I thought I knew what stars looked like. It has become muscle memory to me to look up when I go outside at night. Going into Costa Rica, I certainly did not expect the stars to be what stuck with me most from Gandoca. Away from city lights and distractions, the stars in Gandoca were absolutely stunning, meaning there were so many of them, and they were so bright that I could not always make out where one star started and one star ended. That moment, as cliche as it sounds, made me realize how much light pollution clouds not just our view of the sky, but also our view of what matters. I kept thinking: these stars have always been here. I’ve seen the North Star and the Big Dipper countless times before. I have just never seen them like this. It made me wonder what else I have missed — not because it’s not there, but because there’s just too much noise, too much going on. Light pollution, life pollution, whatever you want to call it. It forced me to pay more attention to the smaller things that are all around us.
Before I left, I told myself two things: be present and listen to the local community. Really, truly, listen. Both sound obvious. And both were way harder than I thought they’d be. Being present means slowing down. It means staying engaged in a conversation when the words are being said so fast in a language you don’t understand, you aren’t quite sure what the conversation is about anymore. It means being brave enough to voice questions that you don’t know how to ask in the right language. It means not filling the silence, allowing actions and half-understood sentences to form relationships.
During one of the soccer games, I was playing on the sidelines with one of the local girls I had befriended, named Amanda. She turned to me and asked if I wanted to “go see her grandmother.” I said that I would love to, and she took my hand, leading me down the road to the local village’s cemetery. On the way there, she stopped every couple of yards to pick wildflowers. When we got there, she walked around and placed wildflowers on every single grave in that cemetery. She handed me some, so I could do the same. There was no rush, no real explanation. Just an unspoken understanding that she wanted me to meet the entirety of her family. On the way back to the soccer field, Amanda and her friends stopped once again every couple of yards to pick wildflowers, but this time, they handed them to me and my teammate. I honestly didn’t know what to say, and I certainly didn’t know how to say what I wanted to say in Spanish to this incredibly gentle-spirited girl. It wasn’t a grand gesture — just quiet, thoughtful kindness. There was no required shared language or spoken words to build this friendship. Just the act of showing up and a kind gesture.
The language barrier never fully went away, but over time, I started to care less about the perfect translation and more about simply being there. It turns out, laughing with the kids in the community, attempting to articulate complex ideas with elementary-level Spanish questions, builds relationships faster than expected. The universal language of laughter became the foundation of our relationships. That’s not something I usually feel in my day-to-day life. I’m used to overexplaining, filling silence, and keeping pace. But here, I learned how to just be with people.
I also kept reflecting on how grief looks different in Costa Rica. In the U.S., grief is often something people are expected to “get over” — something personal, private, fast. But in Gandoca, grief felt slower, more open. It was a shared thing. Amanda didn’t seem to think twice about bringing me to the cemetery. There was no hesitation in making space for remembrance — and no rush to move on. It wasn’t dramatic or heavy, just… normal. And I think that might be the biggest thing I want to take with me from this trip: that the way we process things, grief, connection, even joy, doesn’t have to be one size fits all. There’s a different kind of peace in letting things take the time they need.
I don’t want to forget these things. I want to remember what it felt like to walk slowly, to notice things, to not be in a hurry to “get over” hard stuff. I want to be someone who makes someone feel heard. I want to be someone who doesn’t need everything to be familiar to feel connected. With that, I don’t have a neat takeaway. Just a lot of moments that might not feel momentous in the moment, but certainly left a long-lasting impact.