like in Monteverde, and they are without the algae-like green covering clothes develop in the rainy season in Guanacaste. Nevertheless they smell of mold. I’ll hang them in the sun again, no problema. Just a reminder I live in the tropics.

big trucks go fast

Of my conversations, two were with angry men. Ostensibly they were angry for different reasons, but the root was the same – bureaucracy / corruption / ineptitude in Costa Rica. It’s a common thing, especially with non tico males, and at some point everyone experiences it. At some point everyone hates Costa Rica. The conversations happened at different times, and in different locations in the café, but strangely enough both decided to pour all their frustration and despair with nameless, faceless others into a spitting fury at truck drivers. There are a lot of truck drivers here, a new road is being made somewhere east, and there are a lot of big mack trucks ploughing up and down. Not juggernauts but sizeable, dust producing monsters. Both men were furious at the speed of “these 19 year old drivers”, who had “no respect for people”. A lot of venting happened, to which I listened quietly with interest. Because for me the experience is different. I’ve never had a truck speed by me, rather the trucks move so slowly behind and past me that I’m sure I must know the drivers. They creep along, can it be the same trucks? Must be. And then it dawned on me. I’m female. In this macho society where it makes sense to speed by the white guy on the bicycle with your huge, powerful engine spitting dust and smoke in his face, it makes equal sense to drive by the white girl slowly enough that you can watch her body move to push on the pedals, slowly enough that when they pass, one can get a good look at the big brave hombre who can handle such an intensely masculine monster. There’s no blurring of gender roles here.

half in love with easeful life

Yeah, I know I’m misquoting, but so what, aren’t life and death just two sides of the same coin? Who was it anyway, Keats or Shelley? Sounds like Shelley, he was ever the melodramatic melancholic (sorry Jon). But I am, actually I’m more than half in love. It’s been a good weekend. I’ve been cloistering myself away, so determined to selfishly hoard my hours, doing my hermit thang, but this weekend I guess I got outed. Friends from Guanacaste turned up, I literally cycled by them in the street and it’s been wonderful to spend time with them. I taught the kids and it was so nice to have Miel riding on my back and tackling my legs with his scrawny 3 year old arms, his sister is as sweet as ever, and the two fight just as much as they did when I last saw them 2 months ago. Other friends from Guanacaste arrived this afternoon, turns out they’re renting a place on the same street as me, what are the chances? I spent a pleasant afternoon sitting in a café owned by other friends, thinking to do some reading, but it seems I actually know a lot of people. Gallons of coffee later I stumbled home having talked politics, permaculture, the pros and cons of living in a developing nation, how to make proper sushi, developmental needs of 6 year olds, how songs travel around the world, how best to get passports stamped and where one could get organic cabbage. I felt full. It’s never really occurred to me that I could spend the whole afternoon in a café doing nothing other than talking and drinking good organic coffee. What a life! And I don’t actually feel one pang of guilt, even more amazing! Sunday passed just as sweetly, breakfast with visiting friends, the afternoon at the bookstore talking nonsense and hanging signs, and to top it all we finally managed to remove the last tick from Hoss’ right nostril. What a glorious way to pass a weekend.

