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Puerto Viejo is in the province of Limon, a very diverse area of Costa Rica. I have had many friends from our group CASC (Central America's Solidarity Coalition) which always stopped there after spending time helping out in Nicaragua and El Salvador during the war years of the 70's and 8o's. I'll bet some of them ate at that restaurateur's place. As he complained about racism in Costa Rica, i could not help scan his customers eating at his place- many of whom were white. LOL!!! Of course there is racism there, but anecdotal, one person or two persons commenting on it is a bit of oversimplification; it is a little more nuanced. Costa Rica has done much to fight racism.

On August 5, 2016, Costa Rican President Luis Guillermo Solis signed Law 9558, by which Costa Rica becomes the first State in the region to ratify the Inter-American Convention against Racism, Racial Discrimination, and Related Forms of Intolerance – a Convention approved by the General Assembly of the Organization of American States (OAS) in Antigua, Guatemala in 2013.

President Solis apologized to the Afro-descendant, indigenous, Jewish, Chinese, Lebanese and Palestinian communities living in the country, “for the forms of discrimination to which they’ve been subjected throughout history.”

I believe it was in 1949 that they outlawed segregation.

In 2018, Epsy Campbell Barr became the first Black female to serve as vice president in Latin American history bringing national attention to civil rights.

Yes, like all of their neighbors, their Black population suffers from high poverty rates, poor housing and high unemployment, but government efforts in recent years to lower these numbers is commendable.