by Rod Hughes

Brujas of Escazu, undefeated on their own home pitch, beat Liberia 2-1 yesterday in a match that showed the Guanacaste side unable to put together a coherent attack despite good spirit. (When we say home pitch, we should explain that Escazu has no stadium and that Brujas plays at Cuty Monge Stadium in the southern suburb of Desamparados.)

Not waiting for play to sort itself out, Leandro Gobatto placed an accurate shot into the netting after only five minutes of play. It was not until the second half that William Sunsing was able to tie for Liberia. Gobatto headed in the winning goal from an accurate centering by Paolo Jimenez.
Alajuela-Carmelita 0-0

A surprisingly strong Carmelita side fought a surprisingly dispirited-looking Alajuela to a 0-0 tie.
San Carlos 3, Puntarenas 0

What can we say about the “Bulls of the North” as San Carlos is called? The Ciudad Quesada team from the northernmost canton has taken new life after the advent of head coach Juan Carlos Arguidas, earning 14 of its season 18 points in the last few matches. And only an error of San Carlos’s forward and repeated furious action on the part of Liberia goalie Brian Zamora kept the score from being even more lopsided.

Victor Abelinda drew first blood on a pass from Eddy Salas at 15 minutes, Marcos Mena drew more at minute 76, and Andre Petroni made it a hemorhage at minute 82.
Goals and Assists So Far this Season

Diego Pais of Perez Zeledon has scored most with 10m followed by Andy Furtado of San Carlos with 9 and Victor Nunez with 8. Tirso Guio of Perez Zeledon leads in assits with 8. With such a record, no wonder Perez Zeledon is doing better than expected.

by Rod Hughes

Well, it’s back to the ol’ drawingboard for Costa Rican All-Star coach Hernan Medford after yesterday’s defeat by their Guatemalan under-23-year-old counterparts, 2-1. Tennis, anyone?

No amount of twiddling with the lineup could dispell the impression that Guatemala was playing a pickup crew of amateurs and not a dangerous opponent contending for a Central American place at the next Olympics. Well, it’s only a game, we Tico boosters keep telling ourselves as we prepare to fall on our swords.

It’s early, yet, and Costa Rica, even the senior All-Star team, is always a slow-starter, but the score cannot convey the gap between the skill each team showed on the pitch Sunday. It took all the considerable skills of impressive Tico goalie Daniel Cambronero to avoid a ruinous landslide of goals.

Believe it or not, Guatemala’s Wilson Lanlin scored on a header only after three minutes since the starting whistle. Costa Rica wiped the egg off its face at minute 14 on a goal by Jean Carlos Solorzano generated from a pass by Yeder Balladares. At minute 63, a long-range shot by Guatemala’s Jose Manuel Contreras patted the last shovel full down over the grave of Ticolandia’s hopes for a tie, after Cambonero had staved off numerous attacks.

Costa Rica will play Panama on Nov. 30 and Dec.6 or 9. We’ll be watching. Tico fans are gluttons for punishment.

by Rod Hughes

Costa Rican star forward Paulo Wanchope, 31, stunned the soccer world yesterday by announcing his retirement from the sport that gained him world fame. Most recently, he played with the U.S. Chicago Fire team in Major League Soccer.

Wanchope–called affectionaly “Cho-pay” by his fans in several countries–found his recent times with the Fire a rocky road and was criticized roundly for his performance against New England in a series that knocked Fire out of the MLS playoffs.

He played for Costa Rica in the World Cups of 2002 and 2006 but his greatest successes came in his early years abroad in England playing with Derby Country, West Ham and Manchester City. He started playing with Heredia and also played with Qatar, Spain, Tokyo FC and Rosario Central of Argentina. In this colorful 12-year career, he racked up 71 matches in which he scored a remarkable 45 goals

by Rod Hughes

What is there about Costa Rica that lulls people, even shady people, into being careless as they would never be at home? It must be the laid back friendliness of the locals…

A man from the Dominican Republic that police identified only as Baez was captured by Judicial investigators in a smooth operation made easier by the fact that his front door was unlocked. Yesterday morning, one of his pals made a trip to the store to by the daily bread for Baez and his wife, leaving the door open.

Baez is suspected of defrauding a German, Emil Schnell, of a million dollars on the sale of properties in Heredia and Guapiles. Also arrested were his wife and an employee accused of selling cars registered in Baez’s name, reported the newspaper Al Dia.

