First day of classes

(again, 2nd post today--same reason!)

Today was the first day of official classes. I left my house at 7:15 to meet someone else and make sure we made it to class on time. I actually found the bus stop and we got there in plenty of time! Yeah! We then had class straight until noon, and then had 30 minutes for lunch. After lunch, the intern here showed us the walking route to get to our other site for classes. It takes 55 minutes of brisk walking to get to this other site. We could walk, but many of us are itching to do something physical, so we welcome the walk. We arrived here at 1:30 and had class until 4:30 straight. This intense schedule of classes (basically from 8-4:30) will be like this for 2 days a week. On the other 3 days of the week we are only going to have class from 1:30 – 4:30.

The class that I have in the morning from 8-noon is going to be really interesting and challenging. We are going to be talking about a lot of interesting topics, and I am honestly excited about this class. Some issues include: US and Latin American relations, poverty in Latin America, and culture diversity in Latin America. We started the day off by talking about our awareness of world issues, and it was incredibly humbling. Here are a few things we talked about:

-         The worlds 3 richest men have wealth equal to the combined GDP of the poorest 47 nations

-         An annual 11% tax on the world’s 225 most well-to-do people would suffice to provide the following essentials for all those in developing countries: adequate food, safe water and sanitation, basic education, basic health care, and reproductive health care

-         The military spending of the United States is approximately 35% of the world’s total military spending

When I am reminded of the injustices of the world, it makes me angry. It makes me almost physically sick to my stomach. As we were discussing these staggering statistics along with others, we were just reminded that we are going to be talking about these difficult things all semester. It is not like there is just going to be one hard day and then we are off free. No. this entire semester is intended to challenge me to wrestle through issues instead of merely accepting them. After some discussion, we had a passionate talk from one of our professors. It is so obvious that they love what they are doing, and this is so awesome! He talked to us about how our whole lives we have heard the story of our country from a very biased perspective, and he said that it was far from the truth. We went through some things we had learned in past history classes, and he told us how they were totally incomplete. Even though I hate history, I was totally into this lecture because some of the things he said here unbelievable. It is scary to think about how I have always learned things from a biased perspective of a middleclass, white American.

Honestly, I’m going to try to refrain from talking on and on about the things we cover in class. I feel like I could probably write pages on the things we talk about, but I know that most of you are probably not that interested. I know that I was gifted with a special mind that just goes and goes, analyzing everything…so I’m going to keep most of my thoughts to myself. :) I already know that I am going to genuinely thank God for the mind he has given me at times during the semester, as it will allow me to delve into these topics with passion and a genuine desire to know the truth. However, I know there will also be times when I despise my mind because it makes my life so much more difficult. It is much easier to just accept things and go on living my life comfortably, but I know this is not how God made me. Having said that, please forgive me if I go off on a tangent sometimes about what we are talking about. :)

At our other site for class, we met with our other teachers. Every single afternoon from 1:30 – 4:30 I will be in Spanish class. This will last for 5 weeks straight. Wow. That’s a lot of Spanish! These classes are really unique though because my class has only 4 other students. On the 1^st day here, we had evaluations on where we were with our Spanish skills, and they put us in groups according to our levels. Today we met with our groups (the other students are all in this program with me), and we also met the professors. There are 38 students and 10 professors. Doing the math, that makes for a very intimate learning relationship, and I’m really excited about this individual attention. The professors will rotate every week, so I won’t have the same professor for more than a week. This is also nice in case I don’t particularly learn well from one of them. It is also going to be primarily oral learning. II think I will really learn a lot in this type of setting, even though it will be intense!

After class, 7 of us students who live in the same area-ish took the bus home. This sounds easy. It’s not. We first have to take a bus downtown to San Jose, and then we have to get off, walk several blocks to a different bus stop, and then get on another bus for home. Once we got downtown, we definitely had some confusion on where the next bus stop was, and I am convinced that we did not hit the nearest bus stop! Oh well. We got on a bus, and the traffic was nuts! Oh my goodness! We had been on the 2^nd bus for almost 45 minutes, and I was really wondering when our stop was coming. I thought I saw something familiar, but it did not agree with where we thought we were. Anyway, I ended up talking to the lady next to me on the bus and asked her for a long time about where we were and where I needed to go. She was probably 30 and so kind! She was just very helpful at explaining to me where we were and helping me figure out where different landmarks were that I knew could remember seeing by my house. Not only does it stink to be lost and not recognize anything, it is hard to ask for directions when you don’t know where you are going and you are speaking a different language. Anyway, praise the Lord I asked her when I did because we were 1 block away from where I needed to get off. So I got off the bus and walked about 5 minutes alone to get home. This was very stressful because seriously the sidewalks are even packed and you have to like maneuver your way through them, not to mention crossing the streets is virtually impossible. Oh and did I mention it was almost dark? By the grace of God I made it home 1 hour and 45 minutes later :)