Anyways, I’ll stop being so negative (well I’ll try) and explain. Ryan has been at the beach hostel most of the month. I think he has been home in San Jose for like 5 days out of last 4 ½ weeks. Since it is slow season his boss is having him do maintenance repairs on the hostel such as sanding and re-varnishing the beds, benches, tables, etc. Let me tell you, one thing I have learned from my short marriage is that Ryan hates painting and anything like it. So even though he has been at the beach it has not been a bowl of peaches. Plus the reason it is slow season is cause it is also “Rainy” season, hence it rains everyday pretty much. Ryan says the surf is crap and there is debris from the jungle (logs, leaves, sticks, trash) all over the beach, which were brought down from the rains into the ocean and pushed back up on shore from the waves. But all in all I think he can’t complain too much he is at the beach after all while I have been stuck in San Jose city.

However, on another note Ryan is still likes his job overall and is doing a great job. His hard work is paying off / paying our bills and living cost in Costa Rica. His job has been very important to keep us going and to be able to save the money I have been earning teaching; which of course goes into our South America travel funds.

So that brings me to ME. I have been working my butt off teaching the last month. WOW if I only knew how much work this would be. I spend most of my days doing lesson plans (for those of you who have no clue what I mean…I look at the book, decide what grammar or vocabulary I am going to teach, research what it means since most of the time I don’t know, then plan ways to teach it such as readings, fill in the blanks, board games, matching, speaking discussions, etc.). Then after hours of doing lesson plans, I have to correct papers and finally go to class to teach. While I am getting a lot faster at doing lesson plans everyone I have talked to says that the first year of teaching is the worse because you don’t know anything and have to learn all the grammar. Well that’s good news and something to look forward to.

In order to keep my sanity from living in the city alone and being a workaholic I am still going to aerobics class. It is my way to release stress and as most of you know my enjoyment (exercise).

BUT now the good news… this Saturday I have a week vacation break and am going to meet up with Ryan at the beach hostel cause of course he is there. Even though he still has to work this weekend and next week we will be together. And while it will probably be raining maybe we will go for walks on the beach in the rain or just enjoy laying around together in the cabana.

Then next Wednesday we will head back to San Jose and on Friday we are going to a Chocolate Farm to help harvest the coco and learn how to make organic chocolate. A few days of the real tropical and cultural Costa Rican experience.

Hopefully my next blog will be all good news and some good adventures.

written by  ryan & debbrial on June 23, 2010 from San Jose, Costa Rica
from the travel blog: Us Discovering the Latin Americas
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What we did decide was to get out of the city. Just as we were leaving the house it started raining like crazy, fat cats and dogs. It was pouring down so much all the gutters in the streets were overfilling. But that didn’t stop us. We took a bus downtown then hopped in a cab to the train station thinking it would be a nice relaxing way to travel. A few dollars later on the cab’s meter we got to the CLOSED train station and then a few more dollars later we were back downtown getting on another bus. We didn’t really have a specific destination for the day so we had the cab driver drop us off at one of the closes bus stations. We ended up going to Heredia, a mid-size, popular town outside San Jose. We decided when we got there we would get on another bus somewhere else.

The rain had let up by the time we got to Heredia so we walked around town and took some pictures with fake hedge stone figurines. I am chill’n with some monkeys while Ryan is hanging with a crocodile.

Debb chill'n with the monkeys

Mommy & Baby Monkeys

Ryan hanging with the crocodile

Anyways the bus made its loop and ended back in Heredia. At this point we were pretty tried, it was getting late and frankly we didn’t know exactly where to go next so we got on one more bus and headed back to San Jose. For the rest of the evening we decided to stick with something safe; a nice Steak dinner at the Del Mar Restaurant. Dinner was the most typical, traditional part of our celebration. We had a pleasantly long dinner with cocktails, red wine, soup appetizers (to cut the chill from all the rain) and shared a steak entrée. And most importantly again enjoyed each other’s company. After dinner it was one more last bus home to finish the day.

Our celebration was definitely not a typical 1-year Anniversary but what can I say we aren’t exactly living a typical life right now either. We are living and doing what we want though, TOGETHER!!!

Kisses. Our first dance at the wedding.

