Saturday, July 30, 2011

Thoughts on language

I have never considered myself much of a Bible reader, probably because I feel like I ought to be and it then becomes a sort of task in my mind.  So I end up running from it.  Sometime recently, I realized that the Bible is the best sort of literature in that it is lovely and uplifting and full of truth.  I have spent many days this summer fumbling around in a language that isn't my own, one that comes off of my tongue awkward and heavy and usually not quite how I want it to.  I have fully appreciated how God blessed us with words and with the goodness of language to express how much he loves us.  And as I write this, I am just beginning to understand that although he sometimes uses language to speak to us and so we may speak to each other,  he also takes it away so that he may speak through us in the silence.   All of this to say, that I wanted to share some of the verses through which God has spoken to me this summer when things got tough.

"The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want
He makes me lie down in green pastures,
he leads me beside quiet waters,
he restores my soul."

-Psalm 23:1-3

"We also rejoice in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope.  And hope does not disappoint us, because God has poured out his love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit, whom he has given us." -Romans 5:3-5

"Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles, and let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us." -Hebrews 12:1

"And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age." -Matthew 28:20

Sunday, July 24, 2011

Tough

I’ve always thought that I was pretty tough.  When I was a little girl, my brothers and I joined co-ed rec soccer teams every spring and fall and spent many sunny Saturday mornings at the Blue Ridge Park.  I was a bony little kid swallowed by my jersey and outsized by most of the other kids, but a real fighter on the field, especially if someone fouled me.  My mom (and my soccer coach for many years) would always say that she secretly hoped I got knocked down early in the game because I would get up with a fire in me.  Mom was constantly telling people, “Watch out for Leigh Anne, she’s a feisty one” and I felt like the toughest kid out there.  I can still remember one soccer game when I must have been about seven and, after several falls, a referee asked me to leave the field because he was afraid I would get hurt.  I huffed off the field, with scraped knees and a hot throat.  Mom, always quick to defend her children, puffed up with anger and told me something like, "You just keep playing the way you always do."  To this day, whenever someone calls me feisty, I take real pride in it just as I did as a kid on the soccer field.

Yet it is through experiences like this summer that I realize I am not tough at all – not compared to the people I have met these past two months.  I think of Lidiannet and Carlos, who work tirelessly in the strawberry fields, yet never seem to miss a sermon or a prayer meeting.  I think of their daughter, Andrea, who works at the Poas Volcano Lodge six and a half days a week washing dishes, yet comes to English class two nights a week so that when her English is better, she can get a job as a telemarketer.  I think of Sandra and Gabi, two of the high school students who have to walk a twisting mountain road an hour from the main road, and then a 10-minute van ride just to get to school.  I think of Eugenia, living in temporary housing after the earthquake and taking care of her 14-year-old sister, who just had a baby and whose husband isn’t in the picture.  These people are tough.

I pray that I would live with utmost simplicity for these, some of the feistiest and truest and best people that I know.  And also for Jesus who calls us to give up everything we have and follow him.  I often try to twist this explicit command from him to suit my lifestyle or justify the ways I am not giving.  But I think he meant exactly what he said and he calls us to give all energy, time, money, and even comfort to follow him.  In this call, Jesus sounds extreme, maybe even unfair, but he also offers us these words as well:

“But those who hope in the Lord will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint.”

“Surely I am with you always, even to the end of the age.”

 “Whoever lives and believes in me will never die. Do you believe this?”

He offers us strength, his own presence, and even eternal life if we will only have faith and then turns to us and asks, “Do you believe this?”  I can see his face, gentle but sincere, as he places that question before me, not just once, but again and again as something to wrestle with for the rest of my life.

Saturday, July 23, 2011

Lists


With less than two weeks to go, I think I am ready to go home.  I think the weather (something like Blacksburg in early November) has worn me down, and my latest project of starting a bilingual community newspaper, although exciting, has drained most of my energy.  So I thought I would take a moment to list the things that I will miss most and the things I am most looking forward to

What I will love about being home:
·      Milkshakes
·      Showers with steady heat
·      Being warm
·      A dryer instead of a clothesline
·      Seeing the stars at night (it’s too cloudy here most nights)
·      Hamburgers, Chik-Fil-A, lemonade
·      Smooth roads and driving again
·      Going barefoot and wearing shorts

