| Ruminations
On Good ole Canada |
| Postcard
From Costa Rica |
| by Kevin Barker |
| October
2005
San Jose,
Costa Rica
My apologies
to any readers who waited patiently for my report on Buenos Aires and/or
my definitive profile of renowned realtor and man-about-town in Nicaragua
Larry Hustler. All of that is coming but not right now. Actually in this
issue I need to answer some reader mail that’s been piling up for eons.
But first,
a personal update: Late last September it seemed oddly appropriate for
me to go sit in a Toronto hotel room and get all misty watching curling
on TV. |
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| Not many Canadians
raised outside of Winnipeg (or any Canadians at all) do this after
prolonged periods abroad, but I for one found it an ideal cure for an uncharacteristic
fit of homesickness. You know the commercial on TV where some kid has Tim
Horton coffee sent to him in London where he’s going to college? I can’t
say I agree with this commercialization of Canadianism…but the fact is
I pine for Canada every autumn. I love the flaming colours and the crisp
mornings and the smell of burning leaves in Quebec’s Gatineau Hills.
It’s splendiferous,
unrivaled in the world although New England runs a close second and Russia
undoubtedly has equal variety.
However riveting
the Tim Horton Brier was, I tired quickly with analysis of ‘picks and
rocks’ (does anyone outside of curling ever get this lingo?),
and so surfed to an interview with famed author Peter C. Newman, who seemed
to be agreeing with Austin Powers that the world is now run by ‘damned
dirty apes’. He didn’t put that way (Newman was referring to the ‘new’
New Canadian establishment), but I think he had the same drift. |
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| I was astonished
by his later suggestion that the Rt. Hon. P.E. Trudeau had an ‘icicle
for a heart.’ Pierre certainly was not the emotive type but the untimely
death of his youngest son Sacha in a B.C. avalanche some years ago, followed
shortly after by the senior Trudeau’s own passing, would seem to suggest
that he had grown one late in life, n’est ce pas?
Mailroom. Ron
Rico, a reader, wants to know if he can live in Costa Rica on a fixed income
of $620 a month, about the infamous ‘Devil's Shower’, and healthcare
in general.
Answer: Healthcare
is abundant in terms of government programs.
Expect to pay
about $50 per month for government insurance (called INS), and to
line up for long periods of time if you get sick and need to use the country’s
rather good medical services. |
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Offshore Resources Gallery
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| You may get
private health insurance for substantially more, and the hospitals for
those are like five star hotels. Living in C.R. is doable at $650 per month
if you’re creative.
Example: My
monthly nut is $550 and I live in a furnished three bedroom home, with
a patio, kitchen, wooden floors and secured garage in a small, two-church
town outside Heredia in the Central Valley.
My budget includes
travel, food and prep, laundry, maid service, Spanish lessons, phone, TV,
and electricity. My situation is unique because I live with my Colombian
ex girlfriend and her two sons.
But to be perfectly
frank, Aracelly Brand Duque (to accord my ex her full panoply of names)
is not terribly cooperative with the Spanish lessons since she’s trying
to learn English herself.
The so-called
‘Devil’s Shower’ is in fact an electrical showerhead with an off/on switch
connected by wires to a throw lever on the wall. |
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| It is also
called a ‘suicide shower’ since it uses readily available electricity within
the shower head itself to heat the water that issues forth.
It’s scary
indeed, but I’ve never heard of any resulting electrocutions.
Until next
month, happy travels!
The following
are the previous articles Kevin wrote for the magazine:
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Offshore
Resources Gallery
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Article
Index ~ Costa
Rica Index ~ |
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