Casas a la venta y en alquiler en Costa Rica | Paradisus Condos / Rohrmoser - Newsletters

Weather: Mixed bag: Some light rains with fair amount of overcast; light breezes.--some sunshine in the mornings.

Ingenious Ticos:  When in the CR equivalent of the IRS last week, a curious thing happened: To get served in order, you pull a number upon arrival and then wait for your number to be called. The numbers are from 1-99. When we arrived we drew 27 and they were serving 86. As the IRS representatives finished their clients and rolled the numbers forward, several times more than one person arrived at the service window.  Each claiming and actually showing the number called. How could this have happened? Answer: when a person arrives, they see the number being served and the number they would get to be in the quay. If they didn't like that, they pulled through all the numbers and drew one just in front of the number being served. Just another example of the culture--if you can get away with it, do it.

Parrot: Vicka flew out of her bird sitting tree and into the house nearby. Scared the living hell out of the occupant. Lita was called to the rescue.

New Construction Project-Pozos:  For the past month, a wall and small building have been under construction along the section of the road linking Santa Ana to Belen. This section is now being called "The Platinum Mile". Last Sunday, signage went up on the wall with a link to a website: www.triotower.com This is to be a 10 story multi use building--commercial space --offices, restaurants, spa, etc. and residential on the upper 5 levels--being a condo hotel with heliport pad on the top. The website implies that when the entire project is finished, there will be more than one tower. This area just doesn't stop growing and the world financial maelstrom doesn't seem to have hit here.  

Traffic: Traffic congestion continues to be a real problem. Certainly this condition is aggravated by the continuous construction works on the autopista (highway) as a result of the upgrading of that artery as part of the new Caldera highway currently under rapid construction. In addition, this is "aguinaldo" month and people are out spending their bonus. Traffic is always bad on Fridays--this past Friday was gridlock chaos as one can only experience in CR.

Brad's Grill: I know George Bradbury and the manager, John Hepner. George opened a sports bar / restaurant in the new Millennium Mall near us. We tried it out on Tuesday.  he group had three hamburgers, two orders of ribs and nachos. All dishes were "good" to "very good" but pricey. The basic burger was $11, ribs $25, and nachos $7. Certainly the place is nice and service was good. We'll go back but I doubt that it will become like the Time Out Tavern has for us--a weekly event. We wish him / them well and feel they will do fine.

Time Out Tavern: The last three weeks, the food has been disappointing. My fish and chips were not great--soggy batter and cold fries and Lita's salmon dishes weren't as good as previously. I switched to their hamburger ($7) and Lita again had their salmon dish. Both were excellent and those who had the fish and chips pronounced them as being back to their previous level of deliciousness. We're glad because we enjoy our gathering.

Villalobos "The Brothers" Case:  In early 2002, I, like a lot of others at the time, placed money with an organization known euphamistically as "The Brothers". This organization had, for the previous 20+ years paid 3% interest monthly on deposits paid in cash. While there were various stories about what they did to be able to pay those rates, no one really knew but I heard so many great stories that public relations specialists couldn't have possibly created. I placed $40K of risk capital with them.Three months later, the company was shut down as a result of a government raid. Various accusations flew back a forth. The government urged investors to launch legal action; other groups urged investors not to arguing that all would be made good. Three of us duly filed charges with the government. Earlier this year, a decision was reached in the case. One of the brothers was found guilty and the other has disappeared.For some reason, the two other investors with whom I filed  (separately but at the same time in the same building) were not on the list of beneficiaries. Why? I and they don't know but my name was there.  Currently a proposal for partial payout has been proposed;  I was actually contacted this week by the government represantative stating this and promising to contact me with the exact proposal which I needed to sign (actually all parties need to sign--this requirement is unlikely to happen since it is likely that some have died, others will have different addressess or contact points, etc. than given in 2002). We'll see. I'm not rushing to spend what I haven't yet recovered.

Re. my assessment of the whole situation: I still have a very healthy level of skepticism that the real story has yet been told.....I have this little voice in the back of my head saying there were dirty hands by those perpatrating the closure and there are some organizations which are unusually silent. Whether it was a ponzi scheme or not, will remain an open question with me until the little voice goes silent.

Brian, Lita, Hugo, irreverent Vicka, the pigeon toed parrot, and the newbies — Chico and Chica.

Jan Kozak, Marketing Manager
Hacienda El Dorado
Rio Oro, Santa Ana
Costa Rica

Web: www.eldoradocostarica.com
E-mail: info@eldoradocostarica.com
MSN: jan.kozak.jr@hotmail.com
Skype: jan.kozak.jr

Tel (US) (+1) 647-477-5825
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