And the things I will miss:
·      People I work with and who have been a sort of family
·      The kids at school who have become some of my dearest friends
·      Speaking in Spanish
·      Watching “Doug” (everyone’s favorite childhood show) with housemates
·      The Pooh Bear blanket on my bed
·      All of the green scenery
·      Seeing Poás Volcano from the window every morning
·      Watching the two kittens romp around and pounce on each other
·      Kiku and Ashes, the two puppies
·      The faithfulness and the whole-hearted worship of the church
·      People who have brought me into their homes and fed me
·      The home-made bread
·      Being a part of an organization that works tirelessly
·      Living simply

After making these two lists, I’m a little surprised to realize how many things that I will miss about this place.  And I’m also surprised that the first list is mostly full of small comforts and satisfactions – first world luxuries.  I know being home will make me think about my own richness and the richness of my country and although I feel ready to reflect on all of this, I am also afraid to face it.

Sunday, July 17, 2011

Thoughts on Coming Home


I haven’t written recently partly because I’ve been busy researching how to start up a local newspaper for the community and partly because I would rather watch an old episode of Doug with Jacqueline or play with the kittens, letting them mew and cling to my sweater. But I woke up at 6:00 A.M. with the morning still and untouched except by yellow light and I had nothing else to do because the Internet was out.  So now I’m sitting in the top of my bunk bed (Lauren moved in to my room when the new intern, Jacqueline came), stretching my toes in their wool socks, and thinking of how to tell you all that’s been going on with my life in the past couple weeks.
Yesterday in our meeting, Lindsey asked me if, with three weeks to go, if I felt ready to go home.  I have asked myself this same question every so often in the past two months and it’s usually the same wishy-washy, “Sometimes yes, sometimes no.”  I came into this internship envisioning a place that was perhaps a little warmer and myself, in a pair of shorts, within some grand adventure.  Although my time here has panned out differently than I would have expected, it has been fulfilling in that it has challenged and humbled me.  When I think of being dropped off at the airport to go home, my heart lifts inside my chest in excitement at the thought of home and comfort and food other than beans, and then sinks in something that feels like terror at the thought of leaving these friends behind.
I hate thinking that soon, I won’t wake up in the same room as Lauren or hear Jacqueline blow-drying her body (yes, it’s that cold.)  I hate knowing that I won’t be able to throw my arm around Daniela, and worse, that I might never see her or some of the other students again.  These people – interns, staff, students, and neighbors – have shown me an incredible love.  I hope that I can come back some day to visit and see how much Fabian’s English has improved and how tall Nadia has grown to be and how the community, too, has grown.
Looking back on leaving Ecuador, I was sad to leave several very dear American friends and a lifestyle of travel, independence, and adventure.  This time, I will still leave friends, but I will also leave behind a community of people, from Pastor Carlos who plays a mean bass, to the shy little girl in Sunday school who never says much to me but insists on holding my hand.  I don’t know what else to say about these people or how to describe their goodness so I’ll just say this: they have been Christ to me and Christ to each other.  I can think of no higher compliment.
Since I’m on a sentimental sort of track, I want to say thank you to everyone has prayed for me or wished me well.  It has been an adventure, a very different sort than I ever thought, but one that will bring me home full and reflective and, maybe more than anything, grateful.  You all have done more than enough for me but I have one more request.  I ask that you pray that I have the strength to work hard and enjoy these last couple weeks to their utmost.  And please lift up the people of Vara Blanca and San Rafael, some of the strongest, most encouraging, lively folks I have known.  Thank you so much, friends!

Thursday, July 14, 2011

Stillness, Joy, Fullness


This summer, I have sat with God and he Has been in the stillness, or rather He was the stillness itself.  He could not be separated from the flowing stream in our yard or from the fearsome splendor of Volcano Poás.  In everything, I felt Stillness.  And I soon found another name for this Stillness, something that C.S. Lewis calls Joy.  Joy was what settled and spread within me, a bit like cinnamon hot cocoa but everlasting, as I was looking through the wooden frame of the church window.  A simple butterfly caught my eye, its blue wings flitting away towards the road.  There was another, yellow this time, and it followed the first.  I couldn’t tell you why, but those two tiny-winged butterflies unearthed a memory that overwhelmed me, not unpleasantly, but the way a large wave lifts you unexpectedly. 
It was of my last Sunday at Forest Hills and there in the wood and the soft light and the pleasant bustle of the chapel right before a service, were some of the people that I loved dearest in the world.  I was sitting on a high bench between two of my best friends, Josh and Audrey, and could look out to see the Moores off to the side and towards the back, Mom, Dad and Grandma sitting beside Mike and Margie.  I don’t remember what we all sang or what we all said that day, but I remember crying.  Part of it was knowing I only had a handful of days left in the U.S. and part of it was knowing that I wouldn’t see Audrey for a year.  But the time when I cried the hardest was when we were called up to paint our hand green and make a leaf on the canvas where James had drawn a tree.  Suddenly, I walked out of the chapel, ran downstairs and outside and sat on a curb and wept.  It was like I had to get away and be still and let it all catch up with me.  I couldn’t stop weeping and couldn’t trace it to anything but Joy.  There were pieces of sadness, too, thinking of being away and pieces of confusion at my own tears and I wish that I could explain it all better than that.  But I know I have never felt more surrounded by God or so completely Full as I did then, sitting on the curb in a parking lot with my hands in my face. 
I don’t think anyone ever saw my tears, except little Sara, who asked me later if I was all right and why I had been crying.  I think I told her they were happy tears, and although that is true in part, I realized I could never explain the joy and the fullness of it in a way that made any real sense.  And I didn’t tell anyone else because I felt that out of all of us, maybe a little girl understood the Fullness the best.

