I have had some pretty difficult times while talking to my host family. I personally am not the best at Spanish. Actually, I don’t speak any. That has been such a challenge for me. During dinners, we leave google translate open so we can talk to our family. I would say I am pretty surprised that they don’t speak English. On the first day, we were told by their son that they have been doing this for 15 years, so that is why I was a little shocked.
I could definitely see that throughout the city of Heredia today. First, we did a scavenger hunt at the market. It was very difficult because everything was in Spanish, and the people around us didn’t seem to know English. Luckily, Ryan was in my group and he can speak Spanish. That was definitely helpful for us all.
When coming here, all you hear is that a lot of people can speak both languages, so it was kind of a shock to me that they don’t. Don’t get me wrong, it is fun to try and speak Spanish to them, and we can all laugh about how bad my pronunciation is. Sometimes it is just a little difficult. Overall, I have really enjoyed trying to speak Spanish and learn a new language!