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| I can’t say for sure that the vet lives in the same house he cares for animals, but it is a house! And across the street is David & Corinna’s house where they both live & have language classes as their place of business. In their case, one rent is better than two rents! 🙂 |
From Behind the Big Rock: African Tulip Tree!
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| From behind the big rock at Roca Verde entrance you see the red-orange flowers of our African Tulip Tree. Atenas, Costa Rica |
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| African Tulip Tree Zooming in on another tropical tree that blooms for about one month. Atenas, Costa Rica |
I walk about half a mile up a steep hill to Chef Dan’s house 2 or 3 times a week for one of his gourmet meals for dinner. Monday I had Shrimp Alfredo with side salad and Italian bread. Tonight I walked up the hill for Curry Chicken Salad Wrap with side salad and mango chutney. I eat pretty well most of the time to be living in the rainforests of Central America! 🙂
I begin my ascent at this big rock near the front gate and of course come back by it on my way home for this view. The front side of the rock is often covered in moss, thus the name “green rock” (roca verde).
This big tropical flowering tree is by the guard house at the front gate but you see it better from behind the big rock! It is a native to Africa but planted in many tropical areas including Costa Rica as an ornamental tree. The scientific name is Spathodea campanulata or commonly called African Tulip Tree. What’s really neat about all the tropical trees with beautiful blooms here is that they nearly all bloom in different months, so that we almost always have some tree blooming somewhere in Costa Rica! What will I see next week in the Caribe?
For other blooming trees in Atenas, see my Walking Atenas photo gallery
Or for the whole country, see my larger Flora & Forest photo gallery
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PEAK OF RAINY SEASON
Rainy Season, el invierno, winter, or “Green Season” is at its peak in Central Valley in September and October when we get the most rain, typically 6-8 hours a day, mostly in late afternoon and evening. Great for sleeping! November is the “shoulder” month or when it tapers off and by December no rain for 6 months! Sad to me. I prefer the rainy season! Not only is it greener and cooler, but fewer American tourists! ¡Tranquilo! 🙂
Another interesting phenomenon in rainy season is that while Sep-Oct are the heaviest rains in Central Valley, it is also the time when the Caribbean gets the least amount of rain! Thus I always plan my trips there in Sep-Oct! 🙂 Also note that both coasts are coastal rainforests which get rain year around, even when it is not rainy season here. I would like living there for that but not for the always hot and humid condition of the beaches. (Though the NW corner called Guanacaste is the desert area and pretty dry year around.) So I think the Central Valley is the best place to live with easy access to the whole country and the best overall weather! In fact the PR slogan of Atenas is “el mejor clima del mundo” or “the best weather in the world.”
One realtor’s take on it:
And the Canary Islands also claim the best weather in this interesting video:
But that is the other side of the world! Different continent!
NORMAL! NORMAL! — Mi Aventura Médica
That is what the wonderful young Tico doctor almost shouted to me at the conclusion of my angiogram. Normal! Normal! (Fist Bump!) He seemed as pleased as me that I have no blockages or other problems. Now I will try to summarize my gran “Aventura Médica” as I am calling it. Totally using the national health system which means my only expense was the taxi fares! 🙂
WEDNESDAY, 23 AUGUST
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| Hospital San Rafael de Alajuela Alajuela, Costa Rica |
My friend Jason Quesada goes with me on bus and taxi to Hospital San Rafael de Alajuela for a 1:00 pm appointment for what I thought was going to be paperwork to take with me to the bigger Hospital Mexico in San Jose on Friday though Jason thought I was going to be checked into Hospital Alajuela, which I knew couldn’t be two days before a test. I was wrong again. In short they were full and one day in advance is enough said Lorenzo in Admissions. (See my last post) So he promised me he would have a room the next day because the test was pre-scheduled.
