LOST IN PARADISE

I have been lost in my own little world for a bit, and it has been very nice for the time it has lasted.  I forgot about everything and everyone back home for a while, and have lived here in my own little bubble.  It was like London and the life I had there did not exsist, like it was just some dream.  I even have my own little daily rountine.   I wake usual at 6.30 am, listen to my music in my bunk bed until 7.00am, then I changed into my bikini, put the sun cream on and head to the bar, where Julie serves me my usual hot ginger, lemon and honey, which Jeff usual nicks.  Sometimes I mix it up depending on my mood and have museli intsead of omelette (Crazy I know)!  I then walk to the beach usual with Thomas as he goes for his morning surf, or with Hannah if she can out of bed in time.  I lay basking in the rays until 11.30am, at which time I leave on my 4km walk to Spanish school (I'm getting very fit here), stopping off on the way for my usual pastry from Cafe de Paris where I practice my really bad Spanish with the guy behind the till.  I get to Spanish school, have a dip in the pool before lessons start and look over my very badly done home work.  I suffer for four hours in lessons and then get a ride home with Sylvia one of the teachers, back to Almost Paradise.  I shower change my clothes and then go and prop up the bar for the rest of the night, eating Stefans food of the day and talking to the regulars.  I feel like part of the furniture there these days.  So this has been my life for the last couple of weeks and I have been very happy with it, but the problem with bubbles is that they always burst and one day mine did a little.  Me and Thomas have been close now for a couple of weeks, to the point that people started  to refer to him as my boyfriend.  It felt weird.  What felt even weirder was I started to feel a little bit attached towards him.  This was not part of the plan.  I did not come here to get in a relationship with anyone.  Especially not Thomas.  He is very independant, a nomad, and wants no ties in life. He is also a big player.  I always knew that about him and have never expected anything from him.  I think we both freaked each other out.  I decided it was for the best to cut myself off from him and told him I just wanted to be friends.  He agreed.  It has changed us, which makes me sad.  The first couple of days, were uncomfortable, but things have got better and we are friends once again.  It did make me realise though that this little world I have here is not forever and I will be leaving soon for the road.  Its time to start taking my head out of the sand.
Its hard to get around here.  We are so cut off from everything, there is no real transport unless you have a car.  We have been trying to pimp Hannah out to men with cars so we have transport, which she suceeded with an American guy called Andrew for a bit, but then he pissed off back to the states.  So when, me and Thomas tried to hitch to go and see the baby Turtles at Ostional, and failed miserably as it was a Sunday morning, we decided to hire a quad bike.  Yes!  Quads are the way to get around here as the roads are so bad.  Only one problem is the dust on the roads.  You get covered.  Me and Thomas showed up at the bar for mulled wine night looking like chimney sweeps, which made Julie laugh alot as we sat there drinking our drinks covered from head to toe in dust. It didn´t help that Thomas also drove the quad like he was Micheal Schmacher, but I like a bit of danger; its more exciting.  We did get to see the turtles in the end (actually I bloody saw three times in the end) as we drove to them at first light getting Hannah on the quad with us.  We told Thomas he was very lucky to have a threesome on a quad with a blonde and burnette.  He just smiled.  It was worth it though to see hundreds of little baby turtles take their first steps into the world and head towards the sea.  It was so magical, until Thomas informed us that only one in a hundred make it!  Then the picture became more clear as vultures attacked them and bit their heads off, dogs ate them, the sea knocked them on to their backs and the hot sun drained the life out of them.  Magic turned into massacre and all this on a hangover after mulled wine night; not good!  Me and Hannah were sad.  Thomas was? Well just Thomas!  So couldn´t tell what the hell he thought. Just another day in Paradise, then.

OBSERVATIONS

* The howler monkeys round here are little bastards.  They like to shit or piss on people when they walk under the trees they are in, as I found out the other day on my way to Spanish school as one decided to shit on my arm.  God dam it!

* We had a bit of danger and excitement the other day in the hostel when Stefan found a snake in the foot path.  It turned out it was a fluer de Lance and if it bites you, you only have minutes to live.  So some one had to kill.  Andrew the American volunteered as I think he wanted to show off in front of Hannah.  He got a machete and chopped it into bits.   Which wasn´t to pleasant as I had just eaten!

*  The local supermarket does not sell water, beer, or much food, but there is always a vast supply of cocaine.  Not quite Sainsburys then!