Friday, July 8, 2011

A day in Heredia

Last weekend, the three of us interns woke up at 6:00 A.M. and even as grumpy as we were, couldn't help but be cheered by the bright morning.  Angeley, who grew up in Costa Rica and then moved to New York when she was a young girl, had plans to meet her cousin and the rest of his family so Lauren and I decided to tag along to explore a new city.  We had been told that the bus comes anytime between 7:00 and 7:30, so we rushed around, chomping Corn Flakes and grabbing coffee.  Then we waited outside the little red gate at the bottom of the driveway and I sat in the gravel as we talked.  Then, just as Lauren had gone inside for more coffee, the bus started pulling up the hill.  As planned, Angeley yelled, "Bus!" to me, who was planted in the yard so I could yell, "Bus!" to Lauren (and then "Coo-WEE!" like some wild bird just for the fun of it.  Lauren came tearing out of the house with her coffee (sugar but no milk), and the three of us jumped on the bus.

We wound through the neighboring town of Cartagos, down, down the mountain past houses painted yellow or blue or papaya, down where the sun hit each clothesline hanging in the yards.  We all began to feel nausea creeping into our stomachs and Lauren and I stopped talking almost instantly in order to mentally focus on not being sick.  About an hour and a half later, we stumbled off, rather eagerly, and then made a call to Angeley's cousin at a little flower shop.  He came to pick her up, a lanky guy with a easy-coming smile and a smooth Carribean accent who kindly showed Lauren and I the bus stop home and bought us all Granizados.  (I think I'll take the time to describe the Granizado because it is something like a soon-to-be Seventh Wonder of the World.  You choose between any three flavors of slurpee flavors, then pick bananas, papayas, watermelon or all three, then powdered milk, condensed milk and, just when you thought the cup couldn't hold more, you pick a flavor of ice cream for the top.)  Feeling adventurous, even at 9:00 in the morning, I asked for everything.  It was almost sickly sweet as you can imagine and I wished I'd avoided the powdered milk, but I was glad I got to try it because it's a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity because I think your system can only handle one in your lifetime.

Lauren and I split from Angeley and her cousin and began to explore Heredia.  We knew that we were the very picture of tourist, two girls in Chacos with funny shoulder bags, but we didn't mind.  We were happy to be out of Vara Blanca for the day and in weather that was almost uncomfortably muggy, the way summer ought to be.  Fueled, and a little sickened, by Granizado, we picked our way down the sidewalk, slipping into boutique shops stuffed with sheer blouses and trendy dresses we could never afford.  In one dark, retro store, I found a pair of delicate earrings with painted summery flowers for 1000 colones ($2) and bought them for Lauren's 20th birthday, which was only a couple days away.  Even though neither of us are big shoppers, it was fun to window shop all the same.

We made our way back to the central park and ate lunch in a little sandwich shop which looked out on the white church in the plaza.  No one came in during that whole hour, so we were free to talk about our different traveling adventures and mission trips and study abroad without anyone staring at us for our English.  After taking a couple touristy shots by the fountain and the church, we headed to the bus stop, knowing it would come sometime between 12:45 and 1:30.  It came at 1:35 and one bus stop down, a stone's throw from where Lauren and I had been sitting on concrete steps.  The next bus to Vara Blanca wasn't until 5:00, so we tore down the street, yelling, "Run!  Run!" to each other, looking like two ridiculous Americans (which we were), and caught the bus just in time.  We spent the first five minutes laughing like crazy and the last seventy or so sleeping.

