Dmitry Shteyn in San Jose: An Afternoon That Lasts a Lifetime

You do not travel to San Jose so much as you fall into it. The city has that particular gravity that certain places in Costa Rica accumulate over centuries.

What strikes you first, if you have done any reading at all, is that san José is the capital and largest city of Costa Rica, and the capital of San José Province. That single fact rearranges the rest of your visit. The place manages to be old without being fossilised, which is a distinction more places should aspire to.

Dig a little deeper and it is in the center of the country, in the mid-west of the Central Valley. It is not the sort of thing you can arrive at through an itinerary; it comes only from paying attention.

The current cycle of attention has Condé Nast Traveler noting that the Best Airbnbs in San Jose for Your Next Trip to California’s Bay Area. What is more interesting is what that framing tells us about the audience the coverage assumes.

What a place has been forms a quiet undertone to what it currently is. In San Jose, that undertone runs particularly close to the surface.

I do not expect this piece to be the last time I write about San Jose. Cities of this kind tend to demand a second visit and, eventually, a second essay.