blakspring

I honestly didn’t realize that the whole reality show thing was going to be such a curiosity.  And I promise that I’ll write a full post with all the details, but not today.  Because today I am going to Costa Rica.  My flight leaves in a few hours and I won’t be back in NYC for ten days.  Costa Rica is a place that I’ve wanted to go to for quite some a while, and Ultra and I decided that now was the time.  We had already been thinking about it last year and even looking into some guided tours, but ever since my solo trekking in Indonesia I’ve gotten back to my wingin’ it, slummin’ it roots.  I talked Ultra into doing it on our own because, even though we won’t see as much as we would with a group, going at our own pace, chilling, and not having to rush through everything will just be much more enjoyable.

I booked a hostel in San Jose for the first night since we will be arriving there about 10 p.m. but after that we have a loose itinerary.  We want to head out to La Fortuna to the Arenal Volcano, next go to the Santa Elena-Monteverde area where the Cloud Forest is, and finally make our way to the West Coast and just relax on the beaches.  Because we have been booked anything in advance we’ll be able to play it by ear and spend an extra night somewhere that we particularly like, or shorten our stay somewhere else.  Our one big splurge was booking a flight from Tamarindo on the West Coast back to San Jose the day before we fly home.  Some things we want to do are ziplining through the trees, doing a suspension bridge tour, seeing all the gorgeous and colorful animals in the rain forest, warming up in the hot springs, and just relaxing by the water.

I’m hoping that after a few days my very very rudimentary Spanish will kick in, kind of like it did in Peru.  For some reason, I mainly remember food vocabulary and can only speak a bit in very simple terms like “me hungry now”.  Ultra’s Spanish is a bit better, though I’m sure we will be speaking English 99% of the time anyway.

GeekHiker had asked me a while back about difficulties with language while traveling, and I’m finally going to answer that question.  I can honestly say that I’ve really never had any problems because English is so common in all corners of the world.  Whether in Japan, Morocco, or Sweden, chances are good that a random stranger on the street will know at least some English and be able to help you.  Even if the first or second person you ask doesn’t speak English, most likely the third person you ask will.  And generally, people are very nice and actually go out of their way to help you.  I’ve had people walk me to my destination even though it was completely out of their way.

The other thing about language and traveling is that where there is money to be made the local people of the country will learn English and probably other languages, enough to get by.  If you need to buy a souvenir or food or find a hostel for the night you’ll have no problem being understood.  Even in smaller towns, anyone that relies on tourist money to make a living knows that the more foreign languages they can speak the more they’ll have the upper hand over their competition.

And when all else fails, and there are no English speakers to be found, do not dismiss the power of miming.  You don’t need to find an English speaker when you have a map and someone can point you in the right direction.  I suspect that there are some universally understood gestures like turning an imaginary steering wheel for transportation or moving your hand to your mouth to show that you’re hungry.  It’s often the silly, half-mimed, half-broken-English conversations that will be the most fun and will give you the most satisfaction when you and this total stranger from another part of the world realize that you can understand each other.

PS - Though I always have ambitious intentions of posting regularly while away, the reality is that it will probably happen rarely, if at all.  And I’ll be catching up on everyone’s lives when I get back.  Cheers.

This entry was posted on Friday, February 12th, 2010 at 11:34 am and is filed under travel. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.