Los Guido

Los Guido

This morning we went to visit Los Guido.  This is a community that Clint and Renee have worked in several times before.  Last year, the graduating class at Dayspring Christian School in Greeley went on a senior class mission trip to work in the same area.  Jerry had helped with that team and spoke highly of the work they did there.  Today I was extremely impressed with what they had accomplished when I saw the obstacles they faced.

We found our way into the area although it was difficult as many of the roads in were blocked because of on-going road repair.  The houses we went by were increasingly humble the farther in we got.  They also were clinging to the hillsides.  Down at the bottom of the gully ran a river.  All of the pipes running directly out of the backs of the houses ran with liquid falling into that river.  The electric lines ran helter skelter from house to house at times.  We parked on a steep narrow road, and found a narrow path running up the hill between houses.  The path ran by houses of people Clint greeted at times.  At one point the path had all but dropped into the gully with only a small part still passable. When we got to the church, there was a concrete walkway.  We met the pastor who showed us the church and the construction project that the school had helped with.

These "kids" had hauled many many loads of gravel and sand up the hill on their backs as well as sacks of concrete and re-bar.  They also carried a cement mixer up, a septic tank, and a water tank.  It seems almost impossible when you see the steep, long, narrow path.  They said the septic tank barely fit through in places.

After they hauled all of the supplies, they dug out a long dirt bank and poured a footing for a new church wall.  They also dug the septic tank hole and drain field.  They also put the water tank way up on the hill above the church.  The wall has been mostly been built upon the foundation they poured.  The church is hoping to get further this year.

The church they now meet in is pretty humble, but they have done a lot with scrap materials.  They have a few electric lights and can run a simple sound system.  Right outside the church, the hill falls away to the gully.  The church is at the end of the path, so the pastor says they are usually not bothered by anyone there.

This is the mission field, the houses of Los Guido.

The church from the front.  It apparently is not really sound and will come down when the new church arises.



This cement mixer was carried up the hill by the Dayspring Team




Jerry pointing to the new wall that was erected behind the church on the Dayspring foundation.  This was will be part of the new church.




Here is the wall




Inside the present church.  They just had a women's crusade for the local women.  That's what the balloons are for.




Jerry and Pastor Rocha (sp?)



The pastor's "study" was just a table by one of the windows.



The bathrooms at the church.  Note the sink.  Pretty nice.




Sometimes it is hard to see where one house starts and the other stops.



The water tank way up the hill.  That was a very steep hill too.

The disappearing path would be a challenge with a cement mixer. That is quite a drop.

We spent some time praying with the pastor and encouraging him. What a passionate heart he has.

We plan on going back to Llano Verde next weekend to hold a church service,  and then to Nicaragua for the next week.  We may visit the Mosquito Indians and see what ministry opportunities are there with them. It is a recon trip mostly.
 We also are interested in seeing more of Nicaragua.  It seems like things politically are heating up there, and this will be a good time to go before it gets too unstable. 

Quinta Esencia and Guanacaste

It is inevitable for those who aspire to do mission work in Costa Rica or Hawaii or some incredibly beautiful place that they are “forced” to have a beach encounter.  It has been our lot these last few days to be at the beach.

 All of the Wisdoms were able to go as well as us 5 making 15 in the van.  It truly is a 15 passenger van. Even with 3 kid's car seats we fit fine.   We pulled the smaller trailer for our stuff, the beach gear and ice chests with food in.

On Tuesday we headed off for a 6 hour drive to Guanacaste.  This is in the northwest, on the Pacific coast.  It is the off season for tourists.  For those of us from Washington and Colorado, it is great.  There are partially cloud-covered days. Maybe a few hour-long rain storms but otherwise it is very warm and comfortable.

The beaches were empty, the stores and restaurants were empty and people were just hanging around hoping we would give them business.

