About 2 months before hand I had gotten back in touch with some friends from high school. They were planning on launching a website that was going to rival sites like VRBO and Homeaway , vacation rental websites. The premise of the site was sound and the numbers sounded even better if they were able to hit them.
I was of course interested in becoming a part of this ground level operation because I saw the potential for both growth and financial success. Although I was doing fairly well with the current projects that I was working on, adding this was not going to add that much extra work to my schedule. That is one thing I always try to balance, the amount of time I was going to need to invest versus the amount of money coming back into my pockets. The ultimate goal was to be able to fund the internship program and each little bit helped.
After communicating for a period of time it looked like they were going to set up the office in Costa Rica until they got up and running. I was currently living in complete and total solitude in a 5 bedroom house in Hermosa so there was extra room. I was looking forward to the venture as well as having company for a little while. My hope was the project would take off and we would all live happily ever after. It is funny how quickly hope can fade or at least get pushed to the side for a little while.
The 3 guys arrived in Costa Rica, 2 friends from high school and one of their friends from Colorado. Upon arrival I took them out in Jaco and showed them the infamous Hotel Cocal. They were flat out blown away by the beauty of the women and the fact that for the right price they could have any of them. After dropping the guys off I headed back home to work. I had seen what they were experiencing for the first time and do not usually stay out past about 10 pm ever. The old saying that our parents used to tell us “nothing good happens after 10 pm” holds up as being true most of the time.
I knew there was going to be a time period where the guys would be having a good time, partying a bit and enjoying themselves. If someone is coming to a foreign country it happens and I accepted that. The only problem was it did not stop after the first week.
The site was coming along but they needed to upload about 120,000 properties to it from a database. This was being done by a team in India and basically nothing could be accomplished on the site until the complete database is loaded. What this did was give the guys all kinds of free time, something that they really didn’t need. I had gone from living in solitude to a life where I felt like I was living in a fraternity house. I gone to college once and had no desire to do it again.
It had become obvious by the third week that they were there but the site would not be launched for an extended 
period of time. I knew the site would be a success but unfortunately I was not going to be making any money on it for a long time. I had to refocus on my current projects in order to ensure I was able to pay the bills. It became frustrating on a daily basis as the drinking and partying continued. That is one thing about Costa Rica if you have a vice drag you down into that vice if you let it. For those people coming here to quit drinking – find someplace else. For those coming here to get away from womanizing – definitely find someplace else. And for those trying to start up a new business Costa Rica it can become very expensive very quickly.
I was enjoying the time with my friends from high school and during the sober hours it was nice to catch up. The only thing I could not deal with was the friend they brought from Colorado. There are some people that I truly believe will never function in society. This was one of those people. One of my friends from high school appropriately nicknamed him “clown baby”. It truly fit him and his persona.
For all of you that live in Costa Rica there is a TV show called Combate, that plays most nights of the week. Basically it’s a bunch of fairly good looking Costa Ricans – both men and women – that perform “challenges” on the television show. It is very popular for those without much intelligence. The correct term that most people use is “polo”, which is basically the Costa Rican equivalent of white trash.
On this show one of the guys is named Bryan Gamboa. His claim to fame is having big muscles and dating a Costa Rican model named Melissa Mora. I’ve met him one time and his intelligence ranges in between a cockroach and a wet fart, but he doesn’t seem to mind. I guess truly ignorance is bliss.
The reason I went into that last part was the friend from Colorado that that came with my high school friends was very similar to Bryan. When he woke up in the morning it took him about an hour and a half to get ready. I literally think most women getting ready for the prom would be ready before him. The next thing he would want to do is head to the gym. Working out was his life, his only life. He wanted to make sure that his muscles look good to the women. His entire self-image was based on his looks and honestly I felt sorry for him.
The traits above were not what bothered me. It was the fact that he could do nothing on his own. It was almost as if he had been babied his entire life and had never learned to function as an adult. He was unable to go to town by himself, he was scared to talk to girls, and he was continually glued to his iPhone. I do not think I’ve seen anyone 
that addicted to Facebook in my life. There was a difference between hanging out friends and almost having to babysit a 25-year-old male. The frustration of having him in the house was boiling over with everybody and it started to have its effects about week five.
The site still was not launched and it was going on almost a month and a half. The frustrations between everyone working on the launch started to come to fruition. Yelling and drama over money occurred almost on a daily basis and the investor in the states was growing tired of the site not being up and running. It had become clear to my friends from Colorado that they would not be able to launch in Costa Rica with the temptations in around Jaco. For many people that come to Costa Rica it is difficult to live a life on a straight and narrow path and the devil can’t take hold of you.
After six weeks in Costa Rica they were heading home for the holidays back to the United States. Each was going to visit friends and family before heading to Bali to continue on the site. Bali has some of the same temptations there is the possibility to stay away from them. In Costa Rica that possibility is few and far between especially in Playa Jaco, the devil’s playground after 10 PM.
I still believed in the project that they were doing but until I saw money coming in from it I could not commit myself completely. Although there were frustrations upon my friends’ exits from Costa Rica, we all left on good terms and continue to be in touch. I’m sure I will help the mount when the website is launched down the road but at this time I needed to refocus my energy on my current projects.
We had just passed Thanksgiving and I was back to my life of solitude. It was time to make one final push in 2013 to get all my ducks in a row. I truly saw now that living a life alone was something that I need to do is point. My old life filled with drama was a thing of the past and the future looks bright. It was just a matter of figuring out the right direction to go.
After getting the house back to where it felt like home for me I took a walk to the ocean and sat on the sand. I need to get my mind in the right place again and I did something that I hadn’t done in a while. I prayed.
Next Up – The Nightmare Continues
