The flight began it’s approach into San Jose International Airport and my palms began to sweat in anticipation. Instead of seeing the lush vibrant green landscape that I had heard so much about before coming, the sky was dark save the thousand twinkling lights of the city below. I couldn’t wait to be on the ground! I was utterly exhausted from my cold and the pressure of the descent wreaked havoc on my eardrums. But despite it all, I was excited to finally be here in Costa Rica, a place I’ve wanted to visit for a long time.

I gathered my belongings, headed through customs and entered into the Arrivals lounge into a sea of black heads holding hundreds of white signs listing names of the passengers whom they’ve come to greet. I also find the Arrivals area in another country to be quite a stressful, disorderly place. You walk through the glass doors and there you are, voila, surrounded by hundreds of smiling, shouting people waving big white signs in your face. It is overwhelming to say the least. Especially when you are tired or jet-lagged (which I was not given only a two hour time change and a relatively short flight from Minneapolis).

I searched the eager faces, desperately hoping he was there. Then I found him, smiling and holding a sign that said Mrs. Melancon (so formal!) and was relieved that my driver had come. You never know for sure when corresponding and organizing all your travel details via email. Especially when there is a language barrier involved. Yet I was glad he was there to take me to my hotel. The last thing I wanted to do was have to haggle with an unknown driver in a language I wasn’t all that red hot at. Furthermore, it was almost nine o’clock and I was ready to relax.

The driver grabbed my bags, packed them inside the small, old sedan and sped off towards downtown San Jose. It was Saturday night and the city was incredibly alive. People were out, everywhere, walking down the streets, driving in cars, and going out to eat. I could feel the energy pull me in and instantly felt happy. It had been such a long cold winter!

My driver didn’t speak a lick of English yet that didn’t seem to faze him one bit. He talked boisterously and rapidly to me the entire ride, and was delighted by my second grade level Spanish. In fact, he encouraged it which was a relief and helped me let down my guard so I wasn’t so afraid of making my many mistakes. Somehow, like magic we managed to communicate and before I knew it, we were at my hotel, El Presidente, located right on the main drag. Gracias, I said cheerfully, glad that he got me there safe and sound and also put up with my terrible Spanish. I secretly cursed myself for majoring in French! The Ticos, as Costa Rican people are called, seemed extremely cool, gregarious people that I definitely wanted to get to know. It would have helped if I could communicate better in Spanish but I hoped that after a week long immersion, I would somehow become more proficient.

The hotel was large and quite modern. I had no idea at all what to expect so I was quite pleased to be in a clean, comfortable, safe place. The staff was overwhelmingly friendly and welcomed me with smiles. Despite my pounding sinus headache and sore throat, I had to get a drink before bed. I knew there was no way I could sleep so soon after arriving into a new country. Fortunately the hotel has a nice gringo bar that opens up onto the street, which enabled me, a blond American woman traveling solo, to have herself a glass of ice cold Sav Blanc and watch the world go by on a Saturday night. I was amazed by the people out on the streets. I had heard several times that San Jose can be dangerous, especially for foreign women and especially at night. The hotel staff reminded me gently to not leave the hotel at night alone. Period. Of course I didn’t. Thus finding the gringo bar was the perfect opportunity to explore my surroundings all under the comforts and safety of the hotel. Tomorrow I had the entire day to explore the city and I would talk with the front desk about where to go. I couldn’t wait to see for myself what all the fuss and fascination is about with Costa Rica. And, tomorrow was the day!

It was finally nearing the end of Minnesota’s infamous brutally cold, never-ending winters.  Winter has never been my cup of tea.  It is two things:  Too cold and too long.     Sometimes winter can last almost six full months making it hard to believe that anyone would ever choose to live here.  Yet, somehow, like other hearty Midwesterners, I manage to survive.    

Spring does not arrive until late April or early May.  Usually we would get a few teaser days when the temperature is well above average, and everyone is out and about enjoying the weather.  The lakes start to thaw, the birds reappear, and the snow slowly begins to melt making messy, splashy puddles everywhere.  But before you know it, winter magically reappears and people return to their long, lonely hibernation.  The winter-spring dance normally goes on for weeks until the ice on the lakes finally breaks free, the vibrant green buds burst into leaves and people actually come out of their homes.  It feels like some kind of strange, yet predictable rebirth as life once again returns to Minnesota. 

It is usually around this time of year, in mid-to-late March, that every sane Minnesotan is beyond stir crazy and is desperately seeking sun and sand.  Airplanes become packed with pasty, white, hearty Minnesotans heading south.  Schools close.  Homes become empty and there is no one around.  Many prefer to vacation in Florida or some other tropical paradise far away from anything white and cold.  Others prefer heading south of the border to some luxurious or cheap beachfront hotel in Mexico. 

For me, it was something similar yet different as well.  Like many others, I was also headed south, too, where I would happily be wearing my sandals and t-shirts that had been tucked away for months.  I was going to Costa Rica, but not to sit a beautiful beach and drink every worry in my life away.  I was going on a different kind of vacation.  A volunteer vacation. 