Toucans – ramphastos sulfuratos, ramphastos swainsonii

In Guanacaste I was blessed to live alongside a troupe of howler monkeys. Here I’m blessed to share space with a flock of toucans. They are such unbelievably beautiful birds: black black black with stunning lemon yellow chests and heads; splotches of red and white under wings and tails and the beaks. The beaks are bizarre. Hollow structures supported by struts, clearly too big to be of any real use. When they fly they spread out their tail feathers, and so look curiously balanced, sometimes it’s hard to tell the head from the tail at a distance, and I swear I saw one flying backwards last week. They eat, in this garden, palm fruits, but their beaks are too big for them to look at what’s directly ahead; they have this slow and very steady gradual tilt of the head – like some elderly dowager nodding sedately off to sleep. They turn their heads and with bright beady eye source their food. Then, just as delicately, they pick it with the very tip of their beak, flick back their head, open their beak and in it goes. Not a terribly satisfying or efficient way to eat I think. There are two distinct types here, different species according to the birdbooks. The keel-billed and the chestnut-mandibled, why would two species evolve in the same place? The chestnut mandibled is bigger with a beautiful truly chestnut colour to their lower beak. The keel-billed has an incredible turquoise blue streak to their otherwise green and yellow bill, inside in the crook of their mouth is a brilliant flash of red. The birdbooks say these species have slightly different habits, eating patterns, nesting spaces and calls. The chestnut lives in flocks of 10-15, the keel in smaller flocks of less than 6. However the flock which eats here is mixed, 2 chestnuts with 8 keel-billed. There’s also a pair of aracaris which seem to stay close to the toucans (the aracaris supposedly flock with 10-15 of their own kind). The calls are loud; crrrik (keel), keeureek kirick kirick (chestnut) and pseek, pisseek, pink (aracari) and penetrating, in their staccato, castanet

like sound. No-one has told these birds they are different and should live apart. It seems normal, and fitting for this part of the world to have this happy little mixed flock.

tarantula

I awoke this morning to find the kittens out of their new high sided crate – their little back legs get stronger by the hour! The crate sits in my closet, but 5 feet off the ground, so it would only be a matter of time before they explore right off the end of the shelf. In moving them I discovered a brown tarantula, about as large as my hand. While pondering the pros and cons of moving him – he’s obviously eating something and that something might be less desirable insects and spiders / I think the brown ones bite and I’d hate to see a playful kitten get hurt – I realized he was too big for all the containers I had. Tarantulas are slow moving so I thought I could maybe just brush him out with the broom. When I touched him he took on this warrior stance – strangely reminiscent of spiderman’s crouching pose. I was amazed at the strength of his body in the yoga like position. I touched the broom to him again and he suddenly became much bigger, spreading himself out flat on the ground. The broom idea obviously wasn’t working and instinctual feelings of danger and horror were beginning to replace my previous calm observation and gratitude at finding such a foreign (to me) creature in my bedroom. I got a pot and laid it over him, and then left the room. I think that might have been a mistake. About 5 minutes later I returned, put a piece of paper under the pot and then dragged it to the edge of the deck, pushing it off. When I put the paper in I didn’t feel any resistance, but figured that the spider could be anywhere inside the pot. When I pushed it off the edge of the deck I

didn’t see him either. Now I might have just missed him, or the paper may have landed on top of him. The other option, one I’m not really wanting to think about is that he could have lifted the pot and found another spot in my room. I don’t mind the thought that he’s in their, after all tarantulas are not terribly social creatures and like small dark places which I have no desire to explore. It’s the idea that he was strong enough to lift the pot that troubles me. Relatively his strength is much greater than mine, and for some reason this always freaks me out a little. Watching ants, really any insect or arachnid, as they go about their daily business with such speed and obvious strength always makes me feel just a little in awe and just a little uncomfortable.

Why do we have this instinctual fear / fascination with exoskeletal creatures? From the alien and extra terrestrial movies to the rows of bug spray and insecticides in the supermarket, to the squealing and hysterical killing I’ve seen on several occasions, what is it that makes them so much ‘the other’? I used to think it was because I couldn’t look such creatures in the eye and therefore could have no idea what they were thinking, whether they could think, there could be no connection, no recognition. This is still part of it, but I think it’s also that they are really just so much stronger than us. Perhaps it’s respect turned sideways. Respect without connection becomes a sort of distrust, a wariness?

kitten update

The kittens are now 24 days old. They are looking less like monkeys and more like cats; ears are sticking up, not quite pointed yet though. Their eyes are still blue but fading into yellow. Magellan, the middle born and the largest is the only one with fair control of his back legs, he can now climb out of the one time fridge drawer they call home. Orinoco, the youngest loves to play and is trying out all his new found limbs on his mum and siblings. Amelia still prefers to sleep, she’s the smallest. The names still change, especially Amelia’s, but I’m getting closer to discovering their true names. Molly the mum is now sleeping outside the drawer, but continues to be completely in love and very doting.

