So far my first week in my new Spanish class has been good! My professor definitely speaks faster and is expecting a lot from us, but it's a good challenge! She also gets us talking a lot; she's really trying to make us more conversational which I appreciate! This week I also went to the free dance class at school both Tuesday and Thursday. It was really fun, especially on Thursday! We were doing some tricky moves and switching partners while dancing which was pretty crazy, but really fun!
Also on Thursday I had my first field trip for my "Conflict Resolution and Healthcare" class! We went to an elementary school where we held a workshop on self-esteem and encouraging others. The class seems to loosely follow its name, but that's okay, I had a great time and learned quite a bit! We had prepared an agenda for the workshop, which lasted about 2 hours. The tricky part was... The workshop was held in Spanish! I was really nervous about helping lead a class of 25 students in Spanish! But I tried to be confident and I think it went well. The students had a lot of energy and seemed to enjoy our activities! When our directions didn't make sense luckily our professor was right there to help explain in her fluent Spanish. One of our activities was sending a paper with our name on it around the classroom for other people to write positive qualities and comments on it. The results were very sweet even though the students didn't really know me!
Also on Thursday I had my first field trip for my "Conflict Resolution and Healthcare" class! We went to an elementary school where we held a workshop on self-esteem and encouraging others. The class seems to loosely follow its name, but that's okay, I had a great time and learned quite a bit! We had prepared an agenda for the workshop, which lasted about 2 hours. The tricky part was... The workshop was held in Spanish! I was really nervous about helping lead a class of 25 students in Spanish! But I tried to be confident and I think it went well. The students had a lot of energy and seemed to enjoy our activities! When our directions didn't make sense luckily our professor was right there to help explain in her fluent Spanish. One of our activities was sending a paper with our name on it around the classroom for other people to write positive qualities and comments on it. The results were very sweet even though the students didn't really know me!
Some of the kids!
The positive qualities the students wrote about me!
On Friday after class at about 2:00 I met some friends at the bus stop and we went Downtown to find the Artisan Market. The Artisan Market is basically a long strip of shops selling every kind of souvenir you can think of! I bought only one thing, but I'll be going back before I leave so it was a good chance to see what they had! Also, it was nice to spend a little bit more time in downtown San Jose! After we got back I had dinner with my host family and my friend Stephanie came over and we watched a movie on my laptop. It was a nice Friday night, the first one I've spent here in San Jose!
Saturday I was up bright and early to head to Tortuguero, Costa Rica. Tortuguero is on the Northern Caribbean coast of Costa Rica. We had planned our trip through ISA so we took a private shuttle bus to the coast. On the way we also stopped for a buffet breakfast that was provided and were on our way. We got as far as we could via bus and then had to take an hour boat ride out to our hotel! The boat ride was through the canals of Tortuguero, and I felt like I was on the Jungle Cruise ride at Disneyland. It was so cool and totally different from any experience so far. I can't explain exactly what it was like, so you can see the pictures. The hotel was only accessible by this boat... How cool is that? Right when we arrived at the hotel they had coconuts sitting out for us as a welcome drink! We felt very welcomed and our rooms were pretty nice as well. There was only one other group at the hotel while we were there so they were very attentive to us, which was nice. We had lunch at the hotel and then took another short boat ride to the rest of the town of Tortuguero. It was pretty small, but we had a nice time wandering through it, through souvenir shops, stopped at the beach for a bit, and had way too much fun taking pictures with the many murals around the town!
"The Jungle Cruise" to the hotel.
Coconut waiting for us! Don't even like coconut, but it was a nice thought!
Too much fun with the murals.
Sunday we were up and out by 6 am! We took a two-hour tour of the canals looking at all of the wildlife! It was really nice! We saw a bunch of different birds, iguanas, monkeys, and frogs! Plus I just loved being in the boat and exploring! After we had breakfast, packed up, and left! So it sounds like it was a short trip, but it was great. I loved how I got to see yet another unique part of Costa Rica! Also there was a group of nine girls this trip and it still went really well and everyone got along which is great!
A frog we got to hold!
This week I want to find a book to read in Spanish and to start watching the news or some sort of Spanish TV show daily. I'm determined to keep improving rapidly! I'm loving the challenge of learning Spanish!
Pura Vida
Great post Hannah. We're all living vicariously through you at the moment. All the fun trips you've been taking and really taking advantage of the surrounding country, keep it up!! It was great to talk and see you tonight! Love, Mom & Dad
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