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Second news page |
 Click HERE for photo tour of 526 properties for SALE or RENT in Escazú, Ciudad Colón, Santa Ana, Rohrmoser, Curridabat, Heredia and the Pacific Coast. |
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| Costa Rica Expertise Ltd http://crexpertise.com E-mail info@crexpertise.com Tel:506-256-8585 Fax:506-256-7575 |
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| U.S.
Embassy has plans to increase windows By the A.M. Costa Rica staff
The dust will be flying at the U.S. Embassy for at least six months while changes are made to the consular section. An embassy announcement said the external security of the embassy also will be improved. While the work in the consular section is going on, those Costa Ricans seeking visas and those U.S. citizens seeking consular services will conduct their business in a temporary structure, the embassy announcement said. The embassy announcement said that the reason for the construction at the 20-year-old building in Pavas was because the number of visitors is growing, including the number of U.S. citizens who live and visit Costa Rica. However, the embassy has faced constant criticism over the delays in handling appointments for visa applicants. The embassy announcement said that walls would be torn down to build more offices and windows where the public conducts business. Although the work is planned to take place at times when the public is not at the consular section, the embassy announcement said that visitors should be prepared for dust and noise. The announcement said little about the security changes at the embassy, which already is surrounded by a wall and contains devices to prevent the entry of vehicles. This will take 10 months more, the announcement said. Costa Rican team gets tough Germany to start By the A.M. Costa Rica staff
After all their hard work to get into the 2006 World Cup in Germany, it looks as though Costa Rica's national team may make an early exit. They've drawn international powerhouse and host Germany for their first match June 9 in Munich. The Ticos have also drawn Ecuador and Poland, both of which the Sele, as Costa Rica's national team is affectionately called here, is ranked higher. Costa Rica is 21st, Ecuador is 37th, and Poland is just behind the Ticos at 23rd. Germany is only ranked 16th but it's a good bet that the crowd World Cup Stadium in Munich will be just as fired up as the German national team will be for the first match. The world tourney is put on by the Federation Internationale de Football Association According to the official World Cup Web site: “Always expected to shine in FIFA World Cup year, Germany ought to be even more menacing with home advantage this time around. And they will also be confident of starting off on the right foot against Costa Rica, a team with numerous qualities, but evidently a rung below their opponents on the international footballing ladder. Add the fact that there will not be a spare seat in Munich as the hosts feel the force of an entire nation behind them and it is hard to imagine them slipping up.” Poland has traditionally done well against the Germans and the Ecuadorian team, though it won only one World Cup match, against another European team, Croatia in 2002. The Poles have two European teams in their bracket this year and no one is expecting them to be pushovers, said the Web site. The first round is a round-robin with each team in a group playing every other team in its group. The best two teams from each of the eight groups advance. After that, the tournament takes on a single elimination format until the finals. Puntarenas citizens pledge to help cops By the A.M. Costa Rica staff
More than 5,000 Puntarenas residents and local business owners became allies to the Fuerza Pública Saturday, the Ministerio de Gobernación, Policía y Seguridad Pública said. The activity was an effort to involve the public in the effort of policing the streets of that province “With this graduation, we want to make local residents understand that security is not the affair of only the police force. It is an integral theme in which residents also need to involve themselves,” said Juan José Andrade, regional director of the Fuerza Pública in Puntarenas. Communities from the center of the province such as Barranca, Chacarita, El Roble, Aguirre and Paquera among others have been learning the themes of crime prevention for the last few weeks. Instructors of the citizenry put a special emphasis on the actions in conjunction with the police force so that officers can in effect expand their vigilance. The province is a long one that runs all the way to the Panamá border and includes the southern half of the Nicoya Peninsula. Gunmen hold up plant in Pozos de Santa Ana By the A.M. Costa Rica staff
Six hooded gunmen armed with AK-47 rifles surprised four guards at MUCA in Pozos de Santa Ana early Friday morning, made off with 8 million colons ($16,187) and four portable computers, said agents with the Judicial Investigating Organization. MUCA is a bus factory. Once the gunmen had overwhelmed the guards, they managed to break into a safe at the business holding the money and the computers. The total theft was worth some 15 million colons ($30,352), agents said. Fugitive still on loose By the A.M. Costa Rica staff
Police still have not found one or two men who broke out of the La Reforma prison in Alajuela early Saturday. The fugitive is under investigation for a half dozen murders. He is Michael Javier Inglish Alegría, 22, A companion, Charleston Orlando Hernández Thomas, 18, surrendered to police Sunday. Both are from the Limon area. For Inglish, it is his third jail break. In order to escape from the facility, the men had to pass three guard towers and crawl under a fence. |
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| An A.M. Costa Rica editorial When bad things happen, it's best to be candid |
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| When bad things happen,
institutions are judged by how they handle the crisis. On a scale of 1 to 10, Costa Rica gets a zero for its handling of the closing of Parque Nacional Corcovado. The director of the conservation district ordered the park closed Saturday, Dec. 3, but there was no public notice given. A.M. Costa Rica readers did not find out until Tuesday afternoon. Spanish speakers may have learned Thursday when an article appeared in La Nación. The park is one of the crown jewels of nature in Costa Rica. Tourists are justifiable unhappy that they had no warning. Some probably are still headed here with plans to visit or stay in the park, unaware that it is closed at least through Dec. 20. The reason, of course, is the strange and massive die-off of wildlife there. The cause still is a mystery. |
The order closing the
park was copied to a number of agencies,
including Ambiente y Energía and Turismo. Each has a well-paid
