Hooray! The Miners Are Being Rescued!

I was trying to think of a photo to symbolize the joy as the Chilean miners are being rescued. I decided to use this photo of a monkey jumping for joy.

As I write these words, 5 miners have been rescued and 28 more are yet to come up. We shall hope that all miners and rescuers are safe.

This is a white-faced Capuchin monkey. On a wildlife boat cruise on in Palo Verde National Park, a group of moneys started to play on the roof of our boat and a boat that pulled up along side us. The monkeys enjoyed the roof of the boats, I presume, because they are flat, smooth, and the fiberglass canopy had a little bit of give to it. The monkeys also seemed to enjoy making a thumping sound as they landed from their jumps.

For monkeys living in the jungle, a flat surface like the roof of the boat is a novelty. In the jungle they do not have anything like the roof of the boat on which to jump or play.

If the monkeys could know that the Chilean miners are being rescued, I am sure that they would jump up and down for joy.

Costa Rica does not have mines. The early Spanish explorers named Costa Rica, which means the "rich coast," because they saw natives wearing gold. But the Spanish soon discovered that the gold came from elsewhere, not Costa Rica, so Spain largely ignored Costa Rica during the colonial period. The indigenous population was almost wiped out by the introduction of European diseases and by the enslavement of Costa Ricans to take them to work in the mines of Peru.

My grandfather, who I never met as he died of tuberculosis in about 1930, had worked as a coal miner in Ohio. Let us share in the joy of the rescue of the Chilean miners and reflect on the sacrifices of miners everywhere, and the miners who have lost their lives in their dangerous work.

Please check out the photos of the island of Hvar, Croatia on our Viva la Voyage travel photo site this week.