Charlie Berghammer

Through Angel Villareal Bogarin’s hard work, initiative and leadership, the community of Matapalo has been strengthened in social infrastructure as he has inspired change and others to action. His participation as a community leader and his involvement with the Bandera Azul program, ASANA, as well as a liason for the Matapalo Beach Lifeguards has served as a grand example to other local Costaricans on the importance of being active community participants. His example has also shown the important role the private sector can indeed play to acheive stronger more united multi cultural communitities.

This month’s profile is dedicated to a young women whose story is similiar to many thousands of volunteers involved in the International Peace Corps program. Here below she shares her story of dedicated service to the community of Portalon, 20 minutes south of Quepos.

How exciting to begin the year by sharing the story of a recently migrated expat to Costa Rica who knew from the start that his coming to Costa Rica was more than just to live a comfortable lifestyle in the tropics. His story is that of many of us who have come looking for ways to INTEGRATE into our local Costa Rican communities. What Greg Anderson and many others have discovered is that the catalyst for this integration can come through engagement in local community service.

For many residents living in Aguirre County, the year 2009 will be the saddest in the annals of Matapalo Beach history. Due to the complicated laws and regulations which govern the Maritime Zone, many hard working residents on the beach lost their homes and businesses as well as their personal belongings during the parade of destruction which reigned down some months ago.

This month’s profile belongs to Chris Cobb and Jenny Roman from the Portalon area. Recently the school at Portalon was blessed with 15 computers which form the basis of the new computer lab. We all know that ¨blessings¨of this sort do not just happen. School Director Jenny Roman, one always known for her persuasion and perseverance was instrumental in procuring the computer lab equipment and thanks to expat Chris Cobb, they now have their first program of computer web page design. Together they have created the elements necessary to begin classroom instruction for several interested local students. Read on with excitement as Chris Cobb explains how it all came about!

On a recent visit to Chicago, a friend having just read all the details of the planned Matapalo Beach Community Center sat down with me next to the lake and ask me candidly “Charlie what motivates you to realize such an ambitious project?” My response was simple and to the point. I explained to my friend that I was simply paying back in whatever way I could for all those people who showed up on my lifes stage as miracles to show me my way on lifes journey.