Why to NOT buy counterfeit Ray Bans

1. They break within three hours.
2. Grrrr.

Mis bebes.

Learn to become a washing machine!

1. Fill tub with water and clothes and little bit of shampoo. Let sit for a while and some. If you forget about it for the whole day, that's ok too.. They just smell more like shampoo.
2. Stir, mix, poke, prod them. Get that water lookin dirty!
3. Pour off water.
4. Turn on faucet. Under the running water, vigorously massage each piece of clothing on the bottom of the sink. Let it soak up water and then squeeze it out until you produce no mo bubbles (or almost none if you're lazy) and dirty water.
5. Separate the sink-cleaned clothes as you go.
6. When done, hang em up on the clothes line.

Shabam! Shampoo-smelling clothes :)

Still, after being a washing machine for two months, I'm willing to splurge the energy and money on the professional energy stars..

How to tell it's the Rainy Season

1. At the howl of a monkey, six months of crystal-clear, rainless blue skies turn grey. Rains pour, thunder roars, lighting whip-zap-ping-PYOWs and frogs hop.
2. The green seeps back into the world.
3. I barely have to water the plants. Shazam!
4. Cars whizzing by on dirt roads do NOT kick up a wake of dust that coats your mouth as you bike.
5. Towels take three days to dry.
6.You wake up in sheets that are slightly cool. They're not quite damp... but *just* not quite dry.

To cross the Nicaraguan Border (yikes?)

1. Change money before the border... but only with the guys with badges!
2. Smile at the customs officers, esp. the ladies.
3. Travel light so you don't need to pay a tricycle porter to take you and your stuff the few hundred yards to the border.
4. Ignore advice about bribing officials and having a local fill out your entry paper for you. It's a cinch.
2. To pass the time (fo' eva) you've got to wait in line, talk to folks waiting with you. They might offer a cool place to hang out on your travels. I met a German who studied to be an Englsih teacher, has a Russian mom and helps drug-addicted Nicas (Nicaraguans) get sober in a mobile school in Masaya (where I'm going!).
5. Ask for the bus instead of a taxi--you get to meet Nicaraguans who may offer you advice, warnings and free corn and popcorn (I got all four :]).

Pics
1. Icido!

2. Walk from Costa Rican immigration to the border.

Chicken Poo and Unabashed Cats

Nature really weaves into everyday life here... In fact, chickens got in the other day and pooped on my floor. The same day I think a monkey peed on me. Fortunately, nature is kind sometimes.. Here, air conditioning units are open doors and windows and fand. So, walls only kind of distinguish between outside and in, letting the sounds--clicking birds, chirping geckos, and howling monkeys--smells--brush-burning, cow manure--and little (and big) bugs (see picture) of nature in. And right now, an enormous lizard is clanging around on my roof.

Likewise, life spills out onto the yard, where everyone lounges in a turmoil of hammocks, pig pens, and mango trees. See the horse picture below.

Finally, nature makes an ostentatious show in public. Dogs (and more dogs) sleep on the sidewalk and road. In several restaurants, a cat has climbed onto the table where I am sitting and made my books and paper into a cozy table-top bed.

For good measure, here's Tomato Frog (he hangs out in the tomato planter).

Distant cousins

The people of Guanacaste and the South are definitely distant cousins. Everybody smiles to say hello. Everybody earnestly helps the lost traveller. And walking out on the rural highways near where I live, you'll find cowboy boots, tractors and lots of dried cow patties.

And by george it's hot. Even with the dry gusts in this season, heat is like a gravity that drags you to the nearest hammock.