Let me tell you a little story about the time i almost didn't and then almost did meet the president of Costa Rica.
I had been hearing a rumor for a week or so about a trip some students were going to take to an aqueduct. Now, I always like to keep in mind that often times rumor here is as good as fact since even the facts change every 5 minutes so I made sure to pay attention. In this case the rumor was that the sixth grade class of my school was going to the city's aqueduct to learn about water, which after a few days changed, becoming that the students in our dance troupe were going to the aqueducts to dance. One day before the event in question, I was with Morgan, another volunteer, who got a very excited call from her husband; the president of Costa Rica was coming to their town the next day and the choir he'd organized was going to perform for her. I kinda laughed about the fact that the president of Costa Rica just shows up randomly at places here, then went home to tell the story to my host mom. Her response was, "Oh yeah. That's why we're going to the aqueducts tomorrow so the kids can dance for her." This tells me, and you the reader, two very important things about my host mom: the idea that her daughter will meet the president isn't that exciting to her and that she feels no compulsion to share juicy gossip with me.
As sad as the second point might make me, and as much as it may hamper my ability to do my job (see rumor as fact above), what really struck me was the first point. When her granddaughter got home I asked her about it, mainly to make sure the truth hadn't changed since Gladys left the school a few hours ago. She confirmed it but was equally uninterested in the fact that in less than 24 hrs she would be meeting the leader of her country. In perspective, imagine you learned that you would personally be performing for Obama. And not in a highly scripted mass event but in a tent about the size of a two bedroom house, and your group would be the only one performing for him. Now whatever your politics, the fact that you were gonna meet the president i'm guessing means you'd be psyched at least about the ability to brag to everyone you know about how you one-uped them on 'Guess what Celebrity i've Met'. This girl, and all the kids I later talked to it about couldn't have cared less. I find this to be a really interesting symptom of Costa Rican society. So many meetings that were set in stone can change based on chance (see rumor as fact above) that the fact that you're meeting the most famous person in your country is just another strange thing that happened to you. Also, the country's so small that the president coming to our particular city to watch our particular dance group actually can happen seemingly by random chance. In the States, people are excited even to be in the same state as someone famous, and because there are so many of us, we would never just bump into anyone worth noting (which is why we even play Guess what Celebrity i've Met). Here a woman who leaves the house roughly 4 hrs a week can find herself shaking the hand of the president. The very fact that this could happen with no effort on her part probably suggests to her that it's not that rare and special an event.
Now, while integration into Costa Rican culture is very important to me, I must admit I didn't do that good of a job of it that day. Had I been integrated, based on the average reaction I saw, I probably would have learned this bit of knowledge, shook my head and then made dinner. As it was, I squealed and squirmed in excitement for nearly twenty minutes then fell into an all encompassing funk trying to figure out how I would in less than 12 hours convince someone to let me go. I say funk because when I asked Dona Gladys if she was going she responded that no one but the students would be able to go as it was on the outskirts of town and had to be traveled to in a rented bus. And, as further proof of my american strangeness at worrying about this, mentioned that after all did it really matter? If she went she wouldn't be able to sweep the floor that day so it was probably better that she sat this one out.
The big day came, as days are wont to come, and still deeply ensconced in my funk I made my way to the school. Here I should explain my strategy. I make up for the fact that many adults don't know what to do with me by hanging out with kids who don't seem to yet grasp that life can be complicated. I got to the school and promptly got swarmed by kids first asking if I had my camera with me (my camera is a large part of my appeal) and when I said yes, telling me that I absolutely had to come with them to the aqueduct. Not to see the president mind you, but because they wanted to take pictures of the big tanks of water. Surprisingly, most of the adults were also more interested in the water than the president. Priorities tend to shift, I suppose, when water becomes less of a certainty. Just like using old injuries to predict the weather, people use all sorts of indications including the squeaking of a parrot or the water pressure of a shower to try and predict when the water would cut out so they could fill up as many buckets as possible to hold them over. The fact that the city hold large buckets of water in reserve just like them probably does more than anything else to install confidence in government.
My attendance being a certainty now that the kids were in my corner, I went about trying to get myself in a car. I finally ended up with the school's music teacher who had earlier in the year become the school's dance teacher and who in conversation with her I learned was more upset about the school band coming in second in the regional music competition than excited about her classes performance that morning. We got to the aqueducts before the bus and so had time to park and pull out all the outfits and music player before being swarmed by kids. Making our way to the tent we quickly went about setting up for the performance. Sweaty men in shirts unbuttoned to their belly button ambled by, workers from the aqueduct who had a half day so they could come to the festivity. It was a rowdy crowd between the sweaty chested men, frantic teachers and kids trying to jump into the water tanks since they resembled swimming pools. The only group not represented in the crowd was any sort of security whatsoever. Not once was I asked by anyone there who I was or what my business was. The aqueduct opened onto the Pan-american highway and it looked like the most distinguishing requirement for entrance seemed to be the desire to walk uphill to the front gate. Upon her arrival the President was escorted around by two assistants, although neither of them looked particularly imposing and one seemed to exist only to open doors for her and help her get out of the car without rolling her ankle on the pebbled driveway. It seemed the only sort of background checks that were being performed was a head count in order to know how many McDonalds burgers to bring back for the kids.
Now when I say upon her arrival, you may believe that the event waited for her to arrive to begin. It didn't. The whole production in a nutshell had the itinerary: 1) Have adorable children dance awkwardly. 2) Give a 2 hr speech about water conservation. 3) Eat hamburgers. I was there of course because of my school's participation in event number one which had been sold to my school as "teach kids about being proud of their accomplishments by letting them perform for someone famous." While in my wildest dreams I believe I'll be famous one day, I don't think I count. After we were told the president would be roughly 2 hours late to the event (an event that would have taken 2.5 hours) the director directed us to have the children perform so as to entertain the distinguished water people for the next two hours. By the time the president showed up, the kids were danced out and consorted to hanging out and trying to take pictures of bald mens heads with my camera. Our distinguished guest's appearance was actually the least noticable part of the day. Arriving in a cadillac, shaking hands with my host mom and trying not to yawn while learning about the different dimensions of a drainage pipe, Laura Chinchilla acted just like any other figure in the crowd. I got a kid to take a picture of her for my personal collection and she left, all without me even feeling as touched by greatness as when the stripper cowboys came to my mall for a fashion show.
And so that is how I nearly didn't, then nearly did, then ended up throughly nonplussed about meeting the president of Costa Rica.
Or maybe im just secretly seething with jealousy that Jerred got to serenade her.
