I can't believe I already come home in two weeks. I remember telling myself when I was so nervous about leaving home and the states that Christmas would come before I knew it and I would be coming home. I didn't think it would be this fast though! I have so many mixed feelings about leaving, but still three weeks to balance them all out. I wonder if the simplicity of my life is something I will feel change when I return, how strange it will feel to speak the language I think in, and even how different the weather will be. I have learned so much being here, things that have changed me without me even being able to put them in words. I'm not sure if this will be the last time I will write before I see most all of you reading this, but in the next few weeks (and the ones leading up to now) things will be really busy. Goodbyes, hellos, family and everything that comes with the holidays has flying at me. We have the a Christmas tree up and all but it feels so much different than I am used to, looking out the window at a bright sunny day and putting on shorts singing, "Navidad, navidad para todo la felicidad!" I'm so blessed to be experiencing something so culturally traditional like the holiday season in somewhere where the culture is completely different. I remember when I first came to Costa Rica, I had a hard time speaking Spanish and accepting the culture as my own for the time being. Always I was comparing it to that of the United States and I remember feeling superior; I was from the country that had such a strong influence here, the place where you have to pay $100 just to apply for a Visa to go. I speak natively the language many struggle to learn in search of opprutunity. The more I adjusted to culture here, the more this feeling of superiority faded. Now it is all but gone. I've been through the struggles of communicating in a new language that is native to the people I felt better than while they waited patiently, learned the traditional types of food in their uniqueness, even down to how you greet someone with a kiss on the cheek. All these things I have learned and experienced I can hardly begin to list. All these things I also would have never experienced had God not torn down my wall of superiority. I came with intentions of learning and living but not necessarily changing myself, none the less falling in love with a different culture and its people and it becoming a part of me forever. The closer I come to leaving, the more realistic it's becoming that there is a whole new part of me, a language, a family and a culture. I have loved hearing stories from the elders here that founded the community and experiencing God in the silence of the rainforest, respecting greatly the idea Quakers believe that the light of God is in everyone. With a teacher of mine we have been discussing some about spirituality and how we define God and why. Every Wednesday we have an hour to do this kind of stuff before meeting and we have been writing spiritual autobiographies. Today we shared them and it's been so interesting to think about my relationship with God in relation to everyone elses and to think about where I got my faith. In the meeting room there is a sign that says "strength without dominance, gentleness without weakness, courage without arrogance, love without possessiveness". I love looking at this and thinking that this is what I want to be. I'm so thankful this Thanksgiving for all that has changed in my life and most of all in me. I have found such genuine joy here and in God that I feel I hadn't yet known. I would write more but the sun is setting a bright red out over the Nicoya gulf and since dusk doesn't exist here, I have to head home as to not walk in the dark :)
Hopefully I'll be able to blog a few more times before I come home, but if not I am looking forward so much to seeing you all again!
Con mucho amor y esperanzas que ustedes son buenos.
Pura vida <3
Emma
P.S.
Spanish 2 class at OCS...Did you get the letters I sent?
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