www.CostaRicaTicas.com

And it probably wouldn't make much difference if the streets had names or numbers. The average lifetime tico resident of these towns doesn't think in terms of street names or numbers; as noted, they orient themselves by landmarks.

I was thinking about this fact when I asked a resident of my adopted Midwestern home, a town of 18,000 residents, to tell me where a certain place is located. He couldn't tell me on which street this business was located, but gave me several landmarks, half of which no longer exist. I guess that maybe Costa Rica isn't all that different from home.

BTW, if you hear someone use the unit of measure, "vara" (plural "varas") in Costa Rica, it means roughly an English yardd, just shy of a meter, but to the ticos, a vara equals a meter, so the two terms are sometimes used synonymously. Don't be confused for instance if a tico tells you that the bar you seek is 50 varas from the corner where the old bank used to be located...he means, fifty meters.

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Pura Vulva! Wandering through the dark, I am El Ciego.

Yo Ciego,Being a surveyor as well as an Engineer I know the term vara ohhh.. so well.There are many variations of the measurement vara.The most usual conversion is 33 1/3 inches.It is used extensively in measurement of land based on Spainish infuence.I encounter these terms often in my work in Texas as well as some outhers.I think in general to sum it all up many towns will be laid out differently based on influences of topogaraphy and geography in the most efficient manner.even today we design things for the maximum economic benifit within reason reguardless of the norm.rbc100

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In Search of Fine Kittens,
Please... Bring back the Muff

There something that I've been wondering about since I visited CR last month. Since there are no house numbers, how does one send something by mail to a CR resident? I'm serious, I'm not being sarcastic.

It must be tough to be a mailman in SJ, especially before you become familiar with the residents by name.

-Orange

This is the precise reason that so many people in Costa Rica have P.O. boxes, "apartados," for receiving mail.

Businesses with a bit of a track record/history soon become landmarks for the mail delivery person, as do condoplexes and apartment buildings. I recently sent a "just for fun" box of inexpensive gifts to a tica pal; it took nearly eight weeks, but she received it in good shape at her condo in Tibas. The postal address is the same sort of directions one might give a taxi driver... "100 metros al este del Banco Popular, diagonal a bomba Lizano..." etc.

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Pura Vulva! Wandering through the dark, I am El Ciego.

El Ciego has got it exactly right.



That kind of address is exactly how my mail is addressed and delivered.

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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

As long as we're all going so far off the original topic, 100 meters doesn't even necessarily mean 100 meters. They use it to denote blocks. Though a city block may usually be close to 100 meters it isn't always so. So, for example, 50 meters is often meant as just an approximation denoting half a block, however far that might actually be. Ding Dong himself raised this whole topic not too long ago in his thread http://www.costaricaticas.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?p=52193 entitled "San Jose to name streets?"

Personally, while I realize street names and numbers are mainly meaningless to ticos and use tico style directions myself when, for example, I get in a cab, I still find them useful for my own purposes. It just helps me with my own orientation, in my own head if no where else. It also helps me for finding my way when walking around. For example I know that the HDR and NF are both on or near Calle 9, but knowing Avenida 1 is about 4 blocks south of Avenida 9 (3-5-7-9) helps me with distance and direction if I want to walk there. El C knows what I'm talking about.