Piano

What a day today, stressy, like it should NOT be.

However let us not get to deep into this, and have a positive 'note'.

Today we went to a small pianoconcert in local 'Centro Cultural e Historica'. It was for free, it was classic music and a chance to discover some local talents and good music, no downsides!

The concert should have started at 500 PM, however someone did not think about the traffic jam coming from San José to San Ramon, so, we were up for some waiting. A quick walk through the park (lol) and a view on some festivities for 60 years of ICE (national company handling electricity, telephony, internet...) and we were back to the cultural center. Only a few people, 15 I guess were there, but we enjoyed a nice 'intermezzo'. The three artists, winners in the 'Concurso Internacional de Piano, Maria Clara Cullell 2008' gave us lovely interpretations of music of Brahms, Schubert or Rachmanioff. A truly magnificient experience to watch these humble young talents. Thanks to the 'Ticos y Nicas somos hermanos' association these young prolific artists will play around the country.

A great opportunity to meet and listen to these talents, a bit like Belgian 'Queen Elisabeth' Contest. 

The organisation was taking pictures, I'm sure you will see us on the web via the site of San Ramon's cultural centre :-)

Hereby some links:

The contest:

http://www.concursopianocullell.co.cr/

San Ramon Cultural Centre:

www.centrojosefigueres.org

Manny Prado and his Tico roots

Hola,

On the great site of CyclingDirt, you can find an interview with Manny Prado. Tico of origin, he races XC Mountainbike in the US.

My reason to link this up is that I'll make a post next days about BMX culture in Costa Rica, this is a form of cycling which is very popular with youth here, San Ramon youngsters hit the road with budget BMX bikes or decent streeters and like Manny, there are talented cats around!

As soon as the camera is up, I'll post some pics of some bikes, here you find a link to the interview with Manny, great story.

http://www.cyclingdirt.org/videos/coverage/view_video/234756-better-know-a-pro/173019-manny-prado-intro-part-1-of-2

Clara Rojas - book 'Captive'

This is post about an interview I saw recently with Clara Rojas.

Everybody knows the story about Ingrid Bétancourt and her captivity in a FARC camp.

Clara Rojas was her assistant in her election campaign, and also a victim of FARC operations.

I did not know this, and she represented the 'unknown' victim of cruelty to me. A strange feeling occured as I listened to her story, her strength and ideology are amazing.

Her case is special, because she gave birth during her captivity and had to leave her child to strangers due to health problems.

It hit me hard, how much can a person, a mother, suffer, giving birth in those circumstances?

Hereby a link to a French interview with her, about her book 'Captive'.

http://www.rfi.fr/actufr/articles/112/article_80230.asp

Bad blogger :-)

Hey hey,

Well it started off pretty badly, mainly because of a lack of time (strange for an unemployed tourist you can say)...

Running around, spending hours on a bus, in a taxi (efficiency is an akward word in Costa Rica)

Also I have some camera problems, and the items I wanted to post are 'in the camera'.

But here we go, I will leave some posts today.

An easy start.

Hola!

Just decided to start with a blog, mainly because I like to write (duh) and have a lot on my mind lately. Also to report a bit on the life in a latin american country, the do and donts and off course some decent feedback on mountainbiking in Costa Rica.

More to come next days!

A luego, Soulwheeler