Estoy famosa (I'm famous!)

So I made that title up... I don't really know how to say that. I do that fairly often and every once in a while a made up word is actually a real word. Fun!

I got two new students this week, one of which does not speak English. The other is a really joyful little gringo... when someone asked him to answer a question about money at Calendar he said with great enthusiasm and joy, "I've never done THAT kind of Math before!" What a cutie! The other new student's mom is from Switzerland and speaks Swiss and German to him at home. His dad is from Columbia and speaks Spanish to him at home. So at the age of six, he's working on his fourth language (English). Isn't that crazy? I'm amazed at how much experience and transition so many of my students have gone through. I found out this week that Andrew was born in Japan, lived there for three years, then moved to Scotland for two years, and is now in Costa Rica while his parents study at ILE and serve here for three years. Wow!

I also found out recently that Andrew's family lives on the very next street over from where I live. So close! Not as many families live over this way from ILE because it is a bit of a walk from school. They had me over last night and both mom and dad as well as the five boys are just really solid, sweet, joyful people. Great storytellers as well! I really enjoyed it! Students asking me to hang out with them outside of school is becoming quite the trend. I went to a game night at Mackenzie's house on Friday. For about half of the time he just stared at me because his teacher was at his house, and he was so excited!

It's possible I'll get up to three new students in the next week. Several parents of hte kindergarten class have been talking and want their kids to move up to first grade... I told the principal I'd teach whoever he puts in my class, but asked him if it would be possible to wait a week, so that I have desks and books for the new kids. That would make the transition much smoother for all of us. I will need to rearrange my room if that happens...it will be pretty tight to be able to fit three new desks in there, but we can do it if we need to. (This is where the I'm famous title would fit in! Ha ha!)

I think some kind of shift is happening within me. It's the end of week number five. I know because I just opened one of the notes that the NMSI people wrote me. You will be proud to know that I have had self-control and only opened one a week...so far! The first few were from Erin S., Joe B., and Matt B. They totally made me cry. Anyways, that's how I keep track of how long I've been here because the envelopes have numbers on them. I was telling my tico family about the notes a while back after my tico dad passed by my room and caught me holding one up to the light to try to see whose handwriting was inside there. Ha ha!

Mary and I decided to celebrate our one month in Costa Rica anniversary (Sept 23) by going to the beach next weekend. That's like a get on a bus and travel to another part of the country kind of adventure...my first one here! We are going to ask several other teachers from school to come. Actualy we're going to make them invitations iwth markers and such so they feel special even if they can't come. I am reminded over and over how nice it is to be invited...

Along the same lines, Mary, Esther, Maureen, and I (new teachers at Sojourn) have been getting together once a week to celebrate having completed another week and to try out local food places that people have recommended to us. We were going to try out a restaurant called Fresas (strawberries) that I've heard has great smoothies, but we ended up going somewhere else. Hopefully we'll try that next week! More or less, I've been coordinating the celebration effort, and we're trying to invite new people to come with us each week so we get to know them better (gringas and ticas). It's like a little unity movement. So far it has gone really well, and we've had a lot of fun!

Ana, a mom of one of my students, is a teacher at ILE (The Spanish Language Institute), so I asked her if she'd be willing to practice Spanish with me once a week while her son (Federico) is at gymnastics practice....she's got to stay at school until he's done anyway, so she's already here. She said YES, so I will start tutoring with her on Mondays. On Wednesdays, I tutor with Mau, another teacher at Sojourn. I feel like maybe my accent is changing a little and that I'm slowing down when I talk to try to use all the right tenses instead of talking faster and using just the tenses and forms I know well. This is kind of exciting because I couldn't tell a difference in my Spanish at all for the first few weeks.

Keep praying, friends! There are still really lonely and sad times. There are tons of cool people to pursue friendship with! There is still a great need for rest. I love you all!