I also have a young learners class which = KIDS (10-12 years old). I like them. Their fun, charismatic and straight forward. I asked them how they like to learn, what they like to do in class and they said, "PLAY GAMES". Of course!!

When I'm not in class I am still just working, working, working on lesson plans, researching grammar and looking up English games. Sometimes in the middle of reading about past participles and verb tenses I think to myslef...Really I can't believe I went from Event Planner to Teacher. But it's all relative. But I must say I still made time to do some cooking. I made this pizza from scratch, dough and all (Thanks Kiersten for teaching me).

Pizza dough from scratch

Pizzzzza

Pizza up close.. Oh I'm so hungry

Time to Eat !!!

On another note, Ryan finally got his motorcycle. YEAH!! He is super excited about it and the smile on his face when he got it made me so happy. But what doesn't make me happy is that poor Chiquimula is still sitting broken down in front of our house. Soon he will finish fixing her up and sell her. Hopefully to someone who will have as great as adventures as we had with her. Oh the memories. :)

Hot Stuff!!

Ryan's new motorcycle

Anyways, Ryan took off a few days ago for his first adventure on the bike. OH I just thought of something...we need to name the bike. Umm we'll think of something and get back to you. But back to what I was saying. Ryan headed out to Nicaragua for a visa run on Tuesday. When he got to the border he had problems, of course--stupid borders. They were giving him troubles with his paperwork for the motorcycle. So in the end he ended up spending 5 hours at the border but got a stamp out and back into Costa Rica without having to spend 3 days in Nicaragua. Good news. Now the bad news. His boss told him to come to the beach hostel. So Ryan turned around and drove to the south of the Nicoya Peninsula which = a 16 hour day on the bike and 400 miles ride. No quite the joy ride he was planning on. But, really what can he complain about. A motorcycle ride through the country, wind blowing through his hair and a week at the beach.

SO anyways that is where we are at now. Ryan will be back in a day or so. We are both working a lot and trying to save the dollars for South American adventures. Oh I already can't wait and we still have a year.

written by  ryan & debbrial on May 14, 2010 from San Jose, Costa Rica
from the travel blog: Us Discovering the Latin Americas
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So I had a really good vacation (as I like to say) back at home in the US. The two weeks I was back was surprisingly full of fun times with family and friends. Not to say that I expected it to be boring but I was very busy and all over the place. It started with Sushi lunch with my Mom and friend Drew and a girl’s night out Bunco game on Thursday with my Mom and her friends. They play Bunco every month on the second Thursday for the past…I don’t know like 10 years. Whenever I am in town around this time I always ask if they need substitute player. Lots of times they do and this time I got to play too. Usually I am pretty lucky at Bunco and win the “Most Loss” or “50/50”. I know it sounds funny to want to be the biggest loser but in Bunco you win money for losing. But this time all I won was a really BIG buzz from the wine and no money. Still fun!

Bunco!!

So after that my weekend continued. On Friday night I went out with my friends Jen and John. We went out to dinner and caught up on the past 6 months. Saturday my parents planned an Italian Dinner party for their friends since they just got back from Italy. They wanted to share their Italian experience and put on a 5course meal like they frequently had in Italy. So my Mom planned the menu, did the grocery shopping and my sister and I cooked (everything from scratch) and served the food. Course 1: Focaccia bread and Caprese Salad (buffalo mozzarella, tomato, fresh basil and olive oil). Course 2: Margarita Pizza. Course 3: Pasta Caronara with Pancetta. Course 4: Veal Scaloppine and Rosemary Olive Oil baked Zucchini. Course 5: Molten Lava Cake with Fresh Strawberry sauce. Like I said we did it all from scratch including making the pizza dough and hand kneading it. We started at 10am and finished loading the last dish in the dishwasher at 9pm. It was a lot of work and everyone said the food tasted excellent and REALLY appreciated it. But the best part was spending the day with my sister and Mom bonding in the kitchen.

Making the pizza dough

Kiersten seperating the fresh rosemary (from our neighbors yard)

Mom granting the Italian Parmesan

Me in my cooks apron

Kiersten in her chef outfit

Veal Scaloppine

Home made Margarita Pizza

The next day, Sunday, was another good day. I went to the Lakers first Play-Off game for the season with my Dad and uncle. I am not usually into basketball but as everyone knows it’s always better to see a sport live. And surprisingly I actually watched the game more than I people watched. Probably cause it was a good game and the Lakers were winning the whole time.

