Weekend Movies at Paseo de Stella

In Monteverde the weekend essentially begins on Friday about 1230 when the kids get out of school. For the most part, weekends are just lazy time. On Saturday mornings virtually everyone that lives in the area shows up at the school gymnasium for the Feria, or Farmer's Market. I get a cup of Ceviche (cold fish soup) and Cindy buys lots of locally grown fruits and vegetables. Cindy has fallen in love with hydroponic lettuce. This week we also were directed to a lady that lives on a farm that makes homemade peanut butter with no additives or preservatives. And here's the kicker, she has two grandson's living with her for the year and previously they've been living in Tanzania. So I got to have a nice conversation with them about Tanzania and what its like to live there. They are 11 and 9. Two white kids that can speak Swahili. How cool is that?
I've continued to work on fixing up and performing the required maintenance on the Ninja Turtle as it is apparent that there wasn't much maintenance performed by the previous owner. So far I've purchased a new battery, 4 quarts of oil, one headlight, a hydraulic jack and paid for one flat tire to be repaired. Last night I also had my very first experience changing a tire on a rocky dirt road in the middle of a rain storm (the rocky dirt road becomes a muddy ditch). It wasn't fun and I finished the job soaking wet and covered in mud. Living in Monteverde is a little like being back on the sailboat in some ways. If its broken, you've got to fix it. And sometimes fixing it means fixing it at the mercy of bad weather. But some other good news is that yesterday Cindy and I went for a ride even further out into the country to meet a farmer that has a 1974 Land Rover that doesn't run. He is trying to sell the car and might be willing to scrap it for parts. So if something catastrophic happens, I will likely have lots of spare parts right in town that I could get hold of. At any rate, the Ninja Turtle is a big hit with all of the kids and has even illicited a thumbs up and a "Muy bueno coche!" from some adults.
The Ninja Turtle has quickly become the Creativa kids' taxi. Today I had six kids in there for a ride over to Stella's for the Saturday afternoon movie. The movie theater only operates two times per week. It is a movie that normally would appeal to adults on Friday night and a kids movie on Saturday afternoon. In the photo above, the kids are piling out of the Ninja Turtle to watch "Kung Fu Panda".