Category Archives: Costa Rica

I spent three weeks being a tourist and a further four months volunteering in a women’s rights organisation in the small town of San Ramón. Hopefully some day I’ll even out the balance, but for now there’s a lot more content about my backpacking days!

Sledding a Volcano

Did you guys know that I’ve also been blogging for the Raxa Collective? Well, if I had a penny for the number of times I’ve written, redrafted and posted something over there and then thought ‘It’s not worth going through all that on my own blog just to come up with the same thing’… (insert unnecessary end of metaphor nobody needs to hear). And I really feel like all my posts should be available in the same place, so I’m going to be reblogging some of the posts I’ve written for the Raxa Collective so you can all see everything I’ve written, all in one place! Omg how great is that!

Here’s my first post for them, about my trip to Nicaragua with Ixqui back in November. Enjoy! (And if you’ve already read it, sorry for the repeat!)

Love and kisses,
M. xox

Megan Currie's avatarOrganikos

One volcano-related assumption which I’ve had to let go of since arriving in Central America is that a volcano is a volcano.

Anyone who grows up in Scotland knows that mountains are not just ‘mountains’. There are mountains, but there are also ranges, hills, Bens, and Munroes. There are the kind that, although tall, the fitter of us can walk up without much in the way of equipment; there are others which may be smaller but are impassable unless you really know what you’re doing.

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Episode Fifty – The Last Months Of My Life (Part 6)

Do you see how easy it was to suddenly bring my ‘Last Month Of My Life’ posts back into the realms of accurate titling? While I was happily parenthesising away and turning even my headlines into the grammatical equivalent of Ulysses – where else have you ever seen a title which contains a dash and TWO sets of brackets? – it turns out I could have just chucked an ‘s’ on at the end of ‘month’ and called it a day. Hindsight’s a bitch, as they say.

Shall I continue chatting about the syntax tree of today’s title, or would you rather I just got on wi- ok, ok! No need to shout, I’m getting to it!

Jeez. Continue reading

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Episode Forty Nine – The Last (Wayyy More Than) Month Of My Life (Part 6)

Hello one and all.

I left you in the lurch a little too long with the camera thing, didn’t I? So long you’ve probably forgotten what that nagging feeling in the back of your mind is all about and why your shoulders are so tense. Well, don’t you worry, I’ll put it all to rest today: so grab a cup of tea, read on, and later you can go get yourself a massage or something. Continue reading

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Episode Forty Eight – Saturday in Nicaragua

Note: I wrote some, not all, of this while I was actually in Nicaragua, which is why there may be some discrepancies. Just roll with it – it’ll be okay.

~   *   ~

I’m sick of hearing myself say how fast the time goes.

So instead of mentioning it outright, I hid it away in a secondary clause where it was less offensive. You’re welcome.

So it’s the 19th of November, and my fourth-last weekend in Central America is off to a fantastic start with gorgeous weather and an even more gorgeous hostel. It’s called Bigfoot, it’s like Galileo only better, and right now Purple Rain is wafting through from the Pure Earth vegetarian café to the poolside seating – where I’m currently melting into a little pool of my own.

The Pure Earth Café is a 100% non-profit vegetarian café run by Bigfoot hostel.

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Episode Forty Seven – My Plans For This Weekend

I now have only four weekends left here in Costa Rica. Can you believe it? That wasn’t so long, was it?

I’m measuring in weekends because they’re pretty much my only chance to take advantage of being in Costa Rica. Don’t get me wrong – San Ramón is a lovely town, my coworkers are wonderful, and I enjoy my job and feel like it matters. However, while my daily life is nice here, it’s still daily life, and my weekends are when I can properly get out into the green of Costa Rica and feel like I’m really here.

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Episode Forty Six – The Last (More Than) Month Of My Life (Part 5)

So I left off last time with a picture of a monkey, our arrival in Tamarindo and the subtle suggestion that there may be trouble ahead. I do spin a good yarn, don’t I? Well, dear readers, all will now be revealed. First of all, two conclusions we quickly drew about the Pacific town of Tamarindo.

Conclusion #1: surfing is all anyone cares about in this town. By extension, there are surf-brand clothes shops and beach restaurants and juice bars where you’ll often see white-nosed, shirtless patrons enjoying an ice-cold beverage between waves; but more or less, everyone is just surfing, all the time. Continue reading

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Episode Forty Five – Taller de Reciclaje

Hi all.

I apologize in advance for not having had time to write out, redraft, then upload this post – but goodness knows if I had, it’d be another week or so coming. So here it is, because mostly I just want to share some pictures and links with you all. Continue reading

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Episode Forty Four – The Juggler Who Couldn’t Catch

It’s true – during my last couple of years of high school, this was what they called me.

My group of friends was something of an offshoot from the main clamour of students. Most of us were not part of the ‘elite’ classes you always find in secondary education; nor, I like to believe, were we looked upon as nerds or outcasts (for the most part). For the lack of a more universally-accurate description of us, we were generally known simply as ‘The Jugglers’. I think I started going to Duncan’s Juggling Club in my fourth year, and I learned a few new skills, made a few new friends, and achieved my original goal of operating in the same circles as the boy I liked, back in the day.

Give me three hacky sacks, apples, clubs even; and I’d be able to knock your socks off with 3-ball cascades, inverse tosses, showers or even the occasional flash. But throw a projectile my way with as much warning as you please, and I would miss it every time. It’s not difficult to see why they called me the juggler who couldn’t catch. Continue reading

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Episode Forty Three – On Being Right

I’m beginning to truly regret my recent absence here on the blog. In all honesty, the only reason I’m able to update so frequently these days (by which I mean that I write entries down on paper and then can’t upload them because my home internet connection is messed up) is because things are slow here at work and I’m able to plan my workshops in a couple of days; so I am left with many hours to fill. I’m hoping for more work to keep myself busy with soon, but in the meantime my thinking is that a) if I fulfil all my duties and meet all my deadlines, I’m doing my job; and b) if the participants in my workshop had written what I asked them to last week, I’d have about 7,000 words of Spanish to keep me busy translating. Not my fault nobody listens to me… Continue reading

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Episode Forty Two – Día de la Madre

It wasn’t long after I arrived here that we made our first little trip. Destination: Zarcero. Or, more precisely, Bernardita’s parents’ farm a little past Zarcero. The climate there is like that of Monteverde: green, chilly, draped in fog. When the mists cleared – rarely for longer than 20 minutes or so – the mountainous landscape was impressive to behold, and it felt very natural, fresh and rural.

It was a farm, after all.

Mum's favourite little critters!

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