One week in: Where to begin?

Nothing is ever what you expect it to be.

Every morning, I still have problems comprehending that I am waking up in a completely different country. People have been telling me for a while now that I will miss things that I didn’t expect to miss, that I will be most surprised by things that aren’t even really that exciting—but I have to say, I really didn’t believe them until now.

For example: I never imagined myself brushing my teeth in my host parents’ bathroom. For that matter, I never imagined anything having to do with a bathroom in Costa Rica; in my pre-departure imagination, I assumed that I would be too busy learning to surf to care about the upkeep of a fresh and minty mouth. But the fact of the matter is, I am not just vacationing here. I am living here, breathing in the polluted air of San Pedro on the bus every day to school and bringing the lunch my mama tica kindly prepares for me and, in general, getting used to the idea that this is my home for the next six months.

Aside from the few times that my tico brother has had to repeat his sentence upwards of five times while I stare at him like I don’t know any Spanish, I feel that I have been progressing well with fitting in to my host family. Surprisingly, I seem to get along the best with my papa tico, who I think gets a bit of a kick out of my stumbling over verb conjugations and is the most likely to ask me a question without giving up before hearing the answer. He is also one of the easiest for me to understand, because he has a habit of half-yelling most of his sentences (this habit I very much appreciate).

I have also heard that the one week mark is the first learning curve for a foreign language; the second comes after two weeks, and then improvement becomes a little more sparse. As for personal experience: I can’t say that my Spanish has gotten any worse, but honestly, I don’t think I have much to compare it with. Back in the states, I hardly ever actually practiced my Spanish with another living person (which in retrospect, might have been a good idea), so all I can really say that spitting out a five word sentence is better than the nodding and smiling that I was previously used to.

I suppose just the fact that I am now willing to stop and chat a little with the neighbor down the street is more than I ever could have expected from myself at home, so we’ll go ahead and say that the trip so far is looking up.

Two days until departure. Actually, just over 24 hours—but until it is actually February 2, I am going to lie to myself and say that I have two days.

I am going to poop my pants. Mom, get the Imodium out of my bag—forget avoiding fruits that aren’t peeled, ‘cause I need it now.

It is safe to say that anxiety may have finally caught up with my brimming enthusiasm for traveling to this lovely country. Although, aside from being nervous about speaking in Spanish with my host family (who, by the way, I will know nothing about until I actually get to meet them in person), I am anxious about things that I never knew a sensible human could be anxious about.

For example: I am most worried about injuring myself before I leave for Costa Rica. Not so much while I am there, but before I even leave the United States. The other day, I cut my finger on a bottle; the cut has still not healed, and looks like it even might be getting deeper. I can’t help but wonder, what happens if it’s infected? If my finger is infected now, just think of the things that it could contract while in a country whose health care system is still not considered adequate by the U.S. Pus could soon be oozing out of this cut. It is so sore already—what if it gets worse, and I can’t even email my friends back home? The funny part about all of this is that if I try to imagine getting the same kind of cut while there, then the same consequences somehow don’t apply. My finger cut can only be fatal if obtained here. My diagnosis for this mental derangement is that I am most fearing the unexpected; the fact that when I am in Costa Rica, I will already know what to do with a cut finger is more comforting to me than the fact that at this moment, I have no real health coverage and no idea how to take care of myself upon arriving in a foreign country with a fingertip secreting infectious liquid.

I have also found, as likely many past participants of study abroad have, that the last few weeks before leaving are an emotional roller coaster. Before dismissing this as PMS, believe me when I say that more things have happened to me and that I have done more things than I feel like I typically accomplish in a five-month span when not planning to flee the country. I’m not sure if it’s the mentality that I will be gone anyway, so who cares what I say or do, if it’s the fact that I have now convinced myself that I am dieing (see past blog), or that the prospect of leaving simply inspires me to do things I normally would not. Whichever it is, there’s no denying that it has been quite the ride. Side effects which include laughing like a maniac at different intervals in the day, shaky hands when trying to eat fried chicken, and heavy drinking.

Over Christmas, one of my friend’s parents gave me a book called, When God Winks. It’s supposed to be about how everything works out for a reason, and how if we all take a moment and look, we can see God or Fate or whatever you want to call it giving us a nod to go ahead in the right direction. Well. Before reading this book, I was already convinced that I had received several signs that I was meant to go to Costa Rica; I must now look like a fate fanatic.

There was the movie, Yes Man, which I recommend to everyone who has not seen it, and sends the valuable message of saying yes to all chances in life, especially the ones that sound awkward and uncomfortable, because those are the most rewarding. Clearly meant for me. And there was the Costa Rican guidebook written in Spanish—the only book on Costa Rica or in Spanish in the entire bookstore where I worked (every day I went to work, I told myself I was meant to go if the book was still there. It was clearly fate, because travel books on Costa Rica and written in a foreign language and hidden in the corner of an unorganized store are very much a commodity these days). And let’s not forget my dream. I had a dream about running along the beach of Costa Rica during a stunning sunrise, glancing at houses next to each other that proudly displayed Coloradan and Costa Rican flags next to each other (never mind that I don’t know what the Costa Rican flag looks like). At the end of the dream, I reached the top of a very large and green hill, huffing and puffing, and I saw the most amazing view . . . and I had the most poignant moment in a dream I have ever had. It was a mix of accomplishment, independence, serenity and adrenaline, which had a very intoxicating and exhilarating effect.

Actually, that dream I really am holding on to like no other. I have never been one for interpreting dreams, but if that one means that I am going to experience something similar, I am not so opposed.