Whatever the outcome of the case against them, we can assume that they will always lock the door when they leave home. One can never tell who will come in.

by Rod Hughes

A two-year-old bill to upgrade and augment Costa Rica’s fire hydrants, backed by all the political parties and the Insurance Institute’s fire department, is stalled in congress at number 59 in the list of “must pass” bills. Just to meet minimum needs, the country needs 10,000 fire plugs urgently.

No one denies the seriousness of the situation. First, no governmental agency is in charge of maintaining the current hydrants. Of 616 hydrants in San Jose, exactrly 288 work. Many show unrepaired damage from having been hit by vehicles. Fires in chemical plants last year underscored the need for more. The provinces are even worse off–in Santa Barbara de Heredia, for example, only four exist and half of those do not work. The Nicoya Peninsula town of Hojancha has only two, and that is for the whole canton, not just the town.

Hector Chaves, the country’s fire chief, points out that Christmas is upon us and that the holiday season is disaster waiting to happen, with its Nativity scenes in living rooms, lit by candles and the vulnerable Christmas trees illuminated with often frayed strings of lights.

The bill would authorize funds for the purchase, while charging the Fire Department with periodic inspections. Maintenance would be assigned to A Y A, the water and sewer institute. Despite being a legislative poor relation, approval is assured and opposition to the bill is all but nonexistant. Costa Rica only has 2,500 hydrants and those are antiquated, having been abandoned for 50 years.

by Rod Hughes

He’s at it again! Congressman Oscar Lopez of the miniscule Accessibility without Exclusion Party filed an appeal with the Supreme Court’s Constitutional Chamber challenging the Legislative Assembly directorate’s installation of polarized glass over the visitor’s gallery. Before, protestors could flask placards at the lawmakers. Now, all the legislators see is their own reflection—not an unpleasant prospect for most politicians.

The directorate obviously thought that the deputies had enough trouble concentrating on making or rejecting bills without reading the sometimes rude messages, so the polarized glass was installed. The voters can still hear and see, but the deputies cannot see them now.

Lopez, the sole representative of his party, took exception to the cosmetic change and filed a writ of amparo, an appeal used to block execution of an official action that is arbitrary and misuses authority. Lopez charged that the glass interferred with the public’s access to public sessions. But the judges did not see it that way, rejecting the challenge without comment.

This is the same congressional loose cannon who warned listeners of a provincial radio station that if the free trade pact with the United States passed, the inidiginous residents of far rural areas might disappear because of a trade in transplantable organs. He also blocked a much-needed immigration bill because he felt the Legislative Assembly ignored a similar, but less complete, bill he had submitted.

Nor is he easily dissuaded by the court’s rebuff. He filed an appeal of unconstitutionality with the court last week. On one point, the court will undoubtedly agree: Lopez is a polarizing person

by Rod Hughes

Representatives of 38 countries are meeting here to discuss ways and means of promoting sustainable commercial fishing and reducing the numbers of marine turtles and seabirds killed by current practices. And it comes, ironically, almost simultatiously with the release in U.,S. movie theaters of a documentary highly critical of Costa Rica’s lack to fishing regulation.

The documentary, named Sharkwater, harshly depicts Costa Rica as lax in enforcement of anti-shark finning in its waters. The documentary raised cries of pain and rage from local officials who claim that director Rob Stewart used antiquated information in making the film and chortling from environmentalists who have long criticized local officials for largely ignoring the cruel practice despite laws banning it.

The four-day Fourth Annual International Fishers’ Forum began Monday in the Pacific port of Puntarenas and includes a tour of the nearby Gulf of Nicoya and dozens of panel discussions and presentations.

In his opening speech Monday, Jim Leape, president of the World Wildlife Fund said the world’s fisheries are in a “state of crisis,” reported the English-language weekly The Tico Times. “At current rates, we will exhaust our commercial fisheries by the middle of this century,” he stated.

Carlos Villalobos, head of the Costa Rican Fisheries Institute, was not letting the doucmentary curb his rhetoric. Calling for unity to cure the problems, he said, “We’re in an historic position to curb our impact on the oceans and to guarantee the sustainable use of our resources,” he said, adding, “Costa Rica is proud to be a part of this movement.”

The documentary Sharkwater opens in 10 theaters in this country Nov. 23. Consult The Tico Times for times and theater locations.

by Rod Hughes

Due to obsolete bus routing, the percentage of the population commuting by public transit has declined in the past 13 years, according to a report published today in the newspaper La Nacion.

