(en Español)
by Carol Vlassoff
From the moment she set foot in her friend’s sports fishing boat, Jeannette Pérez fell in love. She sweeps an arm toward her front window, with a view of the Pacific waterfront, directly across the street from her second floor office in a modest Quepos building. “That’s what I loved,” she smiles. “I will never forget my first sailfish. It was the most beautiful thing!”
Fifty year old Pérez also remembers her first taste of Quepos in1989. She had been living in the United States and returned to visit her mother in San José with her ten year old twin sons, Manuel and Carlos. When she was offered a job as manager of Sports Fishing Costa Rica she decided to take a look.
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Filed under: Carol Vlassoff, Personalities in Our Midst on July 17th, 2010
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(en Español)
by Carol Vlassoff
Probably the first thing to strike you when you meet Krissia Rodriguez, General Manager of the largest supermarket in Quepos, Super Mas, is that she looks so young. And she is young – only 31 years old – but she has been working in her father’s store since she was a child.
She laughs as she remembers how she and her sister organized their three month summer vacations: “We agreed to take one month of holiday and spend the other two working in the store. We thought we were working very hard, always begging the cashiers to let us help, but now I realize that we really weren’t.”
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Filed under: Carol Vlassoff, Personalities in Our Midst on June 6th, 2010
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(en Español)
by Carol Vlassoff
It is hard to imagine that the quiet, self-assured person sitting at his posh desk in Manuel Antonio Estates once stood, cold and penniless, on the Trans-Canada Highway on a December night, pinning his hopes on a ride to Vancouver and a new life. That was Richard Lemire, now a respected leader and businessman in the Quepos-Manuel Antonio area, 29 years ago.
Richard remembers what it felt like that night. He had lost all his money at a casino in
Edmonton, including the money he had saved for a car and trip back to Quebec to see his family at Christmas. “I remember being stuck in the mountains in the middle of the night, half frozen. I was happy that I got out of there not owing anybody any money, but I realized I had a serious problem.” Friends had advised him to go to Vancouver, so he hitch-hiked there and slept in a hostel. He found work the next day in a car wash, re recalls, and eventually got a job in construction. “I got myself back on track,” he says, “and I was glad I came to my senses at an early stage in my life. Now I don’t have a gambling problem.” (more…)
Filed under: Carol Vlassoff, Personalities in Our Midst on May 9th, 2010
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(en Español)
By Carol Vlassoff
Dr. Alfonso Gaspar Martinez del Pino, born and educated in Cuba, says that he planned to stay in Costa Rica from the time he accepted an invitation to attend a conference here in 1995. Leaving his friends and family, with 63 pounds of luggage (59 pounds of it books) and $145 in his pocket, he set out to establish a new life here. He gave several lectures at the Escuela de Veterinaria de la Universidad Nacional Autónoma en el Barreal de Heredia, and then, he says, “I stayed.”
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Filed under: Carol Vlassoff, Personalities in Our Midst on April 19th, 2010
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By Carol Vlassoff
Constant Boshoff – chiropractor, conservationist, coffee farmer and owner of Rafiki - was born in German East Africa, Tanganika. His ancestors moved to South Africa when he was a child because of “political storms over Africa”, as he puts it. Boshoff ’s father was a big game hunting outfitter. Equipped with luxury tents and a portable kitchen, his father and his party would pitch their camp under the trees at night. He watched his business grow into a very popular tourist destination for high end clients. This is the background that shaped Constant Boshoff’s own trajectory in life.
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Filed under: Carol Vlassoff, Personalities in Our Midst on March 7th, 2010
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(en Español)
By Carol Vlassoff
Don Gilberto Gomez Barquero, dressed in a wide brimmed hat, cowboy boots and blue jeans, a knife and cell phone tucked into his leather belt, is a familiar personality around Quepos. He can also be seen riding along the beach on Damas Island at sunset or in the hills around Londres guiding a group of sunburned tourists. He usually appears animated as he points out highlights of the area. But as we settle into his office at Iguana Tours he strikes me as a shy man, perhaps more comfortable with groups than in one to one conversations. 
It’s easy to see that Gilberto is a multi-tasker. He doesn’t waste a minute. He speaks on his cell phone while leafing through the newspaper, all the time keeping up a steady conversation and motioning to me to be patient.
Don Gilberto, born in Purescal, completed his Bachelor of Education degree from La Escuela Normal de Costa Rica in 1973. He says the school gave him a profound education “in the sense that all the professors there were very strict – from teaching us how to dress – to how to look after a child. We had to wear grey pants and a grey tie. If your tie wasn’t properly knotted you would be reminded about it. The second time you would be sent home.” (more…)
Filed under: Carol Vlassoff, Personalities in Our Midst on February 20th, 2010
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By Carol Vlassoff
Barry Biesanz pulls into my driveway, hops out of his car and wastes no time settling onto a patio chair for our interview. He does not need any prompting: he clearly has a message to share.
“People ask me,” he says, “I bet you’ve seen a lot of changes here over the last 40 years. They assume they have all been for the worse – but they haven’t. Sure, there are some ill-conceived projects, drugs, prostitution and corruption. But there are far more monkeys than there were in 1971, and much more prosperity.” Most of Manuel Antonio, he continues, was being converted to pasture and crops, even much of what is now the park, and all the mangroves near town were cut to make charcoal.
“The United Fruit Company was the only employer aside from two huge and many small cattle farms. With the switch to tourism, forest cover increased and species that were been gone for decades have returned. Living standards are very much better for Quepeños.”
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Filed under: Carol Vlassoff, Personalities in Our Midst on January 31st, 2010
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by Carol Vlassoff
