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Big Pharma is infuriating for all the reasons you’ve mentioned and some others such as preventing the research, production and marketing of useful medicines (alternative & otherwise). For the last 3 decades (that I know of and probably more) you could buy an ointment in CR called VitaMerfen which was produced by a Swiss company and was based on Vit A. This is such an incredible medicine for cuts, abrasions, burns and even large lacerations–it promotes healing and prevents scaring better than anything else out there. It was always used in the burn ward of the CR Children’s Hospital and I used it for everything from my daughter’s diaper rash to severe lacerations for everyone in my family. Sometimes one application was enough for your body to heal so it wasn’t something that promoted incremental use. If there was ever a “pomada de canaria” this was it for us. It was available everywhere in CR (not in the US) until a big US pharma co. which is prominent in NJ bought it from the Swiss. Now you’re lucky if you can find a tube of it somewhere in a rural pharmacy. Sometimes after a few weeks, Fischel will get some, but it has been increasingly getting harder to find. I really think they bought it to put it out of business because why would something that is simple, doesn’t hurt you, does what it’s supposed to do beautifully and was ALWAYS available before in CR now be so incredibly difficult to find?
Life is funny that way, you never know when it’s going to offer you a wonderful treat or a not so wonderful surprise, but it’s always easier when experienced with people that care about you. Pura Vida Alfred…
Jenny, You’re right to be concerned, a mold allergy was exactly what induced my asthma in CR and I had a very airy and light filled home that was cleaned on a daily basis, but high indices of biodiversity means also being exposed to life forms that I was not accustomed to. The spores that would induce my asthma were in full swing between June and Sept (just as the rains had settled in) and by August I was desperate–the rest of the year was uncomfortable but not as bad. I have met a lot of expats that have similar reactions just about 6 months after they arrive in CR because by their bodies are just not used to it and so it is great advice to keep the house clean, aired out but a mold spore free place would be impossible since it’s carried in the air we’re breathing even when outside. Not all of the different types of mold we come in contact with have been shown to damage our health, but anything foreign to us can certainly make our bodies react. We also have to keep in mind that the cleaning products we use can also affect our health and most certainly can bring on an asthma attack. If I was exposed to “tylex like” cleaning products for only a few minutes, I would actually come out as if I had a major cold (even in the US after the asthma had set in)–not to mention what that does to the environment they are released in. Bleach sometimes is the only thing that will work with certain stubborn & health risk mold conditions (barring blasting them w/frozen nitrogen), but usually much more environmentally friendly choices can clean our homes enough so that we can live in them without being negatively affected and without damaging the other living beings that co-habit our environment. Once the lung inflammation reaction has set in, almost anything can trigger an asthma attack, being exposed to heavy traffic & other airborne irritants, eating certain foods, physical exertion (which is really hard when you need to exercise in order to strengthen your lungs) and emotional stress. That’s why it’s so important to do everything necessary to fortify our bodies so that it can face new allergens and other conditions that stress our bodies without becoming ill. Thanks for bringing the mold issue up because it certainly is a concern in such a humid environment as CR.
We all do the best we know how for ourselves and certainly for our children— when we know more and we know better than we can also make better choices. Your son is young and resilient and I’m sure under Dr. Kokayi’s care he will regain his health in spite of whatever meds he’s been on. Our bodies have an enormous capacity to heal if we provide the right conditions! Please know that I have benefited from your kind and thought provoking words many times before and I’m only glad that I could offer you some info that may be of service. Pura Vida Alfred!
Hi Hummer, This is the info I had when I used them. Try this http://www.aerocasillas.com which leads you directly to http://www.aeropost.com/sjo/home.htm Even if you only use the the http://www.aeropost.com part you can choose the country at the top right hand corner of the screen and then the CR site will appear. This is for Aerocasillas S.A. Tel 506-208-4848 Fax 506-208-4872. This appears to be their email but I’ve never used it. servicessjo@aerocasillas.com Hope this helps…Pura Vida!
