For almost thirty years I have worked as relocation/retirement expert in Costa Rica. I have personally helped thousands of people relocate here through my retirement books and my monthly retirement tours.

During the time I have lived here I have had the opportunity to observe many foreigners. Some of them find their piece of paradise in Costa Rica while others do not. I would be lying through my teeth if I claimed that Costa Rica was for everyone. It simply is not. On my monthly tours I make it a point to get this across to my clients. Costa Rica is not for everyone. However, those who come here and find it to their liking would have to be dragged back to the States or Canada. They have discovered the incredible lifestyle a person can have her if he or she makes an effort.

On the other side of the coin are those who decide after a while that Costa Rica isn’t the place for them. For a variety of reasons the decide to move back home. According to the Association of Residents of Costa Rica, “cultural shock” is the main factor leading to people leaving the country. There are just some kinds of people who cannot handle the Costa Rican culture and all of its nuances. People from this group find it just too hard to adjust to the lifestyle here.

The language is another factor that causes many people to leave. It takes time and effort to learn another language, especially when you are older. This task is not impossible but requires a lot of dedication. You basically get out of it, what you put into it. If you don’t at least learn survival Spanish you will always be a stranger in a strange land.

Boredom is another reason. A lot of people do not learn Spanish well enough and they are isolated in their communities. Or they do not have enough to do. Costa Rica has a wealth of activities for foreigners. All you have to do is pick up the weekend edition of the local English newspaper, the Tico Times, and you will find hundreds of things to do where you can meet other expatriates. La Nación, the local Spanish, newspaper also has a long list of things to do to stay busy and happy. All you have to do is get up off your butt and make the effort.

You can only sit on the balcony watching a tropical sunset for so long before is gets very old. I have a friend who lived on the beach and said, “After a while all of the sunsets look the same.”

The single men tie up with women here and sometimes get stripped of their wealth which leads them to move home. Others do not do their homework and make bad investments which eventually causes them to move back.

Single women sometimes have problems finding male companionship and enough friends of the same age and
educational level.

I am sure there are other reasons why people return to their home countries but the ones I have listed above are the primary factors I have observed.

Yesterday I was I downtown San José, Costa Rica and it seemed everyone was consumed with soccer. A lot of businesses put TVs in the window so that the people on the street could follow the games. I met a friend for coffee at the Patio Restaurant at the Hotel Balmoral. The place was full of people eating lunch and watching the game. There was also a birthday party going on with a group of Mariachis entertaining playing, so the place was buzzing with activity. The Balmoral faces Avenida Central, the city’s main pedestrian mall, so it is a great place to watch people. You’ll certainly get an eye-full!

For the next month everything comes to a virtual halt when there is a World Cup soccer game. It seems that everyone’s life revolves around the sport. Many business even give their employees a flexible schedule so that they can view games. A lot of cab drivers even have small TVs in the vehicles so that they can follow the cup and radios everywhere are blaring the play-by-play.

Soccer or fútbol as I is called here is king and the king rules during the World Cup. This huge event rivals the Super Bowl or Olympics. It hard to believe that in the U.S. most people aren’t aware that the Cup is even going on. That is not the case here.

In case you don’t understand the rules of soccer or how it is played, Don’t worry! Everything is explained in a previous article I wrote on this blog. It also appears in my perennial best seller “The New Golden Door to Retirement and Living in Costa Rica.” By the way the 16th edition will be released in a couple of months.

If you live or retire in Costa Rica sooner or later you will get bitten by the soccer bug. The important games are a good time to socialize and gather with friends to add to your list of incredible experiences in Costa Rica.

About ten years ago I wrote an article for my best-selling guidebook “The New Golden Door to Retirement and Living in Costa Rica” entitled “Dumb and Dumber.” I have included a new version below and added another character I call “Even Dumber.” The purpose of this article is to open men’s eyes to the possible problems of getting involved with “some” of the women here. Most guys don’t share the same fate but nevertheless it is important to be aware of the modus operandi here and save yourself a lot of money and heart ache. I was married to an incredible Costa Rican woman who unfortunately passed away. Thank god that during our marriage she always kept her family at bay and didn’t involve them in our personal life or have me support them.

Over the years I have encountered a lot of foreigners who end up not using common sense and get involved with people with whom they would probably never associate back home. This brings me to the story of “Dumb and Dumber.”

Dumb came to Costa Rica about 12 years ago from the United States, where he was a successful businessman. Almost upon arriving here, he became romantically involved with a woman of ill- repute. He was basically too lazy and busy getting drunk to find a quality mate. Over the course of his relationship, he lost about $300,000 because he entrusted his business dealings to his girlfriend. After splitting up with her and having to give her half of everything he owned because of their common-law situation, he went and got involved with another woman who will probably “take him to the cleaners” someday.