That night we had a sort of slumber party back home under our roof in the steady rain of Vara Blanca.  We watched "Ocean's Twelve" followed by "Gilmore Girls" and ate chips and a spicy dip until our lips stung.  I went to bed exhausted, belly full of Tostitos but happy, and with a little sun on my cheeks for the first time in weeks.

Friday, June 24, 2011

Something like homesickness

This morning I was walking along to the elementary school in my fleece jacket, picking my way down the cracked road.  It was warm but tiny lines rain (which they call "pelito de gato" or "little cat hairs") fell all around my face and everything was still, the way the country always is.  When I got to the school, a girl in my sixth grade class was unlocking the gate for a younger girl with a white bow on her head, so I slipped in.  The older girl led me to the director's office, where I was told that my class had been canceled for the day.

So I walked home with the stray dog, a thick-bodied lab who usually lies in the rocks outside the pulpería (the convenience store.)  I was in a good mood, kicking up rocks and left completely to myself.  I think it was the roughness of the pavement, the gaping potholes, that made me remember the smoothness of I-81 in Virginia.  This of course evoked images of America, of all the cars driving on roads with paved lines and guard rails, which seems both comforting and a little mad in its organization.  I could feel myself missing the roads (a silly thing to miss, I suppose), but I think the roads were some sort of symbol for everything about the U.S. that I feel homesick for.  Most of the time I don't think about it because I live in a house of people who speak to each other in English and who have recently lived in the states.  But I miss the roads I've always driven on: 340 and Old Liberty and Patton Farm.  How is it a chunk of crumbling road can make me miss home?  I don't even feel homesick until I let myself feel it.  And it almost feels good to sit in homesickness and swish it around a bit, the way I do in a bath.  Because, just like hot water, it makes you think of pleasant memories and familiar places.  But, just like a bath, the water becomes lukewarm and cloudy after a while and then you have to get out.

Sitting here upstairs on the bench in the high-ceiling wooden house, I'm brought back into this summer internship as I listen as downstairs Tomás excitedly talks about a project.  I remember my cold toes.  I feel like I have to write down this moment just as it is to ground myself and to so that when I sit in my bedroom at home, I can remember how I sat here in a grey day as Frances poured something into a pan.  I hear sizzling, just for a moment, and then everything falls back into a familiar hush.

Thursday, June 23, 2011

An almost sunny work day

I woke up early yesterday and sat at the bar eating Corn Flakes while reading about Tonga in the National Geographic.  It wasn't sunny exactly, but warm enough to make me glad.  Ben came in the kitchen as I was reading about the lazy prince of Tonga and ate cereal too.  He told me he wasn't sure we could paint the house because the sun hadn't come out.

Tomás walked in a little later, cheerful and wearing work jeans.  I went to change into jeans too, and came back out to help with the work.  The sun poked out a bit, more of a grey-yellow presence than sunny, but I felt happy in my tanktop, dipping a roller into paint.  After rolling several boards with a thick shade of papaya, Angeley and Frances came out and when we put on the stereo from inside, Taylor Swift came through the boards of the house.  I kept painting and grinning.  It felt a bit like a Virginia summer morning.

Wednesday, June 22, 2011

Ups and downs and what I've been up to down here

So I realize that not only have I done a great job at updating my blog, but I haven’t talked a whole lot about what exactly I’m doing here.  When I’m not working on writing or translating something for the ADE website, I am teaching.  Every time I tell someone that I am an English major, that person almost always responds with, “Oh so you want to be a teacher?”  And then I have to explain that no, I want to be a writer.  But I love serving, being with children, and I have known so many wonderful teachers, that I have always felt it kept it in the back-up plan section in the back of my mind. 


I’ve been teaching an English class and a creative writing class at the high school, four English classes at the elementary school, and a Sunday school class for toddlers, as well as helping out two days a week with an English conversation class for adults.  I work with the whole range of ages, from the little boy at church who mutters in slurred, soft-spoken Spanish and still wobbles when she walks, to Andrea, a woman around ten years older than me with dark eyes and a beautiful strength about her.
I must admit though, that teaching is not always satisfying and very rarely glamorous.  It makes you mind-tired, kick off your shoes and sink into the bed tired (or is it only so exhausting because I have to teach in another language?)  It makes me think about my high school geometry teacher, the one with a voice that pinched and who charged a quarter every time anyone dropped a calculator, and makes me wonder if teaching was how she became so bitter.  (And what did she do with all those quarters anyway?)  