THURSDAY, 24 AUGUST
Jason & I get back there a little before 3;00 pm and wait about 30 minutes to start the process. One of the first things they did before taking a group of us upstairs to our rooms was snap on the usual hospital bracelet with my hospital ID number & name. Note that most Latin Americans use 3 names like mine shone here but with slightly different meanings. Of course the “first name” or “given name” is the same. But what I call a middle name “Everett” would be a Tico’s father’s last name and the one most commonly used for shorter names. My Dr. Hernandez is using his father’s last name as his primary family name. Then the third or last name in a list like this is their mother’s maiden name, which is what some here may think about my last name of “Doggett.”
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| Jason snapped this of me eating soup in hallway. |
We had one delay because my hospital file (started earlier) was lost. 🙂 But they found it and up we went to the fourth floor which includes cardiology. Then we sit in a hallway while that nurses station gets me checked into my room 414 which was really my bed number in a room of 6 old men with heart problems, beds 413-418. We are sitting in a hallway with a TV playing a horrible Mexican Comedy Channel for maybe another 45 minutes. No TV in rooms, so you come out here to watch. They start serving the dinner trays and I get my first hospital dinner in Costa Rica while waiting in the hallway for my room preparation. It is very healthy and mostly tasteless bland! Vegetable/chicken noodle soup, beans & rice, mixed tropical vegetables you Tennesseans wouldn’t recognize, a cold beet and carrot salad, cup of fruit juice, and an apple for dessert. This was typical lunch & dinner with varieties and even a pear instead of an apple the next night. I would recommend those planning on a hospital visit to pack salt, pepper, herbal seasonings, hot sauce, catsup, or whatever you like to give more flavor. 🙂
My roommates were all nice and interesting gentlemen, all speaking Spanish of course. 4 of them were bedridden. One came there after a massive heart attack and the following night or at 1:15 am this morning he had another attack and nearly died while I watched, but was still alive and on machines when I left today, but his son told me he had been given only 30 days to live by one doctor. Another commentary on Costa Rica: almost every bed had a family member sitting in the one chair by each bed. Family First here! And the heart-attack guy is why my angiogram!
They kept working on me to past 8:30 pm with things like blood for tests, shunts for catheters, x-rays and the constant blood pressure checks, etc. It was a very noisy night as was the second night with one roommate talking (hollering) in his sleep, nurses in every hour with whatever services and of course turning on lights, and the hospital has all kinds of buzzers, bells, etc and a PA system for announcements and paging of person, and the very friendly and happy crew at the nurses station, right outside our door, laughing and carrying on all night. If planning on a hospital visit here, I suggest you bring ear plugs! 🙂
And we all wore something like hospital sweats or whatever you call the buttoned shirts and tied pants. The only hospital gown I got was for the surgery room test Friday.
FRIDAY, 25 AUGUST
This was the big day and the part I had the most uncertainty about, cutting into my leg at my crotch and running something up the artery. Ugh. By 5:00 am the nurse was getting me ready with two stents for drips as needed and shaving parts of me, etc. We left a little after 6 am with a crew of 4 in an ambulance for the normally 21 minute drive to Hospital Mexico, but in rush hour it was probably 30 to 45 minutes (didn’t time it). Most of my attendants were in their 20’s it seemed, the doc maybe 30, a nurse, orderly, and some kind of helper. The driver was very professional as I learned on the return trip.
The ambulance pulled up to a side door of Hospital Mexico and I was rolled into the second room
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| Hospital Mexico San Jose, Costa rica |
where of course I waited at least 30 minutes while the crew enjoyed themselves! The happiest people in the world just love to be together! Laughing, talking, beautiful digital music and occasionally giving me attention. Someone was having this procedure ahead of me and course another gurney rolled in right after me; a regular assembly line! I was surprised at how quick it was having been told from 30 minutes to two hours if a lot of blockage. After he stuck me with the needle for the local anesthesia (the only part that really hurt), I would guess 15 or maybe 20 minutes before he shouted “Normal! Normal!” with a great big smile on his young face. Then gave me a fist bump. Made me feel good! Even though one of the Mexico nurses whispered in my ear in English, “You still need to avoid KFC and cheeseburgers.” We smiled and chuckled at each other.
