This piece is a Processing sketch that mimics a map from Visit Costa Rica, the official website for Costa Rican tourism under the nation brand Essential Costa Rica. The map pinpoints locations where tourists can find ziplines, hanging bridges, and/or cable cars.

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In my version of the map, I included fourteen such places found throughout the country and accompanied them with eight sites that show evidence of environmental damage, demonstrating that even a “green country” suffers from destruction and neglect. These locations were identified after a process of thorough research through national and international news sources. 

When a user chooses a location, the screen changes into a photograph of the place framed as a vintage-style postcard. An image of a tourist appears, moving through a zipline, and at some point along the path, an audio clip plays a sound that expresses joy and excitement.

This occurs even for the sites of destruction; the effect might be absurd and even disturbing, but this is precisely what I wished to incite. As a tourist, you arrive to a place, enjoy it, and leave after a short stay. You experience your destination in a detached manner (as if zooming over it on a zipline). But for the locals, permanently coexisting with the negative environmental conditions in such places, the damage comes at a high cost.