professional staff of communicators who did not communicate. Certainly there is a fear in the Osa Peninsular surrounding the park that the closure would hurt tourism. Which is better: Tourists who come and are really unhappy because the park is closed or tourists who are told ahead of time and make alternative plans? Even Thursday morning tour agencies were calling A.M. Costa Rica to find out the story. The grand prize goes to the official who said Wednesday that the park closure had not harmed tourism. Of course not. No one knew about it, and tourists continued to arrive. But don't expect them to come back. |
| The words and traditions of a Merry Christmas here |
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| ¡Felices
Pascuas! Felices Pascuas is not really a dicho at all, but I thought it would be a good idea to write a column about the special expressions we use and the traditions we practice during the holiday season in Costa Rica. Felices Pascuas means “Merry Christmas.” Feliz Navidad is the way of saying Merry Christmas that is probably better known among non-Spanish speakers perhaps because it is the title of a Christmas song made famous in a recording by José Feliciano in the late 1960s. We also call Christmas Day el dia del Niño or “the day of the child,” meaning, of course, the day of the baby Jesus. The word pascua of course refers to “the lamb,” which is the symbol of Christ the Savior. Our Christmas customs in Latin America mostly come from traditions as practiced in Spain. One such tradition, however, that didn’t quite make it intact from European Spain to her former American colonies is the custom of eating lechon jamon, or suckling pig, at Christmastime. This practice undoubtedly arose out of Spanish opposition to Jewish and Muslim tradition, and probably originated in the early 15th century, when Christian Spaniards were busy driving the Moors and the Jews out of Iberia. Although many Costa Rican families may serve pork during the holidays, it is usually of the adult variety. Eating piglets is rather abhorrent to most Latinos, and besides, such “delicacies” are quite expensive. On Dec. 24 the children wait for baby Jesus to be born. It is the Christ child that gives us presents. The presents symbolize the gift of Christ’s love and his sacrifice for us. St. Nicolas is sort of the messenger of Jesus who delivers the presents. Traditionally, after Mass and Christmas Eve dinner the kids go to bed. While they are sleeping St. Nicholas brings the presents and leaves them under the children’s beds. Often parents will wake the children to allow them to play with their new toys. There is a method to this particular “tradition.” Since the adults are often up most of the night Christmas Eve, the hope is that the kids will tire themselves out so completely with the excitement of playing with their presents that they will go back to bed and sleep late into the day on Christmas, thus allowing the adults a modicum of extra rest. But I, of course, being very travieso (naughty or impish), would always get up early anyway and go clambering out of the house in search of my friends. After all, I had to show off my new presents to someone! When we reach adolescence the presents under the bed usually stop. By age 15 my parents were giving us money to spend on whatever we would like for Christmas. Usually we would buy some fancy new clothes to estrenar, to introduce or wear for the first time, on New Year’s Eve. New Year’s Eve is the real party night of the holiday season in Latin America. There is food and drink aplenty and, of course, rivers of champaign for raising many toasts. At the sumptuous New Year’s |
Like Christmas, we always celebrate New Year’s with family.
But unlike
the preceding holiday when most people stay in, after midnight on New
Year’s many people go out reveling. The atmosphere at Zapote is festive, to say the least, and
some
folks have a tendency to enjoy themselves perhaps a bit too much. It’s
better to go there by taxi, as the traffic crunch is often fierce. |
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| Woman candidate in Chile will face foe in runoff vote |
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By the A.M. Costa Rica staff
and wire service reports SANTIAGO, Chile — A runoff Jan. 15 is certain between socialist Michelle Bachelet and right wing candidate and billionaire businessman Sebastian Piñera. Ms. Bachelet earned 45.8 percent of the popular vote with returns counted from 84.4 percent of the 5,643,703 votes cast, according to Jorge Correa Sutil, undersecretary of Interior who is in charge of counting the votes. The Jan. 15 election will determine a successor to President Ricardo Lagos, who cannot run again. Ms. Bachelet is a single mother and former defense minister who was tortured during Gen. Augusto Pinochet's dictatorship. She would be Chile's first woman president. Chileans also elected all 120 members of their lower house and 20 out of the country's 38 senators. |
In order to be
president it appears one has to win three times, Ms.
Bachelet told her supporters in her headquarters at the Hotel Plaza San
Francisco. Her party is called Concertación. She meant that she had to win the first round, which she did, and the elections for the parliament and also the Jan. 15 voting. She said that it appears that her party has won a majority in the chamber of deputies and in the senate, allowing her followers to approve the party programs if she wins in January. In the Hotel Crowne Plaza, headquarters of Renovación Nacional, Piñera was joined by Joaquín Lavín, the candidate of Alianza por Chile, who finished third and was out of the runoff with 23.3 percent of the vote. Piñera got 25.7 percent. Lavín said he would offer all his support to Piñera. The fourth candidate, Tomás Hirsch of Pacto Junto Podemos Más, won 5.3 percent of the vote. |
| Two men convicted in murder of U.S. nun in Brazil |
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By the A.M. Costa Rica wire services
BELEM, Brazil — Two Brazilian men have been convicted of killing an American nun who spent decades defending land rights for poor settlers in the Amazon. A jury in this Brazilian city Saturday found the defendants guilty of murdering Sister Dorothy Stang, 73. The man who shot Sister Stang six times was sentenced to 27 years in prison, while his accomplice was sentenced to 17 years. |
Sister Dorothy's
68-year-old brother said the sentences represent justice for his sister
and the poor of the Amazon. But observers say the real test will be if Brazil tries the ranchers who are alleged to have paid the men to kill the nun. Three defendants remain accused of ordering and financing the murder. A Brazilian Senate commission has concluded the crime was part of a wider problem and urged a strong government crackdown on such extra-judicial killings. |
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