Laker's Play-Off game. GO LAKERS!

Me and Dad at the Laker's Play-Off game

Monday and Tuesday I recovered from the weekend. Wednesday I took a day trip to San Diego (down and back) to take care of some business. While I was there I met up with Chris, my brother-n-law, and we went out to Vietnamese Pho Soup for dinner. Another meal I totally miss in Central America. If you have read my previous blogs you know I tried to make Vietnamese vermicelli noodle bowl but definitely don’t know if I could swing the pho soup so it was a must to have it while I was in San Diego. Thursday night my brother and his girlfriend came over to dinner at my parent’s house. Another good family bonding time!

By this time even though I was having lots of fun I was also really starting to miss Ryan. We talked ever day on Skype and wrote sappy love notes to each other on Facebook. While I was having all this fun Ryan said he was just working, working, working and being mopey cause I was gone. Oh I felt bad BUT it was Friday and the weekend partying was starting all over again.

Friday night I went out to dinner with my parents and my friends Meghan and Matt. We went to Black Angus and I shared Prime Rib with my Mom. Once again another thing I miss a good piece of beef. After dinner Meghan, Matt and I met up with some of their other friends and YES of course LOTS of drinks. Saturday I went to a family party with my extended family: grandma, grandpa, aunts, uncles, cousins, friends, etc. For this party I planned the menu, Central American food. Yes not as exciting as an Italian dinner but still good. It was nice to visit with all my family and fill them in on the stories I don’t talk about on blogabond. Sunday I layout at the pool with Jen and John, working on their first tans for the year and trying to keep my color before rainy season starts in Costa Rica.

So lets see…to sum up my last few days in California. Monday day I drove down to Los Angeles paid $52 to Secretary of State and $80 to Consulate of Costa Rica to certify documents for my work visa for Costa Rica. Monday night I went to an Angels baseball game with Meghan, Matt and some of their friends. A friend of a friend of theirs knows some big wig who works at the stadium so we got a box behind home plate with tons of free food (hot dogs, hamburger sliders, pizza and of course peanuts and Cracker Jacks) and beer.

Our view from the box at Angel's stadium

Me, Meghan, Matt and firends at the Angel's Baseball game

Finally two weeks later, Wednesday morning 11am I got on a plane back to Costa Rica and the love of my life my husband. Yet it was a long day with two connections in Mexico (Guadalajara and Mexico City) and both planes were late. Yep back to the Latin slow life. I landed in CR at 1am and was greeted with a HUGE hug and kiss xoxoxo by Ryan. The first thing he said was “I hope you had fun but don’t ever leave me again. Haha”.

written by  ryan & debbrial on April 28, 2010 from Santa Clarita, United States
from the travel blog: Us Discovering the Latin Americas
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I on the other hand am still moseying around the house waiting for my job at the British Institute to start in May. But in the meantime I am trying to keep myself busy. I am still going to the aerobics class with my roommate, whom has proven to be a motivated workout partner which from my experience is hard to find. Then I practice learning Spanish with Rosetta Stone and/or watch Spanish TV. I have also become a regular chef. Almost every day I cook up something new and creative. Recently I have made a Costa Rican beet salad, Argentinean chimichurri sauce, Vietnamese vermicelli noodle bowl and an Italian zesty potato salad. All with my own twist of course! I have even started writing my recipes down and are thinking of making a cookbook and/or save them for my café one day (Yeah lots of time on my hands).

Costa Rican beet salad

Argentinean chimichurri sauce

Vietnamese vermicelli noodle bowl

But even more exciting, as a result of my currently boundless free time, my parents decided to buy me a plane ticket home to visit. And YES I mean visit!!! I have a round-trip ticket there to California and back to Costa Rica. At first I was very hesitant about the trip because I personally thought it would be cheating for me to go home when Ryan and I said we would be gone for 3-5 years. Like I am on the Amazing Race or Survivor or something. Haha. But after some reassurance from Ryan and reevaluating on my own behalf I decided I guess a small trip home and getting to hangout wit h my family would be better than sitting around here for the next two weeks till I start my job. SO I am flying back home next Wednesday, April 14th for two weeks. The sad part is that Ryan can’t come with. He has to stay here and continue working; though I don’t think he is very disappointed. Like I have said before he is loving “learning the ropes” and always comes home and tells me all about his day.

