www.CostaRicaTicas.com

abogado........Thanks for the responses!!

Mr Sullivan-
I, as well as many people here and other forums(amCR) did not initially feel positive about your letter, but now that you have responded to this forum, I would be very interested to hear more of your experiences. I, myself, have chosen not to move to CR, in spite of falling in love with the country on my 1st visit almost 8 years ago... probably for many of the same reasons. Please don't be put off by many of the negative responses, as I think your intelligent input could provide invaluable info for others in love with a dream

Odds are I've done a lot more camping, hunting and fishing, as well as the cleaning and skinning, than you have ever done.

You are officially invited to visit Lincoln.

mucho mas, mas tarde

Hey Mr. S..... I guess since I started this thread I should at least welcome you. Your insight is certainly appreciated. Of course, up until hopefully now we had only your letter to AM Costa Rica to go by. It came across as very negative and for those of us that love the place... negative characteristics and all.... well we did what boneheads do from time to time... speculate on a wide range of issues.

Can I assume your wife agreed with your letter? Knowing what I know now I am thinking she did.

Berk.....

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FRUITCAKE... and you thought it was something you eat! Not on CRT!

abogado_de_nebraska

Welcome & thanks for taking your time. Please try to keep in your perspective that this is a mongering board so some of us are not the most pure lot of guys you might meet.

I agree & please reread my quote I don't think I said what you refer too. Zippy

sorry you took it that way ..... We see many Gringos meet Pay 4 Play (P4P) Latinas (Putas) & try to make them a wife which never seems to work & that is what I am refering too not your wife ! Try to overlook our second guessing of this one short article. It is pure backseat driving but then again many members have seen enough to make anyones hair curl .

I appreciate your presence here ! Thanks again!

_________________
"Run silent, run deep"
Spunk glazed Chicas are the building blocks of the universe!

How about this. Dear Atlanta Journal. I am an attorney from Costa Rica.
I moved to Ga and I am so unhappy. I live up here in the hills with all these hillbillys. I'm so sad that I cant get electricity to work right in my 30 year old trailer. Some guy robbed me when I was walking thru downtown Atl in the wee hours of the morning. Some guy sold me a time share in Florida that is not a good value. I bought a used car that wont make it to work and back and there is nothing I can do about it. I joined a health club and they are sueing me even though I dont go there. I got a ticket and was able to pay an attorney to get me out of it- kind of reminds me of paying to cops directly in CR - You are able to pay your way out of things just the only difference in america is that there are more middle men. I went to a local dive restaurant and the restrooms were dirty. I cant fit in so all these people keep calling me a Mexican. I'm a tico not a dirty mexican ! Bla, Bla, Bla. Nobody said that everyone will fit into a completely new environment. But moving from a lilly white area of Nebraska to the hills of CR is a BIG DAMN DIFFERENCE. Maybe the experience would have been better if you had moved to a newer neighborhood in Santa Ana. I live in a new building and I have reliable cable , internet, electricity, and water. The power was out 2-4 periods in a year. I used a battery powered dvd and watched movies and worked on my computer and played with my girlfriend , until it came back on. It was no big inconvenience . I don't remember the water ever not working. My cable is great and my internet is great. Your experience and mine have been really different.

Mr. S.
Thank you for taking the time to reply. I am sure your experiences in Costa Rica were exactly as you described them and they eaffected your decision to return to the US.

Living in Costa Rica is not for everyone. I have been here for 4 years and while I find some adjustment is necessary I am here for as long as I can imagine. Naturally I am talking of the foreseeable future who knows what is ahead. Granted I had some advantages over you. I have been coming here for 15 years, I had friends who lived here full time, I came from Miami so had some experience with Latins.

What I find interesting about this post is of the 50 some replies I count 5 from guys who actually live here. Always easy to criticize when you have never been in a persons shoes. Hard to accept the views of those who come for 7 to 14 visits and never leave the gulch.

I am wondering why you decide on Desamparados. You might have wanted to avoid a gated community in Escazu or Santa Ana but why not a place in Sabana? I think your experience there might have been diffrent.

Anyway, again thanks for coming forward and replying. best wishes to you and your family.

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Pura Vida
Only Irish coffee provides in a single glass all four
essential food groups:
alcohol, caffeine, sugar and fat.
Alex Levine

Since Mr. Sullivan has a real life with much better things to do than monitor this thread allow me to fill in some of the blanks. These are things he shared with me in our telephone conversation this afternoon.

