San Jose, Costa Rica.

After a few years anticipating my visit to CR, I’ve finally arrived in San Jose. This is my first stop on a month’s long journey. I come excited to acclimate, willing to communicate with limited Spanish, open to new experiences but also prepared to compare life here with my time in Colombia. Getting here, first leg of the trip from home was to LAX, then SJO. On arrival, we went through a long immigration queue, I was almost turned around because of a half way torn page on my passport. After immigrations (they wrote only 15days on the passport stamp, bummer) then, customs where your bags go through the scanner and you hand them your filled customs paper (printed in Spanish — no English custom paper).
Thanks to the Airport wifi, I was able to get Uber — keep in mind, Arrival exit is downstairs but Uber requires you to go to the upstairs exit. There’s a staircase outside, on the other side that takes you upstairs. So far, Costa Rica’ arrival went smoother than my first trip to Colombia.

There are stray dogs here. The dogs don’t bother you, time to time you hear them bark. Be careful when you have take out. One time, a dog I walked by sniffed the food in my bag and started following me for the bag.
Being here, you would soon hear that San Jose (they often mean Downtown) is “bad” — “you should be careful” and other cautionary words. My host told me he witnessed as someone was robbed while everyone else walked by, minding their business. Of course it is expected that you know what’s going on around you, I did not think of the downtown area as “dangerous”. I also did not leave the house after 5pm. One time, I felt as though I was being followed. Others times when I branched a street that looked sketchy, I wasn’t too proud to turn around and go the other way.

There are a bunch of people downtown. Most going about their day, some people inviting passersby to patronize their shop, there are also a few number of people who are “hanging out”. Be careful with your phone. You could watch the sculptures, like the one photographed above, through out downtown. I saw maybe one or two people take photos. Most people took family photos but not a lot of people by themselves brought their phones out. I took a photo or two and stored my phone away.

My time here in San Jose feels more like I live here rather than just visiting. It’s easy to go grocery shopping, go to the Bank to change money (better rates than changing at the airport). $100 was around CRC60,600 which was lasted almost a week before I had to change again. In Bogota, I felt separate from the city maybe because of how big and spread out it is, but San Jose feels more like an easy-to-navigate city. I stayed in Sabanilla for some time then stayed around Collegio Zion (this is the nice part to live, if I were to move to SJ).

My overall experience here is that I would like to be back, though I didn’t respond the same as I did when I was in London, Berlin or Montreal — in the sense that (especially in Sabanilla), I mostly stayed in. While in those other places, I mostly was outside. Walking the city and feeling one with the place.

This trip made it possible for me to realize I have a coping mechanism with being in a new place and to pay attention to it. You know, evaluating my response beyond my excitement to visit. Why would I rather be shut in here but energized to walk till almost midnight in a different environment?

I did go about an hour on bus to Cartega which I kept pronouncing Cartago. Food is cheaper there compared to San Jose. I paid 13,000 Colones for three dinner plates. Same amount gets me two dinner plates in SJ. The (Cartega) downtown area where the bus stops is great for walking. There’s a park with monuments but no trees — to seat and people watch. Restaurants, fast food and love birds hand in hand, on the corner of the main buildings.

To visit neighboring cities, you have to make your way to downtown San Jose. The transportation here is more visitor friendly than Bogota. All way leads to San Jose downtown. You get here first, then you find the bus to wherever it is you want to go to. Keep in mind, people queue here and sometimes the line could be so long you think they’re waiting for the new iPhone. There is a number in front of the bus mostly written on a cardboard, that is not the bus number. That is the fare amount. Most of the buses are 400 Colones or less. So you’d see a few 400’s and a few 325’s.

Also, multiple buses go to the same place but they take different routes to get to the same place. This is very confusing. Lincoln (Linkin) plaza is a famous mall, it’s called Plaza de Lincoln (LeanCorn), should you say Linkin Plaza chances are the driver would not understand you. While bus A and bus B have the same destination on their cardboard or on the screen in front of the bus, if your destination is before the plaza, it’s best to ask the driver about another establishment closest to your bus stop, before you enter. I also noticed should you mispronounce your destination, the locals I encountered did not seem willing to guess what you might have meant. Having missed my way, I made a few trips back to San Jose downtown just to retry entering the right bus. It did not click at first that each bus could go a route different from the other bus.

The people here are friendly, more English speaking than Colombia. You see them try to put words together, mixed with a long sentence in Spanish but eventually you both seem to understand each other as you burst into laughter. I am also more functional in San Jose than in Bogota or Cartagena. I can roam about on my own, go grocery shopping, take on each day like I live here, as opposed to feeling like a visitor. And, the hot water shower is definitely a plus over Colombia. The wifi, not so much.

A trip is worth it to me not only when I experience new culture or routine but when I discover something within me I previously did not know about. This new knowledge tend to be applicable to other areas of my life. I now know that I have an internal response to each place and to pay attention to that feeling. Each city does something different for us. Some encourages our curiosity to know more, some invites us to be one with the city, others serve as a resting ground to rejuvenate and then move on. The latter might be San Jose for me, at least for this trip. I am glad to experience life in Costa Rica and I envision being back.

I’m excited to find out how I’d respond to Cahuita. I hear Puerto Viejo seems to be all the buzz, some day I’ll make it out there too.

With Love,

Famous Steve.