Water and Peace Eco-tourism Fair
Through Sunday, Paseo de Las Flores mall, Heredia. Info: 2466-8252, 2466-8221. 

Festival SalSan José
Salsa concert with the Bobby Orchestra, La Sonora Ponceña, Son de Tikizia, tonight and tomorrow, 8 p.m., El Tobogán, 200 m. north of La República Newspaper, Barrio Tournón.

Guanacaste entertainment
Concerts, food, exhibits, 6 p.m., UNCADA Auditorium, Las Juntas de Abangares.

Ismael Serrano in concert
Trova, tonight and tomorrow, 8 p.m., Melico Salazar Theater, tickets at 2207-2025, www.mundoticket.com.

Tatiana Gómez in concert
Tribute to Mecano, 10 p.m., Jazz Café, Escazú.

Judo Youth Cup
Celebrating Japan Week, 9 a.m., National Gymnasium. 

‘Empowerment of Our Sensual Femininity' workshop
10:30 a.m., Pozos de Santa Ana, 2771-7482, 2203-3652. 

Dance workshop
5-7 p.m., Krama Studio, 800 m. north-west of Multiplaza Rotunda, Ofi-bodegas Capri, next to Blue Valley High School, Bodega 10. Info: 2203-4759.

Angelicus Chorale in concert
Performing works by Henry Purcell, Vivaldi and Costa Rican composer Berny Siles, 7 p.m., Los Lagos Church, Heredia. Info: 8353-8027.

5th Multicultural Festival
Featuring Calypso, Middle Eastern dances, Costa Rican and Spanish dances, indigenous chants, 10 a.m., National Museum.

National Symphony Orchestra
Friday, 8 p.m.; Sunday, 10:30 a.m., National Theater.

Historias Cabecares
Puppet show, today and Oct. 12, 19, 26, Nov. 2, 11 a.m., Eugene O'Neill Theater, CCCN.

Haury in concert
Trova, 10 p.m., Jazz Café, San Pedro.

For the second year in a row, Costa Rica officials canceled the annual Caribbean carnival in Limón set for next weekend because for fears of dengue fever, according to the Public Health Ministry.

Health Minister María Luisa Avila told the daily La Nación that the city's growing trash problem poses too great a risk of an outbreak.

The city's trash must be hauled to a dumping ground 100 kilometers away, and the result is a backup of rubbish in the streets. The trash, which would multiply with the influx of people to the carnival, attracts mosquitoes.

Last year, Avila canceled the carnival after more than 2,000 cases of dengue plagued the Limón province in under a year. This year, cases are down 65 percent in the province, Avila told La Nación.

“I'd rather be the bad guy if it's going to help people's health,” she said. “We can't risk losing what we've worked so hard for.”

Another attempt at civil protest ended in violence yesterday afternoon when a group of pro-government thugs clashed with a group of student protesters who were demonstrating outside Multinoticias Channel 4 TV, the official government station in Managua.

Reporters from Multinoticias responded aggressively to the students in the streets, who held signs denouncing the “dictatorship” of President Daniel Ortega. The reporters blamed the students for inciting violence.

A group of Ortega supporters was then called in to “rescue” Multinoticias by forcibly removing the students from the neighborhood. The pro-Ortega thugs shoved and hit the students, who tried to resist non-violently by sitting on the ground and chanting “We don't want violence.”

Reporters from Multinoticias accused the group of protesters of being right-wing “pretty boys” who are “financed by the United States” and “puppets of the empire” – echoing Ortega's mantra about the opposition. The students, however, evoked a revolutionary spirit by chanting old Sandinista slogans and insisting that were struggling against the Ortega dictatorship.

Yesterday was the second such bout of street violence in the past two weeks between Ortega supporters and anti-government protesters. The Orteguistas have warned they are not willing to “give an inch” to protesters because the Sandinistas “control the streets.”

Homes in San José-area districts Curridabat and Desemparados flooded and even some roofs caved in during the heavy rains that have battered much of Costa Rica this week.

Emergency workers counted 16 homes in the neighborhood of Tirrases in Curridabat, an eastern San José district, as standing in “high-risk” conditions.

The Santa Teresita de Tirrases Church is sheltering 100 residents whose homes sustained heavy damage. The other remaining shelter, the Asamblea de Dios Church in Gloria Bejarano, is offering refuge to 30 people.

“Intense rains, bad urban planning and informal constructions along the banks of rivers and in poor areas are still creating emergencies in different sections of the Central Valley,” said a National Emergency Commission (CNE) press release issued yesterday afternoon.

The Taras River in Cartago overflowed Wednesday soaking and damaging some 50 houses, according to the latest count by the CNE.

The commission issued a “yellow” alert – the second level of its weather warnings – for the Guanacaste province ahead of a low pressure system forecast for the region, according to CNE press officer Reinaldo Carballo.

Other flood-prone towns and villages throughout the Pacific and Central Valley remain under “green” alert, the lowest level, Carballo said.