5 semanas...

Hello to all! Yes, that's right, I only have 5 weeks left until I come home! I started packing yesterday actually. :-) As much as I love Costa Rica and have loved this experience, it's starting to get to me a little bit. I love my host mom but she smokes like a freight train and I honestly fear for her health, that being said, I'm tired of walking out of my room and being enveloped in cigarette smoke...not really my cup of tea. I'm afraid I've developed a little cough just from being around it so much. I am also slightly fed up with the water systems here. I know there are millions of people around the world that don't even have water, much less running water, but nonetheless, it is annoying that the water mysteriously stops working here for no apparent reason at all. It's especially annoying when I come home from a long day of walking in the pollution that permeates my town and all I want is a shower, it will be cold, but I've gotten used to this. I don't think a shower is too much to ask for, but apparently the city of Heredia thinks otherwise. We're not in a drought, so it's not like the water's not there, and we have all of the most modern plumbing pipes that exist, so in my opinion, the water should work all the time. So far this week, the water has gone out at least twice for hours at time, today it didn't come on until 5:30 pm...

Okay, enough venting, in other news, I saw Iron Man last night, in Spanish unfortunately, so I'll have to watch it again in English when I get back. It was pretty good, but so many things are lost in the translation, and I find that I'm still not very good at watching movies in Spanish. I have no clue what was being said for the majority of the movie, lol. It was a fun night out with a few of my friends, though, so that's always nice. I spent today resting and doing a little homework, thinking about how much homework I'm going to have to do this week. I only have 3 weeks of classes left, yay!!

Hope all is well for everyone!

Pura vida,
Amelia

Fumes of the End

Hello to all! Everything is going well here. I just got back from a wonderful weekend trip to my favorite beach in the whole world, Montezuma. It was kind of bittersweet because I knew that I wasn't going to get to see in a really long time. My friend Elena's dad came down to visit and put us up in a little house on the beach, very cool, props to her dad. I really appreciate him supporting us for a weekend, lol. This time I also got to see one of the beautiful waterfalls in Montezuma and do a little swimming in freshwater, which was really nice. I think everyone had a pretty good time over all. It'll probably be a few weekends until we go anywhere again, so hopefully that will tide us over.

Schoolwork is piling on more and more daily, and I can definitely tell that I'm nearing the end of this 5 month roller coaster. Today, I was walking with one of my friends, trying to have a conversation, and was bathed in diesel and carbon monoxide fumes from a huge truck. I've decided it's probably time for me to come home if anything, just for my health, lol. My poor lungs can't take much more of this city life. I'm looking forward to walking out my front door again, and being able to breathe deeply without coughing, lol.

Sorry my posts haven't been more interesting as of late, but there really aren't a whole lot of interesting things going on. I can't go many places due to schoolwork, and the newness of this whole experience has kind of worn off. Don't get me wrong, I'm still enjoying myself immensely, but the brightness of it all is gone.

Hopefully something exciting will happen soon! :-) Hope all is well...

Pura vida,
Amelia

Depressed because I'm happy, what?

Life is going quite wonderfully at the moment. I've never had this little stress in my life, there aren't any reminders of bad things that happened in the past, I really don't do much of anything as far as school goes...I'm happy. With this happiness though, apparently, comes the consequence of not being able to write good music. I don't know if any other musician has ever experienced this, but I can't seem to write anything good when I'm happy, lol. I'm baffled actually! Because of this I'm slightly depressed that I can't write a good song at the moment, lol...yeah, it's pretty weird. Oh well, I only have 7 weeks left, so soon I will be back in the stressful, do-everything-as-fast-as-possible world of the U.S. I'm sure I'll have plenty to write about. :-)

Seriously, though, I'm amazed at how nice things have been since I've been down here. In the States I used to cry at least twice a month over who knows what(I can't really remember), but the only times I cry here are when I'm homesick, and it's been a month or so since I've been really homesick. I'm ready to come home so I can get on with the rest of my life, but at the same time, I'm afraid that I'm going to lose this carefree attitude that I've developed as soon as I get back. I'm going to try to stay the way I am now when I return. So, if some of you notice that I really just don't care about certain things that are important to many people that live in the U.S., such as being early for everything, I apologize in advance, lol. Apparently that's what it takes for me to chill...I just can't worry about trying to please everyone. I have to do what makes me happy because if I can't make myself happy then everyone around won't want to stay around me. Happiness is infectious, kind of like a drug. Everyone should take a lesson from the Costa Ricans on this issue. The Costa Rican mottos are "Pura vida" and "Tranquilo," both of which basically just mean, "chill out", "don't worry, be happy." This is all that matters in life. Nothing is worth stressing over too much. I hope I can keep this attitude when I get back. Everything is so much simpler this way...

Paz,
Amelia