Always unexpected

Hola!

Friday was a pretty normal day: classes and tough/good conversations. On Friday night I asked my family if we had any plans for the weekend, and of course, they said no. So I ended up going to downtown San Jose with 2 of my friends (Rene and Michelle). We went to the art market where artists sell their different types of work. I love going here. You see the cool jewelry, pottery, paintings, purses, scarves, and so much more…but you also see the person who made them. You can talk to the person and tell him or her that you like their work. It’s really a cool experience. After spending a couple hours in the art market, we just walked downtown and browsed in different little shops. It just amazes me that there are so many shops. I honestly have no idea how they are making a living in these shops because the competition is just incredible. In fact, we figured out why it is so easy to get turned around in San Jose: there are always repeated stores. We walked down one street for several blocks, then we turned and walked 1 block over, and the stores were the exact same stores! They were the same names and same products. Talk about confusing for a gringo who is trying to navigate around the city.

My friend Michelle comes from a Reformed background and the church that she attends at school sponsors the same missionaries that my church sponsors (Tom and Sheryl Soerens). We found this commonality several weeks ago when we were walking to class and passed a building that said “Christian Reformed Church.” We decided that it would be interesting to meet with the missionaries and just talk to them about what they are doing here in Costa Rica. Michelle’s mom actually knows the missionaries and skyped with them to figure out a time that would work for us to get together, which ended up being yesterday afternoon. When I met Rene and Michelle in the morning, Michelle told me that today was the time that worked best for them. Good thing I’m getting good at being flexible and never knowing what is coming! So yesterday afternoon, Michelle, Rene, and I met up with Tom and Sheryl in downtown San Jose and had lunch together. After lunch, they drove us to their university where Tom works as the director of online classes. He just showed us around and explained what he does more thoroughly. It was really good to make a connection with them and just get to know them a little bit.

Later in the afternoon, we went back to our homes. Almost immediately after I got home, my family took off to run a few errands. They told me they were leaving, and they all piled in the car to go (my dad, mom, sister, and 2 relatives). Right as they were about to pull out, my sister actually came back inside and asked me if I wanted to go too! Yeah! An invitation! Of course, I went along, thankful for the invitation. It was about 6:00pm when we got back home, and I found out that we were having a party at our house that night. So much for no plans for the weekend!

The party was supposed to start at 7. People did start showing up at 7, but the last people didn’t arrive until 8:30pm (very common in Tico time). This party was to celebrate my grandpa’s recovery from alcoholism. He had been a heavy alcoholic for a long time, but now he has not had a drink in 23 years. They have a party to celebrate every year, and they have a cake with candles and everything. An interesting observation: the party was to celebrate how he hasn’t drunk in so many years, but almost everyone drank alcohol at the party (except the grandpa)! It was just so ironic that they were celebrating being dry while everyone else was drinking. Of course, this party consisted of only family (friends are a rare commodity in Costa Rica). There were 20+ people in our little house, which made it quite the struggle for me to keep up in conversations!

Since there were so many people in the house, a few of the kids decided to go outside in the garage area. This is a cement slab that is enclosed by bars and is exactly the size of a car. The car was parked outside on the street, so the kids were playing in this little area with a soccer ball. As they were playing soccer, one of the kids kicked the ball, and it broke this pipe. It just so happens that this pipe is our water supply for the house. This means that we did not have any water. My dad worked on fixing it forever, and then finally it was working enough so I could go to the bathroom before sleeping. However, I woke up at 2:30, and my dad still had the lights on in the house and had not gone to bed yet. I don’t think he had it fully fixed yet when I had gone to bed.

Needless to say, it was a late night for my dad, and we did not go to church this morning (although I’m pretty sure we were not going to go anyway…but I’ll just say it was because we had a late night last night). Of course, I have no idea what will happen the rest of the day, but I guess I’ll find out!

Interesting side note: you guys had Daylight Savings Time at home last night. Costa Rica is on the same time zone, but they do not observe Daylight Savings Time. This means that now you guys are one hour ahead of me.

A few logistics: this is my last week of formal classes. This means I have a lot of homework, and it is going to be busy. This is also the last week before our internships, and I will be staying with a different family for this internship. Please pray that God allows this week to be a time of good memories with my current family. Please pray that I would be able to connect with them and appreciate them for who they are. I just pray that I end this week on a good note with them. I will be living with this same family again for 5 days at the end of the semester, so it is not completely our last time together. However, this is a significant moment, as the majority of my time living with them is definitely coming to an end. I just pray that I would be able to reflect on the experience without taking things too personally, especially since it has been tough the past couple weeks with this family.