Kickin' homesickness in the butt!

I cannot believe I only have two more months in La Florida, Santiago with my family and at my school. I am super stoked to see what these final two months have in store for me because all the good, and the bad, in the past three months have been an incredible ride. While making the decision to study abroad I had no idea what my experience would be like. Now I can say that I have been super pleased with all the ups AND the downs because the "downs" make you stronger and make the "ups" even more worth it. 

I don't want this blog to be superficial and only about the ups. I don't want to make it look like I had an absolutely perfect time with no bumps in the road because no matter where you are living, you will have downs and go through rough patches. A couple of weeks ago I had one of those rough patches. I had gotten food poisoning so I stayed home sick for a while. Then a relative back in the US passed away. It was unfortunate timing that I was sick and homesick at the same time because then instead of going out and doing things, I had to stay in bed which just made me even more restless and made me think about letting myself and my family down because I wasn't living up to the goals I had set for my time in Chile. I changed my mindset and began to think that even if I was still in Colorado my relative would have still passed away and I would have still gotten sick at times. I left Colorado, my family, friends, and the way of life I am used to so how can I except for everyday to be perfect sailing. I am thankful that I have gotten along with everyone of my Chilean families and that I have become great friends with my peers and sister because all those relationships make the last two months pass even smoother.

Coming here, I knew that I was going to have some bad days and I knew that I was going to miss my family and friends. But honestly, that's all just part of the experience. All the hard times build your character, make you stronger, and make you even more mature. When I do get homesick, I try to focus on improving my Spanish; talking with whomever will talk to me (not strangers!), work on the conjugations, my accent, and all the new vocabulary. Other simple ways to forget homesickness, is to go try new things, experience the new culture, join a sports team, meet up with your new friends, or just focus on school work. It's crazy how effective it is to go do something. Of course I still have bad days where I come home feeling down but I also have great days where I feel on top of the world. For me, to kick homesickness and those bad days in the behind, all it takes is a run or playing cards, watching TV, and talking with my host family. To sum that all up, all you need to do is stay busy! I also find my self a lot happier when I don't think about living up to the expectations from myself and my friends/family and when I don't compare other exchange student's experiences to mine. The language expectations, the experiences, who you meet... everything. So from here on out, I am going to accomplish the rest of my goals I had for my experience in Chile, I am not going to care about other peoples expectations, and I am going to continue to have the time of my life! 

So now to talk about language immersion. When you are learning a new language you literally need to write down every single new word you hear. I have a notebook filled with all the new words I hear/see and then before I go to bed I review the ones from that day. (Or at least that's the goal... sometimes I get lazy). You'd never think you would get told to watch more TV, but watching TV actually helps your pronunciation since you are listening to how natives speak. Most importantly, have confidence and try to talk as much as possible! Sometimes I get down on myself because I don't notice any improvement in my Spanish since growth in a new language is gradual and slow. Then, other times I will have a successful conversation and will feel so great about my self. Of course I have miscommunications and conversations that don't go so well but the conversations that are smooth make up for all the embarrassing miscommunications. Now I realize that I have improved a lot since I came. Before I came, I was in Spanish level four and I had an 'A' in that class. I thought I was pretty decent at Spanish and I certainly enjoyed learning it (hence why I was first interested in an abroad program). When I arrived in Chile, it seemed that all my confidence of being good at Spanish vanished because being in a classroom and being in the real situation is SO different. I can now understand pretty much everything people say (unless they talk in slang... that's a different story). I can read and write but talking is for sure the most difficult for me and I still haven't broken through my gringa accent. 

As promised in my last blog, I said I would talk about Easter. Easter proved to be very similar to back at home. Even though nobody in my host family believes in the Easter Bunny, not even my 10 year old brother, we still woke up to Easter baskets filled with chocolate eggs. Also on Easter weekend, we had relatives over for big family meals. Overall, it was a fun and relaxing weekend. 

Today is Thursday and nobody has work or school because today is a  holiday called,  Día del Trabajo. Also know as, Labor Day, Work Day or May Day. We also don't have school tomorrow, which is totally fine by me.  Chilean students call it a "sandwich" day where there is a holiday on a Thursday, so then there is no school on Friday. Bacán! Cool! 

Chao everyone!

Abrazos y besitos!!