Cultural notes, part 4

Yesterday after graduation, I hugged Mireilla and Melissa goodbye as they headed off into the rainforest and on to Sámara this weekend. I had lunch at Café Mambo with Ken and Ellie, the students I shared Zeneida's house with my first week in Costa Rica. They're living in an apartment now and have a knack for making gallo pinto and a few other local dishes. Tara and Alison, two of the girls I met my first week in Heredia, are off to Sámara tomorrow as well so we went out to La Rumba Disco last night to go dancing one last time. I wished all of them well and knew they'd have an amazing time on the beach.


A few parting cultural notes on this, my final Saturday afternoon in Costa Rica:

• Tiquismos – local variations on Spanish that are unique to Costa Rica and/or Central America
  
• usted – Though considered formal in standard Spanish, this is the everyday way of saying "you" in Costa Rica regardless of the relationship between the speaker and listener. Vos is highly familiar and usually reserved for long-time friendships. Tú – which in most other dialects may be mildly familiar – is intimately familiar in Tico Spanish and traditionally used only with lovers and God. On the other hand, Silvia suggested to me one time that the continuing homogenization of Latin culture through mass media may have the power to change that, as young people grow up with pan-Latin television, movies and music which promote the non-Tico usage of tú.
  
• ¿Cuánto vale? – the local variant of ¿Cuánto cuesta? ("How much does it cost?") which literally means "How much is it worth?"


• Con (mucho) gusto – "You're welcome." It literally means, "With (great) pleasure" so it has a much warmer meaning than the standard de nada ("It's nothing") which I've never heard once in Costa Rica.
  
• tranquil – I've heard this from many people, including Zeneida. It is a shortened form of tranquilo ("calm") and as an exclamation ("¡Tránquil!") is used to mean "No problem" or "Don't worry about it" as far as I can tell. This would make it roughly equivalent to No problema or possibly even No te preocupes or No se preocupe.
  
• pulpería – a convenience store, roughly analogous to 7-Eleven


• plata – another word for "money" that's much more common here and in other parts of Latin America than the standard dinero. It literally means "silver" and reflects the importance of silver currency in the history of many Latin American countries.
  
• cien metros – "one hundred meters," the standard way of refering to a city block regardless of its actual length


• mae – a tag word roughly equivalent to "dude" or "man," e.g., ¡Tuanis, mae! ("Cool, man!")
  
• As with many rural towns, the population in Sámara is too small to support a dedicated high school. Norma's granddaughter Dailis thus rides to Nicoya two hours each way, every weekday, to go to school.
  
• Even the dogs are friendly in Costa Rica. They walk the streets freely and never wear leashes. Not once has a dog barked at me while I've been here. Sometimes, a random dog will even follow you like he's your pet. So if you plan to visit Costa Rica, know that being a dog lover is practically a requirement!
  
• Going to a salsa club is a different experience from the U.S. or other parts of the world. For one thing, the style of salsa dancing is completely different here and I've only started to get used to it. The clubs also tend to play a more even mix of different styles – salsa, reggaeton, merengue and cumbia. Lastly, it's typical for people to go out in groups and less typical to see people go by themselves, even though the latter is often the norm in the U.S. Asking someone to dance is probably the only situation in Costa Rica where I've ever encountered a cold shoulder.
  
• Ticos have never heard of decaffeinated coffee. It's not supposed to exist.