Brazil Meets Costa Rica!

Recently, I attended a Brazilian party right in the heart of downtown San Jose, Costa Rica. 

Normal.

In honor of the recent Carnival celebration in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, all of the Brazilian ex-patriates in San Jose gathered together to create their best Carnival themed party. Fortunately, the P.E. teacher at our school is Brazilian so he brought us along for the ride!

What we found when we arrived: lots of wild costumes, loud music, and a lot of dancing. 

One of my favorite parts of the night was when we had a chance to learn the dances to the popular "Samba music". Samba is a very rhythmic type of music that involves a LOT of drumming. 

We also got to see some Capoeira (Brazilian martial arts)! 

Our school hosts a Capoeira class after hours so I was very excited to ACTUALLY know what these Brazilians were up to! 

Last but not least, we also ran into a group of American guys in town for an international futbol tournament. It was weird to have a taste of home in the midst of this culture overload. They were surprisingly pleased to discover that we spoke English!

Unfortunately, I know that speaking English happens to be pretty common around here- a pretty big reason why I'm not fluent in Spanish yet. 

I promise, I'm working on it!

New item added to the bucket list:

Celebrate the real Carnival in Rio!