Tag: rivers

Posted on

Flowing through us . . . + Another Healthcare Adventure

Rio Tortuguero, Tortuguero National Park, Limón, Costa Rica, September 9, 2025, persons unknown. I photographed from another boat that I was on from my lodge, also exploring the river.

¡Pura Vida!

My Latest Public Healthcare Adventure

I now wear hearing aids – a very high quality, made in Denmark. My ENT (with free public healthcare) who is monitoring my head and neck for any possible resurgence of that cancer removed in 2021, also now takes good care of my ears, nose and throat, his specialty. 🙂 When I told him that I could not hear much, if anything, with my left ear, he gave me a hearing test that showed it was sure enough not functioning well and in the process learned that even my right ear was not functioning as good as it could. Radiation Therapy could have possibly caused this, “but don’t worry, we’ll fix it!”

This week I started wearing a hearing aid in each ear, adjusted to fit my needs through the audiologist’s laptop computer. (Everything is computer-related now!) I even have the option of getting the software for my cell phone so I can adjust the volume, etc. myself on my own electronically. I decided to wait a little while before I jump into that technology. 🙂 I seem to stay overwhelmed by technology every day.

The public health hospitals don’t now have audiologists, so they pay a private practice audiologist right here in Atenas to order the hearing aids, fit them to my particular needs (each ear separately). For now I will be seeing him once a month until everything is working smoothly for my hearing and then as often as needed, plus I have his personal phone number I can call any time. And none of this has (or will ever) cost me a penny, thanks to the forward thinking government of Costa Rica.

And I really like the Tico young man who is my audiologist, Leiner Rodriquez, who tried to explain away his German first name as something his mother just liked at that time! 🙂 I look forward to working with him to hear better! It seems like every day I have another reason to be glad that I moved to Cost Rica. 🙂

¡Pura Vida!

Posted on

New Graffiti/Mural at Sports Park

They are replacing all the old graffiti murals that were on this sidewalk wall.
This is first one completed. The whole wall was painted black first, then tags (below),
now this over one of the tags, a turquoise scribble.
Atenas, Costa Rica

For a year or more this is what was in the above spot:

Last year in the same location.

Then early in January these “tags” were painted with the bright turquoise at far right being where the current cartoon mice reside. I hope the other tags are overpainted too. I like the mice!

-o-
Unfortunately we have Polluted Rivers in the “Green” country of Costa Rica too. Click the link for an online English newspaper article prodding the government to do more. Sad for me that this is about the Tarcoles River, the closest birding river for me and of course dangerous for the birds. The Tarcoles has tributaries coming from the big city of San Jose which is one of the problems. Be sure to see the video in the article showing all the plastic bottle caps and other junk found in the stomach of a fish. Shocking!

Posted on

Clean Rivers Needed Everywhere!

Sign on one of the streets I walk on
between my house and downtown.

Roughly translated, the sign in Spanish says in English:

If we want clean rivers, do not pollute.

ADECA is doing a good job in Atenas of helping people be aware of their environment and the individual’s responsibility to not polute which is a problem here like everywhere. I look forward to finding more of these signs around town, maybe for different purposes like the one I shared earlier on Trees.