🌿 Dispatches from the Jungle 🌿

A Queer Expat Blog for the Bold, the Curious, and the Deeply Alive

Welcome to Dispatches from the Jungle — a lifestyle blog at the intersection of queer identity, creative freedom, and midlife reinvention. I’m Waymon Hudson: a late-deafened writer, Broadway musical creator, and marketing futurist living loud in the jungles of Costa Rica.

This isn’t just a blog. It’s a digital campfire — a place for stories about joy, grief, surf sessions, messy growth, and gorgeous resistance. Whether I’m writing about life as a queer expat, the behind-the-scenes of building a Broadway show, or what it’s like to rewire your life at 45, you’ll find it all here. Raw, real, and radically hopeful.

Subscribe to read about:

🌈 LGBTQ+ life in Costa Rica and beyond

📖 Memoir-style reflections on healing, identity & reinvention

🧠 Marketing insights and brand storytelling with soul

🏄 Jungle living, dogs, and imperfect adventures

✨ The creative chaos of art, activism, and starting over

Ready for a blog that doesn’t just inform — but connects, uplifts, and sparks something real?

👉 Subscribe on Substack or explore the latest dispatches below.

🌟 Featured Posts🌟

Miss Addie stands center stage in the Velvet Boot nightclub set, hands raised as she sings with power and vulnerability, surrounded by the queer community she is finally stepping into.

I Carried the Sound: When Broadway Passes the Torch of Legacy

How Miss Addie becomes the Velvet Boot’s new heartbeat... and how queer survival becomes triumph in Broadway's Speakeasy: A New Musical.

Close-up portrait of Waymon Hudson with soft snowflakes in his hair, looking off-camera with a calm, introspective expression. Shot outdoors in winter. Image highlights the emotional, intimate tone of his holiday single “Christmas in the Quiet,” an orchestral ballad about grief and quiet Christmas moments.

🎶 Christmas in the Quiet: The Holiday Song for the Empty Chair

“Christmas in the Quiet” is the holiday song for the years we don’t talk about—the ones filled with memory, grief, and the ache of an empty chair. Here’s the intimate story behind Waymon Hudson’s newest winter ballad.

The Watchers: Broadway’s Anthems of Witness

“The Watchers” is the queer spiritual core of Speakeasy — a sacred Broadway anthem about survival, chosen family, and the power of witnessing each other.

Three friends playing under a massive waterfall in Costa Rica, smiling and throwing peace signs while standing on the rocks.

Building Your Jungle Crew in Costa Rica: How to Make Friends, Find Community, and Actually Live the Pura Vida Life

Costa Rica gives you sunsets and surf… but the real magic? The people. 🌴 From neighbors with fruit to drag shows in San José, here’s how building community in Costa Rica makes expat life joyful, easy, and pura vida.

The Pura Vida Diaries: Costa Rica

Waymon Hudson

Oct 155 min read

Pets in Paradise: Bringing Your Dog or Cat to Costa Rica — and Why You Might Adopt One Here

Pets in Costa Rica are part of the pura vida lifestyle. Bringing your dog or cat is easier than you think — no quarantine for healthy pets from the U.S., Canada, or Europe. Affordable vet care, friendly landlords, and a vibrant rescue scene make this a true pet paradise. I brought one dog with me and adopted three rescues here (Daisy, Rose, and Iris). Here’s everything you need to know about importing pets, living with them, and maybe meeting your next best friend in the jung

The Pura Vida Diaries: Costa Rica

Waymon Hudson

Oct 15 min read

The Dogs, the Jungle, and the Joy: My Costa Rica Queer Expat Life Reboot

What do burnout, a jungle surf town, and three small rescue dogs have in common? They saved my life. This is the story of how I left corporate chaos behind, rebooted my queer joy, and wrote a Broadway musical with parrots screaming in the background.

🏳️‍🌈 Queer Expat Life

Waymon Hudson

Jul 143 min read