Where did you come from?

Why Did You Come Here?
What Do You Do?
By Martha Bennett
There are several species of estranjeros living in Costa Rica for a variety of reasons and doing different things. They come to retire, for adventure, to invest or open a business, or to study with one thing in common: changing their life style.

There are tourists. Some come to appreciate the flora and the fauna, volcanoes, beaches and mountains, and observe the Costa Rica culture. Others flock for sports: deep sea fishing, diving, surfing, white water rafting, hiking and hanging out. Everything is available except snow sports. Cultural events may be added on to either group's activities. A third group comes entirely for the bars, casinos and massage parlors. No one comes for the great food which has not inspired restaurants in other parts of the world. No matter, the ingredients are available to create your own cusine.

The people who park here for six months to life do these things and more. Missionaries come for Latin language and culture. Old men come looking for young Ticas. They get them too. This unlikely alliance builds the men's egos and the girls like the upgraded standard of living. Others of all ages earn or supplement their income teaching languages, writing, renting rooms or acting as tour guides. There is a group, usually college educated, who can't find, satisfactory jobs in North America. They are found in the tourist industry or working for international companies. A foreigner can work here if the task is something a Tico can not do. There are regulations, but in Latin countries, these are worked around. A slower pace of life and close family ties appeal to people in high stress jobs who have children. They come for a change of atmosphere. There is crime and substance abuse here, but the tightly knit community provides a healthier climate for raising children.

Retirees participate in many things. Some renovate a dream house. Some persue the World Wide Web. There is a Theater Group, a Canadian Club, Women's club, Scrabble, bridge and T'ai Chi clubs and even a society for refrigeration engineers. The country club set plays golf, graces swimming pools, and dines elegantly. One can study yoga, painting, writing, language, pottery, gardening, holistic medicine and dance.

Remember, living takes longer here. Time is spent finding things, fixing things, cutting red tape and avoiding long lines. But this pace allows more time for reading, observing, listening to music and just being. In Costa Rica, we are more human beings than human doings. Pura vida! Pure life!

Opening an English Language
Bookstore in Costa Rica
By Mike Jones
My business partner and I are often asked how we decided to start a bookstore in Costa Rica. We began by listing all the businesses we thought might be interesting to operate and/or potentially profitable. The list we came up with included a pool hall, music store, bar, pharmacy, bagel shop, bookstore and laundromat. As we were mulling over the possibilities, we heard about a bar that was for sale. After talking to the owners of the bar and consulting with our lawyer, we decided to make an offer, contingent upon our being able to discuss with the building's landlord the changes we wanted to make to the bar. When the owners of the bar told us that it wouldn't be possible to talk to their landlord prior to purchase, we balked at the deal, sensing bad faith. A few weeks later, some friends contacted us about an excellent retail location that was becoming available in downtown San José. Because the location is near to the Plaza de la Cultura, a point visited by nearly every tourist, we decided that an English language bookstore, whose main market would be tourists, might work. And so, within the space of two weeks we went from being bar ownwers to bookstore owners.

Our bookstore has now been opened nearly four years, and each year sales have nudged upward. There have been moments of despair, frustration and crisis, but the business appears to have finally left the crawling stage behind and is walking. I never owned a business before in the U.S. and do not think that only four years of business ownership prepares me to give general business advice. What I could instead offer is a handful of tips that relate specifically to expatriate business ownership.

The first relates to your decision about opening a business in Costa Rica. You must decide if you like the country! This is an obvious point, but I have seen many tourists arrive and decide to move here mainly on the basis of having enjoyed their vacation. The rythm of day-to-day existence versus that of tourist life is entirely distinct. If you can pull it off financially, I would recommend first arriving for a six month visit to really test the idea that this is where you would like to live. Even then, you must keep in mind that there is a big difference between living here while not working and living here while running a business; all the things you enjoyed doing when you were free of work obligations, you will find little time for when you are starting up a business. When you do decide to start a business, be prepared for a dual challenge, you will be facing all the standard problems of business ownership (managing cash, monitoring competition, attempting to increase sales, etc.) at the same time that you are learning a new culture and language.

As you go through the process of trying to decide what kind of business to open, it is common to make a list of kinds of businesses that exist in the home country but do not exist in Costa Rica. For several years we expatriates were clamoring for a bagelry and a micro brewery, and when they did finally arrive they met with considerable success. Nevertheless, it is important to keep in mind the significant cultural differences that exist between the home country and here, and that what works there won't always work here. The expatriate community is not so large that you can succeed simply by targeting that group. You need tico customers too, and disposable income is not too high here. Also, whatever business you choose, it is obviously important as an expatriate to respect the customs and moral standards of this country. One gentleman from Canada entered the store and told me he was planning on opening a topless car wash. I said, "I would suggest doing that in another country."

