Okay, so I am super excited about this: An extremely good friend of mine and her husband (also an extremely good friend) are moving to Costa Rica!
This is an excellent opportunity to learn what it is like to be an American living in Costa Rica. I want to hear about what they experience, what they eat, what they drink, who they see, how hard or easy it is to transition between cultures. After you grow up on horses in Colorado, get a degree in Political Science and marry an entrepreneur in California who looks like Thor, how do you start a new home in a foreign, tropical country?
I want to know it all, and I would love to share this with you guys 🙂
So, here is Anna’s first letter: The Few Weeks Before They Leave!
Anna & Dreutch
Tamarah,
We have only a few weeks until we move to Costa Rica. Yikes! It has not truly hit me yet that we are leaving. I am excited and nervous at the same time.
In regards to planning: we decided that we could either plan for the entire year before we moved or wait until 3 months before and work like mad to be ready in time. We chose the latter. We recently coined the term in our house “The wall of inevitability” in reference to the move date. When I start to panic that we won’t be ready or that I will forget something we need, I try to remember that I only technically need our passports and money. So if I forgot to purchase the snake-bite kit, water purifier, carabineers, or other misc. “Costa Rica items” or if per chance they don’t fit, it will not be the end of the world.
We are moving with 2 suitcases and a carry-on for each person. In case your brain just exploded like mine did at first– our apartment there will be fully furnished. So it’s not quite that crazy. Ya! I love the freedom of only being responsible for 100 lbs of stuff! I have been lauding the merits of minimalism for months. Yet it has been a bit of a challenge to clear the nonessentials. I discovered that I struggle the most to let go of free stuff. My mom has generously given me an abundance of clothes that she no longer would wear or that don’t fit (and I have been accumulating them for the past 8 years) For obvious reasons, they were free and they were from my mom! It didn’t take me long to decide that at this point, the ones I don’t wear, I shouldn’t keep “just in case”. Here’s to hoping someone else will enjoy them!
Then there are the clothes that I don’t fit into anymore, but I keep around because I want to fit into them. I am almost ashamed to admit I put a decent number of shorts into storage that I can’t even wear right now. You know, for magical future me that will be able to wear them. I like to consider myself an optimist. Or maybe I should just imagine myself as Gollum on this issue… “my precious pants that are 4 sizes too small…”
I know, I know, let it go….
A few things I will miss from the US.
1. Friends and family
2. Cheddar cheese, steak, asparagus, peaches, strawberries
3. Toffee nut latte – Starbucks
4. Boots for blustery fall weather
5. My amazing spin instructor and her crazy music.
6. Our new-ish church that we love!
Excited for
1. Meeting new people and living near friends.
2. Discovering new amazing and fun foods and hobbies!
a. Pineapple, manga, sashimi straight from the ocean
b. Spear fishing
c. New adventures!
“Toodle-oo!”
Anna
P.S. (Try using “Toodle-oo” on guys, sometimes they will say it back to you before they process that it sounds silly. Which makes me chuckle (inside)). Except when Duke Ellington does it. Then its magic.
The Platypus Directive 