Story Location: Costa Rica
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Rugby Offers Opportunity to Improve Spanish Skills
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Ella Gianino discusses how practicing with the local White Wolves ruby team helped her overcome language barriers and experience an additional facet of the Heredia community. How did you get involved in rugby in Costa Rica?My host family and I usually go to the neighborhood park to play soccer in the evenings. It was at…
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Expectations of Studying Abroad
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Expectations studying abroad were always one of the aspects of college I was looking forward to most. Although my major, second language, and goals may have changed, my desire to spend time outside of the United States remained constant. It’s quite a cliché to hear, “My semester abroad changed my life!” so I had a…
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How Studying Abroad in Costa Rica Defined My Future in International Relations
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For some students, studying abroad is the opportunity to experience a new culture and expand your understanding of the world. For other students, there is a requirement for study abroad to help improve language skills or intercultural communication skills to graduate with their specific major. For me, it was both. I wanted to study abroad…
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Do’s and Don’ts of Study Abroad in Costa Rica
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As I finish up my semester here in Costa Rica, I’ve been taking more and more time to reflect upon the culture that I’ve integrated myself in. Costa Rica and studying abroad have their quirks, but you stop noticing them after a while. These differences became starker to me when my mother visited and pointed…
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What Studying Abroad Taught Me About Learning a New Language
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Doubt “Sí, se puedes.” These are the words that hung on a poster on the back wall of Rodney’s (my IFSA Resident Director) office. The phrase means “Yes, you can” in Spanish. However, as I sat in front of Rodney, nearly in tears, I could not bring myself to believe these words. I had been abroad in…
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Saving Money in Costa Rica
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Managing money abroad is always a topic of stress, regardless of one’s financial status. No matter how much leeway you have with your budget, it’s always best to err on the side of saving money. Here are some tips I’ve found helpful in saving money in Costa Rica: Before you go The first step to…
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How to Break Your Ankle Abroad
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There is no ‘good time’ to break a bone. Breaking one’s ankle abroad might be the most inopportune timing. Unfortunately, it happened to me! I don’t get to have the fun story of saying I was zip lining or cliff rappelling, because I broke my ankle while walking down a hill during a school field…
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Being Jewish in a Catholic Country
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I used to joke that I was Jew-ish, but my faith is important to me. Even if I don’t believe every word of the Torah, having a larger sense of something to believe in is a doctrine I do subscribe to. Judaism is not only a religion to me, but also a cultural identity, which…
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Managing Disability Abroad
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First thing’s first, I want to say there should be no shame in being disabled! It’s important to realize that being able-bodied can change in an instant, as it did for me to trigger my disability status. I was diagnosed with a rare neurological condition on my 16th birthday, only months after dislocating my spine…
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The Pros and Cons of STEM Abroad
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Writing about STEM is a bit foreign to me, because I only consider myself a sorta-STEM student. I started my college career as a strict social scientist, only to fall in love with environmental studies and ecology my sophomore year. Environmental studies at my home institution is half hard science, half social science – a…
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