Pura Vida

Where to begin...
I want to avoid creating a cliche travel blog that speaks of tropical weather, waterfalls, beaches, fresh fruit, and a ridiculously leisurely life...but that´s exactly what I´m doing, so it´s kind of unavoidable. I arrived in the Costa Rican airport in the evening, slept in a corner, caught a taxi and a bus the next morning, and walked from the bus station to John´s house and got there at about 8:30am that morning. John walked home from class a couple of hours later, we had a joyful reunion, and then we got on a bus with some kids from his language school and took a ferry to Monteverde where we hiked to a gorgeous waterfall and jumped off rocks and loved the cool refreshing water--it´s hot here. All the time. I sleep with no covers every night. Then we slept on the beach, woke up, cracked open some coconuts and drank the water, then jumped in the ocean for a nice morning splash. Ridiculous. Back in Puntarenas, we set up the slack line (similar to tight rope walking) every night for sunset on the beach and good times. Unfortunately, I broke my pinky toe on my first attempt. Ouch. It´s almost better, now, after limping for a few days.
And the produce...it´s everywhere, and it´s cheap. Yesterday we found the best mango spot, with the coolest mango man in town. He cut up a bunch for us to taste, told us how to tell if they´re ripe or not, and after we bought 10 (50 cents each) he threw in 3 for free and cut up some more for us to eat. There´s also cantaloupes, watermelons, papayas, grapes, strawberries, apples, tasty crisp little green guys that are kind of like pears, platanos, and all types of vegetables. Smoothies every day, it´s amazing.
I´m sleeping on John´s floor right now, and working on building an extra platform for my very own bed. His roommates are super mellow, and they love me and said I can stay as long as I like. Most of the people in his program are doing home stays, but he met up with another kid in the airport and they decided to get a house with some other students, and so they have one of the only houses without a host family in the whole program--which means, of course, that it is the party house. There are people there all the time. It´s fun a lot of the time, but sometimes we all just want to mellow out and study and read, and there´s always people coming over trying to hang out. But, in the end, I think it´s worth it. Last night I broke out the ukulele and John brought out some pots and pans and we had a freestyle jam session, everybody taking turns singing lyrics or making nonsense sounds, for about 30 min. Good times. Pura Vida.
John and I also set up some conversation partners at the local university, so we go and practice our Spanish skills every week. It´s a huge help! And I met one of their professors last night, too. He was hanging out with us on the beach while we were slack lining, and he came back to our house for the jam session. He gave me some impromptu lessons, and told me to come by his office today to pick up some materials for grammar exercises. He told me that I spoke very well and that I just needed to practice, but that grammar can be very helpful and so he has some materials for me. Good deal!
Life is good here. Things are much more relaxed, I´m much more relaxed, I´m doing things that I love like exploring beautiful places and meeting people and making spontaneous music, my Spanish is improving, the food is delicious, cheap, and plentiful, and I´m just living day to day, letting life brew up what it will, pursuing what I´m inspired to pursue...it´s beautiful. I´ve started meditating in the mornings and doing yoga, and cultivating a more peaceful inner Glenn--very important, if you´ve ever spent some time in my head. Kinda spooky in there.
Gotta run, our conversation partners await!