Life is Sweet

In the down economy, it is great to see new jobs being created for people who could otherwise probably die of uselessness. Even here in Puriscal, opportunities have opened up which don´t require many skills at all. I am talking about the new parking cop jobs. If I sound bitter, well, maybe I am, just a little. After all, these guys are sucking all of the fun out of living in the funky, stinky, drunk guy sleeping on the curb next to the mangy dog town I call home.

When I moved to Puriscal, Costa Rica nearly seven years ago, we could park in the middle of the road. People did. Slowly, town has gotten more crowded with more and more people driving cars all around. If I try hard, I can see the logic behind paid parking. It should serve to discourage people from parking on the streets all day while they are at work, thus opening space for people wanting to do business with local merchants.

What I take objection to is the way it has come into effect. It is terribly inconvenient to buy paper parking vouchers to stick in your window and these guys offer no mercy AT ALL. Like flies at a picnic, they are on to the tiniest morsel of a violation and the result is that hardly anyone in town is parking on the streets. I have noticed most recently that all they have to do is stand around and look tidy, and important.

Life is sweet like that for some. A couple of weeks ago, I noticed one of them enjoying an icecream cone as he checked out the well shaped backside of a woman passing by. Just yesterday, one was standing idle watching as one of his "inferiors" painted the no parking side of the curb yellow. I wanted to go and grab him a brush of his own. At least he would be contributing to his cause. Of course, his polished shoes and starched duds might have gotten dirty. That would have been a pity.