PRIVATE TAXI

Waking up at 3 in the morning on January 4^th, 2016 wasn’t nearly as hard as it usually would be. On this particular morning, Brett and I were lacing up our hiking boots that wouldn’t fit in our luggage and heading to the Pittsburgh airport. Mom and Dad waited while they rerouted our flight from D.C. to Houston, which meant that we were going to arrive to Costa Rica even earlier than our original flight! They checked our bags (luckily, Brett’s was exactly 50.0 lbs) and we were off to security. We got in line and waved good-bye to los padres and told them we’d message them on Facebook when we made it safe and sound. The flight went really smoothly and our layover in Houston wasn’t any more than fifteen minutes. Because of our new flight schedule, Brett and I weren’t going to be able to sit by each other; I’ll admit, we were pouty about it. We sat in our assigned seats as people piled onto the plane behind us, but, as it turns out, Brett was given permission to take the open seat next to me so we were able to keep each other company after all. I slept for most of the flight, but that’s beside the point.  Before we landed, Brett woke me up and we were glued to the window watching the miles and miles of trees pass under us. Everything looked so green. As we got closer to landing, we started to see small towns made of one story houses, and eventually, Costa Rica’s capitol, San Jose.

                                  

Going through customs was pretty easy. We had our ticket to Panama out and ready to prove we would be “leaving” within their 90 day requirement for a tourist visa. At first, the lady wasn’t sure if our bus tickets were acceptable, but after a minute of holding our breath, they let us pass.

While we were still in the airport, we wanted to take out some money for the taxi/hostel. We had to figure out how much money to take out of the ATM since $1 ROUGHLY converts to ₡530 (colones is the Costa Rican currency). It fluctuates from day to day so there isn’t an exact conversion. I’ll have a whole post on the currency here soon.

After the ATM dispensed the multicolored money, it was time to step out of the airport into what would be our new home for the next six months. As soon as we rounded the corner into the open air, countless people were crowded around us. Some people were holding signs, looking for specific people, but the majority were cab drivers trying their hardest to get us to hop in the back of their car. Obviously, we did need a taxi to get to our hostel, but we had heard to only trust the red taxis with a yellow triangle on the side. It’s not that uncommon for some taxi drivers to take the long way around when they know their passengers aren’t familiar with the area; a longer taxi ride = more colones. Keeping all of this in mind, one guy came right up to Brett and started talking to him in English (we are clearly gringos here). When Brett asked if we could see his taxi before agreeing to go with him, the guy replied by saying, “it’s over here. It’s a private taxi”. Okay, no thanks. We’ll find another one.

I wasn’t super surprised with everyone hollering about taking their taxi because it was similar in Ecuador. Brett, on the other hand, was not a fan in the slightest. He asked a policeman which taxi he would recommend and the officer pointed behind him to another man. We followed him to his red taxi with the yellow triangle and hopped in, hoping that he really did know where Gaudy’s Backpackers hostel was located and trusting that he’d take us right to it.  Five minutes into the taxi ride, I looked over at Brett and I could tell he wasn’t exactly thrilled with our first couple minutes in Costa Rica.

We arrived to Gaudy’s backpackers just as we had hoped. We checked in at the desk and decided we would only pay for a night at a time since we had absolutely no clue what the next day would bring. We stopped at the grocery store just two blocks away and literally had jelly bread and bananas for our first meal there. Since we technically had no income, yet, we really had to watch what we were spending.

           

     

There were a few gecko lizards that kept us company on the walls above us and this older lady named Betsy came over and introduced herself to us, explaining that she was also staying at Gaudy’s for a few days. She is from Scranton, PA, and was down here to get some dental work done. I guess it is cheaper for her to fly down here than to get it done in the U.S. so she decided that she would just travel around a bit while she was here.

We finished the jelly jar and started to get ready for bed. Thankfully, the hostel had pretty good internet and we were able to check our emails. I had gotten a reply from a school saying that I had an interview the next morning at 9am and Brett had one for the day after! That is what is so exciting about this trip - we came down here with nothing more than a certificate and our bags, praying that we would find a job and a place to live. These email replies gave us the you’re-making-progress moment that we needed. Next task: interviews.