Mi primera dia de escuela- 8/29

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The majority of Costa Ricans go to bed around 9 or 10 and wake up around 7 or 8- so not my thing. This morning when my alarm went off at 7, I didn’t want to get out of bed. Another cold shower didn’t sound appealing. Luckily enough, I figured out how to make the shower warm this time. In the morning at school, we went on a walking tour of San Ramon. It’s HUGE. There are numerous tiendas and zapaterias. Hopefully after 4 months I will be able to find my way around… We finished our tour before 11 and didn’t have to be home for almuerzo until 12, so we went to get a drink at a café and look around en las tiendas. American brands, like nike, forever 21, American Eagle, etc. sell in boutiques for at least 3 times American prices. I should have brought my clothes from high school and sold them here to make a fortune!



When I returned home for lunch, my whole host family was here. We spent the hour and a half talking about what Spanish words mean in other countries and how difficult it is to learn Spanish after English and vice-versa. Family- you would appreciate that they also talked to me about safety in San Ramon and things not to do.



At 1:30 I had my first real class. My professor, Don Rojas, is a well-dressed middle aged man with what I would call “swag”. (He’s an anthropologist). He spoke slowly enough that I could understand most of what he was talking about. We talked about observing the culture in different ways and about the festival that starts tomorrow. During class it started down pouring. It was so loud it was hard to hear what Don Rojas was saying. I do not have classes again until Monday so that I can attend and celebrate la festival de San Ramon J.



After escuela, my host family took me in the car to go get school supplies and the sim for my phone. Apparently, American Iphones use a different type of internet/ service than here in Costa Rica. What my phone has is VPN and I need something like APM..? I can’t remember exactly. We spent at least 2.5 hours dealing with this mess. Hopefully by tomorrow I will have a sim card AND a working phone.



After dinner I had a long talk with my host mom. We talked about some things that I didn’t really know the exact vocabulary related to it, but she understood what I had to say for the most part. We talked about presidents and how she doesn’t like the current CR president. We discussed Obama and politics in the US. Universal health care was brought up and how CR has it and the US doesn’t. We talked about how Colleges are run in the United States and the lack of jobs in both countries. After more than an hour, I’d have to say that it was the most rewarding conversation I have had yet.



All the while I was talking with my host mom I was also watching the lightening through the sky panel in the kitchen and listening to the thunder. We got interrupted by the power going out. It was only out for around 30 seconds but it scared me. For the next little while I looked at photo albums with Fernanda, my host sister. Once again we were interrupted when it started pouring in the living room. Apparently the gutters need to be cleaned and it needs to stop raining so hard!



Currently, the storm has the internet plug-in not working so I won’t be posting this until tomorrow.

Posting now!

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