Glimpses from Costa Rica 27-January-02

GLIMPSES FROM COSTA RICA

Recently I was invited to be part of a panel about the YMCA Latin American process. The meeting took place in Alajuela, Costa Rica. It is always a blessing for me to visit Juan Santamarias land.

I landed in Costa Rica after a very long trip of half an hour, and the first impression was the changes in the Airport. It was a new airport, very modern, very clean, and much globalized. Later I learned that it has been giving to a foreign company, which will run the airport for twenty years.

Since arrival, I experienced the typical friendship of Costa Rican people. It is something difficult to explain with words, you have to go there. It is a way of life. Life there is pura vida! At the beginning of the 80s I spend some weeks living in a little town north of San José called Moravia...

At the YMCA meeting, there were young people from Guatemala El Salvador, Costa Rica and Panama. They were having a lot of discussion and also a lot of fun. In their young faces it was reflected the hope and the joy of being together. The YMCA is a seed of change because strongly promotes unity and social responsibility among young people in Central America and everywhere.

One of the questions these young people raised was about our role as adult leaders in the YMCA Movement, and our perception of them. I answer that we should be very clear that we were talking about power...it is difficult to handle power without privileges. The difference is not only in what we do but in how we do it. We need to walk a long way as YMCA to achieve real young participation. It s challenge and it is a dream.

I share also that I can see in these young faces all the illusions and promises of life. I was there twenty years ago. Now I am more realistic about the speed of change, but I keep fighting. And I hope to keep fighting for justice all my life.

About unity in Latin America and the Caribbean I compare the process to a painful love story, with many happy encounters but also many sad desencounters. It is difficult to be together after 10, 15 or even more years of separation. You need for that to have a lot of patience and hope, because in the process very easily differences of approach become differences of principles. And it is very difficult to build trust. But, that is the challenge, which we hope to accomplish next July in Mexico City.

One night I went to a town called Escazu, to have diner with Mario, Costa Rican YMCA President. On our way to that place, there was an old lady as a ghost, begging on the street, without shoes, with a black dress, in a very dark street. Her face was very sad, as defeated and humiliated by life. I imagine that she is without a family, with her stomach empty...we were five in a van, we decided not to see her...not to mention her, no to talk about her...she was a ghost.

I was curious about a new political flag in an old two political party system. I was told that there was a third candidate fort the presidential elections, Othon Solís, a critical of the system corruption. People in Costa Rica have the tradition to put in the roof of their houses the flag of their favorite political party. There was now a new one, red, white and green. It was anew game of the same system? I am not sure.

It was a short trip. When I was waiting at the Airport to go back to San Salvador, the face of the old lady on the road keep watching me, it will be watching me forever...

Alajuela, Costa Rica, January 27th 2002