My trip here included 3 flights and a 7 hour lay over in Panama, but even though it was about 29 hours of total travel time, it all went super smooth. It is SO much easier to travel internationally when we’re not in a Covid pandemic 🤣😆! My Copa flight from Denver checked my bag all the way to Montevideo! There were no covid tests, vaccine cards, proof of flights out of the country, visa concerns, and my bag was not lost! Wins all around! Wahoo! 🙏🏽 🎉🎊💃🏻

I am staying with a host family in the Pocitos neighborhood, about a 13 minute walk from the University that I’ll be attending. The lady who is hosting me is a retired professor and has hosted students for what sounds like at least a decade. She is extremely welcoming and friendly and has made me feel comfortable right from the start. She lives on the 7th floor of a building that is 3 blocks from the ocean! I took these pictures on my walk today. 🌊

Currently, her adult daughter and her 1 year old grandson 👶🏻, as well as her adult son, live in the house too. Her daughter is a doctor 👩🏻‍⚕️and her son is a translator (which has been awesome because my Spanish is pretty minimal and his English is amazing–although he got ‘scolded’ with his mom for speaking to me in English since she knows I need to practice my Spanish😂). I have a little room with a desk and a half bathroom in the room, which is great!

Today I ventured out to a mall to get a SIM card and it was in the 50s and beautiful. It’s winter here currently but will start to warm up and will be full summer when I end the program in December. ☀️

My SIM card with 50gb of data was $7.50 for 1 month. Pretty good deal! The surrounding neighborhood has all kinds of coffee shops, gyms and small grocery stores. We start class on Monday and I noticed on the schedule that we have several field trips planned to places in the area, which is super cute! Stay tuned for more updates. 😀