The first thing I notice driving around this city is how it could be any city I have ever been in. It had restaurants, women and men’s dress shops, personal clinics and auto garages. Many company logos are quite familiar: Penzoil, Subway, Mcdonalds. Spanish words are not that hard to understand under the context of a storefront. I believe I have seen more Spanish in Colorado and California towns than English in San Jose. This city also has a china town, by the way. My only restraint is that I can’t speak to a Tico or Tica in conversation, and I know I am not the type to start a conversation on the street, so I am uncertain why I would feel uneasy at first here.
I do want to say that when I first began the bus ride out of the airport, there was a five car accident on the 3 lane road, no intersection, no stop light. Additionally, motorcycles believe Jesus is personally leading them through the roads and sidewalks out here, and they are the most dangerous thing in the city. My first billboard I noticed out of the airport was advertising for contraception, and the second one was a coca-cola sign. Surrounding it was a classic shanty town of rusted sheet metal shacks situated on the bank of the river here. This was when I knew I had arrived in a developing country.
I appreciated this entry – great imagery.
Haha, nobody can escape McDonald’s! It is surprising to me that you saw an ad for contraception, though, perhaps that is also the work of outside influences like yourself. Costa Rica is mainly catholic, right?
Motorcyclists are like that here, too. I hope they do have some invisible force keeping them safe, no matter how irresponsibly they drive. 😛
Thank you for these travel logs, it is almost like I am experiencing the same things as you through your writing! 🙂
Our Professor explains that everyone self-describes as Roman Catholic but no one practices.
I think drivers here are hyper-aggressive. Erika, our formerly American Professor(she was born in New York, lives full time in Costa Rica. She’s a Cornell grad) that traffic signs and lights and lines in roads are considered “suggestions”. I’m glad we have Carlos, a faithful driver.