Sunday, January 20, 2008

Luna Llena (full moon) Jam Session

Last night we had a truly unique experience. We heard from a few friends about this thing where people get together at the full moon and have a potluck and sing and play music. It sounded interesting so we thought...sure, why not? It ended up that about 8 of us teachers from our school caravaned up to this house waaaaaaaay up in the hills of Santa Antonio de Escazu (we live in San Rafael de Escazu). When we finally got there and got out of the car the only thing you could see of the house was the glowing copula above the trees. You could also see a beautiful view of the whole San Jose area glowing in the dark below. It was breathtaking. When we got closer to the house we were greeted by a glowing fire-pit and the sound of rock music coming from within. The house was beautiful. It has a 360 degree view of the whole San Jose. The whole house was decorated with amazing artwork. Even the bathroom was done in an artistic style. The sink was a gorgeous wood bowl and there was a niche with spotlighting to show off a giant snail shell fossil. The people there spanned in age from teens to 50s. One woman we talked to had been living in Costa Rica since the 70s. When I said "Oh, so you are practically a Tica" she was very quick to respond that she was an ex-pat and that she wasn't a gringa or a tica. So there we were in the ex-pat world. There were only about 10 people there before we got there and they all seemed like they knew each other well. In fact, when one woman pulled her friend aside to ask "who are these new people?" the other woman responded that we were the "new blood" and without us there would only be "stale blood there". So, we felt welcome after a while. They had one room of the house set up with a buffet table and the adjacent room was the music room. The music room had a drum set, 3 or 4 microphones, a few guitars, a bass, and (most importantly for the majority of us who aren't talented with music or voice) a basket full of bells, tambourines, triangles, maracas, and other noise makers. We were very impressed with the quality of music that was being produced. The genre was mostly older rock and roll with the newest music an occasional song from the 90s. While the talented musicians played in front of us, we had a great time adding percussion with our various instruments and singing along to songs we knew. The party broke up around midnight and when we walked outside the moon was partially covered by a thin layer of clouds that covered the whole sky. The clouds were moving very fast, but instead it looked as if it was the moon moving across the sky at rapid speeds. It was very cool!

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