Becoming a Local

I am fast becoming a local in a small seaside town on the Northern Pacific coast of Costa Rica. I get a discount in the supermarket. The weary vendors that plod along the beach in the gruelling heat selling coconuts, animal shaped whistles, full body massages and jewellery made out of shells have stopped lighting up when I walk past; they know I won’t buy anything. The lethargic man with leathery skin who slumps beneath the leafy shade of the same palm tree each day no longer lifts his gaze; even the local insect population has stopped biting me, savagely insistent upon my arrival, they now prefer the blood of the pasty-legged tourists, fresh off the plane.

I’m learning to read the waves and work out which way they will break. I plan my entire day around the rise and fall of the tide and know that a few moments of flat are followed by a crescendo of ravenous water. I can sense how long it will take for the rain drops to fall when the lightning flickers on the horizon and, from the shape and colour of the clouds, calculate how much time I have to walk to the store and pick up my groceries before the torrential rain converts the dusty road into a river of slushy mud.

The surfaces of the streets here are impossibly badly laid. The thirsty earth is dehydrated and cracks open in the punishing midday sun, a dust cloud enveloping pedestrians when a passing 4x4 skims by. It’s even worse when the Heavens open and the going becomes treacherously slippery. I desperately struggle not to dislocate a knee or fall over ungraciously on my behind, as the backs of my legs get splattered with sodden earth.

It’s not recommended to leave anything unattended on the beach, not even flip flops, so I fully experience the loose rubble, sharp beneath my toes, or the soft squelch as I slip and slide my way barefoot to the beach, surfboard tucked under arm and dodging shards of broken beer bottles, pot holes and monkey excrement. From their deafening call it’s easy to see why howler monkeys win the award for loudest land mammal on earth; their eerie lament can be heard for up to three kilometres away.

It’s ladies’ night tonight at Sharky’s and again on Saturday I believe. I have never been but I know their timetable, I walk past the sign every day. The few times that I’ve been out to bars here have left me with little desire to go back. They’re full of lecherous locals drivelling over and praying on drunken tourists and the music pumps distortedly and crackly out of large blown speakers.

My hair has been bleached a funny colour and my ribs are permanently black and blue from the pummelling I take in the ocean. I eat a whole avocado every day and my favourite snack is spicy refried beans spread over crunchy crackers, instead of the marmite on toast I devour when I’m visiting my family in the UK, or when they send me care packages abroad. I’ve had marmite posted to me around the world – that quintessentially English spread that represents a little jar of black gold for me, even if most people find it vehemently repulsive.

If I leave anything out on the counter the resident colony of ants will arm an invasion; I’m getting pretty good at clearing up after myself speedily now. I’m even getting used to the grating screech of the fan and the sand that gets in my bed sheets and all my important electrical items. I am mesmerized by the geckos as they patter across the walls or stop dead, suckered to the spot on the ceiling when they sense that I am watching. The bull frogs croaking in the undergrowth don’t frighten me anymore and the daily power cut is no longer cause for alarm, even my tenuous internet connection as reliable as an English summer fails to get me flustered these days. I think I’m becoming a local.