Up next

If I weren’t so far away, we would do this face to face, maybe over dinner or on a long walk. But I’m here, and you’re there, so we’ll just have to do it this way. I am trying to figure out what to do next year. The thing is I am really, really ready to be home. I can hardly wait to see my family and sleep in my huge bed and eat a big, fat cheeseburger. I want to ride my bike and flush my toilet paper and talk to my grandmothers and hold my nephew and niece and catch up with my best friends. But those things should only take a month or so, so what do I do next?

Here are my options.

I could go to graduate school to become a certified ESL teacher in the United States. This would be great for my future. I’d always have a job, and it would be one that doesn’t require plane tickets, visa processing and learning new languages, etc. However, it would be expensive. And boring.

I could return to Costa Rica to teach English another year. I could stay in Potrero Grande another year, but that would mean volunteering again, which, by definition, doesn’t pay much. Or I could find a job teaching in another school, possibly a private school or language institute. However, most teaching jobs for English speakers are in the capital city of San Jose, and I hate San Jose. I’d love to find a job teaching in a school in the southern part of the country where I am now. I know the area and have strong contacts here. Living in Costa Rica another year would also let me learn more Spanish and spend more time at the beach. This is an expensive option but not a boring one.

I could move to a different Spanish-speaking country, maybe Chile or Argentina. But it’s difficult to find teaching jobs in South America without going there to look for them. I’d be able to learn more Spanish, though, and probably a better form of Spanish than the backwoods dialect I am picking up here. Also, I’d get to experience a new culture and know more of the world. Again, expensive but not boring.

I could move to Asia, maybe South Korea or Taiwan or Vietnam. This is where the money is. If I were to get a job in, let’s say, South Korea, my employer would buy my plane ticket, pay my rent, contribute money to a 401(k) equivalent and offer a great salary. But I would be living in Asia and wouldn’t be learning more Spanish. While it wouldn’t be boring, I don’t think it would be especially fun. Still, I could save a lot of cash and return after a year, and if the desire persists, I would have the money to travel to a more enticing place or pay for graduate school.

So you see my dilemma. Really my favorite option is to return to Costa Rica to teach another year. If I were writing the script, I would get a job at the new bilingual private school in Uvita and make enough money to fly home for a visit during the year. Unfortunately I’m not writing this script, so it seems I’ll either be living in Saigon or with my parents. Which is worse, do you think?