Pablo and his horse

Pablo, the gardener at our condo complex, works hard, as I showed yesterday. In talking to him about his life, it became clear that he is proud of his family and his animals, especially this beautiful white horse. I asked if I could drop by his village to see where he lives and to see his horse, and he graciously agreed.

It was perhaps bad manners for me to ask if I could stop by to see his horse, and I would not have risked being too assertive or intrusive if it had not been for my interest in taking photos for this Daily Photo blog. Some readers have left comments asking about typical life for Costa Ricans and some of the people who land on my site from search engines use search terms looking for typical "tico" houses. I therefore decided to see if I could stop by to see Pablo's horse and to see where he lives, even though Costa Ricans are considered to be very friendly people, but they do not typically invite foreigners to their homes.

Pablo lives in a village about 15 km (10 miles) inland from Tamarindo. Costa Ricans in small towns are proud of and retain their ties to a rural, agrarian life style even though tourism, not agriculture, is now the nation's number one industry. Pablo is a good example of this. He works in Tamarindo, a resort area. He worked in a hotel before he became a gardener for our condo building. Although he has a job from the resort industry, he still has two horses and lots of chickens in his small yard around his house. He owns a field just outside his village where his horses can graze in a pasture and he can grow food.

I will show a few more posts about Pablo's horse and village in the days ahead.