Expatriate business people need to resist the occasional pull toward paranoia, toward the notion that "they", the locals are all trying to take advantage of me. A more reasonable stance, I think, is to asume that in business everyone is trying to take advantage of everyone, regardless of national origin. So far, our only slightly significant encounters with less than honorable people have been two unfortunate business deals with other expatriate business people, who , because they had no strong family or financial ties to this country, were able to flee the country.

Despite a strong tendency on the part of U.S. media to represent Latin American governments as bureaucratic, inefficient mazes, we have found the opposite to be true in Costa Rica. Nearly all the legal and regulatory issues that we have been required to comply with have generally been handled swiftly and fairly inexpensively by our lawyer. Get a good lawyer whose practice focuses on expatriate clients. A related stereotype about Latin America is that it is rife with corruption. While there are great differences between countries, we have never had anyone approach us and insist that we pay a bribe as a condition for conducting business. True, we have had people offer us the option of a bribe in order to receive faster or better service. I've seen similar things happen in New York. A last word of advice...don't expect to get rich.

A Golfer's Dream
By Landy Blank
My wife Susan and I have lived in Costa Rica for two years. We vacationed here many times before deciding to make our big move. It often feels as though we arrived here just yesterday, at other times I don't remember living anywhere else. However, I will always remember the reaction of family and friends upon being told that we were packing our bags, three large dogs and heading to Costa Rica. I thought everybody would be excited and offer lots of encouragement, but read on to get an idea.

"What will you do on that island?" "We'll bring people to Costa Rica on golf vacations, and actually it's not an island. Oh, I didn't know it was a golf destination, they must have some great courses." "Well, not exactly...They do have one great course, the Cariari, and more are being built." "Landy, they only have one course and you're going to sell golf vacations?" "We're looking ahead and new courses are being built!" "When will they be finished?" "That's a tough question, nobody sems to know, but it will happen! The only way I can find out is to move there, get ourselves settled, and be ready when they do open."

Inevitably at this point in the conversation there was a rolling of the eyes and a small smile would pass across the face of my friend, family member, or golfing buddy.

"Why in the world would you want to leave Charleston? You get to play golf as part of your job at the country club, and then go downtown and eat and drink for free at your restaurant. You must be crazy, I just don't understand." How do you explain that Costa Rica has gotten into your blood, the people, the beauty, the climate, and despite the bureaucratic hassles, you're determined to live there. It didn't take long for these conversations to become tiresome, and as quickly as possible we made our move to our new home. With dogs, computers, golf clubs, and anything that would fit into a suitcase, we were off to Costa Rica in search of our destiny.

Many of the people we met in Costa Rica expresssed the same incredulity when we told them we were planning to bring groups of golfers here on vacation. The look we got was, "Well, you're not the first crazy gringo to hit Costa Rica, and I wish you all the best luck in the world. Let me buy you a drink!"

(Author's note: In the past two years, two world class championship golf courses have been completed. Costa Rica is quickly becoming known around the world as a golf destination and we are very happy that we made the move!)

A Fisherman Finds a Home in Costa Rica By Todd Staley
A writing assignment first brought me to Costa Rica in 1987. Being an outdoor journalist, I was very excited to test some of the country's "world famous sportsfishing". This trip brought me in contact with the late Archie Fields and we became immediate friends. While sitting on the veranda of his famous Rio Colorado Lodge, I asked Archie if he ever needed someone to run his lodge I would like to be considered. He chuckled and said I was about number 1000 on the list.

I returned to the States and told all that would listen that I didn't know how, but one day I would be living in Costa Rica. In the meantime I sought out other Costa Rican writing assignments and began bringing groups of fishermen down to Costa Rica.

In June of 1991 Archie called my house in the US and asked me to "think" about coming down and managing his fishing lodge. I took less than three seconds to think it over. In the next three months I condensed my life belongings to 7 suitcases and 35 fishing poles and headed for Costa Rica.

In Barra del Colorado where I lived there are no cars. The river, creeks and canals are the streets and avenues. I worked long hours often going as many as three months without a day off and loved every second of it. I used Norman Paperman, the character in Herman Wouk's "Don't Stop the Carnival" as my relief when problems arose concerning employees or guests.

