Week two was when it started to sink in that I was not on vacation but living here for eight months and that kinda freaked me out. There are a ton of international students here which makes it way to easy to get comfortable with people who are similar to you. That made me panic a little because the whole reason I wanted to study abroad was to become fluent in Spanish and fall into the culture not hang out only with people from the U.S and speak English all the time. Even though it had only been two weeks and although I realized that these things take time I could start to see a pattern developing. I tried to re-evaluate my situation and make more of an effort in every aspect, however I have a lot of things going against me and I guess you could say I have never been a minority the way I am here. What do I mean? Well for starters the color of my skin gives so much about where I am from away and everything associated with being from the U.S. Secondly, I am tall. I am tall for a girl and I am tall for a girl in the U.S so you can only imagine my surprise when I went to the grocery store with my mama tica and realized I was taller than almost EVERYONE in the store. Also, I am a women. San Jose is a big city and not the safest one at that. I am constantly needing to be alert or aware of my surroundings at all time. Coming from a small town I am not used to any of this and it started to feel like I didn’t have much independence. And obviously the communication barrier is a working progress. It has taken me a while to grow familiar with Tico Spanish like slang, accent, and the use of vos instead of tu! Nevertheless I continue to try and put myself in situations where I am around more ticos and being exposed to Spanish and the culture of Costa Rica. I even went out on a limb and went to a theater play at a different university in San Jose with two girls from Spain and Mexico. So maybe it will be the addition of little things that change my experience from foreigner to resident.

Our weekend excursion was at La Fortuna where we spent most the day at a natural hot spring. It was amazing here is a little video of us having fun at the hot spring!(:Baldi Hot Springs

I can´t believe I have spent almost a month in Costa Rica! Every day I am exhausted and each one fly’s by faster than the last. I have had hardly anytime to digest my time in Costa Rica so here goes nothing.

Week One: I arrived extremely early in the morning and everything went smoothly until I got to baggage claim! Someone had mistaken my bag for theirs and I could not have been more freaked out! Then when I arrived at my home stay family I was so worried about my bags and exhausted that I could hardly focus on what my mama tica was saying to me over the two little dogs barking. You could say I had a mini panic attack! Thankfully the person realized their mistake and brought my bag back, and once I took a nap I tried again to be at peace with my arrival in Costa Rica. The first week I noticed many differences between my tica family and my family at home. For example the food was different, never in my life had I ate rice and beans for breakfast, or was used to waking up so early. The university itself is very intriguing! The university is a private school that focuses on the arts and architecture and the school definitely reflects that. There is agriculture within the school and it is very open and I think that is what I love the most about this university. The first week of classes were pretty easy, so easy that I thought of moving up to another level of Spanish but I stayed because I figured it was good review and I just adore my teacher so much! That weekend we had our first excursion to Café Brit which is a coffee plantation and we also went to Volcan Irazu! I loved being at the volcano it was so big and majestic it was a very special experience. Here is a video I made of my time at Volcan Irazu! Volcan Irazu