I’m exaggerating and to be honest, nothing lifts me up like walking into the sixth-grade classroom and hearing eight voices say, “Hallo!”  Don’t tell the other classes, but these guys are my favorite.  They are young enough and driven enough that the lessons can imprint on them and just old enough for me to play a game with them in class without feeling guilty for not giving them a dry assignment.  Yesterday, we played “I spy with my little eye” (no one could really say the word “little,” but hey, you can’t win them all), but everyone’s favorite is the slap game.  The slap games entails forming two groups, lining up, and, after I say the vocab word in Spanish, sprinting to slap the word in English.  Education and exercise – you’re welcome, kids.  They have learned basic phrases, the days of the week, and the colors through the slap game and I’m proud to say we have no injuries to report yet.


Being a teacher has been just as frustrating as it has been rewarding, which seems to mirror my time here.  There have been cold days, the sort of mountain cold that gets trapped in the bones of your fingers and buries itself in your hair and makes you realize that even your eyelids are cold.  There was today, where I sat on a clump of grass outside the tin-roofed school beside Lauren and we just talked, letting the warmth sink into our jeans.  There was the day we had creative writing class where my shouts of “Escuchen!” were drowned out by scraping chairs and raucous laughter and I fought back tears all class.  There have been times where I’ve had one arm around my host sister, Daniela, the two of us laughing not because anything is all that funny, but because it feels so good to laugh together.  And I’ve been learning that it doesn’t much matter if you’re a teacher or an engineer of if you’re in Virginia or Costa Rica.  Even though there will always be times when you wish you were somewhere else, there will always be times when you know there’s no place you’d rather be.

Father's Day


This past Sunday in church, Tomás stood at the front of the little tin-roofed church and bowed his head.  Padre celestial,” he opened, and I lost myself so fully in the beauty and relevancy of those two words (“heavenly father”) on Father’s Day that I heard nothing more.  The congregation started whispering their own prayers, phrases like “Ohhh Dios” overlapping each other and rising like a stream, creating something close to madness or the Pentecost, which for some is the same thing.  
Later that night before I fell asleep, I muttered those two words, wandering at their effect on me.  “Heavenly” elicits images of skies full with stars, of the golden light of morning; “father” stirs up memories of me riding on Dad’s shoulders or crying into his shirt.  And I felt so filled with the wonder of those words together and how God gave me a piece of the heavens, a piece of Himself as the Father, through my own father. 
Of all the fathers I could have ended up with, I have the one who loves to laugh, the one who plays soccer with his kids when he really just wants to nap, the one who, at every church luncheon, brings drinks to the elderly women.  I have the father who loves me through the times when I am selfish or stubborn and even though he doesn’t love me perfectly, he loves me in a way that is perfect in that it is through the Father himself.

Thursday, June 16, 2011

The Wonderful ADE Staff

So I was going to write a little blurb about each person on the permanent staff of ADE, but I wanted to use some of their own words too, so I copied this from the website (my words are in Italics under each picture):

Tomás Enrique Dozier Zahner
 General Director, Community Director
Geology (Occidental College, California)
Education (Holy Names University)
Masters in International Development (Eastern University)
Educator for past 18 years and fanatic of Gallo Pinto, 
Cafe Chorreado, tortillas palmeadas, and chilero
Tomás always offers you coffee, and then will sit and drink a cup with you, never letting on that he is late for a meeting.  He is a friend to everyone, eager to laugh, teach, and give thanks to God in everything.  And for some reason, he reminds me a little of my Uncle Jay.


Chelsea Dozier
Writer
English and Comparative World Literature, Psychology (Occidental College, California)
Spanish (Spanish Language Institute)
Counseling Certificate (Family Ministries and FPCB)
English professor/instructor for 15 years
Homeschool mother of three wonderful children
Trilingual, Aerobics instructor, Enjoys playing violin


Even though she is busy teaching at the ADE high school and homeschooling her own children, she still has overflowing patience and good cheer.  She has a full and wonderful laugh, an eagerness to share with others (and a giant book shelf, which makes for a good combination in my opinion), and a certain glow about her.

Lindsey Miller
Director of International Coordination
Public and Urban Affairs: International Development, 
Political Science, Mathematics (Virginia Tech)
Internship United Nations (Vienna, Austria)
Has a german shepherd puppy named "Ash Esperanza" 
or "Ashes" for short

Lindsey is one of those people who seems to know who they are and stays faithful to that, which is something that I have always admired.  She is pretty darn funny, even though she doesn't think she is, a hardworker, and pure of heart.  And a Hokie, so she gets extra points :)


 Ben Runyon
Director of Sustainable Development
Biblical Studies, Social Science (Bethel College, IN)
Graduate Certificate in Nonprofit Management (Northeastern University, MA)
MBA Urban Economic Development (Eastern University, PA)
Likes sports, books, food that is not vegetables, the beach, and may
or may not enjoy dancing salsa


Ben is a good sport for being the only guy in the house (we like to call him "dad" and Frances "mom.")  He has a great sense of humor and a strong work ethic - and he's tall, so he can reach all the cups on the top shelf for us.