The first night we drove right to a restaurant that had plastic tables and chairs, covered with colorful table and chair cloths, under an awning right on the beach.  While our food cooked we kicked off our shoes and waded into the surf.  With sandy toes, we ate fresh seafood and listened to four guys who came up and played music for us.  A mariachi (sp?) band.  The one guy had a guitaron which is a huge bass guitar.  The strings look more than an 1/8 inch thick and are plucked. 

The next 3 days all that we did was to be in the water as much as possible.  Despite the fact that Dale and Shari, and Jerry and I, Carol got out every hour or so to slather ourselves with SPF 50, we still got well burned.  We just stayed in the bath-warm green water and bobbed and soaked in the beauty of the ocean beaches.  We found a particular beach that was made of broken shells, and was white that was our favorite.

There were strong enough surf waves for the littlest kids to play in and have fun.  I actually enjoyed that quite a bit, being tossed around and pulled in and out like a piece of driftwood.

There also was one end of the beach with rocks that we were able to snorkel around and see some great fish.  Puffer fish were the most exotic.

The second day we all were crispy and had a number of sand flea bites, but were content inside.  The ocean stays in your brain for quite a while.  I still feel the bobbing after 2 days.  I hope it never goes away.  That night we sang Clint a group “Happy Birthday” song.  He and Renee went out for dinner together. They found a private romantic spot that they raved about.   After that we had cake and ice cream. Clint said that he liked his birthday, at the beach, with family.  I can say that that would be my first choice too for a birthday.



The owner of our hotel and his dog going to town.  I believe that he is Italian.  He keeps a nice and clean hotel with off season rooms for $35 a night. We ate lots of cereal and sandwiches with an occasional meal out which made this a cheap vacation.




This was our end of beach day reward, pretty spectacular!!



Russell hated every minute of this.



If you bury the children, you know right where to find them later.




our veranda




 which was also our living room, note coffee maker there




The only thing that makes you tired of bobbing at a tropical beach is getting chilled or shriveled, but it takes hours.



We stayed at an excellent place called Quinta Esencia.  Clint and Renee, the Weides and us Chilcotes each had a room in a 4-room hotel.  Right across the driveway was another hotel with large apartments. All the girls minus Chloe stayed in there in one room.  They had a swimming pool, a kitchen, several bedrooms, as best of all TV!!!  They enjoyed watching movies at night.

We had a 2-block length walk to the beach from the hotels. The area really had no big hotels or buildings.  Everything there, just about, was open to the air.

Our hotel was very charming.  All wood, with a full length porch that we really lived on, looking out at huge tropical plants.  The weather was warm and muggy.  We never needed more than shorts and t-shirts outside.  There was a Jacuzzi.  It was unheated and when we first got there we were not sure it would be used.  It actually was a favorite later with those who wanted to cool off and soak their sunburns in cooler water.

We left yesterday after struggling to get ourselves stuffed back into the van.  Our hearts just wouldn’t stay in there.  We had a remarkably quiet trip home.

As we exited, however, there was a sudden rain storm which made loading gear damp. Also Jerry's flip flops didn't do well on our steep stairs, despite trying to be careful while carrying a load he fell head long without serious injury.  At the same time Dale put his hand on the deck upright and felt a strong sting. He shook something off his hand, and it was a scorpion.  He felt afterwards like it was equivalent to a hornet sting, but hurt more going in.  I guess it was time to go.

Other than the trip to the beach,  we have continued in our spanish lessons daily, and had weekend adventures locally.  Jerry and I took Shari and Katie to the mall. We didn't need anything particularily.  We wanted to test our navigation skills again. 

We did do better the second time without the extra 2-hour trip riding the bus.  We had no problems getting through all the bus changes.  We did get off a little early in one town, but asked for directions and found our stop.  It made a huge difference that we were traveling in daylight.  It boosted our confidence a lot.  If you ask for the town square by the huge Catholic church, you may find one of several. (note to self). 

Each weekend day we can, we go to the local market.  We are less shy about asking questions and have brought back all the fruits and veggis for the house.  It is fun to see, the market people are friendly and honest, and the food is great. Some of them know us now.  We are extremely easy to spot however.