I don’t know about now and I imagine it depends which area you’re in, but one of the reasons the other types of PO Box systems took off for people in the Central Valley area was because the gov’t post offices had run out of smaller PO Boxes in some of the city areas of CR. I couldn’t believe it when a friend of mine let her Guadalupe PO Box expire and then couldn’t get a new one a few years ago, she ended up finding one in San Pedro…I guess you just have to ask. Also try not to have anything sent to you in a box (no matter how small) thru the gov’t post office or it will be referred to Aduanas (customs) and although it’s inexpensive, it’s very time consuming to get out. All of the public systems have been trying to revamp in order to keep up with demand, but sometimes this takes a bit longer than we’d hoped for…
Dear Alexgil, I hope this helps–My friend and “concuña” (my sister’s sister-in-law) Beatriz Sequeira works in ANAI and she recommended that you speak with Lic. Rosa Bustillo, she’s an attorney and is also the current president of the Biological Corridor Talamanca-Caribbean and has helped many orgs/NGOs establish themselves in Limon and I’m sure she could help you in the San Juan area even if it’s at the other extreme of CR. Her email is: rbustillo@corredortalamanca.org, she has an office near Escuela Laboratorio in Vargas Araya, San Pedro (near San Jose)and her telephone number is: 253-8582. Best of luck…Rebeca
Maravilla, thank you so much for providing the info & links—I was thrilled to hear of more recognition for these great doctors/researchers. Orthomolecular medicine is the area of research that I’m most interested in and specifically with how that relates to human behavior because so much damage has been caused by the psychotropic meds prescribed and methodology used in hospitals. One thing is essential, you must find the people that are actually serious about their work and educate yourself because there is a myriad of books and Internet sources that aren’t worth the pages/sites they’re printed on and can actually make you quite ill. I have been using alternative medicine and combo of allopathic/naturapathic (when necessary) for years, but just because something is natural doesn’t mean it can’t hurt you which is why any use of megavitamin dosages needs to be monitored by a qualified physician. I do not know Dr. Kokayi personally (I think Keith is very lucky to have him as a friend), but I can’t tell you how many times I have heard him speak, this man knows his stuff while showing an added dosage of compassion and humbleness. Thanks again, you made my day with this news!
Dernocom, there are a lot of people on this Forum that truly are very knowledgeable not only about CR but many other areas and we are most certainly a diverse group, but that will also give you a broader range of information. Costa Rica has so much to offer that in the 25 years I have been going there and exploring I cannot say that I have been everywhere–there’s much left to see and other places that well, are just my favorites so I have to revisit every time I’m there. My aunt Yiyi says, “camina despacio que voy de prisa” (go slow because I’m in a hurry). Give yourself time to get to know a bit of a specific area or it all becomes one big blurr. Make that your incentive to come back over and over again. Who knows, maybe after a few trips you will really want to buy a home somewhere in CR for visiting or for a total change of scenery. If you do end up thinking of buying something in CR, don’t hesitate to seek the founder of this Forum (Scott Oliver) since he can probably guide you to people that can truly help you in this respect. I have professionally sold real estate part time in US and in CR and I wish I would have known about this site or Scott when I had to leave CR due to an emergency and I couldn’t get a decent (professionally speaking) realtor to sell my house. I actually had to come back to market it and sell myself–it took me all of 3 weeks to find a buyer and close the deal and I never knew why one of the 3 realtors working on my house couldn’t do it in 3 months!