Esta no cancion d’amor, esta cancion de la revolution, part 2

I believe increasingly that this should be the task of education. Current education is nothing but a sentimental attempt at maintaining the status quo, churning out industrial product in the shape of consumers who know how to do, more or less, what they’ve been told, more or less. Education has become fragmented where children fill in the blanks in predrawn paper sheets, imagination chewed and offered up semi digested. In the States public schools follow Houghton Mifflin scripted lessons where the teachers read from books, “Good Morning Class” and the day continues in a prefabricated monologue with no room for autonomy let alone thought. The children sit staring, their systems full of high fructose corn syrup, food colouring, additives and chemicals, or all this plus drugs to keep them focused and docile.

Rather let education be revolution, a circle spiraling forward, revolving, evolving creating new generations of thinking, loving, unique individuals.

Why do we still teach to what was needed 2 centuries ago? I’ve been in the classroom for 12 years and I can see a difference in those now entering school from those children now graduating high school. People are evolving, the world is evolving at a heightened rate. The world in physical ways, the human in social, psychological, psychical ways, in consciousness. Education is not keeping up. The most important things I’ve ‘taught’ in my time have not been reading, writing, arithmetic (children learn these almost always by themselves), but rather social skills; communication; community and trust building; observation and respect for human and natural environments; care of each other, animals, nature; imagination; self expression and self trust, and love. The things that don’t appear much in teacher training establishments, let alone scripted lessons. As family recedes and

the importance of the individual continues, children have to learn how to be part of a community. What was taken for granted 2 centuries ago in social terms no longer exists and it must be taken up elsewhere.

Academics are important, yes of course, but they need to be seen in a larger context. The word education comes from the Greek root ‘educare’ meaning to raise up. This is what education must become again. We must serve the children a diet that will sustain them throughout their lives, not just through college entrance exams. We must feed their souls, their minds, their imagination, their creativity, their self expression, their love as much as their bodies. Not a sentimental love song conferring loss. A song of revolution.

Esta no cancion d’amor, esta cancion de la revolution

The fourth grade teacher, who’s Columbian, is singing a song with her class, a blend of Central and South Americans, Europeans and Africans. She tells them the song is local Caribe-African, she’s singing in English. I hear it from the other room and can’t help but wander to her class. It’s a Scottish song, an old traditional ballad, most definitely Scots. She disagrees, telling me that the immigrating Afro-Caribes brought it from Africa via Jamaica. It’s ‘My Bonny Lies Over The Ocean’, as Scots as haggis and proper whiskey. Later when I have the class I tell them the song really isn’t a love song, the real message is one of revolution. The Bonnie is not a sweetheart, but Bonnie Prince Charlie, the heir to the Scottish throne, raised in France and almost ready for the Jacobean uprising of the 1740s. The song was a way of spreading propaganda and support for the rebellion under the watchful eyes and ears of the bastard English. I look at the faces in front of me, the

incredible diversity in the classroom and I wonder what this can mean to them, how they might relate. In other parts of the world people still die under imperialism, sacrifice themselves in revolutions. But I teach the bilingual children of Romeo and Juliet in a country which abolished its army 60 years ago.

When I was a kid I was fiercely proud of my nationality, my culture, history, country. While I continue to appreciate its beauty and the characteristics and story of its people, I can no longer feel the pull of nationality. For me, the future has to lie in these blended children and their belief that the world is their home, the earth is their land, their blood the blood that flows through all peoples.

