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12-16-2003 9:30am What a sad day. This morning, as I was having my morning coffee the phone rang. I answered the phone and it was Derek's mom. She needed to talk to Derek due to an emergency. His grandfather passed away last night from a heart attack. Now, Derek's parents are trying to get a flight back to the U.S. cutting there vacation short. I know that Derek wishes he could also fly with them but he is not able to. My prayers go to Derek and his family. 12-14-2003 7:35pm I must say that last month was rather eventful. So eventful in fact that I did some serious slacking on the weblog. However, if anybody should take the blame for it it is Kris from Atlanta who came to visit me for Thanksgiving. The whole week that he was here, we did nothing but go out night after night after night. It's a good thing he didn't stay any longer because he was killing. In the end, I think that he had a good time with his first Thanksgiving in Costa Rica. Don't worry Kris, everything that happens in Costa Rica stays in Costa Rica. Which is why, there will be no pictures of you for this entry!!!! On a more personal note, some of my readers know one of the reasons why I came to Costa Rica and an odd yet interesting thing has happeneds in the past few weeks. You see, I met this person who worked in the office next to the old office I used to work at. A chipper and interesting person whom I started talking to. Possible connection but as I found out more about her, I found out that she is half Tica and half Spanish raised in the surrounding areas of Miami. Now I ask the people who know what I'm talking about, does it count? Anyway, the past is the past and let us now talk about December. Work, don't even want to get into it. Those who know me in Costa Rica know what I'm talking about so let us talk about Derek and his parents. Yesterday, Derek's parents Pat and Don arrived in Costa Rica. It was really nice to see them again and they came at a great moment for yesterday was the Light Festival. Starting from the beginning, derek's parent arrived yesterday aroun 1:30pm if I remember correctly. Knowing this in mind, I called Derek from work around 3:30pm to see what they were up to next so we could all go out and catch up on things(I am such a good guy!). I heard in the office about the Festival of Light which is basically a Christmas parade going on in Paseo Colon and thought I would mention it. It must have been fate for they already knew about it since the hotel they are staying it is right of where the parade was going to be held at. Phone conversation over, I bolted out of the office to meet them at our house. I arrived at home just a minute after they had arrived and after a bit of chit-chatting it was time to eat. Italian was the choice for the night and we first tried to go to "La Casa Italia" since it is right next to our house but no luck. The guard tells us that it does not open until 6:00pm. No problem, we catch a cab and head to another Italian restaurant which is right behind the Outlet Mall.
 What a meal I tell you. We head back to the house because I want to make a phone call to Helen tosee if she can join us. Helen says that she gets off work in 30 minutes and she will meet us at Pat and Don's Hotel, the famous, "Grano de Oro" hotel.
While we waited for Helen to show up, Derek and his parents went inside the hotel to see if they could get a last minute tour for Sunday. They were in luck for they were able to catch an all day tour at the Arenal volcano. They wanted me to come but unfortunately, I had to work. Sigh, while I am here typing away on the computer to put the pictures up, they are enjoying a nice diner with a view of the volcano complete with dripping lava after a hard day at the hot springs. We waited for a good 30 minutes and Helen was still a no show. Feeling bad for them, I told them to go up the road and watch the parade and I would wait a little bit longer for Helen. They did just that and I waited another 15 minutes. Still no Helen, so I headed up the road to meet them.
Yes, I do need to work on taking pictures at night for most of the pictures I took did not turn out very well. Should have brought the camcorder as well since it has night vision and a much better zoom.
It's really hard to tell from the few pictures I put on the internet but it was more like a Mardi Grad parade rather then a Christmas parade for they were more Mardi Gras floats and people then Christmas people. Since I was in a festive mood, I decided to get everyone a cheesy yet cool santa hat with blinking Coca-Cola bottles on them. He he he, hope you enjoy the following goofy pictures because they will be the last that you will see of us like that in quite some time. Or at least, I hope...
At the parade, we stayed still for awhile just enjoying the floats, the crowd, the bands and the many other things that went passed us. I was surprised by the number of people that were there. An even nicer thing I noticed was that I did not see people getting drunk. It was more of a family thing and even though some people were drinking, I did not see anybody drinking in excess(even though I'm certain that it did happen but not in an obvious way).
As the parade kept going, it was interesting to note that they were many bands and even cheerleaders that were part of the parade. A surprise for me since it was the first time I noticed either of those since I have been here in Costa Rica. Hum... Not wanting to stay still in one spot, we walked up the road towards the beginning of the parade and at every intersection, we discovered many new fun things. Like grand stands, a stage, TV crews, different types of people at different intersections. It was a nice evening.
The parade was dying down, so we decided to beat the rush and headed towards the hotel. All of a sudden, Derek's cell phone rings and it's Helen apologizing for not being able to meet us at the hotel on time due to the crowd of people. No problem Helen these things happen. Helen told us that she was with some friends at the News Cafe and if we wanted to join us. However, I more or less declined for we wanted to drop Derek's parents off at the hotel and check out the hotel itself. Plus, they had just flown in and were tired and tomorrow was going to be a long day for all of us. Well, that's the story of my life thus far and I'm sticking to what I wrote down. I certainly am not going to go into details as to how Derek and I ended up walking home wearing our Christmas blinking hats since we could not take a taxi or about the bar or two we stopped at on the way home.(Hey, it was a long walk!!!)
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