El fines de semana; extented family, Catholicism and haircuts

Well even though it will be Wednesday by the time most of you get this, I thought I'd fill you in on my weekend, it's a fairly typical one in ways and represents alot about culture here.

I left the office a bit later than usual on the Friday night. As I walked home I saw some groups of people gathered outside their homes having mass. Some houses had finished and just a few statues and candles were left outside. I knew that the Catholic church was strong here, there are 40 churches in this village of 10 000, yet every third of fourth house having this construction outside made it even more obvious.

Saturday we left to go to the next big town, which is home to all my extended host family. We dropped the kids off at Grandma's and went to the market. It was fairly similar to the Vic-Market in Melbourne, except there were beggars and guys selling things like lottery tickets and pens wandering around. I tried some green mango with salsa, which was quite good, sort of like an apple with a hint of mango.

Then my host mother and I went to the hairdresser. I had a section in my lonely planet phrase book with phases like "the water is too hot" or "I would like a trim". The salon was a small room off what looked like a large wood shed. Costa Rican women are generally well presented so I was quite confident. As this is a relationship orientated culture, rather than time orientated one, we waited for about 2 hours for our turn. Apparently giving specific times can seem rude. The hairdresser kept saying "Que color!" (what a color!) as she cut my hair.

We left the hairdresser for my and it turned out it wasn't only her who thought my hair was something special. The plan was to walk but we got a taxi because my host mother decided it "wasn't safe for two women alone with my hair to be walking on the street"!

At my host mothers house we had lunch, along with the rest of the extended family. Given the effort in the food and the presence of everyone I thought that it must be some special occasion and it was...family together! After finsihing up there a few hours later, we set off to my host father's parents place for a similiar function. Then we headed home for dinner and some friends came around. The next day after church, some more extended family came to visit. I knew to expect a culture where family was important before I came here, but I never expected to see them every weekend or to be accepted into there family with such warmth. My host grandfather told me that his house was mine also!