Dumber is even more stupid than Dumb. He came to the country as a millionaire. The first thing he did was get romantically involved with a woman of the night. Dumber also spent most of his time in bars, like Dumb. Consequently, when he broke up with his lady friend, after a few years together, he had to pay her about $50,000. He is now with another woman and most likely supporting her whole family. He will probably end up broke like Dumb. Neither Dumb nor Dumber speaks Spanish nor has made any effort to understand the locals and constantly refers to them in derogatory terms.

This brings me to ‘Even Dumber.” He came here many years ago to retire. He is bright and I am sure he has read about the two characters above according to what he once told me over a couple of beers. “Even Dumber” is a man of money who was a successful lawyer in Texas before retiring here. He had been married and divorced twice in the States and has a couple of grown children. Dumb lives near the beach and enjoys the outdoors. He still maintains a residence in the U.S. I give him credit because he has learned some Spanish and made an effort has tried to fit in with the locals unlike the two dufuses above.

About five years ago he met a curvaceous young Costa Rican woman with a couple of children from her previous relationship. Five months later he moved her and the kids in with him. The woman has been good to him and he has developed an excellent relationship with her children. The only problem is that “Even Dumber” is now supporting not only his girlfriend and her kids but his girlfriend’s parents and several other relatives, about ten people in all. Don’t forget if you hook up with a woman or marry her here you also get involved with the her whole family.

Older single men can be blinded by lust and a beautiful younger woman but have to remember that there is ALWAYS a price to pay…and it just may be exorbitant. Fortunately, this story has a fairly happy ending because this guy’s wife is honest, devoted and didn’t take him to the cleaners. He is just lucky to have deep pockets to support her extended family. Over the years I have heard many other stories with less happy endings.

I admit Even Dumber has a good heart and is a kind person but the “buck has to stop someplace.” Kindness is often synonymous with stupidity here. Americans are seen by many a winning lottery ticket and an upgrade in lifestyle. Unfortunately, many Americans are taken advantage of because of their good hearts. A lot of the locals take a lot more than they give in any relationship whether it be romance or in business.

The bottom line is that as foreigners we are guests in this beautiful country, but we should not go overboard with our generosity and let people take advantage of us. Unfortunately many Americans and Canadians “leave their brain” on the plane. I have seen this situation repeated over and over.

On my monthly relocation and retirement tours I’m always asked about activities in which Costa Ricans engage. I always make it a point to talk about the lottery or lotería nacional. Don’t get me worng! I don’t advocate going to a casino and gambling away your hard earned money, because I never do. However, I always explain how the lottery works here, especially after many of my clients notice the venders selling the tickets on the streets and ask, “What are they selling there?”

The lottery is a part of most Costa Rican’s lives for a long time. Almost every tico I know dreams of striking it rich by winning the big Christmas lottery called EL Gordo Navideño or Premio Mayor (grand prize). There are also weekly lotteries which offer a smaller payoff. The results can be found in the newspapers.

People use their date of birth, their lucky number, numbers and symbols from their dreams, etc. in order to select they lottery numbers they will play.

The lottery is a Costa Rican tradition and has been around since 1800s when the first drawing was held. In 1845 Nazarino Toledo, the head of a charity, requested the government start a public lottery to raise funds for the construction of the San Juan de Dios Hospital. Shortly after the government initiated a monthly lottery to raise money. However, it wasn’t until 1885 that the lottery officially began on a more regular basis.

In December of 1960 the Gordo Navideño was held. It wasn’t until 1979 that the first million colón prize was offered. In 1986 the largest prize was 5 million colónes. Today the prizes are larger and lottery tickets are more colorful. A large portion of the money collected still goes to charity and the remainder is given to the respective winners.

If you plan to live or retire in Costa Rica you have chosen a healthy country with excellent medical care. In previous articles I talked about the country’s “Blue Zones” where many centenarians reside. I also alluded to the fact that if you are a Costa Rican and reach eighty years of age you have the longest longevity rate in the world thereafter.

In today’s la Nación newspaper there was an article that said Costa Ricans also have the least chance of dying before 60 years of age than people who live in other countries in Latin America and the Caribbean. The study attributes this to the country’s excellent “cradle to grave” health care system and the absence of internal and external conflicts (wars). The study appeared in the publication The Lancet which is financed by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

The study covered 187 countries and Costa Rica was first in Latin America and 32 in the entire world. Chile was in second place in this report. This study came to the same conclusions as previous work by the World Bank.

So, if you are interested in living or retiring in a country with a great climate and healthy people, then Costa Rica is the obvious choice. Who know? If you adopt the healthy Costa Rican lifestyle you can probably “add years to your life.” I can guarantee you that you will add “life to your years” because of the fantastic lifestyle.