It has been a week and two days since I have been in Costa Rica and it has been nothing but amazing. I have had a few cases of "culture shock" and fear, but nothing too bad. My main issues that I face on a daily basis is not knowing much Spanish. I live in San Jose, and I go to work on the other side of Downtown, so daily I have to trek down the crowded "Avenieda Central" (Central Avenue). It is a walking street that cars are not allowed to drive on, but there are people on both sides constantly yelling at you trying to sell things, it's a crazy experience.
Okay…Now to update everyone on my first week here. My first 3 days (Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday) were orientation days with EVOLC at Aliarse. I went through crash courses on Costa Rican Culture, Costa Rican Spanish, and last but not least, teaching English as a Second Language. It was definitely a lot of information to take in during the course of three days, but luckily I took a lot of notes! Since I came in the middle of two "official" start dates (I was supposed to leave for Costa Rica April 21st) I had an awesome one-on-one orientation with Chelsea (ironically) the coordinator of EVOLC. I was able to ask questions and have a more personal first three days here which was excellent!
Friday afternoon Chelsea and I got a cab and headed to my host family's house. My "mom" wasn't home, just my "sister." Karla (my sister) works for Amazon.com in a call center here in Costa Rica, so she is fluent in English, thank God! (gracias a Dios!) She was able to tell me a little bit about herself and her family, it was a nice little bonding time. She is 19 (20 on June 2nd) and she has a brother Renato who is 15. They also have another sister who is 23, but she lives with their dad, I haven't had the chance to meet her yet. Later that night my "mom" came home and I was so excited because she is the happiest, bubbliest person ever, I am excited to get to know her more. My mom speaks very little English and I speak very little Spanish, so it is very difficult to communicate with her. My translator on my iPad is my best friend when Karla isn't home to translate! I am constantly practicing my Spanish, so hopefully I will be able to better communicate with her soon. That night we had our first "family dinner" in my eyes, but apparently it is normal for Costa Rican families to have dinner together every single night (this has been a very hard adjustment for me!) My first meal with them was spaghetti, and those of you that know me, know that I have the biggest fear of eating in front of people I don't know, especially pastas and things that are difficult to eat haha, but I survived!!
Saturday Renato had a futbol (soccer) game in Guanacaste, another provience in Costa Rica that is about 3 hours away. My mom woke up around 5am and travelled to see his game, Karla was at work, and I stayed home to settle in. I ventured out to the Sports Center of The University of Costa Rica and walked around for a few hours. It was a very peaceful day, and I got to people watch, which is my favorite thing to do! Later Saturday evening Karla took me to church with her. Everyone in her small group was really nice to me and some were trying their hardest to speak English to me, it was a nice gesture. Everything was in Spanish, so I wasn't really sure what was going on, but I could pick out a few words here and there and I understood what the service was about in general.
Sunday was a pretty relaxed day, I ironed and got my clothes ready for the week and just hung out and did a few Spanish lessons on my computer. Sunday night it took me a while to fall asleep because I was so nervous about my first day at school on Monday!
Monday…wow, what do I say about Monday…! I arrived to my first class around 9:15 with Chelsea. My Monday/Tuesday class is an advance class, so they have pretty decent English. As soon as Chelsea left, I was surrounded by my students, I felt like a celebrity! haha they were so interested in me and were asking me all kinds of questions. They asked me if I wanted to learn Spanish, and of course by habit I said "Yes I do, I hope YALL can teach me" they all looked at me and said "What is YALL? I don't understand Teacher Chelsea." So I gave them a mini "Texas English" lesson and they were using YALL all day, it was the funniest thing ever. One thing about teaching in Costa Rica is that they don't call you by your last name. So instead of calling me Ms. Bishop, they call me Teacher Chelsea. It is definitely something I am adjusting to, and it is very weird! Most of my students are around my age though, so it is more like having friends instead of students. Which in Costa Rica it is normal to be friends with your students once they are in College (I'm teaching at a college level for those of you that didn't know) but during school they still respect you as their Teacher, and the "adult" in the room, even though everyone there is an adult. After school I had lunch with my co-teacher and her friends, then one of her friends walked be back downtown to my bus stop. He spoke very little English, but he wanted to practice, so we talked in English the whole time (thank goodness!).
Tuesday was pretty much the same as Monday, I was with my advanced class and everything was great. After school I ventured home alone, stopped at a little restaurant (they call them Soda's) and had a traditional casado for lunch. In the Soda they also sold a few things, I will attach a picture below, but I felt like I was eating in the middle of a Dollar Store. It was the strangest thing ever. After that I ventured down Avenieda Central and stopped and bought some "helado" (ice cream) from the famous POPS, it is the most popular helado shop here in Costa Rica, kinda like the equivalent of a Baskin Robbins or something.
Wednesday I started teaching my Basic class. They organized a traditional breakfast for me on my first day, it was very nice. We had fruit, Costa Rican pancakes, and some kind of breakfast cake. Of course along with all of that we had "cafe" (coffee…Costa Ricans loooovveee coffee, we drink coffee here like 5 times a day). During this break, I had a few students talk to me, but not many. Since they are Basic, they don't know much English so I am sure that they are just too shy to talk to me. In class they were learning about time and how to tell time on the clock. This class is very very basic, and it's hard to connect with the students because many of them cannot understand things that I say. After class was over at 1pm I went over to my advance class to talk to my co-teacher. Many of my students were still in there and invited me to stay and have lunch and play games with them. They were trying to teach me a few basic Spanish words and it was really fun. For the life of me I cannot pronounce "Teatro" (theater) in Spanish and it was a complete laughing fest every time I said it haha. After lunch it started raining really hard, so no one wanted to leave, so we stayed and played games (the rainy season has just started so it rains every day for like an hour or so). We all played Pictionary in Spanish, and ironically, I was really good at it! I ended up staying at school with them until 5, I was having so much fun!
Nothing too exciting happened on Thursday, but Friday was fun. My old boss Pilar, from Janie and Jack in Houston lives in Costa Rica, so she came to pick me up to spend the day with her and her husband. I went with them to sign on their house that was just finished being built. It was such a cute little house, perfect for just the two of them. Definitely somewhere I would live if I lived here! We went back to the house that they are living in now, had lunch, then sat out by the pool. Unfortunately it wasn't as sunny as I wished, but it was still a nice day and Pilar and I practiced my Spanish! Later they took me back home and Karla and I went to a little party at her church. It was very nice, regardless of the fact that I had no idea what anyone was saying haha. Her friends are very nice and they try to speak to me in English when they can.
It has been one verrrryyyyy long week, but I am enjoying every little bit of it!! I will try and post more often so that you aren't left reading a book once a week from me! haha
My first meal alone, at a Peruvian Restaurant near my hotel
My room for the next 3 months!
This is my house. It is cute :) 
They view from the park where I went running Saturday. 
This is my address. Costa Rican addresses are CrAzY!!
This is the meal I had at the "Soda" on Tuesday. 
My view at the Soda..They had undershirts, socks, bathing suits, bath sponges, hot plates, party decorations, it was really weird. hahaHasta la próxima vez!
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