So for some of you who read my blog, See you soon!

written by  ryan & debbrial on April 8, 2010 from San Jose, Costa Rica
from the travel blog: Us Discovering the Latin Americas
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Semana Santa: I thought it was going to be all fun and games with lots of street parades, live religious/art performances and bbq’s like I read. But no San Jose, Costa Rica is a ghost town. Starting today all the stores are closed including the grocery stores, the buses stopped running and ALCOHOL is Illegal. San Jose is on lock down from Good Friday till Easter Sunday. Luckily we had some clues to the prohibition of alcohol so I ran out and bought a 12 pack of beer, cheap box wine and a bottle of whiskey. This should last the weekend.

Beer cooler boxed up and locked up for Semana Santa

Beer covered with cardboard boxes

Me trying to break into the beer cooler during Semana Santa

All kidding aside I really did think there would be a lot going on in San Jose for the Semana Santa. I don’t know kinda like Granada, Nicaragua for Christmas and New Years. Lots of street processions, neighborhood block parties and Oh yeah I can’t forget the fireworks!! I am sort of disappointed. I guess the Costa Rican’s don’t know how to party like the Nicas (if any Costa Rican heard me say that I would be in big trouble. There’s a rivalry between the two countries).

Anyways leading up to this week there was the huge and impressive two-week 12th annual International Art Festival in San Jose at Sabana Park. The festival featured more than 5,000 artists from 20 countries taking part in over 350 shows and activities. The program included cultural and artistic events—parades, music, dance, theater, opera, magic, clowns, puppet shows, and film in either Sabana Park or in/around downtown San Jose.

Since we didn’t really know about it until last minute we could not get tickets to any of the live theater performances, which I would have really liked, but we did go to the festival in Sabana Park both last Sunday and the one before.

We walked through the artesian booths which were set up and tented like a normal convention and sorted into sections such as traditional

Debb at the Art Festival in Sabana Park

Painting we bought at CR International Art Festival

Ryan petting the sad baby colt at the Art Festival

Clown on stilts at the Art Festival in Sabana Park

Now if I can just find those festivals, parties and barbecues for Semana Santa before it’s over.

written by  ryan & debbrial on April 1, 2010 from San Jose, Costa Rica
from the travel blog: Us Discovering the Latin Americas
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Ryan is loving it though. He likes not being stuck behind the desk all day long and the extra responsibilities. Now he is doing things like paying bills, managing the employees’ cash boxes and inventory, doing handy-man maintenance, and all the other odds and ends it takes to run a hostel. He says it’s a great experience for learning how to run his own business one day.

On the down side once he gets off work he hasn’t had much of a break because we are trying to sell Chiquimula and she needs lots of love before that day comes. He put her in the shop to get the rattling and shaking taken care of but now it seems there is an electrical problem. He says he can fix it himself it’s just trying to get the American part down here. I wish I could help but like I know anything about working on cars. Here's a picture of her current state.

Well what have I been up to? Ummm….working on sorting out documents needed for my work visa, which has NOT been easy since all the documents need to be certified copies from California including my finger prints for police record. Can’t I just tell them I’m a good girl and have never been arrested? No don’t think that will fly. Let’s see what else. I’ve been practicing my Spanish and started an aerobics class with one of my roommates. The aerobics class is at a park up the street from my house. It’s funny cause it’s a lot of older stay-at-home ladies and of course the class is all in Spanish. So most of the time I am one or two beats behind cause I have to watch everyone else to figure out what we are doing. Not that am completely coordinated when it comes to aerobic and dance moves anyways. But it’s a good workout and another way to practice my Spanish.

That’s pretty much it for now. We’ll check back soon.

written by  ryan & debbrial on March 26, 2010 from San Jose, Costa Rica
from the travel blog: Us Discovering the Latin Americas
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I can’t remember what the company was called but it was out toward Tres Rios. The tour started with an awesome off road drive in their old Suburban truck. The drive was crazy but handled it. Then we had a tiring 25 minute hike up the hill to the start of the zip lines.

