22 Apr Worldschooling at kindergarten in Playa Chiquita

Time has come for us to start saying goodbye to Puerto Viejo de Talamanca and to Costa Rica for now after an explorative stay of a few months. Today we took Isa for the last time to her kindergarten, called Jardín Infantil Las Semillas, to say goodbye. It is a Waldorf/ Montessori kindergarten in the middle of the jungle, which we found  through our research to the area surrounding Puerto Viejo on the internet and contacted its people before we arrived in january 2019. It is part of our wish to ‘worldschool’ our children. We wrote a blog about that to explain what worldschooling means, and how we have done it as a family.

Over the phone we spoke and Isa was more than welcome to join. It has been a very warm place, kind, caring and observant as to what she needs as a young girl growing up. Isa learns to speak Spanish and makes full sentences, plays with words and jokes around. It is such a delight to see that young children pick up a language so swiftly, while we were ‘afraid‘ that she would not be able to express herself in Spanish or stay behind in Dutch. We could not have been more wrong. We wrote a post about raising bilingual kids, if you are interested to read more on why we chose to teach our kids a language neither parent has as a first language and how we go about that. On our way to Las Semillas to say goodbye, we came across this huge lizard crossing the road! Breathtaking and for us such a treasure to be able to show it to our kids as long these ancient creatures are still here: this is why we are here, Steven said to me. To see it, share it and help protect it.

Saying goodbye always is an important part of our journeys. Twice a year we say goodbye: either to family and friends in Holland or to the places and people we fall in love with while traveling. Saying goodbye makes us feel sad, but also full of love, of intense joy that we are here in this world, in this place, at this time. It  is that intense feeling of gratefulness that we hope to instill in our children, make them aware of it, help them embrace it. At the kindergarten, a special ‘ronda‘ was dedicated to Isa saying goodbye. We were sitting in a circle, and she was asked to choose her favorite song and the children would sing  it to her. She picked one where she could dance and invite children to dance with her. What a beautiful way to say goodbye and to feel the love that Las Semillas has given us and her. To help her say goodbye, I (diana) prepared a small healthy treat for Isa to give to the children in her kindergarten group. This helps Isa understand that time has passed and that we are leaving soon ánd that she is coming back to this place in a few months. It was a lovely morning we enjoyed very much. We hope to be back here in october for another six months of playing, learning and experiencing this magical place. Las Semillas, thank you for now and see you soon!

We are well aware of the fact that we take our children with us to travel the world and that they do not have a choice in this (yet). So when it is time to pack our bags, they come with us of course and we prepare them as best as we can think of. To explain to Isa the notion of time passing, we use a small hand-made calender. Every morning, starting 7 days before we leave on our journey, Isa can cut a day off the calender and make a drawing on it. Saying goodbye to her friends in Kindergarten, also was part of this calender. The last thing on the calendar was going for drinks with mama in the local bar called Koki. The first time I went out with my daughter to drink a cocktail! Bye bye Puerto Viejo, we love you, see you soon!