A Beautiful Balance

Adventure, mystery, and piracy are all very alive in Costa Rica.  Trucks of money get high jacked, the drivers taken hostage and the prirates make away with the money into the jungle.  Everytime I walk into the jungle(my new back yard) I am met by sounds and sites that I have never before wittnessed.  Tucans sing their melodies and poison dart frogs call for mates, I have yet to see a snake but I know they are watching me as I pass.

We have spent the last few days on a steep slippery slope picking beans.  With the central American sun at your back, blaring at least 90 degrees by 9AM, picking beans is no easy task.  There was a bit of a miss communication between our leaders and the job was not done as efficiently as posible and we had to go back over our work!

The volunteer gang here on the farm is really awesome, I have yet to connect with the interns.  I read aloud the first chapter of The Four Agreements to Handassa, Eva, Handassa, and Trista, they loved it.  If you have not read this book, check it out it will change your world. Some how I have managed to get a reputation for having a calming voice.  I am not sure when this came about but its not too bad of a reputation.  The enthusiasm for yoga on the farm is great!  I lead a short sun salutation as the sun set one night. What started with two people origionally turned into five by the end of the session. There where five people cramed onto the yoga deck getting there flow on, the dec is about 10×10, HA.  It feels great to be teaching and to have people enjoying.

Recently as i have been meditating I have had many colofull patterns come dance in my minds view.  The first night I arrived I meditated under the full moon, of course I arrived on a full moon…  Through my meditations I have felt more of a connection to the land and the earth than ever before.  I feel apart of the cycle, the circle, the love.  I sat in the cow pasture to contempalte this the other night.  I was trying my best to practice the second yoga Sutra, Yogash Chitta Vritti Nhirodaha.  I was peeling away the layers of the emotion I was feeling, I was searching for why I felt so much more connected here in Costa Rica than in Hawaii or California.  I came to the conclusión that the balance between nature and human is much more equal.  Any day I could encounter a poison dart frog or one of the top five deadliest snakes, they could easily take my life, just as easily as a buss could run me of the road into the jungle.  In Hawaii and California humans are boss.  In these áreas I am not in a constant Yin Yang with nature, but here I am.  Here humans are on an equal playing field with nature.  It is quite beautiful balance.

I hit my first emotional Wall at the farm.  I was woken up in the middle of a siesta to go into the small town of Mastatal, this set me off a bit unbalanced and groggly.  I accompanied a few volunteers into town for ice cream and a Coca.  Side note the Coca Cola is sooooooooooo much better here because they use real sugar and the soda doesn’t make my teeth feel like they are going to fall out.  Well, sodas turned into beers and beers turned into the local bar owner Giovani pouring shots of lacally made casetas, or fermented sugar cane. I entertained the girls I was with by drinking a beer and trying a shot of the local brew but no more.  The music got dancy and it was no accident.  To set the stage a bit, it was three in the afternoon and we where the only women in the bar with three local guys and Giovani, this was no night club.  Not wanting to re enforce any stereotypes or be the afternoon entertainment I paid my bill and left.  I got super in my head on the way back to Villas.  Why am I here in Mastatal, permaculture, travel?  How am I being of any assistance? Am I just another gringo bringing business and getting see through smiles or are my efforts on the farm making a difference.  As the Universe wills I ran into the one volunteer who understood where I was coming from.  As I hottly walked to the yoga deck I found her drinking a beer and making cups out of recycled glass beer and wine bottles.  Obviously seeing my distress she talked to me about how she had felt the same way after arriving, though she had talked to Javier, our fearless farm leader about her feelings.  His response was that loves having the volunteers. He and his wife have made the decisión to run a permaculture farm, to make their land their life, and to share their knowledge with others.  They like the energy that volunteers bring and miss everyone in the wet season, their slow season.  I need to make a better effort to get to know them.

I have been two at four different waterfalls already and havent even made a dent in the number that are around the farm.  Everything is Green and singing here.  One of my favorite memories in Costa Rica thus far has been walking up river after picking beans the first day just to float like a wáter snake back down the whole way.  I was a giant leaf on the wáter, however when it came to sliding down the foot to two foot falls I was not as graceful as a leaf.  I got pretty beat up doing this but it was so worth it.  I was living out my very own natural wáter world or Super fun Splash land, or splash mountain, except this was way better!

Lo siento for all the spelling and funky gramatical errors, I am typing on an internet café computer in Puriscal and it doesnt want to let me enter a few English words… Also pictures coming soon once I get wifi ( pronounced We Fee here hahaha)