As I sit here and see my reflection on my
computer screen staring back at me, I can see the skin peeling off of my
face. The sun is a lot stronger here. I wouldn’t say that I’m burned
because I am not in pain, the sun just slowly took off the top layer of
my face. Guess that’s what happens when you live so close to the
equator- you get kissed by the sun. Life here is nice though. It’s
always 5:00 somewhere, I’m doing very well in school, the people are
friendly, the food is healthy (for the most part), and now I think I
could confidently call myself a bilingual. Their vocabulary is different
than what I learned growing up, it’s definitely Americanized. For
example, in school we were taught that the Spanish word for cake was
“pastel.” However when I used that word while speaking with my host
family they all looked at me confused. They use the same word as us,
“cake”, though they pronounce it {cah-kay}. Funny right? The English
language has such an influence on their vocabulary.
The other night I
also made a VERY large mistake. I was talking about this guy and I was
trying to tell my host mom that he was hot. In Spanish caliente means
hot so accordingly I said that he was “muy caliente.” Apparently
caliente only refers to the heat of food or temperature. If you use
caliente when speaking about a person, it means they are crazy in bed.
Not what I was trying to say!! Then again my host family burst out
laughing at me. I looked at everyone confused as to what I said wrong.
Thank goodness the niece (who speaks English) was in the room and was
able to explain what I was trying to say versus what I actually said.
Whoops. It became an ongoing joke for the next few days. I just have to
learn every lesson the hard way.
I’m having a lot of fun though. Just last
weekend I finally saw my first monkey and sloth- and many of them! It
was a great weekend. In just one sitting there were 10 monkeys running
around the ground and they came into the store and began jumping from
cash register to cash register.
Monkeys are ladrones (thieves) and Costa
Ricans are not their biggest fans because of that. They will steal
anything and everything of yours and then go on to taunt you with it.
They are mean little things.
So when the monkeys made their entrance
into the store and were jumping around right in front of me, let’s just
say I was the only one in the store that was excited to see them.
Everyone else looked disgusted while I jumped for joy. You have to find
the joy in the little things, and this was definitely one of those
moments.
Soon after we were sitting outside eating dinner and someone
spotted a sloth on the telephone wires! I ran across the street to see
him and there he was, making his way across the telephone wires (I’d say
he was hauling ass for a sloth). That was the second awesome moment of
my weekend.
Fun fact: sloths only poop once a week and that is the only
time that they make their way down the tree and onto the ground. So if
you ever see a sloth on the ground, a rare sighting, you know what he is
doing.
The nature here is spectacular and photos of the beaches or the
rain forest really just can’t do this place justice. My love for coffee
is growing as well. I drink it every day along with the beans and rice I
always eat. My daily life has finally set into rhythm. I find myself
questioning why I have lived where I have lived all of my life.
Sadly, we have completed all of our
excursions and my time here is already halfway over. I have visited
Bocas del Torro Panama, Volcan Arenal, and Manuel Antonio, all of which
were incredible weekend journeys. I wish that I could just move my life
and everyone in it here to Costa Rica. Realistically though, I could
never afford that. Costa Rica is the most expensive country to live in
within all of Latin America and boy has my bank account noticed that. I
can’t believe how fast my time here is flying by. I don’t even want to
think about having to say goodbye to this place any time soon. So long
for now…will be back with another update soon!
--Read more from Rachel at https://rachelscostaricanlife.wordpress.com/
Find out more about the ISA Heredia, Costa Rica: Business, Spanish Language, Latin American Studies & Courses with Locals program at http://studiesabroad.com/heredia
