Drinking games and mechanical bulls in San Jose
Trip Start
Oct 10, 2006
1
4
20
Trip End
Oct 10, 2007
San Jose,
Costa Rica
Friday, November 3, 2006
We arrive in San Isidro and are greeted by the first real trudge on foot with all our gear, it is uphill between bus stations and lasts about 10 minutes. The rain is lashing down with all its force and we arrive a couple of minutes after the bus leaves. We get a ticket for the one in an hour and a half and sit in a street front cafe trying to dry out. Our final bus in Costa Rica is uneventful and delivers us to San Jose quickly and safely.
We jump in taxis to Hostel Pangea, one we had picked out before hand. The taxi driver tells us there is two buildings for Hostel Pangea, the first one he takes us to I jump out and pop to reception. I ask the lady at the desk "is this the building with the swimming pool and mechanical bull?", she laughs and says no. The whole sentence was in Spanish apart from 'mechanical bull', unfortunately thats one noun on my vocab list from school I could never remember. She tells me the swimming pool is at the other building and the mechanical bull but it wont be up and running until Tuesday. I laugh and say "thats ok", after all, mechanical bull action every day would probably get a bit tiresome. I jump back in the cab and ask for the other building, 5 minutes later we are at the reception of our hostel which is modern, clean and spacious. The lady behind this desk lists the shared amenities we have available, swimming pool, restaurant, bar and rooftop terrace, free internet from 12 desks, pool, huge TV and dvd etc.. She then tells us how we would be mad not to stay until tuesday night for the Halloween Party with the mechanical bull (a fact we realised when we saw the flier at a previous hostel). I tell her that we like partying hard but had planned to leave before then. I allow her a few moments to realise that having two english lads who like to party at the hostel would be good for the private bar bill and use that to negotiate a better rate for our room.
After dumping our bags we head up to the terrace via the swimming pool which looks unused and dirty, no surprises! We join a group of about 10 people gathered around a large round table, we introduce ourselves and take the last spare seats. To my left are two girls from Norway, Celina and Natt, to my right is a girl from Australia, Bonny. The usual starter questions for people travelling are gotten out of the way. "where you from..?, where you goin..?, where you been..?, are you really an innocent spy wanted for crimes against the monarchy back in England?(this one has only started appearing since I got bored with answering the truth to all these standard questions). The girls are a good laugh and I am enjoying, for the first time on this trip, chatting to a group of people from around the world who all speak english. Others at the table are guys from Canada, Switzerland, and other girls from Germany and Holland. Jb is on the other side of the Norwegians and is already having his ear torn off by a loud and easily excitable girl from Bermuda. I see him take a few frantic looks around for help, but I chuckle to myself as he realises that everyone else is involved with other conversations.
After a while, the rain forces us inside and we join a table of American lads playing drinking games. Jb tries to lose his noisy shadow and fails. The first game involves rolling dice and the winner chooses who necks a cup of booze that everyone has contributed to from their own cups (whilst typing this, I can almost hear my Mum saying "thats a nice way to share germs!"). The second has each of the four suits being horses in a race. After giving the yanks there turn, I introduce a game called Bunnies, some of you know it. If you dont, you only need to know it is fast moving, makes you look stupid even when you are doing well at it and is perfect for near the end of the night when reactions are slow. Me and jb head for sleep after the games and long day and Australian Bonny agrees to wake me up to go to the consulate early (we have no alarm clock as yet), she has also had her bag with passport snatched in San Jose and as Australia dont have one she needs to visit the Canadian consulate nearby.
The next morning we go to get passport photos from a place nearby. This isnt a boring booth, it is first floor shop in a dodgy neighbourhood with one guy and a digital camera. From looking at his walls, you can see his is handy at editing photos and using other digital images. They are covered with a variety of pictures from the worlds of cinema, sport, animals etc and they all have one thing in common, his head transplanted onto them! There are some good ones of Superman, a WWF wrestler, NFL star, some amusing ones with his head fitting seamlessly on a giraffes body and some exotic spider. However, there are some slightly disturbing ones, including The Little Mermaid (with a moustache!), Mr Burns naked and Marilyn Monroe in her famous pose from the Seven Year Itch. I ponder asking if he can put my head on the tuxedo clad shoulders of James Bond for my passport..
We share a cab and I jump out for the British Consulate first, it is the first time I have visited a formal British presence abroad. The pictures of English canals and country pubs are too early into my trip to produce feelings of homesickness, rather they remind you of how different a place you are currently in, or heading for. After some tedious form filling, I am told it should be ready in two days. I give the picture of the Queen a curt nod and am about to leave when Bonny walks in. It seems Canada have spurned the Australian in need and passed her over to Britain. She fills in the same forms as me and is told she will have a 6 month temporary British Passport in about a 4 days. I take the mickey informing her how for the next 6 months she has a chance to become a better person, learn how to speak properly and make her bow to the Queen before leaving.
We leave for the American Airlines building which is close by to get my replacement RTW tickets. I think this will be a quick task as I have already gone through a lot of hoops and annoying conversations back and forth between my travel agent, AA and Iberia who issued the intitial ticket. When hearing why I am there the girls at the AA desk quickly tell me I have to go to Iberia, I calmly inform them of the previous converstaions I have had. After 5 minutes of debate they seem to recognise my patience is about to end and get the top boss involved, she agress to take my request on board herself and asks me to take a seat. Bonny waits with me to share a cab and as we already have most of the stock questions out of the way we settle into swapping stories from home about friends, family and nights out etc. Bonny is one of a few girls I have met who can hold her own against me with amusing or embarassing stories from childhood, mostly involving alchohol of some kind. Good work Bonny!
