#tico29

“In the pale light of midnight I tried to take flight But my wings were too weak and the stars were too bright

So, I waited a week til the winter winds blew Stars were shrouded in clouds and the moon was too

Not a thing alive witnessed my wings unfold As my breath grew quick and my heart grew bold

And soon I was soaring, oh, upwards and on Til the sky was all ‘round and the ground was gone

And I watched as each object, each person, each place Became one glowing orb spinning slowly in space

And I thought to myself, ‘through the eyes of a bird This life and this Earth seem entirely absurd’

Then I suddenly felt indescribably small And wondered if anything mattered at all

Like what people wished for or what people felt Or whether the ice caps would finally melt

Then, I realized, after an hour or two That things matter, because, they matter to you

Although what you do won’t change much from up here It can comfort or crush those you find yourself near

This universe may be enormous and strange But look close to home and there’s much you can change

And now that I know it, that’s just what I’ll do Informed and enthused by my new point of view

It seems that such questions as grand as existence Can only be solved from a reasonable distance”

I learned some jokes this weekend in español. Are you ready? No. But here goes.

Que hace el pez perezoso? Nada.

y

Cual árbol es el más espantoso? La palma. Por qué? El Coco!

So, I’ve been in my site for 13 days now. Tomorrow marks my official 2 week mark here, and I have a lot of thoughts.

Pace of life is way different. I mean, they tell you in training that it’s going to be so different and to just prepare yourself for it; but, honestly, I didn’t expect this. I’m sure a lot of people have a lot more free time than I have, (another friend just wrote a blog post about how she’s been in her hamock for almost 10 days straight and had one meeting with her counterpart. Like, what?!) but I was still not ready for the amount of free time I have. Even though I was intellectually prepared for this, I was not actually mentally prepared for this.

“Intermediate Mid” my ass. Supposedly, I tested at the “Intermediate Mid” level for my Spanish. And, supposedly, this is the bare minimum requirement for “survival as a PCV” according to the higherups. However, I’ve apparently been missing meetings that my CP “told me about” becuase I “don’t understand Spanish” and that’s kind of a big deal. I don’t want people to think I’m flakey, and I definitely don’t want them to think I’m blowing them off. I mean, it’s kind of up in the air whether or not I was actually told about these meetings tbh. What matters is that I’m not sure I was sufficiently prepared for this, but I’m working through it. Even if it means asking everyone to tell me things twice and speak to me like I’m five.

I have no idea what I’m doing. I seriously don’t. Like, all the TEFL kids be like “Taught my first class today!” and “Here’s a pic of my school!” and “I have a schedule and I know where I’m supposed to be at all times!” But then, I’m over here like, “I drank 10 cups of coffee by myself and hung out with the Adultos Mayores group for a couple hours in the park today and then watched Netflix while answering the phone and translated ‘teaspoons’ for somebody...” But, the great thing about PC is that that’s actually considered work. Like, dancing in the park with the senior citizens for two hours counts as work. So, screw you guys with your 9-5 jobs and big paychecks. I get enough to live and I dance in the park for it. I win.

I don’t know if I’m adapting to the culture. The thing with my site is that it’s actually almost like a city. It’s not a San José or Upala or anything, but it’s still pretty big and has a lot of resources. Becuase of this, It feels an awful lot like my training site (San Raf). And, the thing is, other than people speaking a different language, it’s not that different from home. I mean, take a stroll down Nolensville Pike and you’ll get a sense of what San Jose is like. I’m not weird, I’m not getting stared at for being the new kid, I’m not getting strange questions about Americans, and people tell me all the time about the different cities in the US they’ve visited. I know there has to be some cultural differences that I’m just not seeing right now, but at this point I don’t feel like I’ve had to adapt my ways or my thinking just yet. Which kind of scares the hell out of me because it’s got to be coming. So, if it’s four months later than expected, it’s probably just gearing up to be a real punch in the face instead of a light slap which is terrifying. Maybe I’m in denial.

How do friend? I have made friends in the past. As early as daycare, as recently as training. But, now, in site, I have absolutely no idea how to make friends. Like, I’m not even sure how I made friends in the past. I just know that I have them. I don’t know how long it takes to make friends. I don’t know how to initiate friendship, and I definitely don’t know how to do it in Spanish. So, I’m just gonna have to rely on past experience and hope it happens sometime.

All that being said, overall happiness has increased. I have previously stated that I was on a downward trajectory since Easter and I didn’t know why. This is why I started that “100HappyDays” challenge. I highly doubt the increased happiness is due to this picture challenge, though. I would attribute it to my site placement and the end of training. My site is gorgeous. Absolutely gorgeous. One day I’ll get around to charging my camera battery and taking pictures of this town, becuase y’all need to see it to believe it. The rest of Guanacaste is dry and hot, but my site is green, windy, still hot but not as hot, and mountainous. That plus the end of training has made my mood lift quite a bit. I’m finally in the place I’m going to be for 2 years. I’m finally getting a chance to aclimate to my new life vs. just being on the edge for three months, knowing I wasn’t staying anywhere near where I was living. It’s fantastic. I’m not shitting rainbows or anything, but I’m much more relaxed now, which makes me much more happy.