They quickly rolled me back in the waiting room where the next person was waiting or we traded places. I had to lay real still for 30 minutes before they rolled me out to the ambulance again and another ambulance had just arrived with another angiogram person coming in. Wow! They must like angiograms here! 🙂
BUT THE MOST FUN WAS THE DRIVE BACK to Hospital Alajuela which we did make in 20 minutes because the driver turned on the flashing lights and the siren and use the other loud horns and sounds to weave us through the bumper to bumper traffic on Ruta 1 which goes by the airport and thus heavy traffic all day. It was fun and I’m sure the driver enjoyed it and he did a great job! The Alajuela doctor kept reminding me “Don’t move! Don’t move!” referring specifically to my right leg because that is where they cut into an artery and that is not where you want a rupture or blood coming out. Then the rest of the day and second night was difficult because I had to lay still for 24 hours to help the incision heal and avoid a serious problem. I read on my Kindle and played games, talked a little, ate a little, and had to use a bed urinal, but I survived 24 hours of stillness of at least my right leg. Then another noisy night and a heart attack in front of me, meaning I am very tired now and will go to bed early.
THANK YOU to those of you who sent kind notes and prayed for me. It made a difference! It was a good medical test with a very happy result for a 77 year old with no junk in his arteries! 🙂
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| Keep Walking! Keep Smiling! Pura Vida! |
Grasshopper & ESL Class
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| Grasshopper in my Garden Atenas, Costa Rica |
This is one of more than 11,000 species of grasshoppers in Costa Rica. I have yet found a good source of identification of grasshoppers, thus in my gallery only one has a name.
My Photo Gallery: Other Insects
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AND TRYING TO BE AN ESL TEACHER
I was asked by a friend and English teacher at Colegio Liceo to lead an after-school “club” of 10 students going on a student exchange program for two weeks in the USA, to a Virginia suburb of DC. It is basically a conversational English class or group to help them be able to talk to people better on their trip. Last night was our first weekly hour meeting over the next three months and my neighbor George has agreed to help. He was a 5th-6th grade teacher in Arizona and is ESL Certified. He will have the class by himself Sept. 4 when I’m in the Caribe.
Last night we got introduced and learned the names, grade levels and interests of the 8 students that showed up (Grades 8-11). I had learning games on greetings, travel problem phrases, and restaurant phrases. For many of them their English vocabulary is worse than my Spanish vocabulary (which is minimal), so we quickly learned that we have a long ways to go for them to have normal conversations in the states. I’m creating my own lesson plans by researching online – not easy, but it worked out okay last night! As they left they each got a list of “76 English Phrases for Traveling with Ease,” which they are to study for next week. I also asked them to write down one American/English singer or band they liked to listen to. Next week I will put a piece of masking tape on each kid’s forehead with a singer/band name and they will have to figure out which one they have with yes/no questions. Then we will dive into the travel phrases. That lesson plan is not made yet. Next Monday I will try to get a group photo to share in my blog post.
Never a dull moment! Pura Vida!
More Butterflies!
Surveyor as a Home Business
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| Surveyor He will survey your property, providing different reports Atenas, Costa Rica |
See my photo gallery of Home Business Signs in Atenas
Add-On Business: Phone Minutes
All you need is one to three little signs telling the public you sell their phone minutes:
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| Phone company only, with widest call coverage My cellphone is with kolbi Atenas, Costa Rica |
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| Cellphone AND Dish Television Atenas, Costa Rica |
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| Cellphone AND Dish Television Atenas, Costa Rica |
Most people in Costa Rica have a cellphone and no landline and most simply add minutes every month or whenever they think they are low. It is theoretically cheaper if you don’t talk too much or download too much data. I was required to do that as a newcomer. Later I switched to a monthly plan with an automatic debit of my bill to my local bank account. The easy or lazy way! And I use a different company for my cable TV and Internet WiFi in my house. They also debit my local bank with the monthly bill which again is a real convenience for me!
