Expat Community > Costa Rica

guestuser
Joined 2001
Posts: 5

What it takes to adjust to Costa Rica

9 years ago

Wow, some of the recent activity really brought home to me that adjustment to CR does not happen to everyone! I have been here since 2002 and can tell you first hand some of my experience and hopefully it will help you understand if you will or WILL NOT like it here. I think most of what it takes is a mindset that this is a different culture and country and to continue judging and expecting things to be like the US or that the US is so great that everything needs to be the same is sure sign that CR will not be right for you. Let me give a couple examples to better understand. I had a contractor come with his friend to oversee his house building. For the first month--every time we went to the hardware store or whatever he would say "Well, in the US we------" I must have heard this 100 times. FINALLY after the 100th time--when we went to the store and wanted to buy a simple cartridge type filter--he found they sold the housing but NOT the filters! He just caved right at that moment and it sunk in that his "oh everything in the world is like the US" mentally was never going to work and he finally capitulated and had a very pleasant time from that day forward. Me--whenever I would want to take a few days off and travel I would have to plan each day to the hour and the activities we would be doing--you know typical US way of having fun! LOL Trust me---vacationing with my Tico family this was NEVER going to work and I too had to face reality. Now I can say my vacation time is so much more fun and relaxed and spontaneous. And of course the Manana syndrome--this has a real cause if you don't know. Many times in the past no one had cars and bus was the standard form of transport. Sometimes you may have to take 3 buses and if anything was off schedule (which is normal) of course you could not predict the exact time of arrival anywhere. So that cultural behavior has continued despite more cars. GET USED TO IT!! Actually embrace it because in reality this takes the stress off of you so you don't have to drive 100 miles an hour if you think you may be five minutes late--if you are 1/2 hour late it will make no difference to anyone! This is just a small sample of what I have learned and learned to adapt to.
And I am always beat up here no matter what--either I am a desperate lying realtor who will do anything for a sale or else I am so arrogant that I tell Americans to stay home if they don't like it here! But do you ever see this type of anger and lashing out from a Tico??? No.
And to see people disparage everything about the country--the people--the government--the location--and yet they are living in Costa Rica?? Why--- I have no clue at all. Just normal behavior I guess. And that is why I love Costa Rica more than anything--I did marry a Tica 12 years ago and to have her and her family as mine today is the biggest blessing. I loved Costa Rica from my first weekend here when things were far from as "modern" as they are today so for people to constantly criticism and complain baffles me. My word of advice is this--if you relate to the name calling and put downs and really dig that sort of stuff that is a sure sign that Costa Rica may not be the right place. Costa Ricans are respectful and humble people and discord and insults and judgements of people they don't even know is as far from their reality as it could be. So many people I have run into over my years of selling here tell me they LOVE it here so much and moving to Costa Rica--no matter which part--was the best thing they have ever done.

Gill Phelan
www.gvecr.com

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What it takes to adjust to Costa Rica

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