jungle life

the view from the porch of the house in the morning

the house as you walked the long hill up..those are ylang ylang trees in the back part



Has it been 9 years since I met up  with two very eccentric hippies in Costa Rica?
I met Harry and Bertha when I was cooking at hotel Tilawa in Tilaran, CR..
They came and stayed with me for a week. It was a very small hotel, where folks would stay  and enjoy the rain forest  They were buddhist, christian, hindu, everything..he was so full of energy that he made you excited just standing next to him! ( it happens) A rare and drugged up genius, they would say... they would smoke ounces of weed in a day and I heard rumors that they would smoke crack and fight for days...people say things you know, when you are not there to defend yourself...they wanted to save the monkeys, the water (which there never seemed to be enough for everyone), the land, the bananas..
but that was later..
meanwhile I was loving cooking for Jon Paul at Tilawa..I had built up my clients we were making money all day everyday..my menus were stellar! I made fresh rolls every day and would make some fine salads. the likes of which they had never seen, I can tell ya!
So when Harry and Bertha came, I waozed them with my cuisine..naan, curries, freshest avocado sandwiches ever! My sandwiches were my specialty..I would roast peppers and stuff them and bake them with a crusty bready thing..man I could cook in those days!
He freaked out when I roasted a pig..I am cook we cook for everyone..they were vegetarian, so I made everything separately for them..
He wanted some  so bad..all day he  would come down and talk to me and inhale the roasting smells of cumin and pineapples and garlic and mangoes which I roasted the thing with:)
(the pigs feast on green bananas in that region, it changes the meat somehow)
They loved me. They were elegant and she had the biggest rack I had ever seen in real life..I wondered if they were real? Maybe not..who knows..
He finally conceded and ate some pig..he chowed on it..I presented it to him with all the trimmings..my mango relish, the chili relish and of course lots of good beer..he ate and ate and ate and then cried and cried and cried..it was super dramatic and left me with an impression. I liked him very much in a crazy way. Bertha, had a way of taking you in and keeping you for life. Scorpio women will do that with me. Her flair for presentation and love of fine things..was really something..
A year later Jon Paul in a drunken rage, fired me! ( another long one, I'll tell it  one day)
 I moved to the beach to a town called Cobano..pronounced "covah no"..
I am standing at the bus ready to go to cook for some rich Spaniards in a neighboring town and there those two are!
I had forgotten their names..they were delighted to see me..I am like why do all these people here look so rough..is it the red dust and no rain that always seems to make you look so dirty? Yes!
In the rain forest  you deal with the moisture..dampness, mold..at the beach, there is salty sand and red dust and people mist everywhere..when it finally rains, it is such a relief, people start dancing...

They invited me to their place. I didn't go until 6 months later. She made sure to keep me in touch and was always kind to me. I finally took her up on her offer one day. It felt like we were driving to the end of the world. All the twists and turns in the road and it all seemed like uphill..it was..by the time we got up to their place, I could feel the cool air, it was 20 degrees cooler up there! Monkeys looking at me eating and holding their babies while eating..I was enchanted..
they told me I could live here, for free.
All I had to do is never cook meat in the house and always go to town and get bananas for the monkeys..
I am like, "really, ok!"