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about her days as a member of the Rainbow Family.
People from all parts of the globe looking for more than a
vacation in a resort came to help a family with a simple
life and a need for extra hands. People with off-beat
interests. People who want to do more than just travel,
who want to experience.

Every afternoon when our work was done, we all
pulled together to make lunch. We picked salad fresh from
the garden, fruit from the trees, and prepared galla pinto
(rice and beans, a staple of the Costa Rican diet). Nothing
tasted better than fresh, organic food after a morning of
hard work and no sense of urgency pressing at our minds.
After our work was completed, we were all able to take a
well-deserved shower. I waited for my turn to shower in
the three-walled concrete stall that left me exposed to the
beautiful, endless hills; the scenery was so encapsulating
that it was impossible to notice the lack of hot water and
the lizards scurrying across the showerhead. In this
simple moment of bliss I was relaxed. This is the function
of places like La Iguana for the privileged Westerners
whose usual sense of labor is pushing a gas-powered lawn
mower or emptying the dishwasher; the natural feeling of
manual labor removes the technologies and advancements
in our society that distance us from human nature. I
realized how little I needed in order to be happy.

Something as simple as a shower with three walls could
give me such feelings of joy and contentment.

May through December in Costa Rica are considered
the months of the rainy season; mornings are usually
sunny, but almost exactly around 1 p.m. the showers
begin. This down time was spent sleeping off the
afternoon in a hammock and listening to the rain. We
would often sit around and talk to Uncle Renaldo, who
lived down the road but never seemed to get bored of
testing the volunteers' Spanish and giving them a history

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