Three months after entry. Juepucha!! I think I am in love.

The other night, my host uncle decided to put me in the hot seat when he asked me what I would say about my host family to another family back in the States (most likely, my own). When he asked me, the entire room—all twelve of my inherited tico relatives—fell silent. Even Jimena, a six-year-old with a stunningly disproportionate amount of energy for how little her body is, dropped her plastic ponies and looked to me for an answer.
What an impossible question.
Not for the fact that I didn’t want to offend my family, but for the fact that I could find no way to describe how I felt about them, let alone articulate my emotions in Spanish. I thought for a moment.
I thought about how in the time that I have been here, I have gotten to know the members of this family better than I know many of my own. I thought about how Sunday nights have become my favorite night of the week, because it means that we get to go donde la abuela (grandma’s house) and spend time together. About how the meaning of spending time there truly means just that—they go with no expectations, no complaints, no partiality or criticisms. They simply go to see other, to waste time together, to play Quien Quiere Ser Millionario or Pictionary and yell over each other and of course, to tease each other, which seems to be a favorite past time. Judy, my tica aunt, never fails to cuss out a Saprissa player in between drilling me about why I won’t tell her about the secret boyfriend she thinks I have stowed away in Jaco, while her husband Freddy sits by and waits patiently to add in his two-sense. Macho my other uncle just makes sure to tell me “pura vida” and to ask if I found some papacitas at the beach. And then there is Wendy, making wisecracks just like her mom, Tony and Danny usually the brunt of her jokes.
I thought about everything that this family has gone through. Jimena and her parents, Manuel and Hazel, had recently just lost a son to cancer. Isaac had not completed his fifth birthday before he was lost to leukemia, but not before visiting the Saprissa stadium to see his favorite futbol players and of course, (his favorite part according to mom and dad), the dancers. To listen to his family talk about him is to raise your eyebrows in disbelief as they look back on all of their crazy Sunday nights, Isaac often the center of energy and the delight of the entire family. I thought about the look that Hazel gets on her face when she listens to Judy recount a story about Isaac—as if she is holding his picture in her hands instead of a crumpled-up napkin, and the furrowed brow of distaste as she talks about the amount of time they spent in the Children’s Hospital near the end. I thought of Manuel, an anchor for his grieving wife and daughter, forever interested in everything that they each have to say, always the joker but with the same bitter furrow for Isaac. And Jimena, who wet her pants when she found out Isaac was no longer living, repeating kindergarten because she missed so much school to be with him in the hospital.
I thought of my brothers and my parents, who never tire of listening to my stories about small triumphs in class—the first time I spoke up in geography class, my first presentation, and my complaints after having failed—literally, failed—my first exam. I thought of Enrique with his arm forever around Janette’s shoulders, forever the gentleman, looking out for rampant cars and holding an umbrella over both of their heads. I thought of Janette, forever the mother, and more concerned that I get enough to eat at every meal than even I am.
I thought of how this family has no reason to be so welcoming, to quiz me about my weekend trip to the playa, to include me in their private jokes and tell me about their sorrows—they know that I will be gone in six months, anyway. But they truly care. And I truly feel like one of them.
I thought of this, and I realized, I was expecting a lot of things from an experience abroad, but finding another family was not one of them.
I nearly cried.