Thread: costa rica and malaysia in that order

well my gal pal can't go to bali next month so that's out but TY and i are seeing if we can get a last minute deal to costa rica some time in october or november..i know where to find the dancers in costa rica (thru contacts) but we will probably be near tamarindo..possibly lake arenal depends on how much driving our butts can take. we are hopefully looking at a few properties while there

and then if all goes well we are gonna try to go to malaysia in early spring. i know one dancer in malaysia that's it. so if you are from there or nearby hit me up..maybe we can visit while i'm there. i'll be the token white girl.

Costa Rica is beautiful, especially that area. We had a stop in Guatemala and there was a water strike - Everyone on the plane had to get off and stay in this one little room for an hour... no water. Then we finally boarded the plane to go ahead to Costa Rica. It's amazing. The cops actually guard the banks with AK47's, they are nice though. Watch out for the road - no road rules at all. I recommend you rent an SUV as the roads are full of potholes and you can follow the tourist buses to the tourist places like the volcano. Oh, once you get into the C.R. airport go upstairs to the bank and get local currency as they will screw you every chance they get if you use your credit cards. Regarding land - If you buy, make sure you don't buy close to a park because they can legally remove you from your own land and make sure you get the deed to your property. Not sure how a condo property would work. The lizards are really cool and the gecko's are plenty but they eat the other bugs so they are cool - and cute. Not sure if this will be on the way to the volcano because I haven't been there for five years, but if you end up going towards the pacific side, there is (the only road I believe) a road that has an open air restaurant that is owned by an American Woman. It overlooks a vista of coffee bushes and it's just simply breath taking. Oh we met a surfer dude that owns another open air restaurant and he also owns a motel and a pool business - seems there was a market for people wanting pools in the shape of alphabet letters. He did mention that it was like the wild west there - his restaurant is open 24x7 and he pays off the local cops to keep the peace in his little area. Lot's of call girls. We stayed in a holiday Inn and almost everynight this same guy had loud sex with girls he picked up at a local Disco... the sex trade comes right after the tourist industry in regards to how that country makes it's money.

Hey Jes,
You know where to reach me. I'm here for ya girl!
Also, Yemaya (my fabulous teacher) will probably be able to give you tons of advice on buying property here, she and her husband Josh moved down her from Oregon last year and have a huge farm where they're planting thousands of Jatrofa trees for bio-diesel, among all their other promising projects.
BTW, I haven't seen many call girls in my neck of the woods...they usually like to hang around where the American tourists are.

Hugs
Priscilla

OMG! This American dude had a different one every night! They were so loud the family next door to us thought it was us! The Mother gave me a dirty look when I walked out of the room to dry our bathing suits on the balcony - I looked at her and threw my hands up and said, "I know what your thinking, but it wasn't me!" She nodded and walked back inside her room.

We stayed at a beach resort where there were many locals as well. I saw a few Americans, Europeans but most were locals. LOOVE the food there, ate at many restaurants and just loved the food. I never really eat tomatoes but the ones I ate there in C.R. were so incredible and full of flavor! I don't know, maybe food just tastes better when you're on vacation.

Dance scene in Malaysia is vivid and there are lots of great teachers and happenings especially in KL.

One good page to find happenings and dancers/dance schools both in Malaysia and here in Singapore is: M.E.D. aze - you can find links to Malaysian sites on right hand side when browsing downwards...

Especially Paola Blanton from Yallabina and Sherlyn Koh of Sirocco Secrets are well known and they both organize lots of dance happenings ..g.:

oh you guys thanks for posting!!! the trip to CR this fall will depend on if we can find out in time if my husband can travel there..(he's from Malaysia, has his green card..but we'll see)

Jessedan I'd love love love to meet you, it would a lot of fun. If we go to CR we will only get a few days since hub has no vacation time left this year save for two days, so if we plan his two days off next to vacay time then another two days of the next week off (gotta clear it with the boss) then we'll be there

Thank you for posting Kahire, one of my best friends is from Singapore but she is not a dancer so was not familiar with the scene. I'm excited to know that both places we may visit will have some dance activity..am starving here on the big island of Hawaii. Will look up the links you posted, many thanks

we will be visiting Klang but I'm certain my husband will be showing me around a bit while we are there. we are joking about tearing up our return tickets and staying there for a year or two. his entire family is there and i sure would like for Zack to know them. Moki would love to visit Malaysia (he says it would be good exposure for his band hehehe). i'd LOVE to live there for a while. I almost moved to China by myself before coming to Hawaii but got sidetracked by the blue waves and good surf.

just looked up all three sites WOW WOW WOW thank you :) this is really fueling the jets...ahhh workshops, shows, classes, activity!!

