el dia primero de las clases

Our homemade breakfast this morning consisted of pineapple, banana, and french toast. Seeing that those around me had syrup on their french toast, I grabbed a nearby container and poured some of its contents onto my plate. Being soon puzzled by a truly awful taste, I suddenly realized that I had, in fact, poured some coffee onto my french toast in lieu of syrup. Oops! Although I attempted to compensate for the error with the other container's actual maple syrup (which, in my defense, had the same color and consistency as the coffee), the unpleasant flavor remained.

For transportation to classes each morning, we take the municipal bus. Despite their unquestioned dominance, the busses maneuver aggressively within the mosaic of generally unregulated pedestrians, motorcycles, and cars. That’s how I roll-- except when I’m walking to and from the bus stop. Since walking is at the bottom of the transportation totem pole, vigilance is mandatory.

Today’s classes were primarily an orientation to Engineering World Health, San Jose, and Costa Rica. We were reminded that extensive planning and organizational work has been put into the program on the administrative end to try to ensure our safety, mental health, and effectiveness in Nicaragua and Honduras. Additionally, the importance of working our hardest during the month of training was emphasized. “If you work on a defibrillator and return it into service in the hospital without testing it properly and then, because of that, someone dies, it’s just a really bad situation for everyone. This is serious stuff, so you need to get as much as you can from your classes. If someone is slacking off or not doing their best, we’ll have to send you home,” said J.J. Lipor, our current on-the-ground coordinator. “Your success also depends on your ability to learn the language. If you’re able to able to partially restore a device, you also MUST be able to explain which parts do or don’t work. Some people are naturally better at languages than others, but I expect each one of you to always do your very best,” added Gladys Portela, our Spanish instructor and host-family coordinator.

Gladys also gave us some safety instructions for San Jose. Crime, usually motivated by drug addiction, is common. Despite her vigilance, Gladys’s own credit card was stolen yesterday at the airport. Around 500 colones ($1) is enough to buy one dose of crack cocaine, so addicts are interested in stealing even small items like necklaces and earrings, which can then be sold for crack. Since tourism is Costa Rica’s number one industry and tourists tend to carry cash and valuables, they are specifically targeted by thieves. Over the course of our stay, we were told, the probability of some program participants experiencing a robbery is very high (last year, three laptops were taken at gunpoint from program participants, among other incidences). However, the probability of being harmed because of a robbery is very low, and is especially unlikely if the robber is not met with resistance. In fact, if a robber takes a backpack or purse, Gladys suggested asking the robber to return our keys or other needed items! Precautions against robbery include traveling in groups, keeping bags in front, taking taxis instead of the bus after dark, and carrying only small amounts of cash, among many other guidelines.

After the morning session, about half of the program participants and I went to lunch at a nearby restaurant, but the food took much longer than expected to arrive (about 40 minutes). As a result, we were about two minutes late in returning to class, but were then sternly warned that this was unacceptable and cannot happen again unless we want to get kicked out of the program. Message received. Unfortunately, the same policy applies to the 8:15AM session!

Our task during the introductory lab after lunch today was to take inventory of our tools and supplies and to label them in Spanish. In our host hospitals, we’ll frequently be needing to communicate technical details in Spanish to staff, nurses, and physicians.

After classes, I spent some time with the host family, and the children came to talk to me as I worked on my computer. At ages 4 and 6, they assaulted me with questions and confirmed that I needed lots of Spanish practice (that is, verbally told me that I needed lots of practice). I diverted the conversation by quizzing them back in Spanish about how to say various things in English (they have been learning English in school). After correctly identifying several objects and colors and learning some new English words, though, the boys responded by creating non-sensical words and presenting them to us to pronounce and interpret, such as “eknakabaoi" and "bnufsica". I think they won the language game.