Matrimonio, Pura Vida style

The competition for a $150 engagement shoot began to turn ugly on Friday night. I was really upset by some accusations an anonymous person made about my photography and the contest being fixed. It was really irritating. Terry and I have not campaigned since then. We enjoyed our weekend and watched couple #2 take the lead and pull away.

Thank you so much for your support!!! It was a really fun contest for a while there because of all the support and well wishes we were receiving. You all ROCK! The lame bridezilla competition part was the only part that did not rock.

Please vote for us. We are in a contest to win an engagement picture session. We are couple #3.

Here is the link.

Terry and I are finalist for a photographer’s engagement picture give-away. The voting on her site begins on Thursday. I had to write a little back story about us. This is what I posted in case any of you are interested.

We were both new to Miami and met in October 2004 on Craigslist.org through “Housing-Apartments for Rent.” He did not get the place because of my other roomate’s decision (they would have shared a bathroom and she wanted someone with more muscles). I am glad, dating a roomate would be weird for me. We then met in November 2004 through “For Sale – Tickets.” I wanted a ticket to go to a show by myself and he turned out to be the anonymous poster with an extra ticket to offer. He did not hold a grudge over the apartment and offered to drive since he knew where I lived. We talked to each other for hours, had a casual dinner at Pizza Rustica, and saw an amazing Kraftwerk show. We consider that night of 19 November 2004 our first date even though neither of us were searching for romance. He has been my partner in crime since then.

By the way, Kraftwerk are the founding fathers of electronic music. We had a great time that night and Terry actually asked me to marry him after the show when I said I loved “Autobahn” so much I would want it played at my wedding reception. Seriously, as soon as I said that he said, “Will you marry me?” And we both laughed. Who would have thought we would be planning a wedding two years after that first night?

Watch this clip of the band that brought us together. Another cute thing about this clip is that it was played the month I was born (September 1975).

I hope you all don’t put stuff off until the last minute. Apparently passports are taking longer than normal. About 10 weeks for a normal application and 4 weeks for expedited services. I have no idea how long this delay will last.

Here is the article by the Washington post about it.

We have placed a deposit for some family members recently for our Casa Viva lodging. So YAY! We have that process underway.

Today I wanted to share a photo essay by Colin of the Banana Azul hotel in Puerto Viejo. He took some pictures of the the Bribri indigenous community that inhabits portions of the southern Caribbean coast. I need to preface the pictures of these people by letting you know that Costa Rica hardly has any indigenous communities left. We can talk about the horrors of their eradication at some other time, but you need to realize there are very few left in the country. There is a program called the Bridge that works for the social welfare of these communities by sponsoring children to attend schools and provide them with uniforms and supplies, there is a kitchen that provides nutritional meals several times a week, and it acts as a general safety-net for the community.

One thing that has struck me about the children is how much I think they look like a young version of my father. For those of you that don’t know, my dad is from Panama. It is crazy for me to look at them and think how random it is that we were lucky enough to be born in a country where despite our strained medical system, we really are provided for very well compared to many other countries in the world. I mean U. S. medical care can be vastly improved, but our living conditions are nothing like what the Bribri and many other cultures still live through.

Another odd thing is that while on your trip to our wedding you will generally have no idea that these people exist so closely to us. We are on the beach and they are further back inland in the jungle. Most visitors to the region are clueless that these communities exist.

Bribri photo essay

Please comment on this post. I want to bring in wish list supplies for The Bridge during our visit and possibly organize a volunteer half-day with them or a reforestation project. What do you think of these two ideas?

Check out this link to an article about the Jungle Spa that is near Casa Viva. link

Massages/hr=$60, Facial/hr=$50, Body treatment/hr=$50

Here is the link to the Jungle Spa website. link

In wedding circles Save-the-Dates are known as STDs. The days you give people STDs are great ones for your wedding planning. For non-wedding planning folks this sounds utterly disgusting. We already transmitted our STDs to our families. We still have some lingering, but those are mostly to friends that already know about the wedding. Actually almost everyone has known about the wedding, but we wanted to give folks a reminder that you need to make preparations to come to our shindig.

This is not like a wedding before the days of globalization. Terry and I did not grow up in the same town. Our families do not live near each other. Terry’s sister is getting married in two months and her situation meets this ideal criteria. She is doing a church wedding where people only need to drive across town. Unfortunately we could not have the same experience so we chose Costa Rica because it is a location we love and it is a neutral destination for our guests.

Given that you have found this blog, you have found our website. We have access to work on this venture whenever we want. We will update as often as we feel necessary so that you have all the information you need to make the trip south of the border. I want to use this first post to get you all pumped about the trip. Here is a website for a nearby hotel. It is in Puerto Viejo which is about 10 miles north of our Punta Uva location. On the left-hand side are tips to traveling in the country and a photo-essay of things to do in Punta Uva. If you go to Helpful Links you will be directed to a page with a Tico Links section. That page has so much information including blogs by ex-patriots. Their words can give you an idea of what the country is like. So check out the bananaazul website.

Also contact Terry and I to let us know if you have any questions so far or if you will be coming. We have some housing set aside for some family members, but other people seem like they might be interested as well. We want to secure comfortable housing early for everyone. On your end you also need to make sure you have a valid passport for the trip. And don’t forget to start checking on those airline reservations. Kayak.com has a farewatcher program where they will e-mail you if the fare you are watching for a route comes down in price. Now is a good time to set up for this kind of stuff.

Pura Vida.

Kia

Welcome to Kia and Terry’s Pura Vida wedding blog!