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Last night we experienced our first earthquake - well, I experienced our first earthquake (Kelly evidently will sleep thru the house swaying, nuclear bombs dropping and a zombie apocalypse). It was pretty big - 6.2. I woke up to the sound of our windows rattling, which at first I thought was the wind but then realized the room itself was also rattling. Then I felt our whole house sway what felt like 10 feet, but I'm sure was just a few inches. Right after that I woke Kelly up, in case we had to get somewhere safe. I asked her if she felt the earthquake to which she muttered into her pillow how insane I must be. However this morning everyone in San Jose was talking about last nite's earthquake.
There was no damage to our house or any other homes and businesses that I have heard about. Still it was a wild experience, my heart was racing for about 5 minutes until I fell back to sleep.
You can see more info here: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/27801590/
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Hello all - Kyle and I went to Puerto Viejo for the long holiday weekend with our friends Andrea and Julio. Puerto Viejo is on the Carribean side of Costa Rica (the eastern coast). It is much less developed than the west coast - no big fancy hotels here. It is what everyone here likes to call "rustic" - which is not necessarily for everyone (if you like the perfect bed and a fancy bathroom, this is not the place for you!). We rented a house that we found on VRBO (man I love that site) - it was right on the beach, as you can see from the photos, with an enormous yard. The coconuts we are drinking in the pictures came from a tree in our yard! And there were plenty of lizards for the dogs to chase. The house was very simple (we will most certainly find a place with air conditioning next time because it is HOT), but it was big enough for the four of us and incredibly affordable considering the location. Not to mention, we practically had the beach to ourselves - you can see from the pictures that we did not have many neighbors. Izzy as you know is a big fan of the water, and on this trip she was really able to practice her ocean swimming because the water was very calm. Bronco, well, he still hates water, even when it is the perfect temparature. Hope everyone had a nice Labor Day weekend! Kelly & Kyle
Check out our pictures here
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This blog is long overdue – if I’d had the time over the past few months to write a blog, I would have, I swear, but trust me when I say I did not. Most of you already know we have moved to Costa Rica, but not all of you may know exactly why.
Friday, March 14 – Western Union (WU) announced that it would be closing its union facilities in St. Charles, MO, Bridgeton, MO and Dallas, TX. Approximately 1,000 people (union and non-union) would potentially be impacted. They didn’t say at the time that they would be moving these jobs to Costa Rica, but we suspected this.
Monday, March 17 – Kyle and I had already discussed the possibility of moving abroad after our wonderful trip to Hong Kong. In fact, I’d already mentioned my interest in being an expat to my boss (I had recently pursued an opportunity in Dublin, but that didn’t work out). So on Monday morning, I told my boss that I’d be interested in going to Costa Rica if there were any opportunities – she spoke to her boss (Amintore Schenkel, our Chief Accounting Officer) and made him aware of my interest.
Tuesday, March 18 (mom’s birthday) – I had a voicemail waiting for me from Amintore when I arrived at the office. I went to his office and he informed me that yes, there was an opportunity for me there if I was interested. I said yes and then he asked me – “are you serious, are you sure?” because expat assignments have to be approved by our CFO, and he didn’t want to ask if I wasn’t sure. So Kyle and I met for lunch, discussed, and decided to do it. So that day, Amintore spoke to our CFO and got his approval. That evening, Amintore told me to book a flight for Kyle and I for Costa Rica the following week because he didn’t want me to make a final decision until I’d visited (very nice of him). And that night (mom’s birthday, don’t forget!) I let the family know what was going on. The following week, Kyle and I went to visit and decided that we wanted to go for sure.
So, I will try to make the rest of the story a bit shorter. Over the next 2 months, I traveled back and forth between St. Charles, Costa Rica and Denver. I traveled A LOT. Kyle was at home trying to balance his job with the move. To name just a few things that had to get done before our move - (1) finish the basement, (2) find renters for our homes, (3) take 60 hours of Spanish lessons, which could only be done on the weekends because of my travel schedule (3) pack up a house we hadn’t thoroughly cleaned since we moved in, (4) crate train the dogs for the upcoming flight and (4) sell the cars. It was hard, and Kyle deserves most of the credit for getting this all done. On June 17, we all got on a plane and officially moved. And then, I very quickly went back to the United States (St. Charles) for two weeks, which is where I’m at today. But this is my last trip for awhile – I’m really looking forward to not sleeping on planes anymore.
So after a very long couple of months, we now officially live in Costa Rica and hope to see all of our friends and family there very soon (open invitation to all!). In the near future, Kyle will be building a vacation calendar for our website (thanks for the idea Jeff!). Now that we are much further away, we are dedicated to keeping our website current so that we can share all of our experiences with you all. We will miss everyone, but hope to be back quite often for visits. Pura Vida! Oh, one last thing, there are pictures of our new house in the photos section of our website – check them out!
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