Today we celebrated cultures day, each family was invited to share a song, game, play, dance or story from their culture: we had offerings from Nicaragua, Columbia, Argentina, Norway, Germany, Switzerland, Jamaica, Italy, Spain, the US, Japan, Costa Rica, Brazil, South Africa and Scotland. Later we shared a cultural feast of traditional dishes. It was rich, heartfelt, beautiful. If we could share our cultural souls, our folk souls without the attachment and fear which bring racism and imperialism, if we could maintain the ‘same but different’ understanding then maybe we would have time to devote to the real issues.

plastic

Amid the books and coffee cups at Shaun’s place, there’s a scattering, a smattering of magazines – special interest magazines. Always well thumbed and losing a bit of their glossy sheen (do you know that magazine gloss comes from corn? Read ‘The Omnivores Dilemma’, Michael Pollan), they lie tantalizingly behind Mother Jones and Adbusters: the People magazines. The women who lounge at Echo Books are nomads, pioneers, escapists, all of us from different places who now find ourselves between the jungle and the ocean. Our skin is soft from the humidity but thick from outdoor exposure, our sinews stand up in the heat, our hair is stiff with dust, we wonder daily at the new bites, scratches and bumps we collect in the night: “yeah, just put noni juice on it”. And we all love People magazine, from cover to cover. Of course it can’t be called reading, it’s basically a picture book, and watching myself and others we do tend to lose interest about half way through as page after page shows similar looking people in similar looking clothing doing similar looking things. People we don’t know, depending on how long we’ve been ‘out’. It’s a bit like fast food: the cover is what grabs you, the first sensory experience - in this case sight, in food’s case smell. We reach for it, all other thoughts subside, but once that initial sensory zing has gone it’s all a bit unsatisfying. Until the next time .

The one lying on the coffee table this month (no, we don’t buy them, tourists leave them), has Anna Nicol on the cover. It seems she’s been having trouble with her plastic surgeon,

“I’ll never be perfect again”

the coverline reads.

“Oh poor thing, she’ll never be perfect again”

Leah sighs in a sympathetic, motherly tone. We look at each other and smile, confusion flutters across faces, “poor thing”.

duh

One of the things I teach in school is gardening. I just realized I’m the gardening teacher. This may seem very obvious to anyone reading this, but it’s taken me a month to see the significance. I’ve been working clearing the small and tropically overgrown garden at school and re-doing the compost area with the 3^rd and 4^th graders. And I’ve been moaning about the new area of gravel by my new class-space (not what you would call a room). I just realized I’m the one person at school who is in the position to change the gravel and put in more gardens. I can also begin gardening with the other classes I teach, I’m with all of the children every day, and can easily put gardening into our schedule.

There’s a wonderful botanical garden in Puerto Viejo and a great medicinal garden too, oh and a butterfly garden. We have so much room at school. I can meet with the directors of these gardens and get ideas and I’m sure some plants. We could also become carbon neutral by planting some more native trees. Oh my god, where have I been all this time?

death in (of) the family

My beautiful, eccentric, wonderful, damaged, real, grandmother died last month. I miss her. She’s a soulmate and I’m glad to have spent all of my life thus far knowing her, just a call away from her. I’m sure our time together is not complete and we shall meet again. I hope so. She had been abused as a child by an alcoholic father, had not known her mother, run away, put in care, and left to fend for herself. She married my grandfather at 17 and on her wedding night cried when she realized she had to stay with her husband and not return to her sister’s house. She didn’t know how to be a mother. She knew how to lie, how to take, how to survive.

But for me she was a wonderful grandmother: full of stories, laughter, encouragement and bad advise. She didn’t knit, didn’t keep a tidy house, she cursed horribly, cackled like a fishwife and filled me with love and enthusiasm and a genuine interest in what the world is. I love her.