Hey! We're going to costa rica in November! Yay!

what area??

my friend Alaina of Farmhouse Boutique went to CR a few months ago maybe she'll see this post and comment, she was able to get some really good photos

so..visiting the west side of costa rica, will i be craving night life or is there enough to stay busy?

Brea if you are reading this is that your photo on the Bellydance fest in Malaysia?

Originally Posted by jesennia

what area??

my friend Alaina of Farmhouse Boutique went to CR a few months ago maybe she'll see this post and comment, she was able to get some really good photos

so..visiting the west side of costa rica, will i be craving night life or is there enough to stay busy?

Brea if you are reading this is that your photo on the Bellydance fest in Malaysia?

We're going on the Pacific side... Hmm... let me see we're going to Palmar Sur/Corcovada and Quepos, flying in & out of San Jose... You?

we are aiming for liberia, then the northern beaches..if there is time, down to jaco beach ..still waiting on info about if he can travel..he can go if its six months or more before TY expires..well not him expire but whatever card or doc he needs to travel..if we can get away in november and get tickets we're there , if not we'll have to wait. he can for sure go to malaysia ..ah complicated

Originally Posted by jesennia

six months or more before TY expires..well not him expire

..l;,..l;,

Glad you clarified! Hope you have a great trip! I don't know anything about Malaysia, but it sounds pretty exciting as well!

You guys are going to the beach areas. Figures. ,m::
I live in Heredia, a town 15 minutes from San Jose, and 20 minutes from the airport. (and two hours from Jaco Beach) We can still figure something out though...maybe I can pick you up at the aiport Jes, and take you wherever it is you need to get to. At least we´ll get a chance to chat for a while!


Regards
Priscilla

that is so incredibly kind of you Jessedan, we may have to fly to san jose just to see you :)

is there a lot of night life and shopping near tamarindo? i know jaco is a hot spot just wondering about up norte :)

his green card status may kill the deal to CR but i dont want to go without him

Originally Posted by jesennia

what area??

my friend Alaina of Farmhouse Boutique went to CR a few months ago maybe she'll see this post and comment,

Well, WAY far behind, but...I love Costa Rica! I can't wait to go back sometime. My hubby has been a bunch of times but this spring was my first trip.

We were in the northwest...we flew into Liberia, went to La Fortuna to see the Arenal volcano, then went down the coast a bit. We went to a national park there and hiked in the rainforest to a waterfall (this is the same rainforest where my husband got lost and was presumed dead a few years back...yes, I am brave...lol) I'm sorry, the name of that place is escaping me at the moment but I can tell you what it is later. We stayed in a lovely little bed and breakfast there. The park also has a volcano. Then we went further south down the Nicoya peninsula to Samara, which is a beach town.

I found the Costa Rican people wonderfully friendly. You can't leave anything in your car for fear of it being stolen, but you can pay random strangers to watch your car if there's stuff in and they will. We didn't have much issues with money. US currency is just as good at most places and with most people as cash is. The unofficial exchange rate while we were there was 500 colonnas to a dollar...this was actually better than the exchange rate you could get at the banks. If you do use your atm cards to get cash or do other credit card things, just double check your statements when you get home. We were double charged on an atm withdrawal and thought we were going to have to go through a hassle, but the Costa Rican bank caught it before we started the process and the money was credited to our account.

A rental car company tried to screw us but we didn't go with them and decided to take a busses to our first destination, which we did. The last bus didn't go as far as we thought it was and we were dumped in some little town that wasn't quite where we wanted to be...I was exhausted and had been taking pain meds for a root canal and had about had it when an American from ARkansas named John walked by and said, "hello." We asked him about a hotel, he took us to where he was staying and had been for a month and was friends with the owner, Ollie, an American who had last lived in Pahoa. The next day Ollie dug a copy of the "Tico Times" out of the trash for us and showed us where locals rent cars for cheap. We hooked up with a gal named Jenny and arranged to have her bring us a car the next day at our next destination. I think we paid like 200 bucks to rent the little geo tracker for a week...it was a hot pink beat up crazy little car but it navigated the very poorly kept costa rican roads just fine. Then we were going to take a bus to La Fortuna, but we realized the next bus didn't leave until much later that day and we didn't want to wait that long. Ollie suggested we hitchhike and dropped us off at a good spot.

continued....