*  The surfing is starting to get better.  It still bloody hurts though.

* I´m really shit at spanish.

*  I need to stop saying shit so much!

ADIOS!

I realised something the other day; that I'm always having to say goodbye to people in my life. With my job, I'm always working with people for a short space of time and saying goodbye to them when the show finshes.  To be fair I say goodbye a lot to most of my relationships also.  I have grown so use to it now, I tell myself that I'm good at it, that I really don't miss people, but really I do.  Traveling is the same as well, meeting people but always having to say goodbye, which was what I had to do again last week as my international family left me bit by bit.  Maria left for San Jose, Pete when back to the cold of Canada and Alex and Carly 2 ventured off into the sunset on a romantic journey up the north of the country.  Even Cat and Hannah left for Panama for a couple of days (I'm heading there later so decided not to go), thus leaving me all alone sleeping in my empty dorm, and I thought to myself "I miss everyone" but that's OK.  So I found myself left in the care of Jeff and owen!!! This meant being shown round their bachelor pad where they proudly showed me their DIY which consisted of them raising their beds on breeze blocks so they could now see the sunset from them, which they thought might help pull more ladies?  Jeff was not happy when I told him that Owen's bed was much better.  I was also left with task of putting cream on Owen's surf wound, for which I was rewarded with being shown on the floor of the hostel bar, how to get up on a surf board, which was probably not the best timing as we had, had a couple of beers by then.  Some of the dinners looked on in confusion as two crazy people lay on their stomachs on the floor pretending to paddle, while Stefan, sat rocking his head back and two, chewing a tooth pick listening to hard core German rave (Julie and Stefan listen to it 24/7).  I decided to keep myself busy with everyones absence by filling in for Cat as a volunteer at the local summer school.  Rabbit in the head lights would be the sentence I would use to describe it.  My first day consisted of me looking after 160 hyper Costa Rican kids, and me not knowing any Spanish, it was a hard task indeed.  Luckily NO!  means no in Spanish.  The rest of the time I spent shotuing at them in English, to which they ignored me.  So all in all it went very well indeed.  
I wasn't on my own for long.  Thomas came back, looking like a scared little puppy dog.  He didn't think I was going to talk to him and I'm not sure things went well with Frenchie (Wonder why?).  So!  I have had a few complaints from readers on this topic, so let me put things straight.  First he's not my boyfriend and I'm not his girl friend.  Where both traveling and not here to get into a relationship and finally I'm under no illusion that when I leave this place, I am probably never going to him again, because you always have to say goodbye in the end; Remember?  So no, I'm not angry with him, I would of probably done the same.  I'm not interested in going to Heaven.  All I do know is that I get on with him really well, he makes me laugh and for all our differences, I think we are quite similar.  I will make the most of the time we have left together and thats all I can do.
I've started doing an intense Spanish course for two weeks, so that I might be able to survive in South America.  This means I have 4 hours a day, with an amazing teacher called Kattia who only speaks to us in Spanish.  I would like to say I'm finding it easy but God its probably one of the hardest things I have every done!  I'm not going to be fluent but hopefully something will stay in.
So the other night Jeff and Owen decided to have a BBQ which was probably the most disatorous but funny one I have ever been to.  Jeff who had arranged it decided not to show up as the 2 girls he wanted to shag were not coming, so it was left to Owen to set up the BBQ in a wheel barrow, which he dropped as he got nearly bitten by a scorpion.  He proceeded to get very drunk show us his pubes, tell everyone he had seen my nipples, while the two smelly weirdo hippies from the hostel, nicked our food.  Jeff did turn up later, so Owen just started shouting at him that he was a big knob head (there like a married couple!)  So just another normal night at Almost Paradise.  Julie and Stefan are having a mulled wine party on Sunday, to remind them of Berlin, so God knows what carnage is going to go on at that?

OBSERVATIONS

* The boys have all taken up a new sport of Iguana shooting.  I wake up most morning to find Owen on the bar Terrace with an air rifle, swearing alot when he misses them.

*  I'm not an natural surfer.  Had my first lesson with Jeff and spent most of my time spitting salt water out of my mouth as I fell off the board loads.  I did manage to get up in the end though.

* I think I really am starting to hate hippies!

*  Why do Americans all do there best English accent like Dick Van Dyke in Mary Poppins!  Very annoying.

