American Airlines, flight number 971. Delayed, of course. This trip was not meant to be, now was it? Even the little contemporary museum found at the airport was an indication of the terrible situation I was finding myself in, with a giant polar bear head crying over an empty plastic bottle of arctic water; perhaps a statement of how our modern consumerism and technology invades the natural world or some other work of innovative artistic genius. But it was alright, just a few more hours and I would find myself in the beautiful and exotic Costa Rica. Just a few more hours.
It was cloudy – surprisingly – when the plane crossed the Caribbean’s. I (nor any other passenger on the plane) could see the land below; but we all knew what we were getting ourselves into. A full week of drinking alcoholic cocktails made of regional, freshly harvested fruit that would make your taste buds tingle orgasmically. A full week of listening to local street bands with the depth of artistic talent never even scraped by the American kitsch. A full week of beaches so pure it hurts your eyes to stare at the sand on a sunny day. And then, we crossed the clouds.
Jungle, was my first thought. The plane landed on a small strip surrounded by luscious and unkempt trees. There was no civilization to speak of, aside from the airport we all had to go through. Inside, first thing on the left, a little expensive souvenir store with a motivational caption “buying our goods helps preserve the local culture” and a line of products you would never find in any Costa Rican store. A quick stop by the expectedly dirty bathroom, and then just baggage claim, customs, front gate, and we’re back to the jungle.
Perhaps the only thing that reminded me I wasn’t completely stranded away from the pleasures of modern civilization was the car I was inside and the concrete road it was driving on (as a side note, why is it always that roads and cars seem to be the first sign of development in a third world country?) It was rainy. For miles, traveling on the warped road full of potholes, all the vistas I was treated to were other old and rusty cars, wild plant life and makeshift shacks built from wavy steel plates and god knows what else they used there. But among all of this, something caught my eye. When waiting on a red light no car really abides by, I noticed a small hut much like the surrounding ones; but on one of its steel-plated walls, there was a very clearly painted, yellow caption: “INTERNET.”
We finally arrive home – no – a mansion. It was beautiful and specious, with each furniture piece made of dark wood, standing decisively in place, and spaced far enough from one another to accentuated the sterile whiteness of the floors and walls. And the view from the balcony – dear god – the view was amazing. Just image, standing on top of the largest hill, surrounded by the greenest trees you have ever seen in your life, observing the powerful volcanoes and mountains on the horizon, with an obligatory rainbow spanning from the clear, beautiful sky all the way down to the bottom of the valley filled with run down houses, dirty roads and that one place where you could get internet. The Magnificent San Jose.
But it wouldn’t be until two days later when the real trip would begin. Leaving the bleak city behind, a few friends and I spent four hours on a bus to get to Puerto Viejo, one of the greatest beach-towns in all of Costa Rica. Looking out the window I saw the same view I have grown so accustomed to by now; trees on top of trees and mountains on top of mountains, with the occasional house in the middle, just for the hell of it. And somewhere above a small creek, a thick, black, telephone line revelers itself briefly, only to disappear on the other side into more green pulp.
And we finally arrived at “Rockin’ Js – Restaurant, Café and Internet.” This was finally it – the lavish Costa Rica I came for. This resort (if you could call it that) was the very embodiment of pura vida – pure life – with a long line of hammocks you could crash on for just mere five dollars (and yes, they accepted dollars), public showers where the drains were always clogged by sand, and the sign near the check-in area reading “please do not smoke marijuana here – go to the beach!” Near us, a bunch of tourists were sitting at the lounge, shirtless, with their trunks still wet, laughing and playing guitar next to the faint yellow light. And then the one guy slouched over his laptop playing online video games, with huge headphones fully covering his ears to make sure the sound of waves hitting the beach doesn’t distract him.
The next morning we ventured out to the “town.” It was a simple yellow gravel road with restaurants, inns, shops and palm trees on both sides, going parallel to the shoreline. Cheap reggae was coming from almost every direction, complementing the green-yellow-red Bob Marley theme of all the stores, except for one sporting a big sign plastered with icons of Skype™, Facebook™ and Firefox™. Everyone wore flip-flops.
After a whole day of exacting exploration and swimming in the sea, it was time to return back to San Jose the following morning. We took a few short stops on the way (more commonly referred to as the “pee breaks”), one of them at, what appeared to be some sort of a former hangar, now with desks and computers lined up against all three walls. Finally we arrived where we started just a few days ago, right next to the small over-priced café branded with an obvious rip-off of the “Starbucks” logo. We decided to spend my last day in this peculiar country by going to the mall, a pretty new and elegant looking building, right across the street from a small clothes store resembling an underground warehouse of some sort.
We crossed the busy road dodging the incoming traffic, because there existed no concept of a pedestrian crossing. And inside, we found pretty much what you would expect from a typical mall – an ice cream stand, a McDonalds, a Hot Topic look-alike and three porn stores, one per each floor. Right outside, walking to the bus station, the road was lit up by the giant, red and half-broken Coca-Cola neon light from the 90s, which made avoiding the rainwater-filled potholes a tad bit easier. It was just barely enough light to make visible the Quaker Oats symbol painted on the side of the nearby super market.
Before I knew it, I was going through a security check, filling those little forms asking me what kind of expensive and extravagant goods I am trying to smuggle out of Costa Rica. Once again I was greeted by the souvenir shop next to my gate, accompanied by the sole guitar player trying to make a living off of his CDs (how does he even get into the terminal each day? Does he have some special system worked out with the airline or does he just keep flying back and forth all the time? Wouldn’t that be more expensive than whatever puny money he is making off of his little CDs?) And then back on American soil, I had to wait several hours for my connecting flight, with little to do besides browsing the WiFi internet the airport companies charge you $8.99 per hour, and giving one last glance at the crying polar bear. That god-damn, pretentious bear.