Where the streets have no name

Before I begin, yes, that is a transport truck upside-down.

There are lots of unstabilities here in Costa Rica. 1) Let´s start with the roads. In Puerto Viejo there were potholes everywhere. Despite the obvious negatives, it was kind of cool. It added to the controlled chaos. Bikes and cars and dogs and people everywhere... Aside from unfriendly holes in the road, the roads often come dangerously close to massive cliffs when driving in the mountains. Often times all you need to do is stick your head out the window and look down and you´re stairing an unending abyss in the face. Ya....kinda scary. I´d say this truck driver had it lucky.

2) Now there´s also the weather. It´s a little more stable right in the mointains, but in Puerto Viejo it would be sunny and beautiful, then within 20 mintues it would cloud over and drizzle rain. Plans would get canceled, books would open, but then no sooner had you decided to blow off the day, the sky would clear up and the sun would pump you full of good spirits again.

3) The home enertainment scene. When you rent a movie from any video store, there´s a damn good chance it´s burned. Yes, people here rent pirated movies that some Joe Blow downloaded and burnt onto a DVD. Now there´s also a chance that it´s a screener (litereally some Joe Blow sneaks a video camera into a movie theatre and films the screen... weak).

4) And finally, my personal favourite, there are no addresses. No street has a name here and no building has a number. Where I am currently staying is 150 m east of the Plaza, San Juan. Advbertising may look something like this, "Pablo Muflas - 200m south of the old KFC ("old" because it went burnt down and in it's place is a shoe store, which are freakin everywhere here) then 50m west, beside the big oak tree.

On the up side, what isn´t unstable is the people. Ticos (Costa Ricans) are very friendly. Chris (mi amigo) and I went to the hardware store for a couple things and it took us 45 minutes because everyone has to stop and shake hands and talk with everyone. ¨¿How´s your family?¨ ¨¿What´s up for today?¨ ¨¿How´s that massive stone wall comming along, Chris?¨ etc...

I´d say it´s a fair trade. A few holes in the road and some random weather patterns for a big bowl of pleasentry.