We walked up the road and grabbed some pastries from a german bakery and then sat and waited. We didn't wait too long when some Americans, one of them a prof. at berkely, drove by and picked us up. They were traveling with a friend who sprained her ankle the day before...she was holed up in the hotel in pain and they were driving around exploring. They drove us to the next town and to the hotel we were shooting for, but they were out of rooms, so they even drove us to another hotel and then waited while we got settled. Then we all went to the volcano and hiked up to the old lava flows together.

The hotel we stayed at was called Baldi and was at the foot of the volcano. The hotel's big draw is the naturally occurring hot springs...just awesome. We went back to our hotel and then spent the night hanging out in the hot springs and relaxing. The only drawback to Baldi is the blaring 1980's rock.....l;,

Then we headed south towards Samara. Along the way we decided we wanted to go to the national park (Rincoln de Viejo, I think) and we looked in our tour book and found a b and b and called ahead. They stayed up a little late to wait for us and had sandwiches waiting. The next day we hiked up to the waterfall and spent the day there. One of the best spontaneous things I've ever done...it was just amazing. Then we headed out to Samara.

Note: We did a LOT of night driving, which I just would not recommend. First of all, it is very dangerous. Second of all, you miss seeing the countryside as you drive. On future trips I will try to avoid that much night driving.

continued...

So we drove to Samara, again calling along the way to make a reservation at a place called the Flying Crocodile. They have awesome bungalow accomodations there and it is very quiet and private. They also offer things like ultralight rides and other tours for those who are interested. They aren't on the beach, but it is just about a 10 minute walk. On the way to there we got turned around coming out of the town of Samara and couldn't find our road. We stopped and got some directions (after someone found someone who spoke English) but we still couldn't find it. We knew we were going to have to drive across a river. We came to one river bank where there was a car parked. A French guy with two hot chicks in the car was VERY annoyed at our questions but then said he didn't think this was the crossing. We were *obviously* interrupting SOMETHING. lol. We went back and eventually found the proper crossing. Unfortunately, it was very dark and we could not see where the road continued on the other side of the river. My husband thought he saw it off to the left. Before I could tell him I disagreed, he gunned the engine and took off through the water. We landed on the thing he thought was the road and he realized it wasn't really the road. He got out and went back to see if he could spot the road with a flashlight, didn't see it, so figured it must be on ahead and that we needed to go through a little more water. So, he drove forward. Ker-plunk. The car sank down a few feet and water started pouring in the doors. He cut the engine to keep from flooding it and there we sat, knee deep in water in our hot pink geo tracker, in the pitch black, in the middle of a river in freaking costa rica. I was beyond freaking out. He had to talk to me kind of sternly for a second... He grabbed my backpack and I grabbed our small daypack and we abandoned his backpack and the car. Now we're standing in the middle of a river in the middle of the night in the pitch black silence of costa rica. I am not a strong swimmer and I am deathly afraid of crocodiles so I was really having to fight hard not to have a complete panicked meltdown. We walked through the river for not too far and then, lo and behold, we found the road!

continued...

So, we hiked about 5 km up the road til we found a little "soda" which is what they call these little eateries that people run in their neighborhoods. Very simple places. The local men there were all just hanging out so we explained to them what happened and then they got a phone so we could call our hotel. The men were very nice, nice enough that I sat with them and chatted while Dan and the owner of our hotel went to pull the car out of the river. One funny thing is that they were all in their early fifties but were all "retired." One of them had studied geography extensively and had traveled the US a great deal in his younger days. He knew all sorts of facts of cities and states like latitude and longitude and population and key industries and what the place was famous for. We chatted about cultural differences between the US and Costa Rica, mainly because the fact that we have five children yet had only been married two and half years perplexed them until I explained that I had been divorced. (They thought my ex was a sh#thead for abandoning his kids, too. )

So, despite being stuck in the river, our car started up. Dan picked me up and we drove down the road to the Flying Crocodile where that lovely little bungalow was one of the most beautiful sites I've ever seen. We were greeted by a young intern named Giselle who just kept shaking her head in sympathy at what my dastardly husband had put me through that night. ..l;,..l;,..l;, As soon as she left, I sat down, and for the first time in my life said, "I NEED a drink, NOW" and opened up the minibar and fixed myself a rum and coke. I threatened to sleep in the other bed but changed my mind after I finished my second rum and coke. And that concluded the third day....

Alaina

Where and when in Malaysia Jes? I can get cheap flights from here. :) Could maybe meet up with you... :-D