But if you have a phone with minutes added as needed you can get them at the grocery store or just about any other shop, even a home business. So easy to get a dollar’s worth of minutes just about anywhere! The two phone companies that also sell dish TV sell the TV plans separate from the phone minutes.
See my photo gallery of Home Business Signs in Atenas
Home Businesses: Ropa Americano (interesting phenomenon)
Interesting because nearly all of the home businesses AND store fronts advertising “Ropa Americano” or “American Clothing” are selling used clothing that they buy by the kilo from Goodwill Industries in the states. Goodwill simply has too much clothing for the demand in a rich country, so they sell surpluses to entrepreneurs in other countries. We had this same phenomenon in The Gambia also. It meets a real need for more affordable clothing and especially younger people world-wide like to dress like Americans or what they see on TV and in movies.
And yes, the second photo is a home too. They just took the curtains off the windows in two rooms to give them essentially display windows on a street I regularly walk down to my favorite Supermercado. We have two kinds of clothing store fronts, ones that sell this used clothing and more who sell brand new clothing at much higher prices. The new clothing stores are not all American clothing with lots of Central American manufacturers and even new clothing from the Orient and Europe.
But Goodwill has helped some women maintain successful home businesses that depend more on word of mouth than signs.
See more photos of Atenas in several of my photo galleries.
Orange-chinned Parakeets
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| Orange-chinned Parakeets Roca Verde, Atenas, Costa Rica |
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| Orange-chinned Parakeets Roca Verde, Atenas, Costa Rica |
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| Fly-away Orange-chinned Parakeets Roca Verde, Atenas, Costa Rica |
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| Orange-chinned Parakeets Roca Verde, Atenas, Costa Rica |
These parakeets and some red-lored parrots fly over my house every afternoon going up the mountain, but seldom stop at my house. The Orange-chinned Parakeets did stop briefly today in a tree in my yard and a dead tree across the street. They were in the tops of the trees and very difficult to photograph with little good light. So this is my feeble attempt to capture them.
The orange chin is seldom seen unless in very good light, but I am sure of the ID because of the prominent brown shoulders and the little yellow dash below the shoulder in the bottom photo. Bird ID in bad photos is real detective work! 🙂
My BIRDS Photo Galleries
About Orange-chinned Parakeets on Neotropical Birds website
“A prayer for the wild at heart kept in cages.”
― Tennessee Williams, Stairs to the Roof
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Anyone considering a move to Costa Rica should read this article by someone who decided it was not for them. Why We are Leaving Costa Rica. As I have said before, living here is not for everyone and this is only one example. There are many other reasons people try it and decide it is not for them, like impatience with the slow culture, language, lack of infrastructure, “its not the way we do it back home,” missing family, and many more. But this article relates to something else I have always believed, that life is not about being happy but about having purpose and meaning in life. Only you can determine that and whether living in Costa Rica would help fulfill it. And certainly several long visits here before you make a move would help you find your place, both here and in life!
Cuckoo Eating Nance Berries
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Squirrel Cuckoo
My Gardens, Roca Verde, Atenas, Costa Rica
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| Squirrel Cuckoo My Gardens, Roca Verde, Atenas, Costa Rica |
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| Squirrel Cuckoo My Gardens, Roca Verde, Atenas, Costa Rica |
Another breakfast visitor off my terrace, in the Nance Tree where the yellow berries are ripe. The underside of the long tail is beautiful but this one would never show it. This shot at Cañon Negro Reserve shows it somewhat. And there are other shots in my Costa Rica Birds Photo Gallery though he doesn’t seem to often show off his bright tail.
For more info on this beautiful bird, see Neotropical Birds Overview with a songs recording. The are fairly common from Central America down through the northern portions of South America. They are not on any endangered list.
¡Feliz Dia de Mamá!
Happy Mother’s Day!
A national holiday with almost everything closed today and
most mother’s getting a lot of attention from their families.
15th of August every year! Regardless which day of the week.
The restaurant I ate in today had tables of 8 or 10 honoring Moms.
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| ¡Pura Vida! |