Anyway, regarding the cultural-language program it was with a very conservative, private, affluent, southern university that asked me and a friend to help them set up this program in CR. They were incredibly open to our suggestions so we were able to make an 8 week language program with language schools/UCR, home stays in the San Pedro area near the university, lectures regarding different aspects of CR life and history from very distinguished professors/authors/artists/musicians, dance classes (a must if you ask me :), cultural activities, explored different parts of the country from volcanoes, to beaches, to jungles to mountainous areas throughout not just as tourists, but to learn about the local issues and our program had an additional factor different than most language programs in CR–we had a peer group counterpart of 4-5 young Ticos/as that helped the students navigate their new academic and social environments. It became the most highly sought after program of its kind even though they had others going to Europe & Japan. The peer counterparts made for very interesting friendships and usual youthful drama that didn’t always make me smile (at least not while I was trying to explain to them that they needed to act responsibly), but that certainly kept me feeling young! 🙂 However, after the first 6 years, the accompanying university professors were not that thrilled to have to take 4-8 weeks out of their lives to be away from their families and living in CR–that part was difficult. After 10 successful years, a new director was chosen at the university and he was from Chile so he decided that it would be easier for him to take the students to Chile, visit his family there and that’s where the group goes now. There were some other factors involved such as the concern with the SJ area safety for the students, but the accompanying professor’s preference was a big factor. I loved watching those kids come in with all sorts of preconceived stereotypes and feelings of superiority as they reference Hispanics in South Carolina and watch them leave sobbing because they didn’t want to leave CR, the friends they had made and their heartfelt attachments to the CR families that hosted their stays and loved them. Not to mention that I’m very maternal and I was their “mom away from home” for 2 months during good times and more than one scary medical crisis. I cherish them all in my heart and still hear from some of them on occasion.
Alfred, as with everything, even if it typically is good for you and natural, you can hurt yourself if you overdo it especially for fat soluble vitamins since they’re stored in our bodies. You can overdose on Vit A and B6 (which can put the other B vitamins out of wack) among many others, for now give your son the recommended supplement dosage (5,000-6000 in IUS is the RDA— in food sources +/- 10K-15K of beta-carotene will allow the body to convert it to Vit A=2 carrots). The problem with an asthmatic is that if his lungs are also secreting too much mucous, it will be difficult for him to absorb the Vit A which is just why he may need to supplement with foods and cod liver oil. Please do not give him more than 10K IUS of Vit A without it being monitored by the Dr. Kokayi since it can not only affect his liver, but his brain could also swell (which will cause frontal headaches) when toxicity levels are reached. The doctor can go way beyond the RDA amounts while monitoring him for short periods of time. Also, the Vit C will enhance the effect of the Vit A (typically you don’t have to take so much Vit A if you’re also taking Vit C and E).
Unfortunately, like you said, the noblest of causes can be corrupted by greed, but there are people that are taking medicine into the orthomolecular level to address nutritional cures from core sources (as with anything, beware of some who call themselves orthomolecular doctors and most certainly are not anything but quacks). Since big pharma has hijacked our modern medicine, most of the research monies are used to find new drugs to treat symptoms, not to cure people—that would be counterintuitive in an economic sense because if they cure people, then they loose their customer base. Nonetheless, there has been some wonderful research done as to how micronutrients (vitamins, minerals, amino acids and enzyme) supplementation can actually cure the root cause of some diseases therefore also eliminating the symptoms (not trying it the other way around). It’s amazing to see how someone that was being treated as a schizophrenic actually had an incredibly severe Vit B6 deficiency and was able to lead a normal life once that was balanced. Sailors of previous centuries would tell of some of the hallucinations their peers experienced while suffering from scurvy (a mere Vit C deficiency). Our generation may now have refrigeration and many other technologies to make our lives much easier, but our food sources are less nutritious, contaminated with all sorts of manmade chemicals and genetically tampered with so we don’t only have to worry about our genetic flaws that may lead to nutritional deficits, but also that our food choices be the most effective ones for us. That’s why I admire the people on this Forum like Maravilla, happygirl, Jenny and so many others that have had the opportunity and made the choice to grow their own foods and eat the healthiest choices. For us city/suburban dwellers, we have to educate ourselves and make our food choices at the store—no matter where, I also believe it is our choice. I hope your son feels better soon and try to get him that appt so that Dr. Kokayi can help him overcome this truly exhausting and scary problem he’s dealing with as soon as possible.