That evening, me ang jb enjoy the perfectly placed 8 til 10 happy hour when beers are cheap. We chat to other travellers and share stories of people and cultures, we are mostly listening and questioning as we are still in the country we started off in. The bar closes at 12 and I am persuaded by an American guy called Dave and a couple of people who work at the hostel to go out to a club. I still havent had a proper night out on the trip so I agree to go along. The club we arrive at is a bit crazy, it is on the outskirts of town, is playing mainly heavy rock music (I had quite enough at Nathans Place) and is mainly locals. I am introduced to a local guy who looks like a typical hoodlum, at first I am wary, but after speaking to him for a few minutes I realise he is an intelligent guy, speaks very good english and is more interesting company than the people I came with. We discuss Costa Rica and the pro's and con's of the American influence. In general, he dislikes what has already happened and continues to happen to his countries culture and after hearing his reasons it confirms what I had been thinking after the three visits I have made to Costa Rica. The U.S and massive tourism have brought some benefits to some Costa Rican people, however the negatives have changed some peoples previously simple lives and made them harder. A familiar story the world around..
The next day I leave an uninterested jb watching champions league football to hunt for a suitable Halloween outfit, this time I am determind to have something, no matter how weak! Me and the 2 Norwegian Girls walk into downtown San Jose to look around the shops, they also need costumes. After an hour of unsuccesful trips into small shops selling only bright wigs, witches hats and glow in the dark stickers of spiders we jump in a cab for a shopping mall on the other side of the city. We had been told they have a shop with full costumes, when I hear it is called Erotica I am instantly sceptical. We find Erotica and the shop has many full costumes, all for women and all tight and revealing! I have a quick look around, purely on the off chance there is something I can use that is unisex, nothing at all to do with the packfront pictures of beautiful women modeling the outfits of french maids and naughty nurses etc. I manage to find a pirate hat on a high shelf, attached is a picture of a stunning blonde modelling it, I try it on and it looks good on me too. I pop it back on the high shelf and walk quickly out of the shop past the corresponding skimpy pirate girls outfit hanging up, before one of the girls or a motivated shopkeeper tries to get me into it! As I am leaving I see a curtain peal open briefly to expose the second part of the shop, its full of toys, but not for kids.
I wander round the 3 floor mall looking for inspiration, i am now bored and just want to get away from shops. I find a red pirateish bandanna and some badges of skull & crossbones, this decides my outfit. I reluctantly go back to the Erotica shop to discretely buy the pirate hat for girls and escape without too much notice. I get back to the hostel and am happy ,I havent spent much money at all and I will have a recognisable outfit at least. I fashion myself a crude eyepatch from the large black Erotica paper bag, no doubt designed to hide whatever lies within. Fran, a dutch girl at the hostel, who was what I would call a proper backpacker (always looking for a different route off the well trodden path) allowed me to borrow her machete for the night. Along with a colourful shirt and denim shorts I had a makeshift pirate costume. Jb has opted to go as a serial killer, in truth he is just a pun on words...he has superglued a range of mini breakfast cereals including frosties on a t-shirt. As always, jb's outfit is almost costless and minimal, although this time I am glad to see he sticks to it unlike a party at New Years when he changed from Forest Gump to Maverick from Top Gun half way through the night!
Other costumes at the party include a scuba diver, a zombie granny in an old school nightie (nice imagination Fran), the country of Brazil, naughty nurse, pumpkin, cowboy, indian, toga's and many more. Early in the night a girl with paints draws some black lines around my eyes and scars to perfect the Jack Sparrow look. I dont think the paints were designed fopr skin as I still had a dark shadow around my eyes for days! The aforementioned and much anticipated mechanical bull was a bit of a letdown. I stepped up after watching a guy I knew called Frank impressively stay on the whole ride. After stripping down my costume, including the machete (not an advisable prop when riding a bucking bull) I clamber on top. The safety guy approaches and gives me the lowdown in good English. He tells me that they dont have as much padding as they would have liked and it has left the metal base exposed close to the bull. I nod in acknowledgement and glance down to see the man is right. He tell me to make sure that when I fall off (as if there is no possibility of me riding it out), that I try and fling myself as far away from the bull as possible, as otherwise they couldnt guarantee my safety. Part of me is saying "get off now, pretend to have a cramp", with my record of sporting injuries and accidents its highly likely to end in pain. Jb also knows my history and I notice him starting a book on the sidelines giving good odds on me coming out unscathed, he no doubt has offset his bets taken with a monster one with a rival bookie on me losing a limb!
The bull begins and I hold on for dear life, I decide I will ride it out and show the safety man how to avoid his cunning trap. There is now way I am getting laid up in San Jose with some broken bone. I hold on with my right hand and my left is flailing about wildly to help me balance, my legs have the body of the bull in a death grip. After all the build up, the ride is not as bad as I expected, I manage to stay on until the end and receive a round of applause. The only adverse effect being the John Wayne walk I had adopted, my thighs had taken a severe battering, I wander off to see if the guy in the cowboy outfit fancies a swap...
After some dancing and further drinkin, the night wound down. The next morning I took jb to the British Consulate to pick up my passport and give him a chance to salute the Queen. We spend the rest of the day recovering and preparing for the next stage of our trip, Ecuador.
Pete
P.s For those not already on the mail list, check out JB's travel diary on link below for an alternative view of our exploits
http://www.travelblog.org/Bloggers/johnboyellis/
