Lulling Germany into a False State of Security

Folks,

I'm writing this from our bungalow in a hotel in Manuel Antonio, where we're having a great break with Jack's niece and her boyfriend. And my phrase of the week for students is that ' Costa Rica is lulling Germany into a false sense of security' because of their dismal World Cup warm up.

World Cup build-up
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Expectations for Friday's opening World Cup match against Germany are definitely dampened following a very poor warm up campaign by the Costa Rican team. They had been beaten by Catalonia, and now this week it was the turn of Czech Republic (1-0) and the Ukraine (4-0) to humble the team. Still, everyone is looking forward to Friday. We're still not sure where we'll watch the match Friday morning. The school is showing it on a big screen in the dance room, but there may be other options to explore.

Visitors
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Jack's niece Nicole and her boyfriend Ronan are visiting us at the moment. They arrived last Sunday night and it's been great once again to have people staying from home. They have hired a car and headed off for the Arenal volcano on Wednesday, staying in a tree house hotel which sounds so interesting. They were back then on Friday.

I was working on Saturday, but they headed off with Jack to the Poás volcano which is not too far from where we live, but awkward to get to. The joys of a hired car. They had a great day at the beautiful volcano with its lake in the crater, and then they went to the nearby La Paz waterfall and butterfly garden.

We went into San José for a meal last night, and drove down here to Manuel Antonio today. We had tried to phone ahead to book a hotel myself and Jack had stayed in before, but couldn't get them. When it got here it was booked, which was a stroke of luck, because we've come to the place my mother stayed, Hotel Vela Bar, and we've got a fantastic bungalow. It's like a large apartment with two bathrooms, two bedrooms, a kitchen and living area. There's a terrace outside Nicole and Ronan's room, and I'm now out on the veranda having a beer while they've nipped off to the supermarket.

Baby shower
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One of the big celebrations in a workplace in Costa Rica is a baby shower before co-workers go out on maternity leave. There are currently 4 pregnant women, all on the admin side, who are pregnant, with 5 babies due between them. It was so funny. It was, not surprisingly, an overwhelmingly female affair. I think there were seven guys and over 30 women. Hormones were very much in evidence, and when the (quite impressive) presents were given, all of them were in floods of tears. I wasn't far off it myself.

Prices
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We're arriving in Ireland on July 3rd, and we're already gearing ourselves up for the prices. It's going to be so expensive holidaying on Tico wages. We went for a meal with Nicole and Ronan in one of Heredia's plushest restaurants, Oporto, on Friday. It's really nice. We had a meal for four, with all of us having starters and main courses, which also included a bottle of a lovely Argentinean wine, a glass of white wine, coke and a latte. The total, including service and tax, was C35,320, or under €14 per head!
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Well, that's it for another week. The others have just arrived back, and we're going to go into El Avión, the restaurant in and around an old airplane for our meal tonight. We're really looking forward to the match on Friday. So, until next week.

Pura Vida

Éamon