Week 3

My Tica family is very modern and does not really resemble a "typical" Tican family. When talking to my Tica mom, she didn't think many eating practices were strange. For her, normal eating practices included some kind of meat, starch, and vegetable. If it is in one of those categories, I'm nearly certain that my Tica mom would eat it and serve it to her family. When we were discussing food one night, I mentioned that I enjoyed eating cheese. She seemed somewhat shocked by this answer. She does not think cheese or enjoying cheese is weird, she happens to also love cheese. However, many other students that have stayed with her do not enjoy cheese and assumed that it was true of most people from the United States. This is obviously not the case, and I will be given more cheese going forward. 

Many of us discussed this one afternoon at lunch at school. We were talking about what our Tica parents had said and I think Erin's mom said it best. To paraphrase her response, she said that people wanted to look like they had meat on their bones. It was a sign of being healthy and that your family had food to eat. Now, Costa Ricans see body image the way that people from the United States do. It is now more acceptable to have thinner women because everyone is a different shape and size. Clearly people are still concerned when someone looks emaciated, but that is the case in the United States as well. Being overweight here is not as looked down upon and is fairly common here. 

The first ad is for POPS, the major ice cream chain here. There are POPs stores everywhere-on the streets, in the malls, on little carts, and even on the side of the road. Having had the ice cream a few times here already, I've come to the conclusion that it is very good but nothing special. However, the way the ice cream is advertised makes it look very appealing to those with a sweet tooth. As a consumer who loves ice cream, it certainly makes me want to have some.

The second advertisement is for a local grocery store. It is promoting fresh and quality ingredients of all kinds. This speaks to the Costa Rican population because almost all of the food eaten at home is fresh and of a wide variety.

These advertisements are similar to those in the US. In the US, many people enjoy ice cream and go grocery shopping. Everyone wants their groceries to be fresh and their ice cream to be sweet and satisfying. I believe that both of these advertisements prove that Costa Rican and American palates are more similar than they are different.