February 15, 2008

We had our first water meeting of the residents of our development—all 7 of us and John. We have been getting free water since we moved here and John is feeling it is time for all to start paying. His terms are quite reasonable and the system for paying is to give John our money when we see him, maybe quarterly. Once we have a group of 50 people we will form an association with by-laws, procedures, and rules but that is a ways off.

We are watching FOX news tracking the primaries. CNN here is international which we liked at first but stories of Asia and India are less interesting to us than US news—there is something strange about hearing about the American primaries from Hong Kong. We do watch Late Edition with Wolf Blitzer on CNN every Sunday morning. On the movie channels, it is fun watching English movies with Spanish subtitles. Joe was actually able to follow a Korean movie with Spanish subtitles. We also have BBC and some German stations.

Our idyllic life continues. The skies are blue, the temperature is in the 80’s, the water is clean, and the air is pure. I sleep 8-9 hours per night and it is usually a deep restful sleep. We do a minimum amount of work which is plenty and have plenty of time to ourselves. I am enjoying my work with my woman’s health project which is slowly coming along. Volunteering at the state medical clinic is also great--I practice Spanish and see people up close. And I did my first psych evaluation yesterday—a referral from the primary care doctors.

Our two year anniversary party was a hit--our turnout was about 150, most of whom we knew. Our cook was a little slow—she insisted on making one hamburger at a time and not starting a second one until the first was finished. We are starting to provide food during pub hours (with a different cook)—we tried shish kabobs last night and it went well. Author John Howells called and he wants Joe to write up the pub for the next update of his book. “Choose Costa Rica.” John likes the pub and he read Joe’s article in Voice of Nosara—Joe has been getting a lot of good feedback about the article—hope you get a chance to read it on the blog.

We sometimes come up against cultural clashes with the local Ticos, like the time our guard (actually it was our gardener working as a guard) left his young children guarding the gate 1 kilometer down the hill during pub hours while he went to work somewhere else. We have a good relationship with our gardener and his wife but every now and then there are things to work through.

You must visit. The tranquility and the grittines are rejuvenating. I just crossed the river in 12 inches o water . I am starting to make inquiries to get back to the US to work—the hours and the money are there, not here. New York, here I come hopefully in May. Write when you can. Love Helena and Joe