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Home › Forums › Costa Rica Living Forum › Tetley anyone?
i don’t know if this is true or not, but i heard from someone that the reason the shippers don’t allow foodstuffs in the containers is that everything gets sprayed with a pesticide before it’s offloaded. i brought down all kinds of teas, spices, grains, etc. only to discover everything is here.
We, too, brought a number of prepackaged spices, bottles of booze (only a couple), and kitchen things, generally scattered in different boxes, and it all arrived in good shape.
In general, Customs is not going to paw through everything in your container. Once they’re convinced that it’s the usual household goods, they’ll assign a value (typically pretty reasonable) and that will be that. Always remember to describe everything on your inventory as “Used somethingoranother”. So Customs is not an obstacle.
I have no sense that anything of ours was sprayed with any chemicals. But even if they were, it’s not likely that those chemicals would penetrate commercially packaged foodstuffs especially if they’re in cardboard cartons.
The real question, however, is whether or not you can find those same things here (or whether they really aren’t that central to your health and happiness). Remember, one day you’ll run out. Then what?
Then what?! Why, I’ll throw myself down and have a terrific FIT with heel banging and everything! Then I’ll get over it. I just want some “bridge” items until I find substitutes or other things to distract my teeny brain…..
i did that too. how will i live without quinoa? or germinated brown rice? or, god forbid, orzo? so i brought a ton of that stuff with me. the damn bugs got in it before i could eat it. and then i discovered that i could get it all here anyway. and the bulk spices i brought? the humidity ruined them and i had to toss them. white pepper is readily available, as was cumin, and the other things i thought i wouldn’t find. the three pounds of green and white tea i brought? after a year, it was flavorless. into the trash bin it went. now i go to the chinese market and buy it fresh here, at a fraction of the cost.
See, maravilla, if you had just sloshed pesticides all over everything, life would have been good.
the reason i caution about pesticides is that someone at ropa americana told me that it was imperative to wash any item of clothing purchased there because customs fumigates everything that comes in from the states. but will it get past the wrappers on food items in boxes? most people would say no, but i don’t believe anybody when it comes to this stuff. they once told us ddt was safe, too.
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