Advertisement
Published: June 30th 2006
Edit Blog Post
Talk about sensory overload. I don’t remember the last time I’ve learned so much in a 24 hour period. It’s been amazing.
Today, Mike and I had our meeting with our residency lawyers, Jorge and Romulo, and began our residency process. Even though I’ve heard quite a few horror stories, we have had an extremely smooth experience. Granted, we did a lot of running around today and without Mike’s fluency in Spanish, the experience would have been more difficult but regardless, the inefficiencies I’ve heard about over and over again, did not seem to be an issue today. Perhaps it’s more our attitude toward the concept of “process” that is making this transition easier. Things happen, when they happen. They will not happen quickly here ~ bring a book and be patient.
The organization we’re going through to obtain our residency has been amazing to deal with. We arrived this morning with all our paperwork and were told by Jorge that everything was in order. The first step would be for us to walk a few blocks away and have our pictures taken. We found the photo place with no problem which was a store no bigger than the
size of my cube at IKON ~ one desk, 3 pictures on the wall, a small stool and a camera on a tripod. The owner took our photos and while waiting for them to dry, struck up the most interesting conversation with us. Ticos (Costa Ricans) love to talk and they’ll talk for quite some time. We talked about everything from his background, to his time living in Texas, to his feelings on foreigners living in Costa Rica. We found it interesting that Costa Rica is much more of a melting pot than most people would imagine. Our photographer friend said that you can find people settling in Costa Rica from all over the world. Apparently there is an old saying known throughout Central and South America that says "Where you find a Tico, you find democracy." Our friend said that people in San Jose have come to say that "Where you find a Tico, you'll find 1 Columbian, 2 Nicas (those from Nicaragua) and a Hyundai.” HAHA! In one phrase you get a sense of the diversity here and the prominence of inexpensive Japanese cars.
Something to note ~ we spent about 45 minutes talking with the photo
shop owner. At one point another couple was trying to come in to have their pictures taken. Instead of rushing us out the door to take care of his new customers, he told them he’d be a few minutes and continued on with our conversation. Talk about not caring to make a buck but placing more importance on social activities.
From there, we were sent with another gentleman, Brian, to the police station. It was then that I realized that the money we had dished out for the residency lawyers was the best money we had ever spent. The police station was far away and not in the best part of town. Mike and I never would have found this place and it would have cost us a bit of cash to pay a taxi. On top of that, our driver knew the officers very well and they got us through the process extremely quickly. Part of the process here was to get fingerprintede and provide the police with all our distinguishing marks. For example, they asked us if our teeth were natural! Funny part about this, is that I didn’t fully understand the question and said, “no”. To
which the officer cracked up and handed me a plastic bag to apparently put my teeth in. It was then that Mike explained the question to me through his snickering smile. Everyone in the office got quite a laugh out of it and it was really nice to be around police officers having a good time at their job. They even taught me some new words for Mike should he be “bad”. One female officer told me that in Costa Rica, when husbands get too out of line, wives are within their rights to hit them in the head with a frying pan. Haha….
We were dropped back off at the Jorge’s who was out for lunch. The receptionist had no idea when he’d be back so Mike and I decided to go out for a bite ourselves. Not only is the food amazing here but it’s priced great for folks like us. While sitting in an outdoor café, we got to watch a street performer. Very talented fellow and folks were giving him quite a few coins. I don’t know if the coins were for his performance or because people thought he was crazy to be out in the middle of traffic and felt bad for him. You do NOT want to jump in front of cars here. Either way, he put on a great show and we got to sit back and enjoy an extra cup of coffee while being entertained.
Another thing I noticed today about being here in Costa Rica is that people never bring you a check unless you ask for it. It’s like they expect you just to hang out for a long period of time, talk and have multiple cups of coffee. There is no rush to get you moving at all which is such a nice aspect of culture here.
After a long lunch, we made our way back to Jorge’s and found out the next step was to head to the bank of our choice to open up an account. We spoke with Romulo for a bit who reminds me of a suave mob boss (with my best Italian accent, “You need sometin, you come to Romulo. I’ll take care of it. You don’t need to worry bout a thing.”) haha. This guy is great!
This process at the bank went well, most likely because Jorge gave us a “letter of recommendation” which allowed the bank to open an account for us without the normal requirements which include utility bills, a permanent address, etc. Within an hour, we had our accounts established.
We also spent most of our day utilizing the public transit system. We managed to take about 10 buses and it was great. Public transportation is huge here in the city and with each trip costing about a $.25 - $.50 per person (depending on where you’re going); it’s definitely the way to get around. It was here that I noticed that Ticos can speak very differently. I had two people on the bus today that sat next to me and tried to strike up conversation (remember I said Ticos love to talk) yet I couldn’t understand one word. Then there is the waiter at the café who gave us directions to the next bus stop and I understood him just fine. I had no problems communicating with our photographer friend either and have been told it all depends on how much “Pachuco” (local idioms) people use. In fact, our photographer friend was very excited to learn that we were interested in learning some Pachuco. For instance, he told us that when someone passes away, folks say that they “hung up their tennis shoes”. Too funny.
I’ve come to find that the more conversations I have with folks, the more comfortable I am with the language. Today was another day of learning and realizing once again that Mike and I have totally made the right decision. We couldn’t have been happier chatting with people in the café over cups of coffee with no reason to rush anywhere. It’s definitely a nice change of pace.
Oh and our boxes still have not arrived. We did however decide to test our skills with the bus and caught 2 buses down to the airport. We were informed that they still have not yet left Washington.
Advertisement
Tot: 0.091s; Tpl: 0.01s; cc: 12; qc: 63; dbt: 0.0543s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.2mb