My earliest memory of speaking Spanish was being a small child or toddler, calling my mother’s friend “Tía” instead of aunt. She had given me a book in Spanish, having lived in Honduras, and I read it so many times as a little girl. I loved having this unique nickname for the aunt figure in my life, even if I didn’t quite understand yet why I didn’t just call her “Aunt”.
I was raised in an English-speaking household. My father spent part of his childhood in Germany and still knew a little bit, but since he mostly grew up in a small town in South Carolina, he couldn’t teach me much German. My mother took it upon herself to practice the bits of ASL my preschool teachers and babysitters taught me, but she was mostly focused on helping me learn to read early and succeed once I started real school. Thus, my earliest Spanish education was through a preschool teacher who wanted all of us to know a little bit of the second most common language in America. Throughout the few years I attended that preschool, I brought home words and phrases to share with my family.
As I entered elementary school, the basic, once-every-two-week classes continued. Spanish wasn’t treated like it was very important, but I still tried to exchange “te amo” and “buenos dias” with my mother when I could and absorbed any information we were given on the culture. As I reached third grade, the pandemic struck and I found myself stuck at home with nothing to do. Desperate, I downloaded Duolingo. The little green owl and the satisfying Ding! of correct answers brought on an obsession of daily practice. By the next fall, my daily streak was my greatest pride, and I couldn’t wait to share everything I learned with anyone who would listen. Suddenly, learning a language felt manageable, and I had a new life goal: I wanted to be bilingual.
In fifth grade, I transferred to a new school. I was startled and delighted to discover that you could choose to study Spanish or French (I eagerly blurted out that I was doing Spanish before the explanation was over) and that the classes would occur four days every week. This, and my recently discovered goal, led to determination and focus in my studies like never before. I loved how my classes taught me real-world skills, like how to order in a restaurant or ask for directions, and how we got to study the cultures and traditions of different countries. When my teacher announced that we would eventually have study-abroad opportunities, I went home practically singing to my mother. “They offer trips in middle school! We have to sign up!” I had never left the country, despite my curiosity and interest in other cultures. I had a goal, and now I had a purpose. I wanted nothing more than to travel with my class, and to understand enough to travel with my family in a country where I could practice the language skills I picked up.
The years pass, and my classes get harder, but I continue to take Spanish classes, and through them, I finally got the opportunity I was waiting for. In the spring of 2025, a group of us from my school will be traveling to Costa Rica. As I realized that my dreams were accomplishable, the goal I first set for myself at eight years old seems more and more attainable every day. I listen to podcasts and music in Spanish, carry on conversations, and continue to explore my interests. My mother and I still exchange short phrases occasionally, and I still call my aunt Tía, although now I actually know what it means.
Over the years, learning Spanish has become more than an occasional class or a way to pass the endless days in my house. It has become sort of fulfilling in a way, each word a step toward my dream of speaking two languages. It became a way to expand my world beyond the borders of South Carolina and discover the cultures and stories of places I might one day see. And eventually, these studies will help me reach my ultimate dream: explore the world, and see everywhere I want to see in my lifetime. Those first experiences, all those years ago, paved the way for a curiosity that I would carry with me throughout my life.
After Costa Rica
When I realized I had to write an essay about my experience in Costa Rica, I had no idea where to start. Logically, I considered, I should go in chronological order, but that would be a challenge considering that my five days studying abroad went by so quickly that I had trouble recalling what actually happened each day of the trip. In hindsight, hikes and swims and conversations blurred together into a jumble of happy chaos of middle school-aged girls laughing, crying, and coaching each other through some of the greatest but most challenging things we’d ever experienced. Instead of a timeline, I could list my favorite activities. But, honestly, is there any way to do that either? How could I pick between holding rare, endangered frogs, visiting gardens and farms, swimming in hot springs, and exploring with my friends? (Okay, let’s be honest, it was the frogs, but still.) Really, I had no clue.
On further consideration, none of that was exactly right for the essay. So I tried to consider a more educational approach, something more like a prompt on a test or application. I tried to consider what was the main thing I learned. But in an experience like that, there were just too many things I learned. Aside from the obvious (Spanish, it was a language immersion trip, after all), there was the ability to convert between currencies, to talk with strangers, and to not lose my baggage. There was everything I learned about this country, too, about the protected wildlife, the culture, the climate, and the land itself. Or I could focus on how I had changed. I started out slightly shy and unsure, terrified of asking strangers questions and offending them by butchering their language. But eventually, I ended up carrying on entire conversations in a language that I didn’t really understand and, as one of the oldest students on the trip, helping my younger friends do the same. Still, there was no way to pin down exactly what to focus on.
And so, I realized that maybe this was the answer. This trip was so overwhelmingly eventful that I just didn’t know what to focus on, and I realized that the exact point of an immersion trip was to be fully immersed in the experience. And that was what happened. I spent my mornings prepping food for animals in a rehabilitation center, exploring local farmers markets, - at some point, my group just started passing around food and it was incredible - and painting traditional art. I spent my afternoons hiking waterfalls, holding frogs while most of my group went zip lining, planting trees, and swimming at hot springs and hotel pools. In between, I watched scenery out the bus window and laughed with my friends and ate the most amazing food. And the best part? I had never ever experienced any of that before.
So maybe that’s why I didn’t know what to write. I didn’t know what to think half of the time I was there, trapped between utter awe and disbelief that anything this amazing could exist. And sure, it wasn’t perfect. I may have spent a little time crying in the bathroom, and I might have stayed up unhealthily late one night in an attempt to understand a weirdly addictive game show in Spanish, but it was ok because that was it. Those were the only times in the trip that I was unhappy, and this is coming from a girl who has food allergies and is terrified of causing trouble when I need to ask for help, and adding in the language barrier did not help. I overcame this, however, when I realized that the people around me were willing to help as long as I tried.
So maybe this essay is a little all over the place. But isn’t that how life is? Sometimes challenging, sometimes all over the place, and sometimes insanely fun. We don’t learn anything by standing still and saying, “Here is my world; I’m content with the little sliver of life I can see in this moment.” We get on planes, we fly out of the country for the first time, and we swallow our pride and ask for help when we need it. That, precisely, is how I learned that you can’t get everything out of life without being willing to take a risk for it.
