Blood in the ditch. Sunset.

February, 2012. Thursday the 8^th. Sancho's Restaurant. Manuel Antonio.

The bus from the beach pulls up in front of Sancho's. The doors open. A drunk gringo steps into the doorway, Manhattan in one hand, large bag of liquor from Super Joseth's in the other. Weaving and unsteady, he manages to step down the 18 inch bus steps onto the narrow concrete walk bridging the deep concrete ditch between the street and the sidewalk. Still holding his treasures he spins shakily to offer an elbow to the gringa who is following him out of the bus. The gringa can barely stand up, being, it appears, even drunker that her boyfriend. Once she is safely down he spins carelessly, as only a good drunk can spin, to head to the sidewalk.

One foot misses the walk and drops another 18 inches, at least, into the concrete ditch. He drops the Manhattan. The bag of glass liquor bottles slams into the ditch, breaking the top off a large bottle of wine. This leaves a jagged top upon which the tourist gashes his arm as he falls heavily into the ditch. The girl, who is drunkenly concerned but not hysterical watches and weaves.

The guy in the ditch yells for someone to get him an ambulance. He yells it over and over, desperately and finally, angrily. The proprietor of Sancho's, a gringo friend of mine, who has been here many years, tries to explain that an ambulance won't come for this. The gringo continues to yell. He climbs back into the bus on hands and knees, to what purpose no one knows. (Remember Jackie on the back of the limo in Dallas?) He climbs back off the bus, at which point the bus driver, knowing the better part of valor, burns rubber and speeds away.

The proprietor continues to try to reason with the drunk. A crowd has gathered, mostly young partying tourists. One young stud rushes to his car and brings a shop towel to wrap the guy's arm.

Fortunately the cut is on the outside of his arm and and no spurting ensues. There is, however, a 2 inch slice in which can be seen, I am told, bone. A taxi arrives. The guy demands an ambulance. My friend, in frustration, yells, “I'm telling you man, the ambulance won't come. Take the damn taxi!” After more argument the couple fall into the taxi. The woman shouts out the window, “Where are we going?” My friend shouts back, “The taxi driver knows.” and they drive off.

Meanwhile, back inside Sancho's, a young tourist who was lunching with a girlfriend, does the wet noodle thing. She lands on one knee before hitting her forehead against the tile floor. She is unconscious. Someone brings a baggie of ice cubes to put on her head.

This is when I arrive. I was walking home from Quepos. I see the crowd, the girl on the floor, and, hesitate an instant, thinking of the legal responsibility that kicks in when someone like me involves herself in a scene like this.

But, no one appears to be in charge and no one seems to be doing anything constructive, so I kneel by the girl. She regains consciousness. Vitals, pupils equal and reacting to light, level of consciousness, moves all extremities, oriented to time and place, etc etc blah blah blah, it all comes back instantly. So does the “I'm in charge now, back off and butt out” person inside me.

A pale schoolmarmish gringa from my hotel (more about her in another installment), keeps whining over my shoulder, “Don't let her sleep. Keep her awake. Don't let her fall asleep.” Finally, annoyed mostly by her voice, I say, “Are you a nurse?” “No she responds,” meekly. “I am,” I say. “Go over there and be quiet.” She does.  

The injured girl has a big goose egg where her forehead hit and a ¾ inch superficial cut, but not much bleeding. Her knee is red and will bruise later, but is not broken.

I question her, confirm her info with her friend, who sits at the table looking like she might cry. The crowd backs off a little but still clutters the area.

The two girls are here on a vacation. They have rented a car. They go back to San Jose tomorrow to fly home to Boston. The friend has a sister in Boston who is a doctor and whom she can call for advice as soon as they get back to their hotel here in town.

Someone has put a purple Band-aid on the table, so I butterfly the cut and put a napkin and the ice bag over it.

Eventually I help her to sit in a chair for a while. She is shaken and dizzy. She says that sometimes she just faints. She says that seeing the blood “gushing” from the man's arm caused it.

Att this point, the friend says the girl had her hands clenched against her chest and could it have been a seizure? So I question the girl some more, history, family, etc. They both looked about 18 to me, but were 35, so I ruled out teen onset epilepsy for the moment. She did not appear to be suffering the aftermath of a seizure. A trip to the hospital in Quepos would have resulted in more confusion and no resolution, so we agreed, the girl, the friend and me, that they could go back to the hotel and call the sister/doctor.

I stood her up for a few minutes. Then my friend, the proprietor, and I helped her into their car, handed over their untouched meals in Styrofoam boxes and off they went.

My friend and I had been at a meeting together earlier. We “gratefully”, as our ilk like to say, went on with our day. We met again that same night on the beach, neither of us the worse for the experience. Well, he lost one of his only 6 dishtowels when the drunk left in taxi wearing it around his arm..

My friend is sure the drunk will return for what was left in his liquor bag—a quart of vodka, 5 beers, and a quart of rum. The gallon of wine was a total loss, what with the broken glass and the blood and the dirt from the ditch.

At the Sunset Meeting on the beach, the sunset was magnificent.

After the meeting a bunch of us had dinner at Marlin on the beach, where we solved the world's problems and were happy not to have been the guy on the bus. Any of us could have been, at one time in our lives. After dinner we all had superb gelato at the shop next door, boarded the last bus of the day and headed home.

All in all a good day. Nothing like a little excitement to spice up my life. I wonder what happened to the girl. The drunk, not so much. Word will get back from the hospital, or he'll turn up one day and someone will update me. Later.