Costa Rica STT

Today went by super fast, even though it was very long.  I'm writing from the comfort of our Airbnb couch, so we got home from our trip safely (I use "home" in the Heredia  sense of the word. My home is currently in College Station. And my Home is in heaven (home is a funny-sounding word)). I got up early today (6:57) so I could be sure to pack and get breakfast before our 7:40 pickup. Our zip-lining adventure got rained out yesterday, but we got a re-do this morning. I'm really glad we did.  Have you ever heard of a pajaro campana ? Or, maybe procnias tricarunculatus? Three-wattled bellbird is the Englishest name. It's a goofy-looking mustachioed kinda birb.  Like, he looks like he wants those darn kids off his lawn. He sounds like a fire alarm.  Anyway, Matthew really wanted to see one, but we kept only hearing them, because they're so loud. But, we got to see one whilst ziplining and I think there's even a picture on Matthew's phone. Apart from t...

You know the feeling when something is absolutely perfect, but one tiny imperfection seems to ruin it? It’s almost like, if the thing was less perfect, the small foible would matter less, because more things would be wrong, so you wouldn’t notice as much? That’s how I feel about our hotel and the wi-fi. I cannot tell you how amazing this hotel is. The proprietor, the dueño , is (I say this with 0 exaggeration) the best host I’ve ever encountered of any hotel, real or fictional. I wish I could remember his name. Many times in my story of today, he will be a hero. And yesterday, this was no different. This guy has a ready and genuine smile and a very kind manner. Also, this hotel, Alisson Hotel y Restaurante , was super affordable. It’s in a great location that has let us walk most places we need to go (which is handy since there’s effectively no Uber here). The rooms are exactly what we needed them to be (nothing fancy, but everything we need) ….but, as I’m writing this, I’m writing on...

So, yesterday was a lot and today was a lot and I probably won't say all that much about either.  We got up super early today (we stayed at Esther 's house) and took a bus to Monteverde , which is like a very green, very foresty mountain kinda place.  We ate some good food and we got to go on a guided night hike. There were a lot of bugs that Matthew and Sheryl really liked. This is the source of the title of this blog. It's probably the most creative part of it, I'm way too tired to be funny. We also saw part of a sleeping sloth (he was a fuzzy bump in a tree) and we saw a toucan butt and some snakes! I mostly just enjoyed that we were walking around in nature at night. I'm not very emotionally invested in nature. I did Colorado LT and was like, "meh, they're cool looking mountains, i guess." I wish it affected me more.  The food here is tourism-expensive, but also really tasty. I'm excited for our hotel breakfast tomorrow. We had some cheesecake ...

I'm in danger of getting my days upside down. I was so tired today, but now I'm pretty energized. And Friday we're gonna get up crazy early and stay up late, but with a nap in the middle, so....I may end up re-nocturnalized (Hi Travis! If you're reading this after 3 AM, go to sleep). Anyway, today was good. I woke up at 8:55, since Lagos & Co were planning to arrive at 9. We made a BONCH of empanadas , but they were empanadas hondureñas , so...really good. I am not very good at making masa  balls (which then get squished in a squisher (also called a "tortilla press" apparently) to make the pan  part of the empanada ). All of the balls I made were different sizes and generally a little too big, but it was a ton of fun putting them in the squisher. We went to campus and ate and talked and talked and played with the students. I...napped in the grass while they played Organ Attack (which my sister gifted my parents a while back, really fun game). Once it start...

Well, I think today marks the halfway point of my time in Costa Rica this year.  I'm very tired. It's 3 AM here (Matchbox 20 would be lonely). I can't decide if today warrants a long post or if it's smarter to make a short post and just go to bed. I guess you already know where I landed, though I don't yet. Tuesday means CDI and Bible Study. We left the house when I wanted to today, but we still didn't beat Diego to the CDI. We got there and got set up and then, you know, did CDI things. Everyone on our team did a great job today. Sheryl led the Devotional and really engaged well with both sessions of kids. I think they're starting to absorb some of the stuff we're throwing down with Respect. Izzy did great leading the English Lesson with me and she feels ready to start doing them on her own (which is exciting because English-in-Spanish is so confusing to me). Matthew engaged well with the kids in active ways that I'd much rather not; walking them t...

It's Monday! Well, it was. Now it's Tuesday (sort of). Again, days don't count until you go to sleep, imo.  Today we got up early to go to Wong's Chinese Restaurant to see if Matthew's water bottle was there. It wasn't, but we got breakfast there. This was revolutionary for me, because I have never thought about it before. People everywhere eat breakfast, but, apart from Mexican food ( chilaquiles, pan dulce, tacos mañanitas, etc), I don't really have a frame of reference for breakfast foods. We went to the CDI and had a meeting to cast vision for the way we're doing English lessons, so that they can keep going when we leave. It went well, and I think that Georgen y Doña Maria  will do a great job once we're gone.  We had a CDI session. It went pretty well. It felt like our team was in a zone, getting stuff done and interacting well with the kids. We added movements to the verse they're memorizing, and they seemed to mosty like it. We taught some...

Sunday, June 4th happened today. Now, maybe that specific day falling on that specific date (which only happens 3 times every 28 years) has no special significance to most of you, but for me , and for billions of people around the world, Sunday, June 4th also has no special significance. Not that it was a bad day, mind you. I quite liked it. Maybe in 2034 when it happens again, it'll have more significance now. Probably not.  We got up this morning to go help Alejandro  Lagos y su esposa, Melany , move. That's our Lagos 's brother. He's awesome, too. We showed up at their house around 9 and started helping out. Eventually, a flatbed moving truck came and got all the big stuff, but initially, we helped organize and pack the few things they hadn't already packed up. Their apartment was a really cool shapeñ it had rounded walls and unique angles. I liked it a lot, though if I was trying to feng shui a house, it'd be a challenge. I want to tell you the story of...

