The first week of class

A blue morpho butterfly I found near campus

The first week of school was somewhat surreal. The tico students that attend Veritas regularly start school a week after all the study abroad students and therefore it felt like the campus was filled with gringos. We all kept getting lost and confused, so it was probably a good thing that we had time to adjust before the tico students came. I am taking 4 hours of Spanish every morning from 8-12 AM. So far it has been somewhat overwhelming considering that my profesora Liannette doesn’t actually speak a word of English. There are moments when the entire class, which consists of 10 girls, is trying to understand a random verb and she can’t explain it to us in our own language. I am also enrolled in Costa Rican Colloquium: History and Culture, Land Vertebrates of Costa Rica, and Tropical Ecology. Fortunately, those three elective courses are instructed in English. It seems at times that those few hours are the only break from Spanish I get here. Each of my elective courses has field trips associated with them. My two environmental courses have two overnight trips each where we go to the rainforest and the dry forest. My history class has field trips built into the week to such places as the art museum and other cultural attractions in San Jose. I really enjoy my professors thus far. They seem to all want us to learn as much as we can while we are here and each of my teachers places a high emphasis on hands-on-experience, much like Cal Poly. They also seem to have a fairly strict grading system here. If I miss more than one Spanish class or two elective classes, I automatically fail.

International student fiesta and tropical dancers

            Having class from 8 AM to 8 PM every day has proved slightly exhausting. I have spent most of my breaks during the day going to lunch or exploring to locate the nearest grocery shop. I probably walk multiple miles every day… well, I have to work off those rice and beans somehow. My tica mama is perfect. I am already in love with her. And, she completely spoils me and my roommates rotten. She cooks delicious meals for us, cleans our rooms, and does our laundry. She even made me gluten free cake the other day. I don't think I have ever seen her not smiling and she keeps telling us that all she wants is for us to be happy. 

           

Tuesday evening I went to tropical dance class after my night class. It was hysterical. The teacher made ridiculous comments the entire time. There were a fair amount of people there, we filled about half of the lower floor of the architecture building. She taught us the basic steps of salsa, meringue, and machata. The mass of white people shuffling along the ground attempting to dance was comical. Such a fun extracurricular activity!

            On Thursday night, Veritas held a fiesta for all the international students in the courtyard. What an interesting school function it was… there were bottles of beer laid out on tables in the corner and both students and professors alike were dancing while a DJ elevated on a table was blasting music. At one point, they brought in two separate groups of drummers and exotic dancers that performed for us all.       
I feel like I have already been here for a month... so much has already happened and each day is filled with new encounters and experiences!