Alfred, I’m sorry your son is not feeling well–that’s always scary for a parent, but I’ve also heard Dr. Kokayi speak on http://www.wbai.org radio (Global Medicine Review program) and he gives great advice. I had never suffered from asthma until I started living in CR the 2nd time around and it was one of the scariest things to feel that you could do very little to get enough air into your lungs, but you can overcome it. I worked on strengthening my immune system (which helped prevent the colds and the allergic reactions), taking some specific vitamins from food sources and exercising also helped, but it took a while. Unless absolutely necessary, I would steer clear of the Prednisone, I can’t tell you how much that hurt my general health, but when I was in the midst of the worst asthma crisis, I just wanted to breathe so I understand his reasoning for taking it. Heck, at one point I even ate some peanut beetles because they said that could help–as you can tell, I was desperate, but today I no longer suffer from this. In the meantime Vitamin B6 helped me an awful lot and it helps reduce the need for steroids, eating different sources of Vit C/Zinc helped the immune system and peppers, citrus and other foods containing Vit C tend to have flavonoids that help reduce the release of histamines that are triggered in an allergic reaction and asthma is very closely linked to allergies.I hope your son gives alternative medicine a try–especially when coming from someone that is very knowledgeable like Dr. Kakayi. Your family will be in my thoughts and prayers…
CR has much to choose from and you certainly need to gage the requirements of your comfort level, but may I suggest that when exploring in traveling you might also want to consider the mood you might want to set for yourself and your family which may have very little to do with the way you live back home. I had the privilege of previewing many hotels for the language-cultural exchange program that I ran for 10 years in CR and there really is a range of offerings. If you’re feeling adventurous I can tell you that I have stayed in little houses within lush Caribbean gardens, right in front of Playa Chiquita for much less than $35. Now the bed was not as comfortable as the one back home and the netting needed some fixing since this is a must as the mosquitoes there mean serious business when dusk sets, but I managed to have a magical stay there nonetheless and the music of the congos (howler monkeys) and birds was free throughout the day. When looking for more creature comforts and privacy I’ve stayed at Villa Caletas for over $325/night (which is a bargain in NYC, but obviously not in CR and that was in 2001) and how can you complain when the furnishings had a rustic elegance and the suite had its own enclosed garden with a beautiful pool where you had full view of a star filled sky? But I would take the beach at Playa Chiquita any day over the one offered in Villa Caletas unless you like literally being stoned while swimming in the ocean. I don’t know if they have been able to fix this, but you couldn’t go in the water without being hit by fairly good size rocks that came with every wave. My daughter’s favorite hotel in the Central Valley area is the Marriott and it is beautiful, but has become a bit more expensive these days than I care to spend all the time. There is a very safari type place where the rooms are large tents on platforms right in the middle of lush jungle areas and they have been making them more and more rustically elegant in the last few years, it is a fairly expensive place to stay called Almonds & Corals that I took my students to while in the Gandoca-Manzanillo area of Limon, but as the signs on the beach will tell you, and I can vouch for, you are NEVER to swim in that part of the beach since the riptides are treacherous even for the most expert swimmer—you need to walk towards the town of Manzanillo or in the opposite direction towards Playa Chiquita in order to take a dip in the ocean. Consequently, it will always be about the kind of trip you would like to enjoy with your family, the money you spend may not necessarily guarantee what you may be looking for. The worst thing that can happen (and I have done this before) is that if you get there and don’t think it’s an appropriate place for you and your family, then you take your things and leave the next day. Beware of very inexpensive hotels that use the same or very similar names as very nice hotels in CR and are just the opposite, I learned that in Monteverde and also watch out for really nice websites that may not portray the current conditions of said establishment. One of the hotels I previewed in Guanacaste with a friend and my daughter made my 12 year old daughter become incredibly religious, she just kept repeating “Oh my God,” over and over again because the conditions were so deplorable:). We arrived under torrential rains, it was late and we had to tough it out that night, but I was sitting at a very nice resort the next morning. No matter your budget or level of comfort expected when you travel, I’m sure you will be able to find places that you will enjoy during your stay in CR with plans or winging it–the idea is to enjoy what CR has to offer and your family time together. Pura Vida!