I was awestruck by the culture of the Caribbean side of Costa Rica, especially the stories told to me by the older generations. I met people with zero education but with more wisdom than anyone I had met in my life. The people are a mix of Spanish, African, several types of Indian and Chinese. For the first time in my life, through this experience, I came to believe in "magic" both black and white.

For nearly five years I lived in the jungle. Today I'm in the concrete jungle, but you would have to drag me back kicking and screaming the whole way for me to give up the lifestyle I have grown accustomed to in Costa Rica. What worked for me is that the first thing I did was throw any American attitude I may have had down the river that flowed in front of the lodge and immersed myself in the culture, language and people. Tuanis!

A Bookmaker in Paradise
By Redstone Brimely
The life I led in the States wasn't working for me. My last business venture ended in failure and I was being evicted from my home. The country health inspector, alerted by my nosey neighbor, posted the notice on my front door citing me with excessive refuse from fast food establishments. The sum total of my social life consisted of covert flirtations with the non-English speaking East Indian counter girl at my local Stop-And-Go. In all of my thirty-five years on this physical plane I have never made love to a woman I didn't pay for. If that wasn't enough, I was down to my last pair of pants, I had outgrown Big and Tall. I needed a change.

Watching infomercials at four in the morning, I heard testimony from a West Virginian illiterate expounding of teaching English overseas. Like the rube I am I sent for the delux package. The exotic destinations offered were many, but I decided Costa Rica was going to be my new home. There's something about change that gives a young man a bounce to his step. I sensed good things ahead and I was right.

It was ten years since I had last set foot on an airplane. It seemed to me the aisles were much wider then. As I approached my seat 7-B I knew there was trouble ahead. Two women were already seated in 7-A and 7-C, both of gargantuan proportions. Luckily the flight attendent interceded and offered me a seat in first class. Now, I'm a nice guy, but I think that had little to do with my upgrade and more to do with the plane's weight distribution. I've never been one to make excuses, but due to a recent series of setbacks my weight had crept up to a less than svelt 480 pounds.

I went to work as an English teacher for a language institute in San José, tutoring local exectives. My first week there I instructed a group of Costa Ricans who spoke excellent English but needed to brush up on their grammar. Interesting work but my biweekly stipend would barely keep me in rice and beans. A compamy called Grand Central Sports, an offshore Las Vegas-style sportsbook operating in San José, had sent their employees to the class. The top student in the class happened to be a supervisor in the wagering department. At the end of the term he offered me a job.

I had never before worked in the gambling business, however I knew something about gambling- my father was a generate gambler. Before the advent of the remote control my dad would stack TVs one on top of the other so he could watch several stations at the same time.

The company I work for takes bets on all sports, with no limits. To quote my sportsbook manager: " If there's two cockroaches running up the wall we'll take action on it."

When I completed my training I was placed in the betting department along with fifty other clerks where the phones were literally "ringing off the hook." Native beauties with cocoa butter skin and pearly white teeth in halter-tops and sarongs answered the phones speaking perfect English. I was in shock!

My Father, may he rest in peace, would have been proud with the way his boy took to the business. After a short probationary period I was moved to "the front row." I was now one of the few clerks responsible for taking wagers from"heavy hitters." These are the guys who think nothing of wagering $50,000 per game, typically play three to five games a day! The supervisor in our marketing department has given these players pseudonyms, many of whom are celebrities, to prevent undo adulation from our clerks.

My main concern when I took this job was whether or not I was breaking any laws. I did some investigating and found out offshore bookmaking is legal and beyond the juristiction of the United States government. That along with the fact the Costa Rican government licenses businesses for offshore sportsbook gave me the peace of mind I needed. The company's growth during the past football season has been phenomenal. In fact, we've both grown. I was made a betting supervisor and was given a couple of weeks off before the start of the basketball season. Until then I'll be at the beach where I've traded in my Oshkosh for Bermuda shorts and a Panama hat. with the radio at his feet to keep track of his numerous plays. Always an extremely emotional man, it was not uncommon for the old man to hurl a television set out onto the front lawn after one of his plays went sour.

Whenever I thought of a bookie joint, I pictured a dimly lit room run by old grizzled clerks, pockets bulging with scraps of paper, wearing visors, smoking cheap cigars and scribbling unintelligible numbers on a paint faded chalk-board. The reality is, offshore sportsbook of today has gone high tech. Grand Central Sports one of the pioneers in the field, runs its business with state-of-the-art computer hardware, customized software and satellite phone links that enable bettors to call toll free from anywhere in the world and receive lines in real time direct from Las Vegas.

Return to San Jose, Costa Rica Information Page