What's retirement in Corozal like?

I call myself “semi-retired.” I am working and doing plenty of things but it’s entirely on my own schedule. I’m a busy person. I never really even want to think about retiring. I never really thought about stopping work and sitting on a lounge chair by the sea somewhere. 

 

I think retirement is slowing down. There are many of my friends here in Corozal who are...

I call myself “semi-retired.” I am working and doing plenty of things but it’s entirely on my own schedule. I’m a busy person. I never really even want to think about retiring. I never really thought about stopping work and sitting on a lounge chair by the sea somewhere. 

 

I think retirement is slowing down. There are many of my friends here in Corozal who are completely retired; not working at all. Others are commuting to the States for a few months here and there. I do all my work here in the Corozal District with the exception of a few meetings a month in Belize City. 

 

What are the advantages of living in Belize? One, the climate is excellent. Two, it’s English speaking. I have a basic understanding of Spanish, so I can communicate decently but English is broadly spoken.  Also, the pace of life is really one of the big things that I appreciate the most. 

 

Living here is better for my health. Let me explain  

 

When I moved to Belize City, I was on blood pressure pills.  I checked in with  a Doctor in Belize City, who gave me a basic examination. 

 

(Pictured: Picture of sunset taken outside Copper Bank Inn, Corozal, Belize, by Grant D'Eall.)

 

He said, “Your blood pressure is very good, Grant.” 

 

I said, “Well, that’s because I’m taking these,” and I held up my bottle of blood pressure medication. 

 

He said, “You might find that when people move down here the pace of life and so forth is better for their health and their blood pressure goes down. You might want to wean yourself off the pills.” 

 

So I left his office, and being the sort of determined person that I am, I just didn’t take any blood pressure pills again. I didn’t wean; I just stopped. (I don’t like taking pills, anyway.) I went back to that same Doctor a month later and my blood pressure was just fine. I went back another two months later and, once again, my blood pressure was fine. My blood pressure stabilized because of the pace of life.  

 

Nobody’s pushing you here. People are not clock watchers here. Sometimes it’s a little frustrating if you’re trying to do business. If you’re looking for high-end customer service, this is not the place for you. After living here for a few week, I quickly just changed my mindset when doing business in the city. I had a choice - I could be intense about punctuality and expectations or I can just relax a little bit and say, “If I’m going to be stressed about it I’d be stressed out all the time.” So there’s a trade-off and in the end, for me, those things don’t really matter.  

 

The other thing about the pace of life here in Corozal is that we are not inundated with commercialization and advertising. I don’t watch much TV anyway but here, I don’t even have TV. I stream things that I want to watch. Maybe you’ve read these stats that the average North American is exposed to about a thousand advertisements in a day, like TV, bumper stickers, billboards and radio. My point is simply this; I don’t think we realize what the bombardment of advertising does to our stress level. When I went back to Canada last year for a couple of months, all I did was play tennis, golf and hangout with my kids, my friends, and just had what you would deem as a relaxing time. But when I got back to Belize I went to the doctor and my blood pressure was at the point of chest pains, just from being in Canada for 3 months.