Excitement and Stress

The last few weeks have been a blur. I have finished another class and I am almost finished with my last course for the semester. I’m leaving in a few short days and it still feels like there is so much to do: packing, papers, people to see, places to go.

But it will all come together.

At Upeace we have culture nights as part of our mandated curriculum. These cultural nights are a wonderful opportunity for us to learn about places and cultures which we might never get to experience otherwise.

A few weeks ago, Africa Night set the bar with a week of events leading up to the night and a fantastic exhibition of African dance, food, and incredible culture.

This past Friday was North America Night and as part of the planning committee I had my hands full with dancing, organizing, and food preparing.

The night was a tremendous success as we shared Native American heritage, dances from many decades, curling, and French Canada. In prior years, NA Night has been about Thanksgiving but the staff and faculty appreciated our novel approach and BBQ in substitute of turkey.

This week is M.A.P. Night- Middle East, Asia, and Pacific- I’m very excited! I’m dancing in a Bollywood production for those of you who don’t know, Bollywood is basically the Hollywood of India.

Google: “Chammak Challo.” This is a popular Bollywood song, what’s neat about Bollywood films is that they always feature elaborate dance scenes throughout the movie.

In other news, I have been busy with Rotary as well. I teamed up with my fellow scholar, JP and the San Jose Rotaract Club to help collect and distribute Christmas presents to two low-income schools; one near Ciudad Colόn and another far back in the mountains which serves an indigenous population.

This was such a fun event because we were able to meet with the kids and their parents on a Saturday to play games with them and then give them early Christmas presents.

As a Catholic country, Christmas is a very big celebration in Costa Rica and they have even incorporated some traditions such as lights and Christmas trees! (And even Black Friday, which I actually find to be a bit disturbing.)

However, Christmas music is everywhere and even though there is no snow, I am ready for the Christmas season when I go home.

Looking forward to the holidays and a well-deserved break!