The result is increased traffic glut and pollution resulting from any more vehicle on the roads and streets, especially in the metropolitan area. In 2003, private cars numbered 730,000. Currently, it numbers around 900,000 and is climbing.

The numbers turned up in an European Union-financed study of 14,000 households asked about their communiting habits and needs are clear. In 1994, 66% of the population communted aboard buses while only 18% drove. This year, 54% of the people used buses while the number of those using private vehicles zoomed to 31%.

Experts say the villain in this proliferation of traffic and pollution are the antiquated routes that gather up bus passengers from suburbs and dump them in central San Jose where they must trek to another bus stop and board another bus to continue their journey, because of the lack of inter-suburban transport.

The newspaper uses the example of the large number of Moravia residents who must journey to downtown San Jose in order to get to their jobs in the industrial area of Barreal de Heredia. Study coordinator Timas Martinez points out that since 1994, large populations have shifted into new housing developments in suburban areas, changing communting patterns.

The bus is still the cheapest way to go, averaging 31 U.S. cents per trip as opposed to $1.50 for the same distance, and no doubt more people would use that service if it were more convenient. As it stands now, it often is not even feasible for the worker and is, at best, exhausting.

A bright spot in this is the possiblity of expanding train service which links downtown San Jose with Heredia and takes but 25 minutes terminal to terminal. One would hope this study will serve the Ministry of Transport as a goad to study and implement new routes tailored to commuter needs.

If the price of petroleum continues to rise, the demand for more and better public transport will grow.

