so it´s week 2 and i have arrived in santa elena, costa rica´s high western mountains where i will be staying for 2 weeks. the region i am in contains a lot of costs rica´s cloud forest, which is evergreen montane moist forest characterized by a high incidence of low-level cloud cover, usually at the canopy level (thanks wikipedia!) this means it comes down in buckets in the rainy season and most of the time feels like you are walking through a cloud.
internet´s more difficult here, so you probably won´t hear from me as often plus it costs more. i have spent one night with my new host stay, and even though it´s very different from the middle-class family i lived with in san joaquin de flores, it is comfortable and they are very kind. olivier, the father, picked me up from the bus station in his taxi, a beat up 4X4; ana, my mama-tica works in a local clothing store. i´ve met their youngest, jose andre, who attends a bi-lingual school and so can chatter away in english and spanish, but not their daughter, but i know what she looks like from a 2X1´ framed glamshot that hangs squarely above the TV.
today i visited the cheese factory in monteverde, a nearby town founded by a group of alabaman quaker settlers who left the US to escape the draft in the 50´s. in the early days they made 55,000 kg of cheese per year and now make about that in one day. in addition to all the cheeses -- gouda, swiss, cheddar, and montetico (a local brand) -- they make ice cream, caramel and sour cream from the whey biproducts. i really enjoyed it, but then again i´ve become more interested in agri-business since my work on the mill project in Tbilisi.classes are better this week - just me and another 24 year old chica from nj, so we get through a lot of material.
No comments:
Post a Comment