CR Update April 2007

CR Update April 2007.

Hi everybody
I will be working day shift on a Adult/Geriatric Psych unit at Beth Israel Hospital in the lower east side of Manhattan (1st avenue and 16th street). My first task is to find a place to stay. I am looking for a shared situation under $1000/month so if anyone has any ideas, let me know. My contract is from April 23rd till July 23rd and the plan is for Joe to join me on July 23rd so we can visit our families and friends in the northeast. (I will do some preliminary visiting also and people may want to visit me in NY.) There are still logistics to work out but it seems doable. I am fortunate to stay with Bill and Nancy Kanz, friends from Nosara who live on Long Island, while I get settled.

Joe, of course, would prefer I was in Nosara but there is structure in place for the pub and he is doing well. There are thoughts and beginning plans to start serving food-i.e. fish and chips on Friday. Our friend Andy is a cook and he may be coming back to Nosara for a while to give this a try. Andy also brews so we may finally get our ale. Melissa is our regular bartender and does a good job.

We have some new friends who are staying in our guest house—Dian and Kenny and their kids from San Jose-he is Tico, she is part Tico and part American. They are moving here to start up a security company which is like a private police force. Right now most of their contracts are in the American beach project. We hire one of their guards for pub nights and we like knowing a security professional has greeted people and checked their membership cards before letting them through the gate. The local police, called the rural guard, are not armed, do not have a telephone—only a pay phone outside the office, and do not have much authority. Dian is a great resource for my women’s health group. She knows the system, the language and culture, her mother lives in San Jose and is active in a local humanitarian group. Our group plans to intervene with the young girls to provide education about choices. As one of our members said “they need a YWCA here”—I am continuing to talk with the Peace Corps about getting a volunteer. And there will be fundraising. I spoke with the doctors about getting psychotherapy and counseling referrals and they were encouraging so once I get to NY I will be planning my next chapter in Nosara.

Hopefully for my next post I will have a place to live and will have started my job. Feel free to visit Joe any time. We had rain this past week and the blue skies now have rolling clouds; the other day we had a rainbow where we could see both sides of the arc coming up from the earth. The ocean is warm with regular waves—I went out on my boogie board last week and had a wonderful time.
Stay in touch. Love Joe and Helena