Frances Joy Santiago
Director of Sustainable Development
Latin American Studies: Political Science and Sociology (Hood College, MD)
MA Urban Development (Eastern University, PA)
High school Spanish teacher for four years
Addicted to travel, style blogs, dark chocolate and young-adult
fiction books and is trying to learn to sew

Frances is beautiful, stylish, and full of personality.  She has traveled all over the world, is constantly reading, is completely fluent in Spanish (she was born in Puerto Rico) and makes spicy, delicious meals. 


Kiku Runyon Santiago (Ben and Frances' dog)

Fluent in English and Spanish
Traveled in four states and Puerto Rico
Enjoys long walks in the park
Hates bicycles

And now we have 2 little kittens, Pirata and Elefante, both gray striped and blue-eyed (Kiku doesn't seem to accept the new family members and has been acting like a first-born jealous of a new brother and sister, which, as you can imagine, is pretty hilarious.)

Blog post #2 for ADE

http://blog.glocalade.org/

Thursday, June 9, 2011

Inspiration from Mother Teresa

This is one of my all-time favorite quotes and I've been thinking about it recently, so I thought I would share it with you all:

“People are often unreasonable, irrational, and self-centered.  Forgive them anyway.  If you are kind, people may accuse you of selfish, ulterior motives.  Be kind anyway.  If you are successful, you will win some unfaithful friends and some genuine enemies.  Succeed anyway.  If you are honest and sincere, people may deceive you.  Be honest and sincere anyway.  What you spend years creating, others could destroy overnight.  Create anyway.  If you find serenity and happiness, some may be jealous.  Be happy anyway.  The good you do today will often be forgotten.  Do good anyway.  Give the best you have and it will never be enough.  Give your best anyway.  In the final analysis, it is between you and God.  It was never between you and them anyway.”
-Mother Teresa

I think that as an American, or maybe just as a human being, this is hard for me to follow.  Why should I do anything if it will not change, and if my efforts will not matter, then isn't it worthless?  If I teach the children at school about themes and metaphors and similes and they retain nothing, I will feel as if I have failed, and in some sense that is true.  But the important thing is not success, the important thing is for me to do everything I can for them - not for my own gain or even for theirs, but for the Lord.  Even if we never see the fruits of our labor, God calls us to keep creating and loving and finding joy in all things.  And as we do, we come closer to His heart, which is perhaps the greatest success of all.

Wednesday, June 8, 2011

Rainy Days


It’s funny how things can flip so suddenly.  Sometime between Saturday morning and today, slivers of homesickness wormed their way inside me.  The little things make me miss people, like the other day when I was eating pineapple.  I imagined how Josh would sit on the stool next to me, how I would tip the Tupperware in his direction and say, “Want some?”  And then we would sit and eat in silence until our tongues started stinging.  Or whenever I put on the watch with the white leather band that Grandma gave me, I wonder what she is doing in that exact moment and maybe if we are ever thinking of each other at the same time.  I miss phone conversations with Ben because he's always been so good at that older-brother wisdom thing and I miss walking down the hall and flopping next to Dad and lying there with the T.V. going softlyOr I think of how good it would be to have Audrey sit in my bed next to me, curl up under the Pooh Bear blanket, and read our devotionals togetherAnd most of the time I miss Mom, because she is the one who always listens to stories that would bore anyone else and takes the time to write me nice, long emails.  I even miss the things that don’t matter much, like smooth roads and hot water in the sink and texting.
Today, a cold front blew in sheets of grey rain and the only way I could get warm was by putting on several layers and curling up into a ball under the blankets on my bed.  I think all the cold and drabness of today made the distance between here and warm Virginia seem unbearably far.  But I am still happy and am learning how to live with people who are different, how to wash dishes with a cheerful spirit when the water is so icy, and – most importantly of all – how to peel and slice a papaya J Mostly, I’ve been learning (well, God has been teaching me) patience, one of the virtues that didn’t get passed on to me.  It’s difficult teaching a class, particularly in Spanish, and I had to employ a great deal of patience the other day as I floundered about trying to explain metaphors and similes.  So I guess all I’m trying to say is that I miss you all.  And I’m almost grateful for days of cold and homesickness because those are the days when I remember my blessings and when God feels nearest.

