Day 18: Burnt Coconut

It's really interesting to me that memory and smell are connected. My memory is not very good, and neither is my sense of smell. I wonder if there's a connection there. Did you know you can work out your nose to improve your sense of smell? I didn't. Anyway, all that to say, I'm pretty sure I will, however, always associate the smell of tea tree oil with Costa Rica. 

That was more words than necessary to tell you that we're spraying tea tree oil on basically everything. But, it's been a long time since I was concise.

My head is really sunburned, y'all. Did you know tea tree oil can help soothe sunburns? 

Ok, today: Tuesday. Long day at the CDI. We got up early and got over there with our sandwich supplies. The first round of kids showed up and we started doing the stuff. Today, first round, I worked pretty closely con Diego. He's fun, but it is very hard to understand when he speaks, so I do a lot of trying really hard, then just end up smiling or responding to his nonverbal cues. He doesn't seem to mind. It's not my favorite though; I like understanding people. 

We are officially on our new schedule this week. It's very similar to our previous schedule, but just enough different to throw us off *rueful smile*. It's working well though. I led the devotional today; still Jesus' crucifixion. A couple of the kids come on back-to-back days, but not very many, so I think it's worth them getting the repeat for the other kids to get the story. All these kids know a lot of Bible stories. The Catholic Church does a lot to help bless and support the schools here, and as a result, many of the schools have religion classes. So, the kids know the stories, generally. One of my prayers for them is that Jesus would be more than a nice guy in some stories, but take on a realness he hasn't before. I'm not sure how to do that well, though. 

When the time came to walk the kids to school; Lagos, Ana Raquel, Izzy y yo took them. It was a mistake. It had been fairly cloudy all day, but for that walk, the sun came out and cooked the mess out of my head. I could almost hear it sizzling as we walked. One of the kids looked at me with my hand on my head and asked, "el sol te esta quemando el coco?" Which is the cutest possible way I could imagine that being asked. Coco means coconutnut, but colloquially means your noggin. There's a song called, El Coco No, if you want to watch a weird music video. 

"Did you really say noggin?"

Yes, yes I did. Did you know that "noggin" is probably related to the nog in "eggnog?" Noggin originally meant a small cup. I know you really cared about that, so I made sure to tell you.

Ok, second crew of kids came. They were really fun today, and pretty well behaved. It was hard to get Josue to focus on his homework, and he had a lottt of trouble understanding the assignments, but I think it was primarily just because he couldn't really focus on them. But, we got through it! Matthew is still killing it with the English lessons, btw. I really enjoy watching him thrive here. I don't know much about how he operates stateside, to be fair. Izzy has started to really lean into using Spanish and it's amazing how much she's picking up and how quickly.

After the second session, we helped Lagos and Ana Raquel move some stuff around, went to the AM/PM, then headed home. I was so tired by the end, I couldn't tell if my desire to sleep or eat was stronger. I caught a quick nap on the couch, since today was Katie's turn for dinner. 

Despues de cenar, I did some dishes, then our team watched a movie. I took a shower, which felt amazing and tough on my scalp, sprayed some more tea tree oil, and here we are.

I feel really nervous about teaching. Have I told y'all that? At least once. I need to draw out my teaching. Mateo seems pretty chill about doing his, maybe he's as nervous as me, maybe he's just rolling with it. 

Tomorrow, we're doing some team worship and prayer in the morning, so I'll need to get up early to run. I feel less sore than yesterday, but we'll see.

Ok, can I let you in on a secret? I think my girlfriend is really cute. She just sent me her wordle score for tomorrow, since Texas is an hour ahead. The big things about a person obviously matter, but little things can stand out more, you know?

Tomorrow is H@ngout, so it's back to Heredia and the college campus! I may ask Lagos if I can borrow a hat. I meant to bring mine, but then I decided not to.

Prayer? Prayer!
-for us to walk in step with the Spirit
-for us to love the kids at the CDI well
-for Jesus to be real to these kids
-for good team dynamics
-for Mateo's teaching
-for my teaching
-for good connection to the students tomorrow
-for gospel readiness!
-for me to connect well to God and people

Barely touched my phone today, let alone took pictures. Here's a coconut though.

Pregret = when you regret something before you do it