Aero: Meghan Kelly – Costa Rica 2013 – City Life
Aero: Meghan Kelly – Costa Rica 2013 – City Life
Aero: Meghan Kelly – Costa Rica 2013 – City Life
City life in Alajuela, Costa Rica was much different than what we sometimes see around the cities in the US. Coming from a very small town I am not used to having a central park where everyone gathers or seeing many people walking down the street. In Alajuela from sunrise to sunset the parque central was packed with many different people. I saw couples, families, kids hanging out with there friends, and many other types of people.
Very soon into our trip we heard from someone that the whole country was on a summer vacation so that’s why so many people were out in the middle of the day. Coming from freezing weather and wintertime, I didn’t expect it to be their summer vacation in Costa Rica. Everywhere but in the parks especially, we saw many policemen standing around. In the US you see police cars but never policemen standing around in groups. In the beginning it gave me an uneasy feeling because I wondered why they needed so many policemen around. After a while it made me feel very safe and secure to know that they were there had I needed any assistance. At one point for a school assignment one of my classmates and I had to find someone in the park to interview and to ask questions about city life. We were nervous about asking a random person because we didn’t want to offend them and for this reason we decided it would be best to ask one of the policemen that we standing there. My classmate had a much better knowledge of Spanish so I let him do most of the talking. One question that we had to ask was how safe the city was. The policemen went on about how safe it is and that there aren’t many bad things that happen. Later when talking to another person from Alajuela they said at night the streets can be dangerous. It was interesting hearing from someone who enforced the law and also from a resident of the city.
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The homes in the city were very different from those here in the US. Every home had a gate that needed to be unlocked and entered before you could get to the front door. These were not ordinary waste high chain link fences they were 7 or 8 feet tall. There was also barbed wire around most properties. This was very scary to me in the beginning but just like the police I began to see it as great security, making me feel safe. Most homes in the very middle of Alajuela had little to know yard space. The houses were conjoined and only few stood alone. Some of the houses on the outskirts of the city and also the nicer homes had more yard space.
One of the major things about city life that I experienced daily was the driving. In Alajuela people drive fast and sometimes reckless. There are little to no laws to prevent crazy driving. There were stop signs but other than that there weren’t many other traffic signs or lights. The very first night after arriving in Alajuela out host father picked up my roommate and I. On the drive home it was very apparent to us that driving was very different in this city then to any in the United States. Many people would use their horn to communicate with other drivers where in the US it is more of a negative thing when we use our horn. They would use it to let others know that they were going or to let them know it was the other persons turn. All the drivers seemed to understand the “horn language” and always knew what the other was trying to say. One of the dangerous parts of city driving is all of the motorcycles that are used. Since bikes are so small the riders easily swerve in and out of traffic to get to their desired destination faster. It was so dangerous because they would do it at such a high speed. My host father owns a bike and he told my roommate and I that people riding bikes are required to wear reflective vests or they will be fined 150 US dollars. This is a good thing but they still drive recklessly.
Getting around the city was also hard because my sense of direction is less that average and there aren’t any street signs! People would give directions by telling you how many blocks from different common places a location was. For example they would tell you to turn right three blocks after the post office. This made it very difficult to get around in taxis. I was very grateful that my host father wrote down his address on a piece of paper so I could just show the taxi driver where to go.
City life in Alajuela, Costa Rica was very different from the United States. Before embarking on this trip I was determined to experience many different things. I can definitely say that experiencing City life was a sometimes scary. Even so, I was so lucky to be able to experience how different the world is in so many different aspects.
– Meghan Kelly
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