Sunday, June 5, 2011

No snail mail, but...

Sadly, I don't have an address because the mail doesn't come up here to Varablanca.  But what I would love for you to send even more than letters, is prayers.  Or if you want to help donate books to the children, please contact me because there are no public libraries and there are few textbooks, so ADE is slowly building a school library.  Thank you all so much for the ways you've already supported and encouraged me!

Highlight Reel

Here are some snippets from the past two weeks, which I wanted to write about individually, but haven't had the time.


·      The truck rally: the whole town and more showed up on a rainy Sunday to watch trucks racing on a mud track (the national champion of Costa Rica came and creamed everyone, of course)
·      Staying 4 nights at my host family’s home: Michell, Daniela, and I watched 2 of the Lord of the Rings movies and when I told them I had always wanted sisters, they said I could be theirs)

14-year-old Daniela on the left & 17-year-old, Michell on the right
·      Frances’ cooking (she uses all sorts of spices like curry and garlic and makes flavorful, unique dishes that waft up the stairs and settle in our nostrils before dinner each night)
·      Being in a little town in the mountains, because it makes me think of being home in Stuarts Draft
·      Having a Pooh bear quilt in my room

·      Visiting a coffee plantation, tasting a sweet red coffee bean, and drinking freshly-grinded coffee (I think I have drunk more coffee in the last two weeks than in my whole life)
·      Hiking up to Volcán Poas
·      Standing under waterfalls, seeing monkeys, butterflies, jaguars, toucans, and more at La Paz


·      Touring local farms (and getting a free sample of the juiciest strawberry I’ve ever tasted)
·      Getting to know the children in the community, who love to laugh, tickle, and hug, and show love in endless ways
Gabi's 16th birthday part at school
·      Playing soccer in the gym with the kids after school 
·      “Sledding:” riding down a hill in a plastic trash can with Michell (even though my jeans are still stained with dirt)

·      Speaking Spanish (although this should probably be on the “lowlight reel list” too, since I can be pretty awkward sometimes)
·      Having time to read and write, to be in creation, and to be in fellowship

A little stream by the coffee plantation
·      Looking out the window to an incredible view of rolling mountains, a volcano, or endless hills of wild plants
·      Feeling needed and called and loved by the Lord and altogether surrounded by His presence

Saturday, June 4, 2011

Morning Musings


I slept in for the first time since arriving and woke up into a gorgeous day, all sun and breeze and wild mountain beauty.  My clothes were sitting in the washer ready to be hung out to dry in the sun (which has been sadly missing for the whole time I’ve been here) and I could hear the pan sizzling as Ben made pancakes for Frances’ birthday.  And Lauren, another intern who’s my age and really sweet, is moving in today so I’ll have another roommate.  So I thought that while I sit in the company of the daisies and the hypatia bushes and the little stream over by the pump, I could spend a little time writing about pieces from my first two weeks here.

My first impression of Costa Rica, which I consider to be the moment when I first stepped outside of the airport into the city, is sort of bleached and incomplete because I was too concerned with finding the bench where I was supposed to meet Chelsea.  But there was the bench right outside the door, and before I could even consider sitting down to wait, there was Chelsea.  She was slim, Korean, a naturally beautiful woman with little or no make-up and her hair pulled back casually.  “Leigh Anne?” she asked, with a genuine smile, and when I said yes, she pulled me into a motherly hug.  I liked her at once.   
Her two youngest children, Nadia and Nathan, helped pull along my suitcases and then we got into a beat-up red car and drove through the city, where memories of Quito, of beggars and loud Spanish and dust, slammed into my mind.  I was quiet for most of the drive up into the mountins because, even though I didn’t feel too out-of-place, I could feel something invisible and weighty inside me slowly starting to shift.  Even sitting in the passenger seat on my first day in Costa Rica, twisting through a land wild with green in a car full of strangers,  I knew that the summer would change me.  Which is in some ways the most terrifying part, that the self I had before leaving will shed off in a ghostly layer and never come back.
I’m not sure that makes any real sense, but I thought I’d take this beautiful morning to write to you all and let you know that although being a stranger to a place, culture, and language sometimes makes me feel foolish, I am genuinely happy here in Varablanca.  And it somehow feels that I’ve always been here.  Or no, it feels that I was meant to be in this rainy jungle town with these very people in these very months and that things are coming together just as they ought to be.

