Here comes the sun again

I just can’t understand it…a week into into Costa Rica, and I still feel strangely depressed. This couldn’t be happening to me, an avid traveler, a professed lover of all things new and beautiful…I stuck out for 1.5 years in one of my jobs simply coz whenever I’d plan to leave they’d send to me some exotic country!

I hate to admit it, but part of it is home sickness…yes, looks like I am finally beginning to get attached to a place…and Bangalore of all places! I guess I miss my fully reclined routine there…late mornings, weekend drives, long walks in fantastic weather, and tons of freedom to try out arbit things. Don’t like the thought though…comfort zones make me uncomfortable.

Another reason is language. Everything, including the road signs are in Spanish, everyone around me speaks in Spanish….my colleagues revert to Spanish over lunch, everyone in the hotel greets me in Spanish. After the initial novelty of a new language wears off and you have mastered the few cute phrases, you long to hear something familiar. So I have been playing English/Hindi songs in the background at work. Comfort zone again? This gets worser and worser.

I also realize that, being used to over populated India, I miss seeing people around me. Here a neighbour’s house will be at least a mile away from yours…I was completely taken aback to see a crowded mall over the weekend, coz I barely see two people on the highway. Looks like the Pied Piper of capitalist dreams has his lure here too...malls are as popular here as back home.

But probably the biggest reason is the long leave of absence of the sun. I have arrived at the beginning of the rainy season in Costa Rica…which means that when it isn’t raining, it is cloudy. I have barely seen the sun come out since I arrived here…coupled with the mountainous landscape and the scare population, it is a depressing sight...somehow it appears that the clouds have coated everything in a dreary soot of grey.

Two days ago when I was going to return my car, Senor Sun was out for a brief stroll, and the countryside appeared completely transformed to my light-starved eyes. Now I understand why the Brits make such a big deal about sunshine.