13/11/7

In 3 days, I will have been here for two years exactly. When I first traveled the Punta Morales road, it was quite rough. It was asphalt, but it had many potholes, and certain sections required very slow driving, and much caution. On a rainy night you couldn’t see the potholes to avoid them, and needed to drive very slowly. There is a large dock at the end of the road. Tractor trailers carry sugar to a large, like two football fields worth of warehouse, and ethanol to large tanks for storage. When these are full, boats come and empty them, taking the product for export to other countries. It is actually a deeper dock than Puntarenas or Puerto Caldera. Because of this the road was repaired every year at the start of the dry season. Then, in May, when the rain started, the deterioration began anew. This year, there will be no repairs. We have a new road! The whole thing has been paved over the last two months, and we have a beautiful, well built road. Everything was done to very high standards, shoulder work first, good base, sections completely removed when necessary. Excellent work. I am looking forward to smooth driving for a long time to come.
On the subject of roads, all the papers contain complaints about the roads in Costa Rica. It is a topic of conversation among Ticos and tourists alike. The government claims to be fixing them up as best they can, and more money is allotted each year in the budget to repair them. I have to say that from what I have seen, the government is doing well. They are constantly working on the main highway, and sideroads are also receiving new gravel and grading. The story is that the Inter-American Highway is better between Mexico and Costa Rica, and again better in Panama. Why is Costa Rica’s section in worse condition than these other countries’? Also I have been on terrible stretches of roads, and believe the stories of the people living in other areas that say the roads are almost impassible. However, all in all, I believe the government is working hard on improving these conditions.
I received a comment about my house today. It included a compliment on the appearance, a request for more photos, and a question about the process. The paper part of the process varies from province to province, and as I said before, Puntarenas seems to be the worst. We were delayed repeatedly by people who seemed to think they should be given money to speed things up. Because of this, it took two months to get the permit.
The building process is very different from Canada. In Canada, the building code specifies such things as depth of footings, to prevent frost heaving, and strength of trusses to handle snow load. In Costa Rica, the main concern is earth movement. Of course, there are the earthquakes, but in this area, we also have a problem because half the year is wet, and half of it is dry. My house is built on clay. It expands and contracts from one season to the next. To counter these problems, they use a technique that includes a wide concrete footing with a structure of rebar enclosed. This is not just like a ring of rebar, but long cages composed of four pieces of rebar, wrapped regularly with more rebar. This is all connected to columns, again concrete with long cages of rebar enclosed. The block is laid before these vertical columns are poured. Once the walls are in, and this technique is used on all the interior walls as well, the columns are connected to more cages of rebar that form a crown above all the walls, and again concrete poured to make one complete piece of reinforced concrete that includes the footings, walls, and crown. They even left pins of rebar coming out from the walls to connect the wire mesh that reinforces the poured concrete floors. Basically, the house is one piece of reinforced concrete, with allowance for some movement in the walls between the blocks and columns without losing strength or structural integrity. The roof is built with galvanized steel trusses and an anodized zinc roof. Strong, and durable to resist corrosion due to the salt air.
The interior walls are parged, or coated with very thin layers. One layer fine concrete, one layer finer concrete, one layer bondex, two coats of pasta, a coat of sealer, and two coats of paint. I can’t believe how smooth they turned out. The ceilings are drywalled with gypsum. This technique is very new here, and there work with that at the other job I looked at really impressed me. They did an octagonal recess in the center of the ceiling that makes it look pretty fancy, or, as they say, “elegante”. The walls in the bathrooms have ceramic tiles, and they stuccoed the walls of the laundry room, to withstand the moisture better.
The exterior walls are parged with two thin coats of concrete, the second finer than the first. A fine coat of stucco is then applied to finish it. In Canada, a metal lath is attached to the concrete before the stucco is applied, and then the coat of stucco is fairly thick. Before the advent of acrylic stucco, most walls had a problem with the stucco falling off. The big problem in Canada being that if a little moisture worked it’s way in between the stucco and the blocks, the stucco would peel when the water froze in winter. Of course, we don’t have that problem here, but I believe the very thin coat they used will reduce the susceptibility of the stucco to peel for whatever reason.
I didn’t understand the technique, until I saw it. Now that I see the process finished, I have a lot of confidence that the house will withstand ground movement, wind, rain, or anything else that might normally occur. Of course, I know nature can be tougher than any structure, and a major earthquake would no doubt cause some damage, but I am confident that at least the normal passage of time and elements will be withstood for many years to come. These fellows have done good quality work, and exceeded my expectations in many areas.
The electrical systems in Costa Rica are notoriously poor. Many fires are traced back to the electrical systems. They use a two wire, no ground, spider system. The wires are run around inside the ceiling and where an outlet or light is needed, they drop two wires down and hook them up. Often a whole house is wired to three or four breakers. Carlos used a three wire, North American system with a ground bar sunk at the meter, and another at the house. All connections are enclosed in junction boxes, and all wires run through conduit. The electrical code of Costa Rica has been updated to match the American code, but the electricians are not up to date yet. Carlos is.
Very few people here have hot and cold running water. They have techniques for washing clothes and dishes in cold water, and if you want hot showers, you install an electric shower head that heats the water as it passes over two contacts. That’s what we have in the old house. We have a hot water tank in the new house, and everything there will be “normal”.
I have no aesthetic values, but I must add that Carlos says the colour schemes that Linda picked for the paint and ceramic tiles go very well together. Everyone says the house looks beautiful. I’m sure it does, but my concern was the workmanship. I think everyone is going to be very pleased with the results.
I will try to add a picture that shows the rebar technique.

Manuel Valdes
Tico Times Staff

Brazil’s massive production and Costa Rica entering the Chinese market are some of the topics expected to be analyzed in this week’s International Coffee Week in San José.

The annual gathering – in its 21 st year – of coffee producers and buyers from various countries, along with government officials and experts, kicks off Thursday. It will feature panels and lectures on the issues surrounding the business, and all the while Costa Rica will get a chance to show off its product.

More than 400 individuals and entities are expected to attend, said Carlos Alfaro, president of the International Coffee Week Association (SINTERCAFE), the organization in charge of the event, at a press conference yesterday morning.

Costa Rican coffee production is on an upswing this year after several lackluster seasons, with 2.6 million fanegas (a unit of measure equal to 256 kilograms) expected to be harvested. However, that’s still 30% lower than seven years ago, and the estimate is not counting possible damage to crops caused by heavy rains these past few months, said Ramón Ulate, president of the board of directors at the National Coffee Institute (ICAFE).

Meanwhile, production in Brazil and Asia has recently skyrocketed, with the South American giant and Vietnam recording their biggest harvests this year, Alfaro said.

Domestically, labor shortage remains a concern. ICAFE still predicts Costa Rica will lack 10,000 temporary workers this season.

Also, officials from ICAFE visited China two months ago to explore possibilities in that country. When asked about cultural differences, officials acknowledged China remains a tea country, but their efforts are focused on young people and executives in large metropolitan areas such as Shanghai who are more likely to drink coffee.

The conference ends Sunday.