I'm teaching in the building of Universidad Florencio del Castillo, which is about a 20 minute walk from my house in Siquirres. Twenty minutes only because the heat and humidity make it a slog! In Charlotte it would take 10 minutes tops (except July / August). The school would be on my actual street and a straight shot if the streets cut straight through... but there are big abandoned buildings and overgrown lots, and there seems to be only 1 paved road that crosses the railroad tracks... so I have to make a kind of PacMan maze to get from here to there.

If I'm being totally honest, taking into account the cultural differences of language and local architecture, Siquirres wouldn't look much different, to an outsider, than my own little hometown in 1960's South Carolina.

Paved streets are patched and potholed. Tiny homes with the scatterings of their families visible from the sidewalk. Some well kept, some....meh. Dogs (friendly? not friendly? boh...), cats, chickens (not sure if these would be called free range but they are definitely free running). The shops are compact and the doors are open to the street -- no air conditioning but the sound of floor fans from every portal. Kids playing on the school playground during the day, and in the side streets at night - running and jumping and screaming. People sitting on a veranda talking with family or friends.

There seems to be no zoning (as I noticed in Poland last year and) as I remember from my tiny hometown. A restaurant sharing a wall with a copy shop, who shares a wall with a mechanics shop, that adjoins an overgrown lot across from a dentist office whose home sits behind the office. So many people walking to do their business -- as Americans used to do before everyone got so fat and addicted to air conditioning.

The government seems to have spent a lot of time and money on the rainwater removal gutters lining the streets - deep, wide, and lined with concrete -- much needed during the rainy season. There are little bridges for walkers over the ditches.

There are pizza shops (it's taking over the world!), and fried chicken shops, and cafeterias with traditional foods, and bakeries.

Just a normal small town, anywhere in the world.

(Photos coming soon.)