We like to eat the local food from stands when we can. It is usually some variation of a soft taco with a hand-made tortilla.  You can get fresh squeezed juices too.

This band followed us around willing to sing us a tune anytime for a few bucks.  There were few other tourists to help support them.  I thought that some of the businesses must suffer this time of year.

Some of us are going to the church in Llano Verde today.  The rest will stay here and do homework.  Which we did not do over the days at the beach.  No surprise.

The Green Plain

This weekend as a team, we went to the far north to Llano Verde which means green plain.  This is a small town which is not really a plain, but rolling hills.  They are green, however, vivid, spring green.  It's greenness is all the more visible because the dirt is a dark red.  The church there is pastored by Clint Wisdom.  He went there last weekend, and in fact most weekends.  It is about a 6-hour drive from San Jose.
None of the driving is freeway driving.  On the way there, we went along a very steep, windy road that is on very unstable ground.  The views were pretty, and would have been breath-taking had not the clouds been hovering about us.  After we got to the top of the switchbacks, we entered an area where the road winds in and out through steep hills. I don't remember exactly how long ago, but within the last 2 years, there was a devastating earthquake here. The Wisdoms were among those who helped in the disaster relief.  Several hundred killed, and many lost houses, and businesses.  Also the few undamaged tourist places, including the waterfall garden/butterfly pavillion are struggling as people are afraid to come up there.  There is an area where houses were erected for the displaced to live down at the bottom of the mountains. There were places where the road got down to one lane, where temporary bridges were in place, and where the road was flaking off into the deep gorges below.  The government as of yet has not decided to put millions of dollars into fixing this unstable area.
After a pleasant 5 hours of driving, we hit the end of the paved road,  from then on it is car rattling dirt.  You can't build up too much speed as it is easy to bottom out.  This area is all beautiful farms and planted forrests.  Lots of the peaceful looking cows, teak trees, other commercially planted trees, and small farm houses.  Many of the fences have living fence posts.  There is a kind of small tree that you can cut off a branch and stick it in the ground, and it will grow.  The farmers have place these in close-together rows and strung barbed wire on them.  In my opinion it is much nicer to look at than the usual barbed-wire fence.
It was about an hour on the dirt road to Llano Verde itself.  All of us had been there before.  There is one improvement since I last was there.  They have electricity now.  No more going to bed with the sunset and getting up at dawn.  Now they go to bed whenever, and still get up at dawn.  The first evidence I had of the change was TV antennas on the small wooden homes.
Renee, Katie and I attended and shared at the Saturday ladies meeting at the church.  The women are very shy with strangers and didn't speak very much.  I asked also if I could read some Spanish from the Bible as I needed the practice.  They applauded when I finished, but not because I was that good, but because they are that kind.  That night we had a service and a movie night.  Many of the people walk several hours to church, and stay the night with someone, so a Saturday night movie gives them something to do.  We ran a cord over from Victor and Aurora's house two houses down for our electricity.  The film was shown on a white sheet.  The church is open on two sides which makes it possible to get breezes in.  It also lets the bugs in.  At night when they are the thickest, they didn't bother us much, but flocked to the white, lit-up sheet.  It was a little comical to see the heroes faces covered with insects.  Better them than us, I say.
After church, we went back to our host's house to eat, beans and rice with spaghetti noodles also in it.  Not bad.  We also had amazing local pineapple.  Like candy.
The women put up a tent in the house and slept on their living room floor. This kept any mosquitos at bay.  The men had a tent on the wood floor of the church.
Sunday morning, we all got up and showered.  Victor and Aurora have gotten indoor plumbing since last we visited.  It beats a trip to the outhouse in the middle of the night, or a "shower" out of a tub in the yard.  No hot water, of course, but still great.  Their house is very basic, but has everything needed for a good living, and some for beauty.  They still only have 3 pictures of themselves from long ago hanging on a wall. 
The church service was great.  They have a very lively and Spirit-filled worship team.  They give their all to the Lord and it was great fun.  The sermon, in Spanish passed some of us by, but their were lots of "amens" so I think it was well received.
Two babies and a family were dedicated to the Lord in the services.  After prayer, we all went and changed clothes and went to the river.  There are many flowing in the area.  It obviously rains there a lot.  As it was very hot it was great timing for the baptism which occurred.  5 people were baptized, after which everyone jumped into the river pond and played or waded in the water to cool off.
We went back to Victor and Aurora's and ate lunch.  After a leisurly afternoon and showers, we returned home. 
The roads in Costa Rica can be tricky at night.  There are many winding roads filled with slow-moving trucks.  Often people pull out in front of you without warning, and bicycles abound, without lights.
We made it back by 9 PM and ate pizza and went off to bed and emails, etc.
We found it a good challange to try to use our Spanish.  It is a lot harder to understand and speak at the speed people normally do. 
We are going up again next weekend, I think, so will get more opportunity then.


