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Life on the Beach

We as a group found and spotted amazing wildlife on the park, but next to the hotel and the open-air restaurant. Black iguanas feeding on bananas 12 feet from you, Figure 1. I was definitely not use to being able to so close to such large wild lizards.

(Fig 1) Black Iguanas eating Bananas at the Hotel

Birds of every color as well as amazingly beautiful flowers. White face monkeys jumping through the trees the sound of them making you duck for cover thinking they are going to land on your head, figure 2. They were fun to watch and learning that one should not show their teeth to them was a good piece of advice as it is a sign of aggression to them. It was interesting watching them use their hands to hold food and break open large legumes with their teeth.

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(Figure 2) Capuchin Monkey grabbing a legume to drink the fermented liquid inside

Not knowing the language was a definite negative for me. Felling disconnected and partitioned out of the world. With work I will be at least a little bit bilingual in the next year. People are amazing but unless I can communicate, I was frustrated because there were so many interesting people with stories to learn. I can better empathize with the Spanish speaking people that did business with my father. It literally feels like you are totally dependent upon the other dominant language person to live, but the people here in Costa Rica have been very patient with my miss pronunciation and looking at them perplexed with the use of simple words, Figure 3.

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(Figure 3) Inside a Mall in Costa Rica