This is a clip of a book reading from Perfect Girls, Starving Daughters.  The book was published in April 2007, and now, according to her personal website, is available in paperback from Berkeley, Penguin.

The author, Courtney Martin, is an editor over at Feministing.com, a feminist blog that I read probably more than once every day.  She has done some phenomenal work, and I totally envy her life.  I wanted to post the book because I think she put words to something that I’ve been trying to communicate for the past two years, without success.  I have subconsciously tried to break away from this idea in the recent past, but without words, I was moving blindly.  I cannot explain how much I felt directly spoken to when I first saw this clip.  I hope you enjoy it as much as I did.

I will be home from November 16 through December 7.  Hopefully one of these days I’ll get back on the blogging sled with more fun updates for you.  For now, I’m tutoring English, trying to organize classes at businesses in downtown San José, and looking for a new apartment (one that hopefully has internet).  Most likely the chaos won’t dissipate until after the trip home, so I’m hoping to have the blog back in full swing by the end of the year.

Keep in touch.  I hope all is well out there in cyberspace.

I’m just writing a quick note to apologize for falling off the blogging sled.  I’m still alive and kicking.  After two desperate weeks of being completely broke, I finally have some English classes.  I have about 10 students scheduled, and hopefully more on the way (I’m still working on hanging up more fliers).  So I’m making a living!!  I basically have no idea what I’m doing when it comes to teaching English, so that’s what I have been up to.  I’m aiming to put up my fourth month newsletter on Saturday, so keep an eye out for it.

Sorry for the lag.

Since I was robbed, my typical paranoia has been raised to a level of near insanity.  In the days immediately following the robbery, I found that I would shake (knees, hands, the whole bit) anytime I had to walk anywhere by myself—even in broad daylight at 10 a.m.  Often I would come home and have to go through the entire house immediately to reassure myself that no one was hiding in one of the upstairs closets or in the act of sneaking out one of the—mind you, barred—windows.

I’m getting better, but walking around at night is still difficult, and I still get nervous about funny noises.  However, two recent incidents have officially succeeded in making me look foolish with my fears.  The first was that our kitchen sink piping basically exploded.  Around 11 p.m. one night, I woke up (yes, I fall asleep insanely early these days), and heard a really strange noise.  At first, I was really worried that it was the stove (which also happened once, fortunately to no consequence).  I kept asking Sebastian if he had left something on, since he often eats food really late at night.  When I went downstairs, I next thought that the shower was running.  No, there was a shower like stream of water coming out of the cabinet under the kitchen sink, and the water was covering the kitchen floor and flooding the neighboring bathroom.  We shut off the water source, and haven’t used the kitchen sink since.

The second incident was more recent, and apparently recurrent.  The other day, Sebastian and I were preparing breakfast when we noticed that one of the bananas that the neighbor had given us from the farm had fallen on the floor.  We were cleaning up, so it was noticed in passing, but after a second we paused.  “Wait a second, that didn’t just fall,” we said.  So we looked again, and sure enough it was gnawed off on one end and covered with paw prints.  Sebastian said then that he had seen a squirrel come in the house when I wasn’t around, an observation repeated by our friend Kris.  I was afraid that one day the squirrel would forget how to get out of the house, and in her panic, go crazy and break the dishes that we incessantly leave out.  So, as a precaution, I put the bananas in a tied plastic bag, in a basket.  I hung the basket outside on the clothesline, and tucked them in with a towel.  Well this was stupid, to say the least.  Though the basket went undisturbed for a full day, it was only a matter of time.  Today, I was home alone, and I heard rustling like someone going through our recycling bags that we keep in the back of the house.  So I open the back door, and sure enough there is the horrible squirrel.  And she had eaten not one, but ALL of the bananas.

So now I’m only slightly less afraid when I’m home alone.  Now when I hear strange noises, I try to attribute them to the rodents, birds, or insects that are more than likely roaming the house.

Wednesday two weeks ago I was robbed on my way home from the internet café.  It was the Wednesday before payday (payday is every-other Friday), so the streets were dead, and businesses were closing a little bit earlier than usual.  I was walking alone—completely alone, there was no one walking in front of me or behind me as far as I could tell.  When I crossed one of the t-intersection streets on the way home, a guy was walking towards the corner, towards me.  He started hissing right away, which is a pretty common way to get people’s attention in the street or to call at women passing by.  He was hissing like he was trying to get someone’s attention, but in the fashion of women here, I just walked a little faster and didn’t look back.  It made me nervous, but I was already preoccupied and fairly upset about some plans that Sebastian and I were trying, unsuccessfully, to make.  I was almost home when I approached the last T-intersection that is right near our house.  A maroon car pulled up alongside me, stopping just slightly in front of me and the guy on the passenger side got out.  As soon as the car slowed down I more or less knew what was happening, so I was already frozen, clutching my bag, and backing up when the guy looked straight at me.  Once he looked at me, I knew what was before paranoia was now reality, so I immediately started crying hysterically and saying “No, no, no,” in the most convincing way I knew how.

Here are some of the best pictures from the beach trip to Guancaste.

This is Playa Hermosa, probably one of the most touristy beaches that we visited, but very very nice.

The sky in the afternoon was always incredible.  This is also taken from Playa Hermosa.

In one of our final trips to the beaches, we visited Playa Panama, where the tide was out, leaving long stretches of open beach.

