Costa Rica background info

Of interest: Tamarindo (the westernmost town), and Heredia (in the middle)

Okay now some background history and info about Costa Rica (with some help from Lonely Planet), as well as some interesting differences in the way things are done here.  It’s hard writing a blog because there are some readers (ahem, Mom) who love detail, and others who just want the exciting parts.  Soooo if you get bored, this might be one to skip, Kip!  And I already know I use lots of parentheses so you don’t need to tell me.  And watch out, Pedro just took me out for an iced coffee, so I’M ALL JACKED UP ON MOUNTAIN DEW!

Not much is known about Pre-Columbian Costa Rica.  The only person still alive who experienced it is my dad, aka Methuselah, but in his old age he’s forgotten.  Anyway, Costa Rica means “rich coast,” and is said to have gotten its name after Christopher Columbus landed here in 1502 and claimed to have seen “more bling in two days than in four years of MTV.”  Okay just kidding, he actually said “more gold in two days than in four years in Española.”  But it really doesn’t matter which one he said, because subsequent explorers looking for it were left scratching their heads and exclaiming:

Partly because of the dearth of natural resources, and partly because the Spanish headquarters in Central America were far away in Guatemala, Costa Rica spent the next few centuries as a sort of backwater, mostly left on its own.  In fact, news of Central America’s independence from Spain in 1821 didn’t even reach Costa Rica until a month after the fact.  I think the convo went like this: 

Person 1: “Yo, what’s de deal, banana peel?”

Person 2: “Ay, mon, did you ‘ear de news from ‘eadquarters?”

Person 1: “Headquarters?!  What is it?”

Person 2: “Well, it’s a big building where generals meet, but dat’s not important right now.  We independent from Spain, mon!”

Person 1: “aww snap dawg, de news you bring is off de chain!” 

Person 2: “yes, rather off de heezy, is it not?”

Upon which they started busting out Imperials (the local cerveza) in celebration, managing to avoid the civil wars that plagued their neighbors.  Over the next hundred years, Costa Rica’s economy would be transformed first by the introduction and export of coffee (grown mostly by small farmers; and Dad I know what’s coming next - please don’t ask why the coffee was farmed by midgets, “small” refers to the size of the farm itself), and then bananas (where the nefarious United Fruit Company was king).  Then in the late 1940s, the government was overthrown by a farmer-philosopher name José Figueres Ferrar (I think his homies called him Figgy), who radically transformed the government into his vision of a social democracy.  His signature move was the abolition of the army, paving the way for decades of prosperous peace in Costa Rica.  And speaking of army, where does the king keep his armies?  WHY, IN HIS SLEEVIES OF COURSE, WHERE ELSE WOULD HE KEEP THEM?!

Today Costa Rica is the envy of Central America.  How fitting that the national slogan is “pura vida,” or pure life, a reference to the tranquil way of life here.  The country is the wealthiest in the region, politically more stable than the place where horses are kept, has a universal public healthcare system, and is the poster child of sustainable development - the government announced a few years ago that Costa Rica is going carbon-neutral by 2021!  Furthermore, Costa Rica is ranked number one in the world on the Happy Planet Index.  Although far from perfect, the Happy Planet Index was developed as a challenge to traditional measurements of well-being such as GDP, instead positing that although related, happiness and health are more important than material wealth.  It also seeks to preserve the opportunity for happiness and health of future generations, hence “planet” in the name.  The three factors it takes into account are a country’s life expectancy, subjective life satisfaction, and ecological footprint, spitting out a number that attempts to measure “the extent to which countries deliver long, happy, sustainable lives for the people that live in them.”  More on this happiness and wealth topic in a later post.

This despite the mean US life expectancy being skewed by one highly age-challenged individual, mentioned earlier in the post.

Costa Rica has roughly the same population as South Carolina (4.5 million), but with 1/3 less land area and 4 million fewer confederate flags.  In that small land area, it squeezes in an incredible number of species, more than any other country in the world in terms of species per land area.  This is partly due to its wide variety of biomes – the tropical dry forest and Pacific coast, cloud forest, rain forest, mountains, volcanoes, wetlands, and the rainy Caribbean coast.  More than a quarter of Costa Rica’s land has been set aside for protection, and the country now draws more than 2 million visitors a year, which is both a blessing (tourism has now supplanted coffee and bananas as the leading source of income), and a curse (most unfortunately the invasive species Nickio Minajo has been introduced by tourists).  

Pedro fixed this fish for dinner one night!

