I am a professional photographer in Costa Rica. The experiences on my tours are many since I never know what my group and I will happen upon. Let me tell you about one of these surprising events.
During one of our Costa Rica Photo Tours, my group drove to a photography location in the beautiful and pristine Osa Peninsula which National Geographic has called "the most biologically diverse place" on earth. To get there we drove through the tiny village of Ojochal near where I live.
Some Costa Ricans in rural communities have an unusual method of moving. As one of my groups was passing through the village some folks started pointing to something ahead of us. It was a fellow moving. But, before telling you this story, let me give you a little background on this gentleman.
The fellow who was moving was one of my neighbours, Senor Wilson (real Spanish name, don't you think?), who has brought my wife and me flowering plants since we moved in. It was really funny the first day that he stood at the top of the driveway with plants in hand. He was so polite that he would not come down to the house without our invitation even though he was there to give us a present.
After a sort of "conversation", he in Spanish and my wife and I mostly in English, I realized that he wanted to give us the plants. We were new in the community and this was a welcoming from the neighbours who live at least a hour walk up the mountain. Yep, walk. No car. Senor Wilson walked an hour just to deliver a gift. Now, that is neighborly!
Over time, neighbor Wilson has walked to my house many times with plants. Now, it often happens that when he gives me his gifts he stands there waiting for me to plant them. Of course, sometimes I may already be on another project and cannot very well stop what I am doing so the plants get put into the ground later but my good neighbor sometimes drops by to find out where and when I had planted them. I never imagined that when I moved from Canada to Costa Rica.
A couple of days after Senor Wilson gave me plants one time, he came to the house with still another plant and visited while his two boys swam in the river by the house. Of course, he asked me where I planted the others that he had brought the last time he came.
Oops! They were still in the pots on the terrace (these pots are certainly not decorative in any way as they are old aluminum kettles with drainage holes stabbed in the bottom of the pot with a machete). When Senor Wilson saw that his previous gifts were still in the pots, he decided he needed to plant the gifts he had given me since I apparently did not know how to do it. I hope you are getting an idea about what kind of fellow my neighbor is.
Now that you have some idea about the kind of fellow my friend and neighbor Wilson is like, I want to return to my photography tour group driving along the dusty road near my house. Suddenly, we came upon a man walking alongside his horse. The animal was carrying two white bags, two huge white bags, filled with clothes and household items. Between the bags, Wilson or his wife had wedged a blue broom that extended over the animal's head, giving us the impression that the horse was wearing a bristle blue tiara. I wonder if the horse was enjoying his royal status or quietly suffering the indignity of wearing a broom crown.
Wilson, standing by the horse, was holding a bridle in one hand and a birdcage in the other. A man, his birdcage, a horse, his crown. Quite a sight! It was moving day in Costa Rica.
I started the conversation as usual with "Hola, que tal?" "How are you?" And then I asked if he was moving (only kidding). But, sure enough, the horse was neighbor Wilson's version of a moving van. I believe it is called a grass-eating 4 X 4.
He explained that he and his wife (who is a tiny little thing that looks about 14) were going to house-sit one of the B&Bs whose owner went back to Germany for the rainy season. He also said that it would be easier for his wife and 3 kids to live there because it was closer to the pueblo as the B&B is almost in the pueblo where the children would go to school.
I thought that it was rather interesting that he was carrying the birdcage. I would have thought that on one of the previous trips down to their new digs one of the children would have wanted to carry the cage.
I guess carrying flowering plants and birdcages come under the same heading. Wilson explained that the bird was young (parrot or parakeet, can't really tell) and that it was very talkative. As if to show off, the feathered pet suddenly started chattering. Unfortunately, I had not yet mastered Spanish well enough to understand bird Spanish so I could not figure out what he was saying. But, it did not matter to the bird.
You can imagine that my group was very excited about taking pictures of a crowned horse, chattering bird, and Costa Rica family walking down a mountain, worldly possessions carried by their trusty steed. Moving day in Costa Rica. One never knows what one will see or experience on my photo tour of Costa Rica.
About the Author:
Frank Scott lives in tropical Costa Rica where he is a professional Costa Rica Photographer offering unique photography tours. Some of his work can be seen in Costa Rica Vacations, a very popular travel guide to this unique country.
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