(o "sabados de español")  No voy a italizar mis palabras esta vez, porque todos seran en español. Lo siento si mis palabras no son totalmente correcto tambien. Cuando he terminado, voy a poner todo este en Google Translate y vamos a ver como suena.  Decidimos como equipo que los sabados, no vamos a hablar en ingles en nuestra casita. Imagino que este va a ayudarnos mucho en practicar nuestro español. Hoy, nos levantamos y Matthew, Sheryl, y yo fuimos al campus. Tomamos el bus desde el campus hasta el campo. Fuimos a "Monte de la Cruz" para hacer una caminata con los universitarios (los mismos que vieron el partido de fútbol con nosotros).  Vimos muchos insectos raros y la naturaleza alla era hermosa. Lagos trajo cafe y Josue trajo Pepsi y todos eran muy felices. Por la mayoria del tiempo, sentabamos y hablabamos. Era perfecto.  Despues, regresamos a Heredia por el bus, y compramos pizza. Pero el wifi del PizzaHut no funciono, asi que andabamos hasta nuestra casa....

Nothing crazy today. Oh! I remembered a funny story from earlier. The other day at the CDI, when my brain was Spanish mush, I was playing go fish with Andres  and Axel . Go fish in Spanish is vete a pescar , obviously. So, we try to encourage the kids to play in English some to get some practice in. Initially I'd say everything in Spanish except the numbers, but now they're pretty comfortable with those, so I switched and was saying things like, "do you have any diez ?" to get them used to the English "do you have." Double verbs or verb phrases or whatever are tricky, especially when it's split like a question. "Have" makes sense, but people don't usually say, "Have you any ____?" So, things like "can you do ___" or "do you have____" or "will you go ____" are really weird.  Anyway, one of the kids asked me for a card and I said, " vete a pecar " instead of " vete a pescar, " so tha...

I woke up in the morning, not feeling anything remotely like P. Diddy. Today we had out split team, so Sheryl and Matthew did campus while Izzy and I (and Doña Maria and Georgen  and Esther ) did the CDI. We left for the CDI around 7:30 and got there about 20 minutes before the kids were set to arrive.  We have one young man, Diego , who is actually like 26 physically, but has some developmental disorders, so he's mentally right around the same level as the younger kids. Diego  doesn't exactly have much understanding of time, so he was already at the CDI, waiting for us. We got everything opened up and set up, then I sat and talked with Diego  for a while about how big the buses were until the other kids arrived.  First session was small, praise the Lord. The kids we had sat very attentively for the devotional and Doña Maria  shared some great additional thoughts. They love working on the memory verses, which is surprising, but good.  We didn't do the ...

Today was a pretty good day :)  "Wait, what about the title?" I mean, yea, that happened. We'll get there. Ok, Wednesday, here we go: Woke up mildly early, went to Walmart to meet up with Lagos and Ana Raquel.  Walked back from Walmart with some bags of H@ngout stuff while Lagos, Ana Raquel, and Izzy did the shoppings for the foods. Got back to the Airbnb and we combined all the food into tastier food (s y n e r g y).  It's more accurate to say Ana Raquel, Sheryl, and Lagos did that. I did make tea, though. Powder + Water + Kinetic Energy + Sketchy Guestimation = Tasty Tea (s y n e r g y) Also, I poisoned Matthew today. I gave him a piece of mango I was eating and it made his lips angry. He's ok now though. Half of us got into an Uber to head to campus while the other half finished up, so that we would be there when people started arriving. Our Uber driver was chill, we talked about Lawyery stuff (with our driver) and then talked about ministry models (not with ou...

Today was all really good. I'm tired though, and stressed, so I feel less hype about it than maybe matches. We woke up early, made lunch, and went to the CDI. We set it up and the kids came and we did...CDI stuff. Today I bonded a lot with one of the kids, Mateo . But that was the second session, i guess. The first session went really well. Our devotional and English lessons really landed and it seemed like the kids were paying good attention. We walked them to school and it was good. My Spanish brain was very tired today, I had trouble with simple phrases and comprehension. Second session arrived with a lot of kids and a lot of energy. Matthew and I (during the play time) spent a lot of time wrestling with kids. We were obviously gentle though. Mateo  (kid) saw this and when some of the littlest girls attacked him, he also wrestled them very gently. It was cool seeing him imitate restraint almost immediately.  We did our activity for the devotional: draw a picture of yourself...

Today was sorta kinda mostly one of those days... except for the things that went wrong, i guess. Monday means CDI!  We got to the CDI, we set up the tables, we cleaned, we organized. Kids came!  Our planning sesh yesterday definitely paid off. We maybe didn't do everything exactly how we originally planned it, but I think all the things we did came out just right. Our devotional was great. The kids were a little rowdy and distracted, but they seemed to absorb the main point. Matthew did a great job of being fun, but serious. We're talking about Respect for basically the whole time we are here, and we've... well, wait a second. Can you come up with a one-sentence definition of respect? I think you should pause and try to define respect in our own way before you keep reading.  I know you didn't do it and you're still reading, it's ok, I still respect you.  We talked through it for a while as a team and landed on three different...types or levels or aspects of res...