Monday, July 22, 2013

25 Sure Signs You Are Becoming Accustomed to Life in Rural Costa Rica

I saw this and had to post it to our blog.

We live in Atenas and it is pretty rural.

It ain't the sticks, but the population is not very high and most people work in the agricultural arena

Please feel free to add your “Sure Signs” in the comments section below. Pura vida!

25 Sure Signs You Are Becoming Accustomed to Life in Rural Costa Rica

1. You were never considered a “morning person,” but now you don’t even require an alarm clock; the sun beaming into your bedroom window and the birds chirping wake you up quite consistently. And they require no electricity (see Sure Sign #2).

2. You stop assuming water and electricity are available every day. Instead, when you wake up, you switch on the light and faucet to see if either or both are working. You learn to keep an extra bottle of water (or five) handy.

3. Butterflies are a part of your bedroom decor. Not the plastic or fabric kind; the flying, fluttering, living kind.

4. When you see a few ants floating in your tea, you don’t dump the tea; you spoon the ants out and keep drinking.

5. You take your rain jacket or an umbrella everywhere. Even when the sun is shining.

6. You stop cursing the rain and are actually grateful for it. It is, after all, the reason much of Costa Rica is such a gorgeous green.

7. You schedule outdoor activities some time between 6 AM and 1 PM.

8. Instead of squashing the creepy crawlies you find in your house, you either let them be, chase them outside, or capture and release them. Advanced move: You lean in for a closer look to see what new creatures you are sharing your home with.

9. You put meetings on hold to see what species of bird is singing outside the office.





10. You stop wearing moisturizer. All of that moisture in the air is doing a damn good (and free) job of keeping your skin hydrated.

11. Your decision about what to wear involves this rule: If there are no visible stains on an article of clothing and you don’t cringe when smelling it, it’s clean.

12. You stop gripping the seat, door, or dash every time you get in any type of transportation. Or you at least lessen your grip a bit.

13. When you wake up to an unknown insect crawling on your arm, you don’t shriek; you brush it off and go back to sleep.

14. You stop buying all your fruit from the store and start pulling it from the trees.

15. You stop expecting people to show up “on time” and you switch your internal clock to Tico Time. If you really need someone to meet you at a specific time, you tell them a time earlier than your actual meeting time.

16. You have more bug bites than freckles.

17. You always have rice ready.

18. When you are out on a jog and hear a low, barking sound, you don’t look around on the ground for a dog; you look up in the trees for the howler monkeys.

19. You wash your clothes at least two days in advance of when you need them to account for the time it will take for them to dry.

20. Your front door is wide open most hours of the day. So are all of your windows. Advanced move: you live in a house where some doors and windows don’t have glass or screens or any way to *close* them.

21. You accept that seat numbers and bus tickets are not equivalent to the amount of people you can fit on the bus. You can always fit one more person on the bus.

22. You are that one more person trying to fit on the bus.

23. You have mastered the art of standing in the aisle of the bus. Advanced move: you have mastered sleeping while standing in the aisle of the bus.

24. When you go to a soda for a meal, you don’t ask for a menu; you ask what they have in their kitchen today.

25. You give – and follow – directions that include neither exact addresses nor street names, but instead involve descriptions of parks, colors of buildings, and that store over there.


This post is dedicated to anyone who has lived, worked, or played in rural Costa Rica. A special thanks to my Hojancha ohana – Charlotte, Anais, Jessica, Lara, Hanna, Maria, Bram, Guillaume, FX, Teniko, DJ, Marcus, and Scott – who have contributed (intentionally or otherwise!) to the creation of this list.
Originally posted -- http://sunnyamfitzgerald.com/2013/07/03/25-sure-signs-you-are-becoming-accustomed-to-life-in-rural-costa-rica-2/