What I want to remember to take to Antigua

Nine weeks in Guatemala this summer to study Spanish. These are the things I want to remember to take with me. Some of this is obvious, some not so much. Behind each item is one line about the item and it's relation to the trip. If anyone else thinks of something I should take, feel free to comment.

• My Spanish dictionary, verb book and Words They Don’t Teach You book - is this cheating?

• Casual reading (in English!) - I can’t work on Spanish the entire time

• Shoes

- tennis shoes - for hiking
- leather sandals - going to class and dressing up a bit
- mesh casual shoes - alternative shoes for class
- Tevas - what I wear all summer anyway

• laptop - can’t be off the Internet and away from email for nine weeks

• iPod/iPod speakers - need my tunes, baby

• Palm - keeps track of my life and my passwords

• phone - gotta Phone Home

• digital camera - gotta snap those memories

• chargers and connectors for all above - nothing’s any good for very long without juice
  

• extra power strip - it’s an old house where I’m staying, I’m betting only 1 plug, 2 max

• clips - very handy for all sorts of things

• office type accessories - stapler, tape, pens, pencils, lead, folders - it is school, after all

• water purifier tabs - no can drink the water, hope I don’t get bugged

• Nalgene bottle - need someplace to put the good water

• bottle insulator - staying cool, ya know

• med kit - if I bring it, I won’t need it, if I don’t bring it, I’ll, for sure, need it

• prescription drugs (make sure enough for 9 weeks) - better living through chemistry

• clothes (but not too many) - pack judiciously, just enough, but not too much, plus I think they frown on naked tourists
  

• towel - no good space traveler ever goes anywhere without their towel

• travel pillow - otherwise, my neck will make me want to kill myself to stop the pain

• body maintenance items (clippers, hydrogen proxide, nail file, etc.) - it’s the little things you forget that will drive you crazy

• DEET (ick) - hate the stuff, hate dengue fever worse

• international drivers license - might have need for a scooter or car while I’m there

What's this about Guatemala?

I am a non-traditional student working on her BA in sociology with a minor in American Culture. As part of the University of Kentucky Arts & Sciences degree requirements, I'm required to have four semesters of a foreign language. Since they are willing to count my two years of German taken in high school many, many moons ago, I only need 3 semesters or eleven hours of another language.

Since they are going to make me take a foreign language, I would actually like to know a foreign language when I'm done. At this point, Spanish seems the most accessible and practical for me to learn, but I think the only way this old brain is actually going to absorb it enough to retain it, is if I immerse myself in a country and learn it that way. Our other purpose (my husband and I), in studying Spanish in an immersion environment is to experience living in another country. We are starting to consider our retirement and retiring out of the country is being seriously talked about as a way to afford a comfortable retirement.

Antigua, Guatemala was not my first choice. Initially, I thought I might want to go to Quito as Ecuador is of some interest to me, but in tracking the temps in Quito last summer, it quickly became apparent that it is waaay too chilly in Quito for this little grey duck to be comfortable. I then looked at some coastal spots in different countries. I found a program online that said they had classes in both Manta, Ecuador and Granada, Nicaragua, which were both of interest to me. But after three or four attempts to contact them about their programs and getting no answer, I was forced to look elsewhere. Someone suggested maybe I got no answer because they weren't actually a Spanish language school, but a front for the CIA. Could be, wouldn't surprise me.

Time to look elsewhere. Despite working with a very nice young woman in the study abroad office at UK, also named Melinda, I wasn't really getting much help from them in finding a program. All the programs they worked with were not places I wanted to go and of their recommended ones I did look at they were all very expensive. Not practical nor affordable.

I finally settled on two and wrote off to them to get a copy of the course work. Because I'm going with a program UK doesn't have any experience with, I needed to get prior approval from someone in the Spanish dept. about the course outline. I will also need to bring everything back with me and hand it in, in order to get the proper credit when I'm finished. The choice of StudyAbroad, http://www.studyabroad.com/, over BridgeAbroad, http://www.bridgeabroad.com/, basically came down to the one that was most responsive to my request for a course outline and answers to my questions.

Now the course of study has been approved and I'm looking around at places to stay in Antigua. I am going to stay for nine weeks in order to get enough classroom time to fulfill the credit hours I need. My husband, E, will be joining me for four of my nine weeks there. I'm alternately tremendously excited and tremendously terrified.

In future posts I will be listing all that needs to be done, considered, taken with and handled before I leave and while I'm there. More to come.