But compassion is in scarce supply in my family which seems wrecked by old grudges and misunderstandings. I learned yesterday that my father does not yet know his mother is dead. When told she was ill he became angry and said he didn’t want to know anymore. And so he walks around in his guilt and his shame and this must be a terrible weight for him to carry. No closure, no release. My father won’t talk to me, he won’t talk to any of us, how can I help him? I know this is his choice, I know this is his path, but it rips me to see him damage himself so thoroughly, so chronically. It seems my family is dead, we are merely ghosts.

big old bubble, toil and trouble

Last week I had a discussion with a friend about bubbles. Actually the discussion wasn’t about bubbles, bubbles came in as an analogy for something else. Yet the bubble is what stuck with me. He said that the inside of a bubble was a vacuum. I disagreed saying that the inside and outside forces pushed equally on each other. I don’t know what’s right. But as an analogy I can’t stop thinking about it.

I have lived in bubbles for almost all my adult life. The education and communities I’m involved with are bubbles outside the mainstream UK and US systems. I’ve lived in beautiful locations, surrounded by nature, close to farms and health food stores or farmers markets, I had CSAs for most of the time I was in the States, I’ve had my own chickens and goats. I haven’t been registered and able to vote for 20 years, I’ve been thankfully healthy and haven’t needed mainstream medical anything for over 20 years. My friends share my beliefs and my lifestyle. Almost everyone I know lives consciously. I’ve been happily living in bubbleville.

Increasingly I’m understanding that I have to leave the bubble. Why? Because the forces aren’t equal. As borders have to fall, bubbles have to burst and we have to make conscious living mainstream. There has to be change and change has to come from the inside, it can’t be brought about from something that exists as parallel or outside. When the bubble bursts and that captured air mingles with its surroundings – that’s power, that’s the way it works, and that’s what must happen.

footprints

I have made certain choices, most consciously, to simplify my life, reduce my footprint. I live in Costa Rica, but am not a citizen: I have no say in the politics, I am outside the system. All my electricity comes from hydro power stations. I have no car - I have a bicycle. If I travel long distance it’s by bus. I prepare my food from the basic ingredients, trying to buy locally as much as possible: but my grains, pulses and coffee don’t grow in my region, and my beloved tahini comes from Israel. The only processed food I buy is cat food, (the dogs have their own diet), but I’d like to change this. I recycle. I have no debts, no savings and little earnings. Most of what I own is clothing and bedding, 98% of which is cotton, silk, linen or hemp. I also own my wonderful laptop, a slow cooker, a kettle, a camera, a blender and speakers for my ipod. Everything I own will fit in 3 bags. I am currently responsible for 2 dogs and 4 cats.

And that’s it. Yet when I check my footprints online – for carbon, fossil fuels, green living, I’m shocked by how big they are. But I’m also grateful they’re not any bigger. I was a teenager in the 80s, I’m of the x-generation, and I guess we were all a little smug at our post yuppie thinking. We’re older and fatter now and have too much stuff. It’s time to wake up and let it go.

living in truth

Am I living in truth? So many layers to this question. I’m sitting under banana trees technically ‘stealing’ wireless from the realtors next door. But I don’t regard this as untruthful – on 2 counts;

- anywhere that my body picks up wireless I feel entitled to use it

- the realtor is not a fair trader, not living in truth, therefore it isn’t stealing

wow, wait a minute, the logic of the second one is perverse. Does that mean that if say someone were to burn fossil fuels to produce electricity – which god knows isn’t true to the planet, and I were to use it, it would be okay because someone else did it first? Okay, scrap that second reason, it sucks.

Yet how many times a day is this kind of logic the default? All those unconscious moments when I do something because that’s the way I’m conditioned, or because it’s the norm or because it’s easier?

How do I ask myself the question: am I living in truth? Through what I eat, what I wear, what I choose to do for a living, where I choose to live, how I choose to vote, what I do for transport, social action, social outlets . . . the list is long, yet the word choose is prevalent. My life is made up of a series of choices, I can choose at any moment to make a difference. I can choose to live in truth.

And what is truth? True to what? To a moral code left over from imperialism and protestant ‘virtues’? True to myself, to the planet, to my friends, to my vocation? Who’s truth? Perhaps which truth is less important than the concept, the effort to live consciously, to question oneself at any and every moment, wait, am I living in truth, and then to make a choice a decision based the answer.