* Ruby Wax was drinking in Almost Paradise bar last night. Show biz or what.

HOSTEL OF LOVE

So after what seemed like forever and a cancelled flight, me and my friend Hannah, have finally made it here to Costa Rica.  I didn't realise until I got here how burnt out I was and arrived full of Flu and feeling like shit, but after a week of Sunshine and chilling, I feel like a new person, but it does help when your staying in paradise.  Actually thats the name of my hostel here in Nasaro, Well "Almost Paradise."  Nostaro is a little village on the Pacific side of Costa Rica, where not much happens apart from surfing.  God they live for surfing here.  Your an outcast if your not carrying a surf board on the beach.  It also means there are lots of hot surfers to look at all day long which suits me fine.  Anyway back to the hostel.  I'm staying in the same place, that my friend Cat is living at, as she is out here for the year.  I chose to stay in the dorms to save money and it has been the best decision, as I have had so much fun.  My room mates are a Candian called Pete who me and Hannah picked up the plane, a German chef called Thomas, Alex a French guy who smokes too much and thinks its funny to walk round wearing our bras?, Maria a Spanish girl doing volunteer work in San Jose and an Aussie, called guess what?  Carly!  I have have now had that changed to Carly 2 as I was there first!  We all get along really well, very well in fact, but I'll get to that later.  The hostel is owned by a cool German couple called Julie and Stefan, who have a crazy dog called Charlie to match, but they are so lovely and look after us all like a family. We also have two crazy next door neighbours, Cat's surf teacher friends; Owen and Jeffery.  Owen who is from the west country and we can never usually understand what he says and has the maddest long blonde hair you have ever seen, but he can surf amazingly.  Jeff who is Dutch and Cat has warned me and Hannah not to go there as he will want us both (Probably at the same time)! This is not because we are special, its because we have breasts and are breathing! Still we find them fun to hang out with and they are really nice guys.They give us rides in their car the ghetto blaster as it is know which is the biggest shit heap you have ever seen, as it has no windows and they will get fined my the police if they get caught in it as it is not road worthy!
So new year was when it all kicked off.  We all had drinks at sunset on the beach and then headed off in jeeps to the strangest party ever.  We went high up into the mountains of Costa Rica only to find ourselves at a replica english pub called the Black Sheep, which was full of yanks and surfers.  We all preceeded to get very drunk and Cat and Jeff decided to jump in to the pool and thought that everyone would follow  but everyone else just looked on which was very funny.  We then went to a club called La Tropicana where I then started kissing my German roomy Thomas!  I know I said no more Germans after Jan, but he is one of the funniest guys I have ever met which is strange as most Germans aren´t meant to have a sense of humor!  We then decided to walk home but realised in are drunk state that we were to far and were being followed by a horse which was freaking me out, so decided to hitch hike and got picked up by some locals who were playing the Cure?  We got back to the dorms and decided to have some fun on the balcony only to find Carly 2 looking sheepish and Alex just sat there in his under pants having a fag not really giving a shit, what anyone saw (So French)! So me and Thomas then went to the below balcony and tried to have fun in the hammock which is very hard when you are drunk and I kept falling out.  The next day feeling very ropey I realised that Pete or Maria had not come home, as it turns out they were making out on the beach.  Hostel of love or what!  So this started us all sneaking around like teenagers and all us getting into each others bunk beds when the other couples were out.  Me and Thomas got caught on the top bunk the other day when Alex thought it was really funny to shine a torch at us in the dark, but we got our own back as we later caught them in the hammock.  God as I'm getting older I seem to be acting more like a child!  Anyway it being me, nothing is ever simple and there is a slight hitch with me and the Thomas thing!  Before I got to Nasaro he met a French girl who he had arranged to stay with for a couple of days before she went back to France.  He couldn't get in contact with her to tell not to come back as she was up a bloody volcano some where, so now she has turned up and he's now shacked up with her, which is very uncomfortable as everyone knows about me and him. In fact, I had to have breakfast this morning with them and our little group and we kept looking at each other and all I could think was "God I want to rip your clothes off"! I know I will go to hell!   Anyway she goes in 2 days and he said he is staying in Nasaro to surf.  Hmmm!  Will keep you posted on that one.  I Start Spanish lessons next week and Owen is also going to teach me and Hannah surfing.  God help us!