Palmares Festival
Tope horse parade and other festivities, through Jan. 25, Palmares, Alajuela, www.fiestaspalmares.com.   

Santa Cruz Fiestas
In honor of the Cristo de Esquipúlas, with Tico bullfights, horse parade, oxcart parade, rides, cultural events, Jan. 14-20, Santa Cruz, Guanacaste.

Ballad Night
By Jamal Irías, Jan. 14, 9 p.m., El Observatorio, Barrio La California. Reservations 2223-0725.

Watercolor Exhibit
By Lorraine Bromley, through Jan. 30, National Gallery, Children's Museum.

Vacation Workshops
Ages 3-5, 9 a.m.-noon; ages 6-12, 9 a.m.-4 p.m.; Night Camping Workshops, Fri.-Sat., Jan. 14-Feb. 5, INBioparque, Santo Domingo, Heredia, 2507-8116, 2516-8107.

In tragedy: Thousands of people sit in a public square in the Haitian capital of Port-au-Prince Wednesday after Tuesday's deadly magnitude 7 earthquake.

Orlando Barría | EFE

The 7.0 magnitude earthquake that devastated Haiti on Tuesday afternoon has prompted aid responses from Costa Rican institutions and aid groups that have offices in Costa Rica.

On Wednesday, the National Emergency Commission (CNE) announced that it will send a relief team of 50 experts to Haiti to aid in rescue and relief efforts. Press officials said the team will include engineers, doctors and health care and disaster relief specialists.

Haitian government officials have estimated that more than 100,000 people may have died in the quake.

The CNE is working out an agreement with global courier DHL to transport the relief team and their equipment to the Caribbean island. The CNE and DHL collaborated on a 4.8 ton delivery of supplies to El Salvador after heavy rains provoked by Hurricane Ida in November of last year left at least 157 dead and hundreds homeless in the Central American country.

The Costa Rican Red Cross announced late on Wednesday that it will send rescue personnel and equipment to the battered nation. The Red Cross opened its bank accounts at Banco Nacional and Banco de Costa Rica (see box) for donations for victims of the earthquake.

Red Cross Haiti on Wednesday afternoon reported that its teams in the country were “completely overwhelmed.” The Doctors Without Borders organization said none of its three hospitals in Haiti are operable.

Habitat for Humanity's Latin American and Caribbean office sent four volunteers, who live and work in Costa Rica, by plane to Haiti. One Costa Rican Habitat for Humanity staff member, Susan Herrera, was already stationed in Haiti. She arrived with her two sons, ages 10 and 15, and her husband to Haiti approximately two weeks ago. She and her family are safe.

The best way to help Habitat for Humanity's response to the Haitian disaster is by donation via their Web site: https://www.habitat.org/cd/giving/donate.aspx?link=227.

The Chilean-based Un Techo Para Mi País (A Roof for My Country), which helped rebuild homes after the Cinchona earthquake in Costa Rica in January 2009, announced plans to build 100 emergency shelters for families affected by yesterday's earthquake. To collaborate, visit www.untechoparamipais.org.

Costa Rican Foreign Minister Bruno Stagno said on Wednesday afternoon that he had gotten reports that nine Costa Rican were in Haiti, including Herrera and her family, when the quake struck. However, he said there could be more.

Three Costa Ricans were working in Haiti for the Coca-Cola Company. One was evacuated by helicopter, and the other two are secure, Stagno said.

Tuesday's earthquake is believed to have been the worst disaster ever to have struck the deeply impoverished nation. Haiti was battered by four hurricanes in 2008 and officials had been hopeful at the time that the aid the country received after those storms would finally help the country get on its feet.

The country's poor infrastructure does not allow for quick disaster response. Streets and highways are lined with now-homeless citizens, including Haitian President René Preval. The runway at the Port - au - Prince airport is operable, but the air traffic control tower has been damaged, according to reports, further complicating relief efforts.

Costa Rica is nearing a final handshake on the first free trade agreement of the decade, as delegates from Singapore have been in town this week to discuss the final workings of an accord between the two countries.

In the fourth and expected final meeting, at the Double Tree Cariari Hotel in Heredia, north of San José, negotiators are in the process of deciding upon the sanitary, shipment and rules-of-origin regulations that will be imposed on products traded between the two countries.

Costa Rica and Singapore also are making final decisions on which products will be traded free of international tariffs. As of Wednesday, it appeared that both countries were leaning towards lifting tariffs across all product markets.

“At this time, we believe that in this agreement, there will not be one product excluded,” said Fernando Ocampo, Costa Rica's chief negotiator in a statement released by the Foreign Trade Ministry (COMEX). “The idea is that, if we have a consensus in the theme of rules of origin, the free trade agreement will have a 100 percent coverage of products.”

Discussions this week generally have centered on rules-of-origin regulations, which are put in place to ensure that a product purchased from Singapore was not originally manufactured in a different country. This ensures that products included in the free trade agreement originate only in Costa Rican and Singapore. As of Wednesday, Singapore had accepted 95 percent of the regulations that ensure products exported to Costa Rica are not made of raw materials from other countries.

According to COMEX, Singapore has expressed particular interest in agricultural products such as coffee, fruits, vegetables and prepared foods. Costa Rica has expressed interest in trading types of plastic and metal products.

Singapore, a series of islands south of Malaysia and north of Indonesia, is a central port and distribution center for much of Asia. In 2007, Costa Rica's exports to Singapore totaled $31.5 million, while imports totaled $26.4 million. Costa Rica also established an embassy in Singapore in October 2007. The population of Singapore is around 4.6 million, slightly more than Costa Rica's estimated 4.5 million.

The free trade agreement between Costa Rica and Singapore is expected to be approved on Friday.

JINOTEPE, Nicaragua – After swiping 25 bases in his rookie season for the San Diego Padres, Nandaime speed demon Everth Cabrera, 23, has set a goal to become the top base-stealer in Major League Baseball.

In his first season in the big leagues, Cabrera showed that his formidable speed on the base paths, which helped him steal a minor-league leading 73 bases while playing Class A ball in 2008, is nearly as effective against major league catchers. Despite missing two months of the season due to a broken hand, Cabrera still managed to finish in the top 10 in stolen bases for the National League last year.

This year, he hopes to do much better.

“It's not that I disrespect any catcher, but I don't care who is behind the plate,” Cabrera told The Nica Times during an interview following a workout last week in Jinotepe. “I would like to be the best base stealer in baseball, and I am working on that.”

Cabrera, who won the starting job as the Padres' shortstop last year, said the best moment of his rookie season was when he hit a walk-off grand slam off the Mets closer Francisco Rodriguez on Aug. 7 (http://sandiego.padres.mlb.com/media/video.jsp?content_id=5981591).

But the cat-like shortstop turned even more heads with his glove work (http://sandiego.padres.mlb.com/media/video.jsp?content_id=6341869) and cannon-for-an-arm (http://sandiego.padres.mlb.com/media/video.jsp?content_id=6938505).

Cabrera's on-field performance last year for the Padres earned him the honors of being named Nicaragua's Top Athlete of the Year for 2009, an award the young ball player will receive at the end of the month. After that, he'll report to Arizona for the Padres' spring training, where fans, teammates and sportswriters will be eager to see what he can do this year.

“The fan and media view of Everth is very positive,” said Bill Center, a sportswriter for the San Diego Union Tribune. “ San Diego likes the young man. Who couldn't like his story?”

Read this Friday's Nica Times print edition for the full, exclusive interview with Everth Cabrera.