Enjoying the ice and snow before Costa Rica

It’s about time I leave for Costa Rica! Yes, it’s about time. It’s always about time here in America. People scheduling, deadlining, prioritizing, running errands, meeting quotas, speeding around all for the sake of time. And when the day is over, we complain about not having enough… time. Here in America we “spend” our time, like one would spend money. (In fact, some people would even equate time with money). This morning I “spent” time with my family talking over breakfast and then I “spent” time playing tennis with my dad on his break from work. We do so much spending of our time; will we ever run out? There’s nothing wrong with saying we “spend” time doing things; it’s just the way we English-speakers tend to say it. But I love what Spanish does with time. Spanish speakers “pasar tiempo,” or “pass time,” doing things and being with people. That’s also just the way they say it, but isn’t that neat? I’ve been told to expect a much slower pace of life in Costa Rica and to prepare to use lots of patience (good thing I’ve got a little practice in patience from having 4 siblings… just kidding, hermanos!). Perhaps “passing the time” will be a new experience for me down there. I hope to embrace it.

I wouldn’t say I’ve embraced all this packing I’ve had to do these last couple days though. My suitcases have never been this full. Ever. They are so full I may have to walk on that plane tomorrow wearing a suit jacket, 4 pairs of socks and two hats. Maybe even a bath towel. How’s that for an awkwardly suspicious international air traveler? I also haven’t fully embraced the fact that we have to leave our house at 5 a.m. to make it to San Antonio the suggested 3 hours before my flight’s departure. Oh well, at least I ought to have a lot of time to practice “passing” tomorrow morning…

This entry was posted on Monday, January 25th, 2010 at 9:17 am and is filed under College Study Abroad. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.