Another deluge

Last night I got to play in my first soccer game.Boy did I feel old. I don’t know if they will invite me back I played so poorly. I have a list of excuses to fill a page but the reality is I am not 25 anymore. We played on the field in the center of town in front of a sizable audience (at least 25 people) and I stuck out as the big tall slow old white guy. I did enjoy the exercise and my teammates were very patient and gracious toward me. Our neighbor Carlos who invited me to play ended up paying my field use fees, gave up his spot for the night so I could play (I was unaware this was going to happen or I wouldn’t have gone or just watched) stayed for the entire game so he could give me a ride back home and then on top of everything bought me a beer after the game. These people are insanely nice. Except for those on the other team who kept abusing me. Needless to say I woke up quite sore.
Today we stayed around the school after dropping the kids off so that we could watch a short national independence program with songs and dancing. The outdoor auditorium is big enough for all the students in the school to attend all at once, but there are not enough chairs so not everyone got to watch. We found out later that Sidne’s teacher picked five students to go and she was not one of them. Pobrecita. Our friends Karoy and Isue’s daughter danced so it was nice and they were third and fourth graders but it still was no multicultural assembly at Madison.
Today is also Children’s Day here so we took Sid and Leif out for a treat. However the delay put us right in the middle of a large downpour. It is not easy to share umbrellas with someone and stay dry. Luckily, Sid decided she wanted to get soaked. By the time we neared the house Leif had made a similar decision but the first 10 minutes of sharing umbrellas with him left both Laurie and I fairly wet ourselves. It is actually kind of nice to be out in it except that it rains so hard it is impossible to keep you shoes from getting completely drenched and it takes more than a night to dry them out. The clothes are easy enough to deal with. The first time we got caught we were only extremely wet so we just put everything into the spin dryer. Today Leif and Sid got too frolicky and got mud splatter on their white school clothes so they had to be washed and spun dry. If the sun doesn’t come back out like it didn’t today they have to finish drying in front of a fan. We will have to get a video up showing what real rainfall is like.
Every day we pass a lizard sitting on top of an electrical pole unless it is raining and then he is not there. The first few times we saw him he was in the exact same spot on the pole and never moved so we assumed he had been electrocuted. His coloring helped lead us to this conclusion since he was/is much darker near his head and front claws. Yesterday the kids found out where he goes when it rains when they saw the top of his head poking out from within the top of the hollow pole.
We have our own lizards (above photo is one of them) that live on the wall separating our house from our neighbor’s yard. Every other day or so, we will put out some papaya or mango peels for them. We watch as they scamper down the wall and swallow their meal whole. They are still very weary of us and retreat if we try to get too close.
Tonight we watched CR lose another World Cup qualifying match to El Salvador and have now moved from first place to fourth since we have been here. Laurie made a nice dinner of gallo pinto (beans and rice) with an egg on top. Very nice.