“I continue to be overwhelmed by the beauty of Morelos, and cannot imagine leaving without returning in the future. I am so thankful for the care and kindness of my host family and everyone who I have had the pleasure of meeting. Everything is amazing, and the thrill of the unfamiliarity seems to amplify the richness of the food and warmth of the people. No matter how beautiful the culture is, there is something surreal and isolating about being surrounded by a culture which I am not a part of. I have never experienced this before.
Shortly after arriving, I came to the harsh realization that my Spanish is extremely conversationally poor. Communicating in Spanish is more challenging than I ever anticipated; I have never had to struggle to find the words to express simple thoughts. I feel like a baby. Recently I have begun to feel more comfortable communicating in Spanish, and I know that more progress is on the way.”
-Grace

 

“It’s still surreal! While time has been passing seemingly slowly, I can’t believe its already been two weeks. Getting into a regular routine has been difficult. Classes and communication at home the first week and a half were extremely difficult, making me think about everything I wanted to say in the simplest terms as well as how others must feel while trying to learn English at the Putney School. I expected some foods to remind me of home such as name brand foods like Lays, Doritos and KitKats to taste the same as they do back home but it all has totally different flavoring. I had no idea what to expect when trying tacos but am now in love with tacos al pastor and special tacos our host mom made recently. Lastly, driving norms and street layouts were a surprise. It seems faster, but the drivers all seem to be paying really close attention to everyone’s safety. I feel as though my communicating, understanding and writing in Spanish has improved incredibly in this short amount of time and look forward to working hard to keep up the progress.”
-Simone

“There are some things that are so similar to home that I can forget that I am abroad, like the movie theater. But there are other things that are more different than I could have possibly predicted, like the plants or just how fast everyone talks. And I can never tell which one it will be, oneday we are eating tacos al pastor or pozole and the next we’re eating hotdogs.”
-Veleena