Me, Brandon and Steve zip lining

Me zip lining with Tres Rios behind me

After the tour we came back to San Jose and I took the guys on a walking tour around San Jose. We went to the artisan row were the guys bought souvenirs for the family. Next I wanted to take them to the National Museum, which has a wonderful ornate neo-classical design on the inside, but it was late in the afternoon and the museum was closed for tours.

Steve and me Park Espana in downtown San Jose

Brandon in the bamboo tree in Park Espana in downtown San Jose

Architecture in San Jose

Park Morazan and downtown San Jose

Anyways after all our sightseeing and tours we were all exhausted. We went for a delicious dinner at a Peruvian restaurant called Inka then meet up with Ryan for farewell drinks when he got off work. All in all I think Steve and Brandon got a good taste of “touristy” Costa Rica. And we all agreed we really really enjoyed the time spent together. It kinda made me miss home, family and friends BUT not enough to come home yet. Haha.

written by  ryan & debbrial on March 17, 2010 from San Jose, Costa Rica
from the travel blog: Us Discovering the Latin Americas
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On Tuesday morning Steve, Brandon, Ryan and I drove west from San Jose and up into the mountains to a small town called Santiago de Puriscal. The drive was beautiful. Lush green trees, rolling grass covered hills and mountains and one small traditional Costa Rican pueblo after another. Even though Chiquimula was wearing down from the steep incline we finally arrived at Vegas Santiago Cigar Factory

Vegas Santiago Cigar Factory

Costa Rican and Honduras tobabbo leaves

Sorting the tobacco leaves by type, color and size

De-vining the tobacco leaves

Forming, cutting and pressing the cigars

Wrapping the cigars

As part of the tour they let us try to roll our own cigars. I tried the forming, cutting and pressing stage but my cigar ended up looking like a giant messy medieval torch. Brandon on the other hand did the final stage of hand wrapping the cigar which turned out very well I might add.

Debbrial selecting, forming and rolling a cigar from scratch

My lose rolled tourch cigar

Brandon doing the final wrapping of the cigar

Brandon's finely hand rolled cigar

After our debut as cigar rollers the tour guide led us into the cigar storage room. Woohoo! Boy does it smell strong in there. There were thousands of cigars big to small, thin to fat, strong to mild. It was so impressive and we were in awe but after about 6 minutes the sinking in our eyes and nostrils was about unbearable.

Steve with a handful of Cuban cigars

Oh our eyes and noses are stinging. Just take the picture

Ryan sortying and smoking the cigars

We left the store room for the last part of the tour: hand selected packaging. After the tour we sat down for a good cup of Costa Rican coffee and a Puff, Puff on our souvenir cigars.

Vegas Santiago Costa Rican Cigars in the storage room

Vegas Santiago Costa Rican Cigars in the storage room

Santa Teresa Sunset

Santa Teresa Sunset

Santa Teresa Sunset

Last time, over a month ago, when we were here I tried surfing but wasn’t very successful. I got tumbled by the waves since the sets in Santa Teresa are so close between. Plus I hate the salty water. But this time I decided to try again. Crazy me. So Friday morning we got up and hit the beach for some early morning surf when the wind is not so bad and the waves are a little calmer. Ryan found a long board for me to surf which as most everyone knows is easier and better for beginners. Anyways to make a long story short I caught like 6 or 7 waves (kinda white wash but hey), learned to turtle dive and practiced sitting on the board and turning it around. Overall a successful lesson. After I was done Ryan took the long board out and had some really fun.

Santa Teresa Cabana

Santa Teresa Cabana

Chill'n in the breeze in the Santa Teresa Cabana

Relaxing and Reading in the Santa Teresa Cabana

Since it was so hot and humid at the beach we spent a lot of time in the cabana relaxing in the cool breeze up on the hill. Saturday day we just chilled and read our books. Saturday night though we went out to an awesome house party with Lila, the Tranquillo Backpackers receptionist in Santa Teresa, and her friend. The party was at this huge beautiful house on the beach decorated in a Crate and Barrel style. They had an open bar and DJ. After the house party we went to D&N the local night club that everyone goes to. A couple hours there then we went back to the hostel.

Sleeping In on Sunday