Costa Rica...Sunday "What we have been waiting for..."

(I am going back to catch up on the last week in Costa Rica, adding photos...I may be stealing some words from my other friends blogs to help jog my memory...and you may get a photo overload as I journal our amazing week)

Sunday.

Sunday morning we woke early Drew very early as in 4:30 am. He was so excited he couldn't sleep.  This would be the day we would make the 4 hour bus ride over the mountains and to the Caribbean side of Costa Rica. (Which was a longer drive due to bad roads and bathroom stops, Drew was about to go nuts at how often girls have to stop to go to the bathroom) The orphanage is in Limon but due to high crime and generally unsafe environment...don't freak out Mom or Scott, we will be staying an hour a way in Puerto Viejo.

Our team leaving our hotel in San Jose...4 families from Des Moines, our leaders Bre(Nashville) and Amy(Louisiana), Bre's Mom Tammy (MN), Nikki (NE) and a set of Grandparents and their granddaughter from Indiana

We stopped at a fruit stand on the way there...and to have a bathroom break.  (Their bathrooms are NOTHING like ours at home, no toilet paper in the toilet, all goes in the trash...) There was a man in the back chopping coconuts with a machete...he offered us all a coconut to try the water inside, we passed it around, to my surprise even Drew tried it.   The fruit in Costa Rica is beautiful....

                                       

  We got to the orphanage around 1:30 and had about 2 hours to stop at the orphanage and greet the 40 children that live there enroute to our hotel. Wow. Nothing like it. Nothing like watching kids jump off a bus to greet kids they don't know.   Kids have no fear.  In fact the girls on the bus who were here last year on this same trip were squealing with delight the last 10 miles.  Hoping we were almost there. Every single turn they screamed and asked if we were there yet.  

Leading up to our visit, we were told there had been significant trouble at the orphanage with behavior, physical fighting, and kids running away.  

To gain access to the orphanage, we actually had to enter through a guarded gate. Once inside the gate there are several buildings scattered about.   While an improvement over the buildings we visited last year, the conditions aren't good (although I did not get to see the all the buildings today). The kids are broken up by age and gender and placed into different buildings accordingly.

 Drew had thought to buy a soccer ball on one of our 10 stops between San Jose and Limon.  That was a hit. Its unbelievable.  These kids play soccer on a slanted hill that basically gravel and dirt. Much of the time they have no shoes on.  If the ball goes the wrong direction it goes down a HUGE ravine, that is filled with trash and broken glass.  Drew ran down it more times than I could count to get the stray ball.  They were thrilled to have a brand new soccer ball.  The Duricks had purchased more balls but they were packed away in their luggage.  They had one ball there that was old and very worn.  I loved how quickly Drew and Seth got a rousing game of soccer going along with Steve Durick, the sole Dad on our trip.   No one could communicate. We didn't know names. But it didn't matter. I snuck into the baby house and found myself some sweet little ones and some very sad eyed little ones.  I spent much of my time there as that is what I had expected this trip to be for me....rocking babies but God has proven me so wrong. More later on that

We toured the houses as there are 4 that the children live in at this "compound" they call an orphanage. We have a bus driver named Manuel whom is well acquainted with these kids and they greet him like a Grandpa as well as Monica who is with us at all times and knows these children and loves them as well. She's a gift. 

 

Sunday night we had dinner at a local home. Friends of our new friend Susana.  Susana goes along on "visiting  orphan" trips. She is a translator and a BIG supporter of this orphanage.  She's originally from Minnesota too.  She's amazing. The kids at the orphanage adore her.  She lives here in Puerta Viejo. Her friends prepared a Costa Rican meal. Beans and rice. They had quite the life story to share.  Amazing. They live in the humblest of dwellings. I am not kidding. It is basically an open air shack.  They fed us by rigging up 2 light bulbs  outside in a ladder and fed us n picnic tables.  The food was delicious and so kind of them. Rice and beans, with chicken.  

We headed back to the hotel...hot, and exhausted from the day but filled with such excitement for the week.  So excited to see what God had in store....