A few of Victor's cows. He makes and sells great fresh cheese.  He gets up at dawn and milks his cows.




Family dedication in church.  We can look right out at the fields and palm trees beyond.



One of the baptisms in the river by Jerry and Clint



New Amigas




Victor and Aurora with their sons and Jerry and Carol



Gorgeous water fall on the way to Llano Verde. You can see how rugged the terrain is. There is a temporary bridge next to the car.

                                

The walk to the river

                                                               Fun is the same anywhere!!

Jerry and Carol's Excellent Adventure

We have been continuing our spanish studies and they are good but can be frustrating at times.  We would like to move faster, but cannot absorb it faster. 
Jerry and I decided to try a little venture to the local Paseo de las Flores Mall.  We had been there on previous trips and wanted to look at the spanish books in the bookstore.  We also were looking for something for our kitchen.
Nick Wisdom offered to help us get there as he would be glad to meet friends and hang out for a while.
Renee gave us a ride to San Isidro a little town 2 miles or so from their house.  The same town we had gone to the market to buy food at that morning.  Us three got on a bus from San Isidro to Herredia about 3pm.  In Herredia we walked about 5 blocks from the Pizza Hut by the town square with the church.  We boarded another bus for the mall. It was a red and yellow bus.  Nick told us that we could catch the bus back to Herredia accross from the mall.  He said a red and yellow bus would get us to the same bus stop but any bus marked Herredia would get us there, and it was so small it would be easy to find Pizza Hut on the square.
The mall was a success.  We got a couple of spanish-english dictionaries and the small stuff from the store.  We sat and ate a really delicious ice cream cone.  Mine was coconut with actual coconut pieces in it.
By the time we were done it was dark and we felt time to leave. We went accross to the bus stop on a busy street, and a bus to Herredia was there.  It was not the red and yellow one, but I thought Nick was right that we should be able to find the Pizza Hut from another bus stop.  Jerry was not so sure, but he agreed.
When we got to Herredia, it didn't look so small.  We did not pass by any business or lit up areas that looked like a square.  It looked just like all dark streets, especially with the dark and rain.  There was no place that we wanted to get off.  By that time, we were through Herredia going to who knows where.
I kind of thought it would be a bus like the town I grew up in that has a small route it travels once an hour.  It seemed likely that we would retourn to Herredia shortly.  After 30 minutes and several small towns it became apparent that we were not returning.  Then we saw the airport.  We were now looping through the San Jose Airport.  Hmmm that was not planned.  I asked the bus driver how to get to Herredia, but didn't understand the answer, or he didn't understand me.  A nice man who heard the conversation came up and told us that it would take an hour to get to Herredia.  We went to downtown San Jose to a central terminal.  It was not a place that I would like to explore from.  It looked very downtrodden.  The man showed us a bus that was going to Herredia.  We got on it and it left shortly.  But wait, here we go again to the airport.
We looped through the airport for the second time that night.  Thankfully the bus headed back the way we had come.  We started naming off familiar buildings that we remembered. "Oh I remember that Shell station."
When we got near to Herredia, I asked a lady in front of us if this was it.  She said she would show us.  She spoke english. We had told her we needed the town square.  There is was!!  We got off at the town square and there was the church.  We looked all around, but no Pizza Hut!  We asked a man where Pizza Hut was, and he indicated 300 meters straight ahead. So we went that way, and saw only a bus.  We asked the driver of that bus where the bus to San Isidro was, and he had us turn and go another direction.  When we got there, there was PIZZA HUT, ta da! Around the corner was the bus to San Isidro which looked wonderful.
We also saw another town square and another church.  Apparently Herredia is not so small.  While walking around it, it seemed rather large. Especially at night.
We had been riding busses around for a couple of hours.  They were all crowded, and some of them were not gringo sized.  On one Jerry and my derrieres barely fit the double seat, but his knees did not.  He had to put one leg twisted under the seat ahead. Like sitting in the back area of an import pickup truck.
Well our adventure was winding down, and we felt pretty good.  The bus to San Isidro went straight there and we found a taxi right away to take us to Wisdom's.I read off my little note to tell the driver where to go.
The whole time, we knew that we could get off the bus and hail a taxi home from whereever, but we wanted to try and get there as planned. And we did it!!

