It's My Birthday and I'll Do What I Want

... and what I wanted to do was go to San José for an Asian food lunch and, in this case, it was Chinese food at Don Wang Restaurant. I've done a previous post on the dim sum at Don Wang, which was excellent.

This time we ordered off the regular menu and decided on the meal for three persons. Piggish I know, but we wanted to try the sea bass with vegetables and the satay beef sauce, which had two hot peppers beside it on the menu, indicating it should be a spicy dish. Also included were a Beijing salad, shrimp wonton soup, and sweet peppers filled with minced shrimps.

We also ordered two mora (berry) fruit drinks. My favourites were the sea bass and the sweet peppers filled with minced shrimp and a black bean sauce. We had enough left over for para llevar (take away) so we'll enjoy another meal each.

Service was efficient and the food arrived promptly. Don Wang Restaurant is located on Calle 11, between Avenidas 6 and 8. Now that the San José streets have street signs, it makes it much easier to find. On the other hand, all the taxi drivers can get you there.

Here's a handy tip: I carry one of those small, frozen ice packs wrapped in tin foil when going out to places where I think I might be carrying home fresh or frozen food.

The other thing I wanted to do was go to see the new Chinatown area and pick up some much needed Asian food products. We did this after lunch. Also wanted to see the new Chinese gateway into the area. It was a short walk from Don Wang and the area is blocked off to most vehicular traffic.

The Chinatown area is 12 city blocks and runs between 2nd Avenue and 14th Avenue (north to south) and between 7th and 11th Streets (west to east direction). 9th Street is the central boulevard. The area was a commercial center during the last decades of the 20th century. San José's Chinatown officially opened on December 6, 2012, and is the first of it's kind in a Central American city.

We shopped at Super Hansan and I picked up mirin, Tamari soy sauce, black bean garlic sauce, spring roll wrappers, rice paper wrappers, won ton wrappers and some frozen dumplings. I'm still looking for chili paste, and lemon grass and miso pastes. This store also carries woks, dishes, pots, some fresh vegetables, frozen dim sum items, teas, different rices.and lots more.

Taxi to the Coca Cola bus terminal and home to Atenas. A very good birthday!

The Super Hansan Store

Chinatown

The new Gateway to Chinatown

 

La Soledad Church

 

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More On the Buses in Costa Rica

I really enjoy riding on a Costa Rican bus. So far, we've only done the Atenas-San José route and the Atenas-Palmares-San Ramon route.

Today, we had occasion to travel into San Jose but our business there delayed us from catching the 11:00 am bus Atenas bus at the Coca Cola bus station. The next bus to Atenas was at noon. Some time ago, my husband discovered he could get on the bus to Orotina and get off at Atenas, as Atenas is on one of the roads to Orotina.

It seems the Orotina bus runs on the half hour and, sure enough, there it was ready to go at 11:30 am. Also there was our "water bottle guy". I must get his name ... he shows up at the Coca Cola station with bags of bottled water, pop, juice, snacks and does a good trade. He knows all the bus drivers, their routes and the times they are supposed to arrive and leave. He appears to be trilingual (and maybe more) - we know he speaks English, French and Spanish. The first time we met him, he seemed to sense we were Canadians and started speaking French, a language we do not know.

He was a bit surprised to see us getting on a different bus but rose to the occasion and escorted us into the bus (which was crowded with only two seats left), "Lady, follow me", and I got a seat. Then he admonished a passenger to remove his computer case from the last vacant seat, and Lance sat down. We also got our two nice cold bottles of water and a high five. I can't imagine what the Ticos think of this but I think it raises our status somewhat from "turisto" to "maybe they actually live here".

By the way, the Orotina bus is 15 minutes faster than the Atenas bus, including a stop in Alajuela.

When lining up to get on a bus, be aware of what your position in line is. You may see people sitting on benches and not in the actual line. They are ahead of you. So be polite and kind of hang back. When the bus is ready to board, everyone knows exactly where they are in the lineup. Also, the elderly will automatically be put ahead of everyone else.

Another thing I noticed today on the Orotina bus was how both men and women gave up their seats for the elderly or those with a handicap.

One last thing: Costa Rican buses allow folks to board who are trying to raise money for various charities. They may be selling refrigerator magnets, music CD's, cards ... I've noticed the Ticos always give a few coins and so should we. The people trying to raise money work very hard. Today we contributed and got two cool cards which I am going to send to my mother, who is in a care home in Ottawa, Canada. She may no longer understand who they are from but she might enjoy the bright colours.

The Two Cards

 

 

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Teatro Nacional de Costa Rica

This post is in remembrance of my nephew, Allan Michael Miskell, November 10, 1983 - March 22, 2006. He was a gifted musician and would have loved going to the Teatro Nacional.

