Tico Time

There is an interesting phenomenon in Costa Rica called "Tico Time." Tico Time exists in a separate time zone than the rest of the world, where 10 minutes really means 30 minutes and tomorrow really means next week. Sometimes, this drives me crazy, such as when I call for a taxi and am told 10 minutes. Nearly 30 minutes later, the taxi arrived. I've learned to build "wiggle room" into my schedule, but sometimes even that isn't enough.

On the other hand, the slower pace of life can be a nice change from the "everything is urgent and important and must be dealt with now" pace that is very common in the U.S. With the exception of a few times when I have to be somewhere on time, I am enjoying the more relaxed attitude of "I'll get to it when I get to it."

I Googled "Tico Time" and found a couple of interesting anecdotes from other bloggers. These stories will give you a good idea of how Tico Time works in Costa Rica.

From The Costa Rica Expert:
An area where "Tico Time" is most evident is the never ending wait for the bill (or cuenta) when you complete your meal at virtually any restaurant in the country. Now we (you see I said "we") gringos are used to receiving the bill (or having it shoved down our throats) even before we have tasted the last morsel. Not here. If you are waiting to receive the bill get ready to wait a long long time. Why is this? Well you see in Costa Rica it is considered rude and socially unacceptable to bring the bill before officially asked. In Costa Rica culture all social problems are resolved by talking it through for hours after finishing the meal. Therefore, if you want the bill you have to say, repeat after me, "la cuenta por favor." Or better yet, "regaleme la cuente por favor." And please always say please, because the culture here is very polite. Please and thank yous are always expected and appreciated.


From Geodog:
Costa Ricans act as though people are more important than deadlines, and people expect to make time for each other, and to wait for other people and to have other people wait for them. Expatriates, and some Costa Ricans, call this living on Tico Time. Punctuality is not next to godliness, and waiting is not seen as offensive, or as a waste of time. We ran into this all the time. The best example of this was one day when a hotel owner offered to take us and some other people in the hotel up to see turtles coming ashore to lay eggs at Ostional (a fantastic trip). He said that we would leave the hotel after lunch, and I asked him exactly when after lunch we should be ready to go. He shrugged his shoulders, looked at me and slapped his empty wrist and said "you see a watch? We will leave when everybody is ready to go."

From Yourville.blog:
Costa Rican’s will say, “I’ll come over tomorrow”, but they usually don’t. Often they are not hours late, but days late, with no excuse, no phone calls, no apology....For Latin Americans, a person is considered late if he/she arrives 30 minutes after the scheduled time. North Americans often begin to feel tension if a person arrives 15 minutes late, while Latin Americans begin to feel tension if a person arrives 30 minutes after the deadline....The cultural differences in comprehending time can be attributed to the fact that Costa Ricans and North Americans place different value on time. In the U.S., people live to work and time is money. Here in Costa Rica, time is gold. Tico’s live for the moment and occasionally during the week take the time to accomplish some work. In Costa Rica, if you run into a friend, you stop and talk and ask “how’s the family?”