(Sorry for the duplication, I posted this under the wrong thread when I meant to post it here…)
CR has much to choose from and you certainly need to gage the requirements of your comfort level, but may I suggest that when exploring in traveling you might also want to consider the mood you might want to set for yourself and your family which may have very little to do with the way you live back home. I had the privilege of previewing many hotels for the language-cultural exchange program that I ran for 10 years in CR and there really is a range of offerings. If you’re feeling adventurous I can tell you that I have stayed in little houses within lush Caribbean gardens, right in front of Playa Chiquita for much less than $35. Now the bed was not as comfortable as the one back home and the netting needed some fixing since this is a must as the mosquitoes there mean serious business when dusk sets, but I managed to have a magical stay there nonetheless and the music of the congos (howler monkeys) and birds was free throughout the day. When looking for more creature comforts and privacy I’ve stayed at Villa Caletas for over $325/night (which is a bargain in NYC, but obviously not in CR and that was in 2001) and how can you complain when the furnishings had a rustic elegance and the suite had its own enclosed garden with a beautiful pool where you had full view of a star filled sky? But I would take the beach at Playa Chiquita any day over the one offered in Villa Caletas unless you like literally being stoned while swimming in the ocean. I don’t know if they have been able to fix this, but you couldn’t go in the water without being hit by fairly good size rocks that came with every wave. My daughter’s favorite hotel in the Central Valley area is the Marriott and it is beautiful, but has become a bit more expensive these days than I care to spend all the time. There is a very safari type place where the rooms are large tents on platforms right in the middle of lush jungle areas and they have been making them more and more rustically elegant in the last few years, it is a fairly expensive place to stay called Almonds & Corals that I took my students to while in the Gandoca-Manzanillo area of Limon, but as the signs on the beach will tell you, and I can vouch for, you are NEVER to swim in that part of the beach since the riptides are treacherous even for the most expert swimmer—you need to walk towards the town of Manzanillo or in the opposite direction towards Playa Chiquita in order to take a dip in the ocean. Consequently, it will always be about the kind of trip you would like to enjoy with your family, the money you spend may not necessarily guarantee what you may be looking for. The worst thing that can happen (and I have done this before) is that if you get there and don’t think it’s an appropriate place for you and your family, then you take your things and leave the next day. Beware of very inexpensive hotels that use the same or very similar names as very nice hotels in CR and are just the opposite, I learned that in Monteverde and also watch out for really nice websites that may not portray the current conditions of said establishment. One of the hotels I previewed in Guanacaste with a friend and my daughter made my 12 year old daughter become incredibly religious, she just kept repeating “Oh my God,” over and over again because the conditions were so deplorable:). We arrived under torrential rains, it was late and we had to tough it out that night, but I was sitting at a very nice resort the next morning. No matter your budget or level of comfort expected when you travel, I’m sure you will be able to find places that you will enjoy during your stay in CR with plans or winging it–the idea is to enjoy what CR has to offer and your family time together. Pura Vida!
If you haven’t already seen it, you will find the movie, “The Future of Food” a very helpful and well documented source. Unfortunately when Hippocrates said, “Let food be your medicine and your medicine be your food,” we hadn’t entered the industrial age and managed to contaminate so many of our basic resources (water, air, land, food sources, etc.) with natural and manmade compounds, but I agree with Jenny, the foundation of this axiom still applies today.
Alfred, I’m going to love meeting your wife and you one day. A pleasure to read…spoken like someone that not only has come in contact with different people from different cultures and places, but like someone that actually has enjoyed that experience….:)Que dicha, viva la diferencia!
You will find that a lot of people in CR have older Toyotas (including LandCruisers), and it gets them around. The parts are easy to come by and you can by used or new parts, you just need to find a good mechanic that works on these vehicles and will help you in a pinch. You might want to find out how the vehicle inspection laws apply to this model & year car and verify if that car has been in a prior accident that could make the vehicle dangerous to you and your family. Usually easier to tell on these older models than on the newer ones where some stuff is not visible. Let me warn you, cars are expensive in CR and you would never pay much for one of those in the US, but I sold my 1972 LandRover quite a few years ago for $4K. They’re great for more rural areas and I was sorry when I sold that LandRover for a newer sedan. This time around I will bring my LandRover with me when I move back. Pura Vida!