This past Sunday, November 4, we had tickets for the X Concierto of Los Gavilanes (The Hawks) at the historic National Theatre of Costa Rica (Teatro Nacional de Costa Rica).

Construction was started in 1891 and it opened in 1897. The building is considered the finest historic building in San Jose. The lobby is beautiful, with marble floors and paintings depicting life in the 19th century. There is a very good café on site also.

We went with our neighbors, Rosemary and Tony - the four of us took the 0900 bus from Atenas to San Jose. We had a real cowboy of a bus driver this time - only 48 minutes from Atenas to San Jose, a new record. Rounding some of those mountain s-curves on the bus was a new experience.

Arriving at the Coca Cola bus station in San Jose, it was a short taxi ride to Teatro Nacional. We picked up our tickets and climbed up to the third balcony. We were fortunate to get our tickets at a reduced price through the Atenas School of Music. The concert started at 1030.

Ono Mora, Atenas' very own tenor.

No flash allowed, so it was hard to take a clear photo. The ceiling is completely painted in a mural.

The white panel hanging from the ceiling displays the words to the music, in Spanish of course.

It was amazing to be in this historic theatre listening to a live performance. The orchestra was excellent and, of course, so too were the choir and the invited soloists. Imagine all the people from the past who have sat right where we were sitting.

The concert ended at noon and we started walking towards the Coca Cola bus station, stopping en route at a food fair for lunch. We thought our bus left at 1300 on Sundays but turns out it is 1330. No problem - benches to sit on and people to watch. Cost for one person to ride from San Jose to Atenas: 855 colones or about $1.70 CAD or USD. The buses are very comfortable. Sometimes the driver plays Latin music or has a radio station playing.

There is a fellow who often shows up selling water, pop, snacks and so on and there are no rules against consuming them on the bus - another thing I like about Costa Rica. This guy knows us now and  we get hugs and handshakes - he speaks Spanish, English and French. He always hands us water bottles.

Our bus arrives.

How did the Coca Cola bus station get it's name, you ask? There used to be a Coca Cola bottling facility here, now long gone, but the name remains because navigation in Costa Rica is by landmarks. This is changing in San Jose though - street signs are starting to go up.

Visit to Archivo Nacional

On Thursday of this week, we bused our way to San Jose to pick up our mail at ARCR (Association of Residents of Costa Rica). We decided that every time we do this, we will also combine it with visiting some landmark in San Jose.

This trip, we decided on going to the Archivo Nacional (National Archives) in Zapote because they had an exhibit on of early photos and documents of Costa Rica, dating from as early as perhaps 1853. We took a taxi from Casa Canada to the Archives.  AM Costa Rica, a daily English language news source on line, featured an article on this exhibit and that's how we found out about it.

 It took us a while to get in the door, because we were trying to explain why we were there in terrible Spanish and get past the guard with his Magic Wand. Eventually, they let us in and sent a lovely curator who explained the exhibit to us in English. Embarrassing ....  she apologized for her English which was very good and here we are with just a few words of this country's native language. We tried to apologize to her.

Then we took another taxi to PriceSmart, which is like Costco, only the yearly membership is $30 US, not $50 CAD which is what we paid for our Costco membership in Canada.  I decided to sign us up for this thinking that maybe once a month I would take the bus to the PriceSmart in Alajuela and stock up on basics. Then if I go to the feria in Atenas most Fridays, I could get the perishables (fruit, vegetables, meat, cheese). I think I need to get a wheelie cart though.

This particular PriceSmart in Zapote is huge. We got there just before noon so decided to have lunch at their fast food counter. We both got the two pieces of chicken, fries and drink combo - huge portions - we could easily have split one order. Then off to shop - then I realized they don't provide bags - so whatever we bought had to fit in my small fabric shopping bag.

I was particularly looking for gel ice packs - didn't see them. We did stock up on razor blades, found some local Gouda cheese, saw Hebrew National hot dogs which are supposed to be the best, but decided against them because we had a long ride home and what if they went off.

I found shorts! yahoo! for six dollars U.S. and they fit, only bought one pair but now wish I had bought all the colors offered.

This shocked me: a display of lighted Christmas trees for sale along with kids' gifts. I know Christmas is a big holiday here, but this does seem early.

Then, taxi to the Coco Cola bus depot, bought two bottles of water from our now well known snack vender who recognizes us, and seems to be able to speak Spanish, English and French (he said to us "comment allez vous?") so we think he recognized that we are Canucks.

Here are some photos of the fruit drinks we had in San Jose and of the Archives building.