Taking advantage of the low tide we walked around this corner to find…

what was basically our own private beach.

The trip was awesome and I have some more sunset pictures to share with you once I get a new jump drive.   A visit to Playa Panama and Playa Hermosa is one best made in the coming year.  The buildup that is happening as a result of CAFTA (the Central American Free Trade Agreement with the US) is going to transform the area into a tourist city.  While that kind of development is not without benefits, it causes a change that can never be undone.  It’s pretty cool to be able to experience a place when you know that it will be completely different in a few years.

I started kickboxing classes about three weeks ago.  The place where I take classes is called Evolution Fighting Center, and they have a website (all in Spanish), http://www.evolutionfightingcenter.com/.  I absolutely cannot say enough good things about these classes.  Each class is an hour and a half, and the classes vary in size (usually anywhere between four and nine people will show up to classes in the mornings).

The center is the first Kickboxing school in Costa Rica (according to their website).  It’s owned by a 25-year-old guy named Danny, who you can see fight on YouTube.com if you search for “danny muay thai costa rica“.  Danny is surprisingly calm—he clearly has plenty of time to work out any excess of testostorone—very nice and a really good coach.  It’s possible that I’m just used to college and high school psychotic coaches.  He pushes us, but the practices are never so much that you feel like you can’t come again the next day.  There is another coach, though I don’t yet know his name.  He’s also very good and clearly experienced, so the change in coaches is not one that causes you to lose anything.  The coaches change classes too, so if you go to one class regularly you will have both coaches on different days.

The building smells like feet, since so many people come and go each day, and there are classes seven days a week (only one class on both Saturday and Sunday though).  The smell really just means that you don’t have to feel self-conscious if you happened to not have washed your clothes in a week or two.  As the queen of personal hygiene, I, of course, know nothing about this.  The classes are men and women, mostly all somewhere in their twenties as far as I can tell.  The students range from just beginning to very advanced, and the teachers are really good at working with you on your level regardless of the diversity in class members’ experience.

The routine usually goes something like this: we run approximately a mile, a loop around UCR; then we come back to the building and take off our shoes and socks and stretch, then we might do individual work or in pairs if the class is small, and if the class is large, we’ll do stations.  The stations are usually half working on technique at the punching bags.  The rest of the stations will be simple training exercises, like sit-ups on an exercise ball or jumping on a tire.  At the end, we’ll do sit-ups, usually 50 per person, although sometimes more.  When it’s over, I’m always tired, sweaty, and just-the-right-amount-of sore, and I love it.

Exercise is like a drug for me, so at the end of my class I’m always laughing at things that probably shouldn’t be laughed at.  Everyone is always reasonably understanding though.  The gym has proved a great place to meet people, and as the only foreigner (that I know of) I find that people are generally really nice and interested to talk.  The classes give me a chance to feel just slightly more empowered.  This has been an incredible feeling since my daily routine of going around as a foreigner in such a varied city can sometimes be nerve racking.  Also as a result of the classes I’m feeling myself active again, which feeds all other kinds of well-being habits like eating and sleeping, so I’m feeling really good.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY JILL AND KAIA!!!♥

Today is my sister’s birthday, so I just wanted to make a public announcement. Also, Kaia’s birthday was the 26th, so they are more or less celebrating together.

Hugs and kisses to you both. I miss you and love you!

Ok, so I have to apologize for once again falling off the blogging sled. However, these past two weeks have been quite insane. As a result, I have a lot of catch-up blogging to do!

First of all, the beach trip was great. I have a post partially finished entry with lots of pictures from the trip, but the day I was working on it, the internet café closed early without leaving me time to finish. On that same day, I was robbed coming home from the café (and they took my jump drive with the rest of the entry info in it, so I’ll finish that next week sometime). I would like to dedicate a full entry to talking about the robbery and the context that surrounds theft here, so I will just say for now that I was not at all harmed, just really scared. I didn’t lose anything much, but I was carrying my dairy, and it is unlikely to turn up. It will probably take me a little while to get over that one.

The second big thing that has been wreaking havoc here is that my tourist visa, of 90 days, ran out yesterday. In order to renew it, I have to be out of Costa Rica for 72 hours. So, I am writing from Rivas, Nicaragua, where Sebastian and I are staying for a few days. We are staying with a family who are indirectly connected to Sebastian’s mom (the connection is too hard to explain). They are really nice, and they have a beautiful home, so we are doing really well. We are going to visit Ometepe Island, located in Lake Nicaragua, tomorrow. I will be going back to San José on Tuesday morning.

In other exciting news, I absolutely LOVE the kickboxing class that I’m taking. It’s really challenging and satisfying. I also feel like it’s helping my Spanish, and seriously reinforcing my confidence about speaking. That said, I’ve found myself able to communicate much more extensively these days and feeling able to function more independently as a result. Also, I have gotten a few responses to the fliers that I hung up advertising myself as an English tutor. I received a phone call last week that appears to be my first serious client. I’m excited to work the details out with him when I get back next week.

That’s what has been happening in a nutshell… I’ll try to do more in-depth writing when I get back. Keep in touch and keep reading!

I took this picture at the beach. I spent a week in Guanacaste and this day I believe we were spending the day at Playa Hermosa. This is the smallest crab I have ever seen, and I thought it was worth sharing!