Volunteer vacation?  What in the heck is that?  friends asked, wondering how on earth the two words could go hand and hand.  Was it some kind of mid-life crisis?  friends secretly wondered.  Or some kind of “desperate housewife” kind of deal?  Was she going mad?  Although they didn’t exactly ask me these questions, their confused, bewildered faces clearly indicated what they were thinking.  They didn’t understand me.  They didn’t travel.  Well, at least they didn’t travel to the places I wanted to go.  And, that was the problem.   Even my own mother found the idea strange. 

So, why did I decide to leave my husband and two young children behind for a week and volunteer in Costa Rica?  Perhaps it was a little of all the above….mid-life crisis, desperate housewife, mad or so on.  But the real reason behind my decision was simply because I wanted to.   I had always wanted to. 

Ten years ago I saw the article on global volunteering and read it with high hopes that someday I’d be able to do the same.  The stories all sounded amazing:  Working in orphanages in Romania, teaching English in Tanzania, building a school in Peru.  Experiences that would last a lifetime, and would make you feel like you were doing something great in the world, not just earning a meager paycheck or climbing the corporate ladder.  I dreamed of someday volunteering abroad but I knew that it was impossible at that point in my life.  I clipped the article, kept it in my file cabinet, hidden away for years, hoping someday I’d be able to do it.  The path I was following in my life was typical for a young, college-educated American girl:  Work, building a career, marriage, and then finally kids.  I continued to travel internationally throughout the years with my boyfriend, then fiancé, then husband, but due to the pure lack of American vacation,  I never did a volunteer trip (vacation was only two weeks per year given at start of a job and taking more than a week off at once was highly frowned upon—those lucky Europeans!).  It was only when I had my children, they grew a little bit older (well, 3 and 5) and more manageable, that somehow or another I was able to pursue my dream of volunteering abroad.  My husband knew how badly I wanted to do it so he miraculously gave me the green light.  He would take the kids to see his parents in Virginia over spring break allowing me to travel to Costa Rica to volunteer. 

So, after ten long years of hoping and waiting, I finally found myself seated in coach on an American Airlines flight headed off to Costa Rica.  It was the last week of March which was the perfect time to leave.  All my love for Minnesota had dried up long ago and I was looking forward to seeing the color green once again, which had been absent for months.   I had never been past Mexico so Central America would be an entirely new place for me to visit.  I was extremely excited albeit a little nervous as well.  I was traveling alone and would be staying with seven other volunteers (strangers) for the next week, working together.  Who were they?  What would they be like?  What if I hated the experience? Worse yet, what if I never got over my miserable cold and remain sick in bed the whole time?   All these questions racked my brain, making me feel even more anxious than before. 

The one thing I kept reminding myself was the last words I heard before leaving the States:  Go with an Open Mind.  That was the one final piece of advice our program manager from Cross-Cultural Solutions (CCS) said before ending our volunteer conference call.  Those were also the words I kept reminding myself of over and over again when I learned what our volunteer experience would be.  Keep an Open Mind.  There are several volunteer opportunities planned at each site, however, due to the short length of our trip, volunteers going on the one-week “Insight” volunteer program typically do not find out what they are going to be doing until two weeks before departure.  This way CCS can ensure that the project or work can be completed in a week making the experience more worthwhile.  Thus when you sign up for a program with CCS, you are taking a leap of faith not knowing exactly what you will be doing but having an idea that it may involve one of the following opportunities:  Working with kids at an orphanage, teaching English to children or adults, working at a hospital or place for disabled children, or working at a nursing home. 

I was fine with all the potential volunteer opportunities except one:   Working at a nursing home.  I didn’t want to admit it but working at a nursing home seemed like the most depressing experience possible.  In fact, it scared me.  I didn’t like being around elderly people in wheelchairs, watching them wither away and revert to their infancy.  I’m not a religious person either so death scared me.  My only experiences with nursing homes had been negative.  When I was a girl, I was on a dance team who used to perform on Saturdays at the local nursing homes, trying to cheer the white-haired residents up.  It was horrifying.  Then, in my twenties I watched both of my grandparents die in dark, lonely nursing homes.  The experience was always the same.  Depressing.  So I secretly hoped that I would get any other assignment than that. 

Our program manager at CCS must have known that working at the nursing home was probably at the bottom of most volunteers list.  So she spent time setting it all up, emphasizing that before she told us what our volunteer work was going to be, that she wanted us to keep an open mind.  (Third eye, right?).  Those words sent chills through my bones because before she even said it, I knew.  We were getting the nursing home. 

When I told my family and friends that I had received my placement and would be working at a local nursing home for abandoned abuelas and abuelos (Grandmothers and Grandfathers), I tried to sound as upbeat as possible.  It would be great, I said a little too enthusiastically.  But I had my doubts.