Now…you’re in the tropics.
It’s warm and you want to take the family to the beach so you pack a picnic, including a cold box for the beer and soft drinks.
You find a wonderful site under the palms, the swimming is safe inshore and you settle down to enjoy yourselves; loungers, sunglasses, a glass of something cold….the only blot on the landscape being the two chaps who’ve set themselves up a bit too close for comfort, smoking and throwing the cigarette butts about.
The police arrive…..you know smoking is illegal in most public places in Costa Rica so you hope that they will tell them to stop.
No…..they don’t.
They have come to tell you you can’t take beer to the beach.
You give up.
Next day you take the family to the fair and bull ring at Zapote, a suburb of San Jose.
In the arena, drunks career about waving their shirts while bewildered bulls do what comes naturally…chase the nuisances.
The Red Cross treat over one hundred idiots injured by goring or trampling….their task complicated by the the idiots’ state of inebriation.
Outside the ring the police arrest fifteen people for smoking in a public place.
Shops are open, people are going to work…but government offices lie silent, awaiting the return of their normal occupants to participate in the ceremony of taking down the creche after January 6th.
One group of people are impatient for the return to governmental work to come about.
Fuel tanker companies have been waiting for more than five months for the Environment Ministry to renew the licences for their vehicles. They have undergone inspection, have brought their fleets up to scratch…..but no licence renewals have been forthcoming and the expiry date is January 31st 2013.
They are seeking to discuss the situation with the appropriate officials…who will not be available until the creche has been dismantled.
No licence renewal, no petrol stations supplied. No transport, private or public.
They have decided that if no early discussions are possible then they will have to take action.
Not blocking the roads to inconvenience the public…but blocking off the Environment Ministry.
It will be interesting to see if the government try to deploy their unpopular riot police again when faced with tough lorry drivers as opposed to health workers……
The only question is:
Should they block the idle sloths out?
Or should they block the idle sloths in?
The Venomous Bead 
Are you quite sure you have not brought the Clochemerle Syndrome with you?
I think I came to it…..or else, worryingly..I am it.
Some of this seems to be about the creche removal date….in sympathy for
Some of this seems to be about the creche removal date….in sympathy for fuel tanker drivers I have taken my creche down thismorning…a couple of days early, but is seemed like a good cause.
Not sure I’m so supportive a campaigns to help people smoke in public places though Fly. My daughter has just started a campaign in Liverpool to ger a smokers’ lane, preferably in the middle of a busy dual carriageway, so she can avoid them when walking through town. I dont think she has many supporters though. Jx
Fly…me again, when writing “ger a smokers’ lane” I clearly meant “get a smokers’s lane” but must have been thinking in scouse. Jx
You should see my typos…you probably have!
I’m not in favour of smoking full stop…my father used to smoke like a chimney and i suspect that’s why I have a tendency to bronchitis.
The law currently prevents people from smoking in shops, restaurants and bars and at bus stops….but not at the beach – where, however, you can’t drink beer!
Block them in until they finish the work!
Blocking them in permanently, getting a new crowd of people willing to work and setting them up in a new building might be even better……
Love your sense of humor! Hope you moved to another beach or further away from the smokers who were not bothered by the police as they should have been… your life is one big adventure, my friend! And I enjoy every word of it!
At least i wasn’t in the bull ring!
Lots of double standards when it comes to rules and regulations it would seem…much like Turkey really.
I wish they’d use a bit of common sense….you can’t take beer to the beach – a rule to stop noisy beach parties run by bars which upset residents – but you can drink beer and run about in front of bulls!
This does rather sound like the police clocking up brownie points for achieving easy and non-threatening targets, Helen. Much simpler to nab someone for smoking than risk life and limb arresting a drunk in a bull-ring! As for the Men from the Ministry, I’d blockade them until they parley for peace….
Someone must have introduced the police to the value of targets in claiming they are doing a good job…every time the Presidenta goes to Europe she comes back with some new made EU notion….
What about walling them up? Good for the construction industry…
By the sounds of it, the police will book them for illegal parking, or if taking the creche down turns out to be very time-consuming, for having expired licences.
When I was in the States, I used to decant my beer into an empty coke can.
They tried ‘obstructing the highway’ when it was a group of health workers…one thing is for sure the ordinary police won’t take on demonstrators of any kind…it has to be the riot police.
Ah…so we leave the eski in the car and nip up and down with our cans. Brilliant….thank you, I’ll pass this on.
Hmmmm….not sure what to say about this one. I love this photo, though, it takes me to a warmer place than this cold Montreal. đŸ™‚
You’ll have to try it!