Gettin'Out a Bit

The last few day, we have continued with spanish lessons.  A few of us have decided to go walking every day to overcome the blimpyness that we feel like we are attaining just sitting and studying.
The first day Shari, Renee, Jerry and I went out for a loop around the neighborhood.  The first hill out of the wisdom's house is at the end of their driveway.  It is very, very steep and quite a good length.  We feel our quads twang on that one quite well.  The rest of the walk was around several "blocks" which wind through several neighborhoods.  It is quite interesting because you never know who you will meet and greet.  All of the houses are cinderblock with a concrete finish.  They are painted many more beautiful colors than in the US where the grey, tan, white and brown reign.  I have seen many bright orange, florescent green, bright blue etc. houses here.
The next day Jerry and I went on our own.  We started out kind of avoiding folks first out of shyness at not speaking the language well.  Finally we got braver and at least greeted everyone. As we kept going, we felt ourselves relaxing more and laughing about getting lost.  We don't even know how to ask anyone for directions. 
We encounterd 2 ladies and a man out by a front gate talking.  When we said "good day" they asked a question in poor english so we stopped and chatted with them.  Between my poor spanish and their poor english, we actually had quite a good time.  We each learned a lot about each other and went away feeling like we were beginning to launch out a bit. 
We passed many interesting things like an above ground cemetary.  All of the crypts are family burial places many the size of a car with highly decorated marble and tiles.  There are angel statues all around and of course Mary and Jesus.
We walked through coffee fields and kept going, we hoped, in a circle.  Some places looked familiar so we had hope.  We probably went 5 miles or so when we saw the cell tower close to the Wisdom's off in the distance.  After that we felt like we were going the right way again.  We were never truely lost, but were not sure exactly where we were.  By the time we got home we were getting a little tired in the legs. This area is fairly hilly.
Today Renee, Shari, Jerry and I also walked again.  We went off through a coffee field and back through some neighborhoods.  We went to the home of Kati, the Wisdom's former housekeeper whom many know and said hello then heard a band and went to find it. 
We found a tiny parade of school children playing drums and other percussion instruments followed by majorettes and oxen carts thay were colorfully decorated. Renee didn't know the exact occasion.  One of the signs the kids was holding said something about protecting the earth, an another was patriotic.  This was a very tiny, but very charming parade.  In fact we were the only audience they had.
The lesson I learned was to never forget to carry my camera.  I am going to get some of Shari's pics to share with you.
The quads are still screaming, but I think the breathing is easier on the hill.
Back to studying.


The cemetary




oxcart in the parade




cowboys in the parade




oxcart close-up



A-B-C-D-E-F-G or ah-bay-say-day-eh-efay-hay

We started Spanish lessons with Olga.  She is a very nice lady who has taught Spanish for at least 12 years.  All of the Wisdoms received instruction from her.  They said she doesn’t give up, if she doesn’t get through she tries something else.

