'Traditional' Address System

Last century, 1996 to be precise, myself and The ladies man worked at a market research agency called Mode for 3-4 months. We would 'put' half a litre of petrol (for less than 10 rupees) in his Hero puch and go hunting for homes of people we were supposed to interview. Even with the Ladies man's excellent sense of direction and knowledge of Bangalore's bylanes finding the right addresses was a nightmare. House numbers would jump by hundreds without warning and streets would end in dead ends just before we found the number we were looking for! I was sure that a more chaotic address system woudn't exist anywhere.

Well I may have been wrong. A few weeks back my company had to send an invoice to a client in San Jose, Costa Rica. So my teammate wrote to the client for their office address. The client replied with the address in Spanish. It read, Frente a edificio Siemmens, La Uruca (edificio de marmol beige). San José - Costa Rica.

My resourceful teammate googled for the translation and came up with this, In front of Siemmens building, The Uruca (beige marble building). San Jose - Costa Rica

I surmised that, for some reason, she had given us directions instead of the address though I could not fathom why she would do that. So I called her to clarify. Imagine my surprise when the client said that it indeed was their address! She explained that was how addresses were in Costa Rica and that you would find addresses like next to the pink house or in front of the mango tree and so on! She didn't say what would happen when the neighbour painted his house red or if the mango tree died. Boy, I sure would hate to be a postman in Costa Rica!

Added later: A google search reveals that the Costa Rican postal department is providing some relief to their postmen through their revamp of Costa Rica's 'traditional' address system

Added even later: Found a blogger who lives in Costa Rica with the following address. 500 meters West of the Municipality of San Pablo, 50 Meters North, House Number 5, with Brown Fence, San Pablo de Heredia, Costa Rica

As a bonus check out the photos of awesomely sexy Costa Rican women the dude has on his blog . Costa Rica here I come...