Jack: Before the Trip

It is always fascinating to dream about the trip to Costa Rica in a few days, during which I can finally have a glance at the tropical forest and what the agricultural economy looks like.

Being abroad is no longer a new experience for me.  Before becoming an international student studying in the United States, I had already been to several countries outside of China.  Most of them, such as Japan, Australia, the United Kingdom and Singapore, are highly developed countries like the United States, in which I gained a general sense of what a developed country looks like and what trends a developing country are undergoing.  Besides China, which is the country where I was born and raised, I don’t have any cognition of how a developing country may look like and what development means to developing countries with different developmental levels.  In order to generate such a basic sense of development for countries, not only do I need a clue of what development looks like, but also I need some views of the general trends for development.  In order to do so, more references from developing countries are indeed needed, and thus this trip researching the local rural development in Costa Rica comes right on time.

I am majoring in applied mathematics and electrical engineering, and most likely, I will devote my career to industrial and technological development.  In my opinion, technology development is one of the most important factors that determine the level and the rate of development in a country.  As a developing country, Costa Rica has a lot of potential in further improving its technological development to accelerate its overall development.  In this trip, I am looking forward to find out the current situation of technology in Costa Rica and extrapolate its development trends, and hopefully, some chances can be spotted for me to make contributions. 

So far, as we learn about Costa Rica development, even though Costa Ricans have a sophisticated techniques in agriculture, the country may be able to improve its infrastructure.  Studying the development in Costa Rica, we learnt that mud roads are still covering some of the country, especially in rural areas.  Roads, the symbol of transportation, can be related to the development of a region.  I think  that civil engineering can be improved in Costa Rica, and also the technology level in average citizens’ life can be improved, because transportation infrastructure can be linked to automobile usage.  In this way, I think that technological and engineering development can be brought to Costa Rica by improving civil engineering.  Also, since Costa Rica is a country with an agricultural economy, technology of improving agricultural development, such as increasing production rate and reducing labor force, can also be brought either into or from Costa Rica depending on its level of development in agriculture.  The visits of the production factory and farm in Costa Rica are the most fascinating part of the trip for me to gain some inspiration of technological development in Costa Rica.

In a few words, in addition to experience the tropical climate, rainforest and the rural life in Costa Rica, I am really looking forward to some inspiration on technological and engineering development in developing countries.