Improving My Spanish

I've been feeling kind of upset about the way things have been going with the family here. Not like we're negative with each other or anything, but I just haven't really felt like we have clicked yet. 

With two of the brothers, I have felt pretty good, and we have talked a good amount, alternating between Spanish and English usually. They're great and they really try to talk to me, it seems, which is great and has given me good practice.

The hard thing is that the mom doesn't speak ANY English. And it's great because that's what I originally wanted so I would learn more. But it's been tough because I have just felt so awkward with her because I will see her all the time but never know what to say, and even if I do, I won't know HOW to say it. I say little things to her, and she does to me, but it's always with lots of pauses and misunderstandings. And it's embarrassing not to ever know what someone is saying.

But, tonight, when I got home, I thought to myself that I really am just going to try to have a conversation with her. So I just walked up to her in the kitchen and asked "Ha estado a Arenal?" (Have you been to Arenal [the volcano that I'm going to see over spring break]?) And she said she had and talked a little bit about it. Then, since travel came up, she brought up the fact that you always have to be careful in the city here. Any city. You can't ever carry anything with you. Once, when she was in San José, someone ran up to her and pulled her necklace to steal it. She quickly grabbed the pendant so he couldn't take it but he broke the chain. Another time, the necklace was too strong to take so it sort of choked her for a second, but I guess that guy just gave up and ran away. She also told me that sometimes people will just run up to girls and literally pull their earrings out, which most often will rip the ears. Then she told me she was once held up at gunpoint in one of the grocery stores here! She had a gun put up to her head as well as her sister's, they tied their arms up and took everything. And she also told me that she knew about the guy from Indiana who I have talked to who was walking around with his laptop and passport and stuff and it was all stolen. And she told me about how her son was just randomly punched one day so hard when he was playing basketball that he has a hole in his forehead bone (you can see the skin dip in where there isn't bone.) And she told me someone put a bag with a nice camera in the storage area above them in a bus and how it was stolen. It's just nuts; JESUS. So yeah, I've gotta be careful around here for myself as well as my property. I knew this coming down here and I have always been really careful, but still, to see and hear it is actually happening is just crazy.

But overall, I just felt REALLY good that I had a real conversation with her. Yes, to be honest, there were a LOT of gestures flying around, and I had to use my dictionary a few times, and she was talking slowly, but overall, we really did converse and it was so much fun. Her personality is cool and it's the first time I've really been able to see that because I just really haven't had a way to converse.

I LOVE speaking in Spanish. I want to get better and better.

Hasta luego,

Whit