Day Twenty Three – Welcome to CPI Playa Flamingo!

Green Day has a song that has the perfect message for the way we are feeling right now – Welcome to Paradise. Although Billie Joe Armstorng’s words a tab bit tongue in cheek; Playa Flamingo is the epitome of that word – paradise.

We woke this morning to the sounds of chickens outside our window. I forgot to mention yesterday where we are specifically living. In Brasilito, there is a little complex of house and a motel that our host family owns. Pretty much everyone in their entire family lives on the grounds, and there are at least 3 different sets of CPI students staying there as well. Kel and I lucked out pretty well because we get to have on the rooms in the motel to ourselves. Two beds, a TV with cable, a fridge, and a cold shower await us every night when we get home. Don’t get us wrong, we love living with the families – that’s the whole point of the immersion experience – but it is nice to have some privacy.

The family we are staying with is made up of a younger couple and their two twin sons. They’re about the same age as my brother and sister and the boys just turned 8. Their house is like the typical small home most Costa Rica families live in. They have a dog that Kattia was embarrassed to share name with me because her name is Casey as well. Oh well, the two Casey’s can definitely get along.

We ate gallo pinto for breakfast and were off for our first day of classes at CPI Playa Flamingo. The school is a short 15 minute bus ride from our house. As we got closer to the school, we realized that we were literally a hop, skip, and a jump from the beach. The building itself is rather beautiful and has a basketball court, a pool, and a Jacuzzi. Not going to lie, I’m starting to wonder why I don’t teach in a place like this! Classes went well and I’m actually in a class with one of my classmates from Monteverde. There are quite a few of us from Monteverde that traded the rain and cloud forest for the sun and beach.

After class today, we headed out to get some lunch. We found this little sub and pizza shop not more than 5 minutes from the school and grabbed a bite there. From lunch, I headed to the Flamingo Beach Resort that has a special partnership with CPI that allows students to use the premises for free. I ordered a cerveza and soaked in the rays until Kelly got done with her afternoon classes.

One of the cool features of CPI Playa Flamingo is the fact they offer changing rooms and a shower to use before and after you head to the beach. Needless to say, Kel and I took full advantage of them on day one. After Kel’s classes, we headed to Playa Flamingo – the beach, and swam in the ocean for about an hour. It was definitely fun fighting the waves as the tide came in. After swimming, we headed back to CPI to swim in their pool and waited for the best to arrive to take us back to Brasilito.

The night brought another venture down to the seaside to watch the sunset with my classmate Joelle. While watching the colors change from red, to yellow, to orange, to purple, I began to think about how this would be our last Monday in Costa Rica. In fact, from here on out, it will be our last (Insert day of the week) here in Costa Rica. A month is nearly up, but we’ve been having a blast the entire time.

Pura Vida,
Casey