My 1st blog post for the ADE website

http://blog.glocalade.org/2011/06/dr-ebenezers-technology-for-poor.html

Tuesday, May 31, 2011

Pieces and Fullness


This is the first time I have sat down and truly devoted a good amount of time to write since I arrived last Saturday.  It might have something to do with the Internet being currently unavailable… but I think it has more to do with fear.  For me, there is something beautiful and fulfilling about describing a thing through the written word.  But it is as if I am only able to describe the pieces or the edges of a thing, and often clumsily, yet fail to capture its complete essence.  And even if I write in a way that makes me happy (which is when I know it is something worthwhile), I fear that no one will enjoy it, or that the truthfulness of my voice will falter.
As Frances and I walked to the school for Bingo on Saturday, we talked a little about Volcán Poas and how it cannot be captured in a photograph.  (I tagged along with the Tropical Agriculture and Mission class on their field trip to the nearest active volcano to the Varablanca area.)  Although I was irritated to upload cloudy photos that cannot even begin to show the swooping depth or sheer rockiness of the volcano, I was also glad.  Because to see it as it truly is, you must stand there at the edge, breathe in the slight saltiness of the sulfur and dirt, turn your face into the cold wind sweeping up from the basin’s stream, and feel your stomach drop hundreds of meters down to the core of the crater.  Writing tries to bring the reader to this core and all of its surroundings, but just as my photographs fail to depict the volcano, words too, merely act a symbol or a flimsy copy.

Maybe God created it to be this way.  You cannot perfectly paint, or photograph, or write about His creation; you must experience it.  Perhaps in our humanity, just as we cannot pin down the fullness of its beauty, we can only experience the fullness of our God in pieces.  We cannot see Him face-to-face, but we feel his spirit moving through creation, people, and in His love.  And maybe by being in His love, we can begin to experience the fullness of Him. 

It makes me think of what the Lord tells Moses in Exodus 34: “I will cause all my goodness to pass in front of you, and I will proclaim my name, the Lord, in your presence… But you cannot see my face, for no one may see me and live."  And later in the chapter when Moses walks down from Mount Sinai after speaking with God, his face is “radiant.”  We cannot see the face of God, but when we are with Him, our faces reflect His glory.  How curious but yet how lovely, that we cannot directly see His face, but His glory can pass into us and glow through our faces.  Perhaps we are unable to look full on into the Lord’s face or completely express who He is through written word because He is so pure and powerful that we can only hold on to the edges, the mere gleaming, of Him.

Monday, May 30, 2011

Let the blogging begin


I’m one week in, one tenth of the way through this journey and God has already shown me so much.  I’ve been to a Spanish-speaking church filled with clapping and the Holy Spirit (just don’t tell the Presbyterians about all that clapping), to the rushing and spitting La Paz waterfall, to Cinchona, the epicenter of the earthquake from January 2009.  Each adventure is charged, sometimes with wonder, but oftentimes with heartache because the earthquake cannot be separated out from many things that have happened here.  It is still very present in the lives of these people, just as April 16th still resonates strongly with the Virginia Tech community.
For example, Eugenia, a girl from the colegio (the high school), still lives in temporary housing after over two years when the Cinchona earthquake destroyed her house.  Another mother must daily walk by what is know as “The Hole,” a steep drop-off where the tremor ripped apart the road and buried homes, as well as her twelve-year-old son.

As I began to right this first blog entry, I honestly didn’t know what I was going to say.  That’s the funny thing about writing.  You sit down, tenderly draw out your thoughts, like crab meat from its claw, and try to create some sort of coherent piece from all the different ideas that want to be pulled out.  I thought I would talk a little bit about the culture and my home stay, the ADE staff, and the children from school, all of which have blessed me and filled me.  These are key, but the thing that seems to strings them all together – the thing that cannot be overlooked and will be pulled – is the earthquake.
After it struck Cinchona and surrounding areas, Tomás felt that the Lord was calling him back to his home town in San Rafael, where he grew up and where his father owned many acres of farm land.  He created the non-profit organization, ADE, (the Association of Development through Education), with his wife, Chelsea, as a response to the tragedy and an opportunity to use the existing resources to build up the community.  The ADE staff works closely with the high school (20 kids between the ages of 9 and 17), teaching English, Spanish, Civics, Social Studies, Math, and Science, as well as a morning Bible study.  (I will be helping Lindsey teach English and am starting a creative writing class next week.)  I am eager to see what God has in store for the Varablanca area and just ask you all to keep praying.