First of all Mr. Sullivan told me he had enough stories to write a book. There were many, many positives about his time living in Costa Rica (a country he had visited many times). He is fluent in Spanish and said he loved traveling to many places including Cartago, Quantecaste, Monteverde, Manual Antonio and Golfito. Overall he loves the country and the people of Costa Rica.

He was raised in a military family and as I mentioned earlier has lived in 14 states and 3 foreign countries. He also served in the military himself. Let's just say he's covered some ground in the world.

He lived in Desamparados because his wife owned a home there. She also had many relatives living in the same neighborhood. He didn't move to Costa Rica to live with Americans. In fact he told me that the few that he actually came in contact with weren't all that friendly.

The house required a lot of work including new wiring and ceiling. All work was a struggle to get done not to mention the problems he had with the 220 circuits.

He mentioned the numerous times he had to call the police about problems with gang-bangers and crackheads in his neighborhood. The gang members had lookouts posted so they could alert them when the police came into th neighborhood. Eventually the police informed him they would no longer respond.

He said he had many positive stories that he could relate. He told me of two stories regarding taxi drivers. One time a driver took him to Hyper-mart. For some reason it was closed. The driver not only took him back home but didn't charge him for the trip.

On another occasion he was accidentally overcharged as the driver didn't clear his meter from a previous fare. Three months later Mr. Sullivan enter the same taxi and the driver not only recognized him but gave him a refund of the difference. Mr. Sullivan didn't even recognize the driver.

Mr. Sullivan is NOT, I repeat NOT, a monger. He does not smoke or drink or cavort with "working girls". When I told him about CRT and the main "objective" therein he voiced no opinion of us. I was almost afraid he would hang up on me but he was a gentlemen throughout the call.

The bottom line on returning to Lincoln and attempting to get his law practice up and running again stemmed basically from the desire to raise his two young sons in a much better environment. Having grown up in Lincoln, Nebraska myself I can certainly understand his sentiment.

So that's the story. I want to thank Mr. Sullivan for taking time with me on the telephone and for coming on CRT and answering some of your questions. He had no obligation to do either.

Every place in the world is not for everyone. We all have to reach our own "comfort zone".

Now ask yourselves this, Would YOU want to raise two small sons in San Jose?

Hmmmm ...... here is my take.

I am not a Gringo that has isolated himself from Tico culture by living in a gated community in Escazu. To the contrary, I live in a small Tico community on the fringes of the Central Valley. As far as I know I am the only Gringo in town. I have been so graciously welcomed and treated so well. I know my neighbors better than I ever knew my neighbors in the US. I hang out in Tico bars in my community and I have never been in a place where people have gone out of their way to befriend me in the way that I have been befriended in my little town in Costa Rica.

So when I hear reports from a lawyer from the United States that is complaining about how he has been treated while living in Costa Rica, my best guess is that it says more about the author of the letter than it does about the people of Costa Rica.

There are exceptions to everything, but let me ask the question .....

Is it too much of a stretch of the imagination to guess that a Lawyer from the United States might be an asshole that he might be getting exactly the treatment he deserves? I wish I could say that a majority of the Lawyers from the United State that I have met are nice guys, but unfortunately, that is just not the case.

If he is being consistently treated with contempt by Costa Ricans that tells me everything I need to know about the guy, because my experience with Costa Ricans has been exactly opposite.

Kccostarica,
Do you really have a clue?

Witling,

It is good we are all fools or this board would not exist ! Ok Witling where did your post disappear too ?? Pulled the old Buzz trick ...

_________________
"Run silent, run deep"
Spunk glazed Chicas are the building blocks of the universe!

Correction

Hi Wit,

I had not read the thread before before making my comments. My bad.

I stand corrected.

Thanks for the follow up and getting to the bottom of it.

I have had an opposite experience of Mr Sullivan here in Costa Rica, but then again I have not put myself in a position to be taken advantage of either ........

No.... and the fact that Mr. Sullivan is a lawyer is moot. Plain old frickin moot which goes back to the very first word I wrote in this post. Thanks for the info and perspective Wit.

We have several lawyers as members here. Easy boys... easy.

Berk.......

_________________
FRUITCAKE... and you thought it was something you eat! Not on CRT!