Gallo pinto is the national dish, and consists of rice and beans, which are ubiquitous.  For breakfast, maybe gallo pinto with scrambled eggs.  For lunch AND dinner, maybe gallo pinto with some meat.  Thankfully, the cuisine in Pedro’s house is more varied (Pedro and Norma are Venezuelan).  I’ve had a lot of WONDERFUL food here (including LOTS of cilantro!).  Every day is a new yummy dish!  I get the feeling Norma is usually the gefe (boss) chef, but since she got the job working at night, Pedro has been cooking dinner most nights, and the man definitely knows a thing or two about comida.  The biggest problem for me is keeping up with the different types of produce, especially the ones that end in –ote.  I was fine the other night when I learned about the green vegetable chayote.  But then today, Norma fixed the traditional olla de carne, which is similar to beef stew, with THREE MORE three-syllable vegetables that ended in –ote!  There was camote, which is pink and potato-like, ayote, which is yellow and similar to acorn squash, and helote, or corn.  I don’t think I’ll ever get them all straight!  Okay now for some observations:

-Getting gas (and I ain’t talkin about from all the beans they eat).  The gas stations here are few and far between.  Tamarindo illustrates this perfectly – the nearest gasolinera is 20 minutes away in Huacas, and there are only four within an hour’s drive!  There are so few that my map of Costa Rica shows virtually every single one.  When you do finally make it, you stay in the car and tell the attendant exactly how much money you want to spend on gas, and he gives you exactly that much (you will need a picture ID to pay with credit card).  And then he checks the air pressure of all four tires, filling them up for free if one is low.  A little different than our self-service stations.

-Recycling.  Unsurprisingly, there is not really any sort of comprehensive recycling system in Tamarindo.  However, there is a recycling machine at one of the more upscale supermarkets which gives you points for each bottle you insert, and you can redeem points to save money!  María José and Daniel enjoy the process.

The Guanacaste tree

-Open-air buildings.  Tamarindo lies in the province of Guanacaste, which comprises the northern Pacific coast.  Costa Rica only has two seasons – the wet season (May-November) and the dry season (December-April).  In Guanacaste, the temperature remains constant year round – highs around 90, lows around 70 (their humidity is very similar to ours).  To give you a comparison, their temperature year round is the same as the hottest month, July, in North Carolina.  So 365 days a year, 24/7, it’s way hotter than comfortable.  But it’s not so hot as to necessitate air conditioning, so very few buildings have air conditioning, and even fewer leave it on (this sure helps their carbon footprint).  For instance, in Pedro’s house, there are AC units in each bedroom, but they only turn them on for ten minutes right before bedtime.  The rest of the time, they depend on ceiling fans and breezes from wide open doors and windows.  That’s right - highs in the 90s year round, and they don’t use AC.  And they are perfectly civilized people.  I mean come on people, think about that this coming summer: it’s not going to kill you to turn up your thermostat a whole two degrees.  Or to set your thermostat at 90 when you leave home for the weekend...

-Car alarm.  Just a guess going off what I’ve learned about Pedro’s car: car theft must be much more common here.  First of all, the alarm in his compact Hyundai sedan is hypersensitive and beeps if you so much as sneeze.  Anything more, and the whole thing activates (Daniel and I have done it many times with the soccer ball).  Secondly, every 15 minutes or so while the engine is on, the car alarm goes off, and if Pedro doesn’t deactivate it using the hidden switch (which potential thieves don’t know the location of), the engine shuts off.  I wonder how many people have been driving in front of him and thought they were getting pulled over by police…

I didn't realize Norma was such a good artist - she painted these on the wall in Daniel's bedroom and has other artwork in the house!

-Coffee.  I came to Costa Rica drinking coffee at breakfast and lunch.  Now I’ve added one more cup to the schedule; every day at four o’ clock, everything stops for coffee time and a snack… It is a family favorite here, despite the heat.  Also, at the tender age of 24 years old, I am proud to say I have finally learned how to use a real coffee machine (thanks Pedro).

-Road hazards.  You never know what you are going to find around the bend in the road in Costa Rica – cows crossing the road, a police speed trap, a road that’s been completely washed away by a torrential downpour in the wet season, etc.  So Ticos have devised a system to warn those approaching: a simple flick of the lights.  Brilliant!  My first reaction was to wonder why we don’t do that in the US, but one reason it works better here is that all the roads here are two-lane, which makes it more noticeable than if there’s a median or something…  The driving here is definitely different, but not as crazy as I was expecting.  The main difference (other than many unpaved roads) is that there is a lot more passing, which makes sense given that all the roads have only two lanes.  Done safely, it is a very efficient way to maximize the utility of the roads while minimizing infrastructure spending – it’s almost as good as having four-lane roads everywhere, but only having to pay for two-lane roads!

Finally, if you liked my attempt at a Caribbean accent, say “beer can” with a British accent, and…you will discover it sounds like “bacon” with a Jamaican accent!