The smaller things in life...

Hola todos! It's Stephanie again! So todays blog will be on the smaller things in life here in Costa Rica; the water, internet, cable/satellite, food, etc. Hopefully you will find it useful, I like to make things as practical as possible so you can apply it in your life. If you are planning to move to Costa Rica, and you have sort of decided where you would like to live (mountains, beach, or city as mentioned in previous blogs), then there are a few things you need to be aware of.


WATER: Your water bill in Costa Rica will be very cheap when compared to your bill in the US. David and I pay approximately $5-$8 per month (last month's bill was 2,352 colones which is about $5), and I take long showers! What you really need to know about the water here, is that it is very difficult to find a home that has a hot water tank. We do not have hot water in our house, and often have to boil water to clean our dishes or wash extremely dirty clothes. If you are like me and HAVE to have hot showers, you can purchase a "termo ducha" (thermal shower head) at major grocery stores such as Hipermas or Pricemart here in Costa Rica. You can attach this shower head to your shower and PRESTO hot water! Just keep in mind this is an electrical shower head, so you do not want to play with it. I would suggest you turn it on and keep it on, I don't even know how to turn mine off! LOL. You can, however, find a home with hot water, it will most likely be more expensive though. Places such as new gated communities and condominiums usually have hot water.

CELL PHONES: There is only one cell phone company in Costa Rica, and that is ICE (Instituto Costarricense de Electricidad). There are two options you can choose from with this company, TDM or GSM. There is a long waiting list for both, so you could be waiting anywhere from one month to over a year to get your phone connected.

If you chose TDM (Time Division Multiplexing) or "all technology," you can get it sooner than the GSM phone, because not as many people use this system anymore. It is slower and cuts out more, you cannot send pictures or get the internet on your phone through here. Reception is poor in many places.

GSM (Groupe Spécial Mobile) is the most popular choice, with this option you can receive or send photos, surf the internet, it has better reception and better technology. The down side is the waiting list. There are not enough phone numbers in Costa Rica, and so you could be waiting up to a year, maybe longer, to have it connected.

INTERNET: There are four providers for internet services here in Costa Rica. There is Racsa who offers dial up internet service only. They have a maximum transfer speed of 56kb (kilobytes), which is quite slow. ICE only offers ADSL internet services. You can purchase different speeds for different prices. The down side is that it depends of port availability, which means it can also take a long time to have it connected. We signed up for ICE ADSL in October of 2008, they did not hook up our internet until May 2009. The other two are through CableTica and Amnet. You must have cable with these companies in order to purchase internet, and these two companies do not offer services in every area.

CABLE/SATELLITE: Which cable company you use may depend on where you live. If you live in the larger areas, such as Alajuela, San Jose or Heredia, you will have more choices than if you live farther out. CableTica and Amnet are the two cable companies, and SKY is the only satellite company. It doesn't take long to have your cable or satellite connected, usually they can be connected within a week.

ELECTRICTY: The only provider of electricity is ICE; it's nationwide and pretty cheap. Last month we paid 9, 818 colones for electricity, which is roughly $20 American, however the price did increase slightly this month. This month we will probably pay about 11,000 colones ($22). You can find a home for rent which includes cable, electricity, and internet so you don't have to hassel with all these companies. Almost every home has cable, electricity and water. If it doesn't, don't move there!

One last note, you will not find a home with heat in Costa Rica. We live in the mountains where it is cold and rains all the time, and we had to purchase a small electric heater on our honeymoon in Miami last year. Heat is next to impossible to find year, but it is really not needed.