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San José, Costa Rica, Monday, Oct. 30, 2006, Vol. 6, No. 215

Policemen watch the perimeter while fire investigators check the station where two children died Saturday in Escazú centro. The boy and girl were in the back seat of the white car.

A.M. Costa Rica photos/José Pablo Ramírez Vindas

She thought that her two children were buckled up safely

By José Pablo Ramírez Vindas
of the A.M. Costa Rica staff

What could be more horrible for a mother than to see her children die in flames just out of her reach.

That's what happened Saturday under a clear blue sky in Escazú centro. Motor vehicles were lined up at the Shell service station as their drivers anticipated beach trips or shopping excursions.

Among them was the two-door Hyundai Excel operated by Loriana Umaña Marín. Her children, Nicole Loriana González Umaña, 14, and Andre González Umaña, 5, were safely buckled into the rear seat when she approached the station building to pay for her gasoline purchase.

At the same time, preliminary reports say, a station attendant decided to change a fuel filter on one of the gasoline dispensing pumps. Something went wrong and gasoline continued to flow when the filter — which looks very much like an oil filter in an automobile — was removed from its fittings.

The Ministerio de Ambiente y Energía and Shell have launched investigations to find out why an automatic cutoff that is supposed to stop the flow did not work.

A witness, Gerardo Porras Solís, said he was putting gasoline into his Nissan when he saw the fluid pour out of the pump mechanism like a fountain.

Porras said a policeman ran by telling all the stations customers to flee because the gasoline was going to explode. Then there was a small explosion, he said.

Porras got out of the way, as did his fellow occupant, Jeffry Mora Salazar, who had to crawl through the window of a locked car door to flee.

Mrs. Umaña, screaming, ran to her car containing her children, according to witnesses. But the youngsters had trouble leaving the vehicle because they were held by seat belts. The car already was in flames. A larger explosion shook the station.

Jeffry Mora Salazar
. . . dove out car window

Gerardo Porras Solís
. . . it was a fountain

Mrs. Umaña later went to the hospital with burns. A merchant at a nearby storefront who tried to help the woman reported there was nothing he could do either. Three others were treated for burns.

Two patrol cars were among those incinerated by the 9 a.m. blaze. Some motorists were able to drive their car away before flames got to them.

The children were buried Sunday from a church in El Carmen de Escazú. Classmates of the young Nicole turned out, many dressed in school uniforms. A procession of hundreds followed the hearse carrying the identical white caskets to their resting place.

Meanwhile, the charred service station, surrounded by yellow plastic police tape has become a local attraction, and hundreds stopped to see the site of the tragedy Saturday afternoon and Sunday.

A policeman stands guard, and some visitors leave flowers in memory of the children.

The location is about two blocks east of the Catholic church in Escazú centro.

The problem of being all wrapped up with no place to think

Estar ingrido

Explaining this expression will take a little more then just a simple translation. Literally, estar ingrido means to be concentrated, but not in the sense of frozen orange juice or condensed milk. Rather this expression means to be so absorbed by something, or so “taken in” by it that one is oblivious to everything else around him.

A person might say, for example, “I was so taken (estuve ingrido) by the beauty of the roses that I didn’t even notice it had started to rain.” Or, “he was so engrossed (estuvo ingrido) in gazing at the ocean from the escarpment at Manuel Antonio that he tripped and tumbled halfway down the ridge.” Actually, this is exactly how a friend of mine fell and broke his leg!

Ingrido also has a narcissistic connotation in that it can be used to refer to the person who cannot pass by a mirror or plate glass window without checking out his or her reflection, preening a bit, patting their hair or straightening their necktie.

At any rate, the ultimate upshot of all this is to concentrate on something so intently that we lose consciousness of everything else around us. It’s like missing the entire rain forest from staring so fixedly upon a single beautiful orchid.

Ignoring the larger picture can often have the effect of skewing one¹s judgment. Take, for example, CAFTA, the so-called free trade agreement between the United States and Costa Rica.

Last week many thousands of demonstrators took to the streets in San José and other cities across the country to protest the Arias administration¹s apparent single-minded determination to sign the agreement as currently written no matter what.

Whether we agree with the protesters or not, it is time for the government to put aside it’s stubborn resolve to ignore them and seriously consider their objections to this treaty. By the same token, those who object to CAFTA must also take into thoughtful consideration the multiple benefits that a trade agreement with the U.S. could confer on Costa Rica.

The
way we say it

By Daniel Soto

In other words, both sides in this debate estan ingrido. They are so obsessed with their own positions that they are missing the central question that forms the basis of this issue: What is truly the best thing for this little country of ours, and all of its 4.4 million or so inhabitants?

The television set is another thing that captures far too much of too many people’s undivided attention. For some it’s a virtual narcotic! Most of us would do well to better inform ourselves, but this is not likely to happen spending several hours every day adhered to a television screen.

Informing one’s self is an active thing. Most important information about candidates in the up-coming mayoral elections in Costa Rica will doubtless need to be sought out. It¹s not likely to be benignly received by us as we recline in some semi-comatose state before the TV in the living room.

The beautiful youth Narcissus of Greek mythology was so devoted to his own image that he wasted his life away gazing at his reflection in a pool of water. Legend has it that when he died a flower grew up on the spot by the pond where he lay. This lovely blossom now bears his name. Unfortunately, however, so does the neurotic psychological disorder suffered by people who become obsessed with their own person.

Flowers are nice. But obsessions, it would seem, have the potential for landing us in the booby hatch.

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