Juan Santamaría Day

On Sunday, my host mom and I visited Alejuela to celebrate Juan Santamaría Day. Juan Santamaría was a man from Alejuela that helped defend Costa Rica from the invasion of American William Walker during the 1800's. William Walker devastated much of Nicaragua in a quest to aquire slaves to send to the U.S. Knowing they had to protect Costa Rica, Juan Santamaría led the group of barefoot Costa Ricans to defend their country. Okay, enough of the history lesson, let's get to pictures!

In the town square they had speeches from important people, including the Costa Rican President. We didn't get our picture taken with him this time. There was, however, a tent set up for some people to get out of the sun. It was an Texas A&M tent. I doubt they knew what it meant.

Statue of Juan Santamaría in Alejuela.

Parade. They are very different in Costa Rica. It is mostly schools that bring their bands to play. Their bands consist only of percussion instruments. It was also the slowest parade I have ever seen. Really kind of boring, actually. Nonetheless, the streets were absolutely packed with people.

For all of those interested in agriculture, you will enjoy the next part. We took a drive about later that afternoon. At one point, we passed a mango orchard. We are getting very close to mango harvest, and all of the trees are full. This is a pic of the mango trees. Often there were Brahman cattle grazing underneath and eating fallen mangos. Tough life, no?

Mangos hanging on the trees.

Pura Vida,

Billy