my stomach was not made for this

My stomach was not made for this. This is one of the phrases that I think I’ll always remember about my semester abroad. Actually it’s not what you think; the majority of the food here is amazing, but on the other hand the amount that’s given to you is way too much. Let’s look at some examples:

San Jose family—they’re pretty good about letting my serve myself my own portion sizes, however I always get harassed for not eating enough. It’s a battle to make sure that they understand that you like their food; it’s just that if you eat another bit you just might explode. Then again there’s always the time when my mom just scoops more food onto my plate, as I try to fake a smile.

Nicaragua—Nicaragua was a bit different. In orientation we were warned, ‘you have to eat everything they give you [to avoid a major offence].’ There was no option here. Some families had had LASP students in the past and knew that gringos didn’t eat that much, but not my family. In fact I had the hovering mom who would watch to make sure I ate and liked everything. Here was my secret for surviving: skirts are great for hiding food, especially if they have pockets. I became a pro at hiding tortillas, bananos [this is not a spelling error], and the waxy vegetable in my skirts. Yet there was one thing that you couldn’t get around—the rice jello. Fortunately my family couldn’t afford it, so I only had it once at a neighbor’s house.

Grecia—when I thought they gave us a lot of food in San Jose, I was wrong—it doesn’t even compare to Grecia. Every day we have cafecito around 4, which consist of coffee (I’m all for that), a sandwich, some sort of bread, and sometimes something else. This amount of food during cafecito is what I would eat for a normal meal. But then around 7 we have a full blow dinner too. Fortunately I’ve figured that if I only eat crackers for lunch and only eat a sandwich at cafecito, I can make it through most of my food at dinner.

Spanish class in Grecia—the other two days of the week, when we don’t have work, we have Spanish class. We already arrive with full stomachs after a massive breakfast. Then at 10 we have a snack, which would be the equivalent of my lunch. Still an hour and a half later we have a massive lunch. Don’t forget there’s still cafecito and dinner when you get home too. Allowing our stomachs to survive Spanish class has become a team effort. For the snack time we all try to take something different, so it looks like a bit of everything was eaten. Then at lunch we figure out who likes what, and literally sit there eating off each other’s plates. For example, I’ll eat some of Brady’s salad, Brady will eat some of my potatoes, and Melissa will eat some of my rice. Katie also came up with another brilliant method to make it look like we eat more—cut your food into smaller pieces. Generally it’s a secret for anorexics, but it works well for us too.

If we all come back 20 pounds heavier you will know why—the LASP 20. I think we’re all looking forward to being able to have the choice to not eat. But by we’ve all become expert food smugglers. And who knows, maybe these tips can help you when you’re having to eat way too much food in Latin America.