On Day 1 of our Costa Rican adventure I set out with my Aunt, Uncle and two cousins to Playa del Oro, a remote beach on the pacific coast of costa rica. This was not a beach like Miami, Cancun, or even the Jersey Shore where the sand is packed with groups of people each producing their own symphony of sound. The silence on the beach was blissful and precisely the reason we had flown five hours and driven 2 hours on dirt roads to get here. There were no boom boxes or obnoxiously loud sun bathers; just the sound of the waves and the muted noises of the few other people on the beach. As for the others on the beach…this was a local spot, we were the only Americans on this plot of sand. A fact immediately understood just by glancing in our direction.
My aunt and uncle had toted two beach chairs down from my father's house. Not the kind of beach chairs with the various stages of recline and relaxation but rather the short, stout, and stiff variety. The little squat chairs that put your butt approximately a half an inch off the sand and are favored by unnaturally tanned, older women who like to bring them to the water's edge so that they may read their romance novels while the ebb and flow of the sea keeps them cool. There they sat perched upon their striped chairs, he wearing a shirt designed to keep one's base layer dry when performing daunting physical activities like climbing K2 or making breakfast. They also work well at protecting one's winter white body from the beating Costa Rican sun. My aunt employed a more classic technique and was but a stick figure beneath a sun dress, a towel draped across her legs, a baseball hat and sunglasses.
I don't know if the books they were reading were boring or they grew tired of watching the waves roll in, but they mutually decided on an impromptu Spanish lesson. And out came the Spanish to English dictionary and the Latin American Phrase Book. The latter quickly became the preferred text and as I drifted in out of awareness from reading my book I could hear the murmurs of mangled Spanish followed immediately by cackles and giggles. I paid closer attention as the impaired declaration of Spanish phrases grew louder. As any born entertainer would, my aunt and uncle sensed the interest growing from my cousins and me and began to play to the crowd. Before long they were shouting these Spanish phrases and I was no longer paying any attention to my book. Because, really, whatever I was reading was not nearly as engaging as the screams of "mas rapido! mas duro! mas lento! suave!" (faster! harder! slower! softer!)
My uncle had stumbled upon the chapter dedicated to pillow talk (conveniently located after the chapters on "in the bar" and "pick-up lines") in the phrase book and he and my aunt were now effectively holding a public audition for a Latino porn. When my uncle offered "Queres entrar un rato? (Do you want to come inside for awhile?) My aunt demured "No lo voy a hacer sin protecction" (I won't do it without protections). When my uncle persisted " Vamos a la cama" (Let's go to bed). My aunt shut him down with "Suave Tigre!" (Eaaasy Tiger).
Just another day of family fun time at the beach!
