Saturday, February 5th - Getting out of the U.S.

The Liberia Airport

Part 1: Getting out of the U.S.
After arriving at the airport on no sleep at 4:30am we couldn’t have been more ready for a long nap on a plane. We said goodbye to our parents and went through security, where Jenny got the full nudie TSA body scan. Our flight was delayed when United Airlines decided that the weather was too dangerous for us to fly to Chi town for our connection to Costa Rica, which was a little confusing due to the totally clear sky. We had to get on another flight or we would miss our connection to Costa Rica. After much negotiation a saucy United Airline rep put us on a flight with American Eagle (the airline, not the mass carriers of cargo shorts and mini tees) that would connect in Miami . The saucy United rep told us she would get our luggage off the plane to Chicago and send it to baggage claim. The elevator down to the baggage claim floor was like entering an empty set on the Truman Show, totally deserted with an overwhelming amount of product placement. Luckily Kel found a wheelchair and I whipped out some nail polish so we were entertained down there in our private airport section for who knows how long. After emerging from our own worlds we realized our baggage was no where to be found and the baggage claim conveyer belt wasn’t even on. After an hour or so, and much discussion with the saucy United rep (who was more interested on chatting on her bejewled cell phone), our bags arrived. Success!!
Now for the next step, getting on our American Eagle flight to Miami….which unfortunately did not exist. A permed American Eagle rep typed vigorously into her computer for a few minutes before looking at us and saying “You’re young so we are going to try something.” Now things were really getting interesting and we found ourselves sprinting through the Cincinnati airport alongside the permed American Eagle rep with all of our baggage and a backpack each (and this is us we are talking about so all of our baggage is A LOT). We ran from terminal 1 to terminal 3, a true Lance Armstrong moment for Kelly who was carrying an enormous carry-on in addition to her 2 suitcases, and was bundled up in 4 layers of sweaters. Looking like we had just finished a full marathon we collapsed onto the Delta counter where the lady told us we had missed the check-in time by 1 minute – we had reached our breaking point.
Yayyy for our permed American Eagle friend who handled all the arrangements with Delta while we took a nap with our eyes open. We were finally booked on a real flight with Delta, our third airline of the day. We were going to fly to Atlanta at 12:50 and then to Liberia airport in Costa Rica. By 12:50 we were zombies to say the least and we had done everything we could think of at the Cincinnati airport to amuse ourselves. Our TEFL program had arranged airport pick-up in Costa Rica at 1:25pm, the time we were initially scheduled to arrive. Now we weren’t going to get there until 8:30pm and we didn’t have a single address for the school, our housing assignment, or any building in Costa Rica. We had been calling, emailing and skyping TEFL since the morning but hadn’t been able to contact anyone since it was a Saturday and they weren’t at the school. Finally we found our landlord’s phone number so we called him to ask his address. He spoke zero English which was our first reality check about the language barrier. The young girl, Shay (funny coincidence), sitting next to us to us leaned over and said she was Puerto Rican so she spoke to our landlord on our behalf. She attempted to get his address but apparently they don’t have typical addresses in Costa Rica. Our address at Jamie’s is: 100 metros al norte del Minisuper Delfin, mano deracha. Despues del taller, apartmentos amarillos.
We connected in Atlanta and ate lots of appetizers at Chile’s, browsed a bookstore, and called people while we still had functioning cell phones. Finally! Take-off at 5:30pm!! A mere 13 hours of being in airports and both carrying a stack of various boarding passes for flights we didn’t take. We couldn’t have been more relieved to finally be on our way.

Part 2: Are we there yet?
We landed in Costa Rica, where it was already pitch black but still about 85 degrees. We walked down the steps off of our plane and along the runway until we entered a big concrete room that was open to the outside….the airport! We stood in a short line to go through immigration, where a Tico took our immigration form and glanced at our passports. Then we moved on to baggage claim, a few steps away, where one conveyer belt squeaked loudly around and disappeared back into the wall. We got our bags and walked a few more paces to customs, where a man grabbed the other form we had filled out and waved us through and out of the airport without even looking at it – quickest international arrival ever!
We walked out to the mass of taxi drivers holding various signs, still fearing we would have no one to pick us up and no idea how to get where we were going. Amazingly, one of our frantic emails must have been received because a smiling Tico man, named Hillberto, stood holding a sign with Kelly’s name on it. He took our bags to his cab and loaded them in, all the while trying to explain something to us in rapid Spanish. He was met with blank stares from us and finally brought Jenny over to a Canadian uber-hippie (think the slow-talking surfer turtles from Finding Nemo, except dirtier) who would serve as a translator. He explained that Hillberto had 2 more girls to pick up and then told Jenny about how he had moved from Canada to Samara and was a cab driver there. He explained that everything in Costa Rica is a little bit chaotic but no one ever stresses – at all. Something we have found to be very true. The 2 girls we were waiting on were TEFL students as well, a mother and daughter from Cape Town, South Africa – Diana and Sara. Hillberto strapped their luggage to the roof, which made us very thankful that we had arrived first and our bags were safely in the trunk. Then we all squeezed in with our backpacks and purses on our laps and got ready for the 2-hour drive to Samara. Smiley Hillberto turned out to be a total maniac on the road driving up to 90 miles an hour in his tiny red cab, constantly on the wrong side of the road, and within inches of other cars, scooters, pedestrians and animals – all the while with his hand on his little horn yelling that everyone was “loco”. Diana, the South African mother sat in the front seat holding her breath most of the time and screaming out a few times about Hillberto’s insane driving. We were in the back with Sara, the daughter chatting away about all of the amazing experiences Sara has had in other countries. We had our noses pressed against the window to get a glimpse of the amazing stars, which looked like illuminated dust scattering the sky. Sadly our drive was in the dark so we really couldn’t see much of the landscape. Sara made out the outline of a mountain, we saw lots of Ticos walking in groups down the road. We noticed that Tico fences are tiny trees planted in rows which they cut the tops off of and link with wire. After 2 hours we arrived in Samara (the drive with anyone but Hillberto would have taken at least 3) and dropped off Sara and Diana at their apartment. We looked out the window at the small, seemingly run-down town that we had left home to come to. Despite our exhaustion we felt excited to start exploring our temporary home tomorrow. We turned off the paved road and drove about a mile up a dirt road to our apartment. Our apartment is a little difficult to explain and a story in itself so we will write an entry about it later and post pictures…..for now think camp but with a Costa Rican flair. We turned on as many fans as we could and snuggled up under our stolen Delta Airline blankets before falling fast asleep.