She has us divided up in classes of 1 hour each by learning style and previous knowledge of Spanish.  Since our classes are very small, we get great attention from her

We now have had day 2. It is amazing that as adults we are exhausted after we go through the alphabet a few times.  The alphabet?  I have more compassion for little kids and how tired they get at school.  Mental exercise really can make you tired. We all agreed the flesh would rather go out and do some work than to sit and try to memorize words.

Our teacher, Olga, is a Christian so we use the Bible to practice reading and for memorization.  It keeps us encouraged, and will be useful later to know some Spanish scriptures.

We are trying this week to establish team schedules for daily life.  We want to incorporate group devotions and even exercise.  Since many of us are in class and studying we don’t want to become blimps.  We already have divided up the cooking and kitchen chores.

 Soon we will be going out to the church at Llano Verde.  That is the church in a village 6 hours north of here that Clint pastors.  They have been going on without him for the last 2 months and are reportedly doing well.  He is anxious to get back there and encourage them.  Jerry and I have been there before.  Since then, they have gotten electricity I understand.  That will make a big difference.  We won’t need a generator during church services. 

This is the rainy season.  We often have a morning that is warm and sunny, but by noon it starts raining.  It can rain from then until the next am.  Jerry and I are in the back cabin and use rubber boots to go back and forth to the house. This keeps the mud down in the houses.  After Colorado, everything feels very damp to us.  We don’t know if we would think the same if we just came from Washington.

Like Washington, because of the rain, when the sun is out it is very beautiful here.  Palm trees, banana trees, even a grapefruit tree.  There are also many types of flowers.  They are the ones that you would find in an exotic bouquet from the florist.

A couple of other interesting things that have occurred, are a trip to the local farmer's market and separating the 2 trailers.

At the market, we were given lists in Spanish to try and find the produce.  It went well and the farmers were helpful.  It was a very large market going for more than a block in 2 direction.  The procuce was lovely and to us exotic.  Jerry had a cart we brought lose a wheel and dump our watermelons.  A man yelled out in English, "watch out for runaway watermelons!"  They were captured without damage to anyone or them.

Jerry bought these at the market

We had a good time at the farmer's market


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Little trailer inside

 

putting on axles and wheels

You wouldn't think it would fit, huh?

The last step was the fenders and lights.<><><><>

Bananas right out of the field



When we came down, we put a trailer inside of the big trailer.  to make it fit, the fenders, wheels and axles had to be removed.  It took some heave-ho-ing with ropes and jacks, but it was accomplished.  The men bolted the wheels and axles back on, and now they are both working trailers. 

EEEWWW!!! What Else is in There?

Today, we did a whole team outdoor project. Clint had a huge bush on a large dirt mound embedded with rocks in the center of the driveway. It reduced the ability of vehicles being able to turn around easily. Also the new van is quite a bit larger than the old one and needs more room to manuver.  So we took it out.
The guys moved a large palm that was in there first to save it.  Then we all went to work.  We hacked, cut, sawed, dug, hauled dirt, and hauled rocks.  It seemed like it would be necessary to have a bulldozer to get it out of there, but given enough of us and most of the day we did it.
All of us worked adults and older kids.  The younger ones brought us water and iced tea.
As we slowly disassembled the bush and the mound we encountered many surprizes.  We found many varieties of cockroaches, centipedes( like 6 inches long), a 12 inch long black snake, a very fast, huge rat (that we found out was a mom), a nest of baby rats, several ant nests, a terrantula, a christmas light, a lost spoon, vollyball, and a huge piece of concrete.
Usually it has rained everyday around noon, but it held off until we were completely done and had the tools picked up.  Thanks Lord.

Last little bit of root falls

Mr. C

We did it!

Katie moved a whole lot of dirt

Russell helping his brother Nick with another project

It took all of us with ropes and chains to act like horses and drag the mighty bush away. It probably weighed 300 or 400 lbs or more with lots of its roots hacked off.

This was about 15 ft. high on a 2 foot mound of dirt.

Tonight after Renees great soup we had a good time of devotion together.