So how’s the Costa Rica health care system?  Here’s my personal experience.  “Somebody Get Me a Doctor” was always my favorite Van Halen song, but last weekend, it had an entirely different meaning.  At 3:30 AM Saturday night / Sunday morning, I woke up suffocating, having absolutely NO ability to take a breath, and I was totally panicked.  My lungs were filled with liquid, and my throat was completely closed, my airway had shut down.  For what seemed like an eternity, I fought for a breath, trying to cough, trying to clear my throat and my lungs, but there was just no pressure to do it.

Millie was flipping out, barking intensely, and that roused the rest of the pack, and they chimed in too through the panes of my window, scratching and howling, trying to get in to help me.  I will save you the gory details but I forced my throat open and managed to get just enough air to clear my passage.  I probably had less than 10% capacity but I was breathing again.  I immediately picked up my cell phone and called my friend Dr. Pablo, “I can’t breathe” I managed to squeak out and he told me he would be RIGHT OVER.

My tour of Costa Rica waterfalls began because this past weekend was my tenth anniversary of living in Costa Rica, and I was determined to celebrate, as you can imagine.  The party actually started a couple days earlier.  My good buddy Kent came in to visit and we went to my favorite place in Costa Rica, the hot springs at Tabacon. 

As we were bouncing around from bath to bath, we came across this one particular waterfall which welcomed us with a nice little surprise.  Sitting in the steam were half a dozen college girls from Iowa, on some kind of school retreat.  Basically, that means their parents were paying for them to learn how to drink and party Latin American style.  You don’t need to be Aristotle to figure out what happened next, as the co-eds Pied Pipered us back to the swim up bar, and we proceeded to try every flavored alcoholic drink they had on the menu.  If it came with an umbrella and a cherry, we ordered it and I can assure you, that it was one heck of a tab, let me tell you, but I was happy to pay it.

The girls were going to San Jose the next day, as were we, so the party seemed to just continue the following evening where it left off.  It ended at about 3 am Friday night in some tequila bar called TOKILLYA, and if you remember from last months studies, I don’t do well with that stuff.  Unfortunately for me, Callie and Lindsey love that poison, and I just can’t say no to a pretty face.