Settling in

Well, now I'm off on my next international adventure - a medical internship in Heredia, Costa Rica!  I am so excited to see what this trip has in store.  It'll certainly be a huge change from my semester abroad, where I knew several people going with me and saw them everywhere.  This time, I've embarked on my own.  I came in knowing absolutely no one, and that's exactly how I wanted it to be.  This summer will be only what I make of it, and I can't wait to see how it all unfolds.

Now, for a bit about my accommodations:
I am living with a host family that has four adorable kids ages 5-11.  They are all very sweet, and the youngest, the only boy, has quickly grown fond of me because I'm willing to play "Just Dance 3" with him on the Wii.  I can already tell that this home stay experience will be drastically different than my experience in Madrid, where my host mom was genuinely interested in getting to know me and building a relationship.  Here, the family keeps their distance and lets us (there are two other American students in the house as well) have our space, which is nice at times, but I do think it's unfortunate that they aren't quite as emotionally invested as Cris was.  She was what made my semester abroad the wonderful experience that it was.
My room is pretty nice, with a bed and dresser and some space to hang clothes.  It's nothing too exciting, but it has everything I need.
The bathroom that I've been using for the past week has had no hot water, so I've actually become quite used to taking cold showers since I've been here.  Wooo!!!
Other than that, the food is good, though, repetitive, and by the time I get home I know I'm going to be longing for green vegetables and anything but beans and rice.  Our house does not have air conditioning, but we keep the doors and windows open to let light in, which helps bring the temperature down.  It also allows bugs to enter the house, and there are a ton of ants and moths crawling around, but I'm sure I'll get used to those.

The climate here is actually quite lovely...it's very warm in the morning (I would guess around 85+, and then cools off in the afternoon when it's about to rain.  Right now Costa Rica is starting its "wet season," so people expect it to rain every afternoon.  That hasn't quite been the case thus far, and we've had a couple issues with low water supply, but hopefully it'll rain enough to prevent that from happening too much more!

That's about all for the basics, and I'll be talking more about my work and this area throughout my posts, so for now, I'll say goodnight!