Another day without Sofia

The original plan was for the Sheridans to come into town to do paperwork with Ramón and exchange Sofia in the process. But Jennifer wasn’t feeling very well, so they decided to keep Sofia one more day instead of doing the bureaucratic stuff. So they went to the beach, Playa de Doña Ana, just south of Puntarenas beach.

Alex and I took the bus to Plaza Rohrmoser for a little outing. Alex likes to sit in the very back of the bus. “Why do people write on the seats?” he asked, in reference to the copious amounts of graffiti found in the back of the bus. I tried to explain why people do bad things. Alex wondered what the bus driver would do if he caught someone writing on his bus. He put much thought into all this as we made our way to the little mall.

At Plaza Rohrmoser, we walked around and checked out all the stores, more than we had done with Bill and Callista on Tuesday. Many of the stores just sell what I consider to be junk, low-quality goods that aren’t particularly useful. Of course, junk is relative. Some people would not consider a plastic fountain shaped like the Virgin Mary to be useless and junky. But overall, the stores didn’t have much pull on me or my wallet. We checked out the food court and decided to eat lunch there. As I’ve said before, Alex is having a hard time with the food in Costa Rica, so I thought I’d give him a break. I got Alex 2 pieces of fried chicken, French fries, 2 tortillas, and a drink for 995 colones (about 2 bucks). And the chicken was delicious, not like the stuff we bought on Tuesday night. I got my lunch from a different place. I got soup, grilled chicken breast, rice, vegetables (green beans and carrots), a teeny little salad, 2 slices of fried platanos, lemonade, and dessert (a teeny butter cookie) for 1995 colones (about 4 dollars). Overall, a great deal for lunch and very tasty (for a mall food court).

After lunch, we walked to a toy store with the hopes of finding something inexpensive that Alex could safely play with at home. We finally decided on a little basketball hoop that came with a small inflatable basketball. It even came with a little pump for the ball. Price: 2275 (about $4.50).

One of my goals for this trip was to buy a large container of chocolate ice cream. For some reason, the Palí near the house does not carry chocolate ice cream (Ramón jokingly says it’s because Palí is lower class, and the peasants don’t like chocolate). Cristina was having a hankering for chocolate the other night, so I made a mental note to pick some up the next time we went to a Mas por Menos. The only issue was whether the ice cream would survive the bus trip home. How long we might have to wait for the bus could determine how much the ice cream melts. We picked up some yogurt, some more cream cheese, and the chocolate ice cream, which happened to come with a free Frisbee (nice bonus!). After paying, we immediately headed for the bus stop.

It seemed like the ice cream gods were watching over us, because the cross walk light went green just as we approached the road. We ran across to the bus stop on the other side. So far so good. And not 3 minutes later, our bus came roaring up.

And roared right past us.

A note about busses in Costa Rica: If a bus is packed full, the driver won’t stop, even if you wave for them. About 5 minutes later, another bus for our route came. And passed us. I still had faith that the ice cream would survive. It was close to 10 minutes before another bus came. I had already decided that if a third bus passed us by, I was going to get a taxi. But the third bus stopped, and before long we were at home, ice cream safely tucked away in the freezer.

I put the basketball hoop up on the porch and was pleased with how well it worked. Alex had a great time shooting baskets and though I put the goal up pretty high, he made many of his shots.

Maritza was the only one home, as the others had walked to the Galerón to get stuff for the birthday party the next day. Soon they returned and Isabella played some basketball too.

Dinner was spinach pasta and guacamol (they drop the “e” here in Costa Rica for some reason). The kids ate fairly well. We finished off with some guayaba paste and cream cheese. I got the kids in the shower, watched a little TV, read Alex a chapter of his book, said some prayers, and got both kids down by 7:15. I updated the journal and blog, then sat with Cristina and Ramón and listened to stories about Ramón’s adventures on the farm with wood thieves (he scared them away with his gun) and duendes (literally elves, but described more like trolls).