Our trip to the coast

Sandy writes:

We woke up early Wednesday morning to get started on our trip to the coast. The Barbary’s live in Playa Hermosa and it is a four hour drive depending on the traffic. With our stop for lunch and our little putter of a car it took a little longer. We stopped along the way at a restaurant that a couple of sisters highly recommended for there milkshakes. It’s called the Monteverde restaurant, in the town of Monteverde. It is known for the dairy products that the Quaker population started in the early 1900’s when they landed there to settle and started there dairies. The milkshakes hit the spot and where very delicious. So after our break we continued on to the coast. The terrain along the way was very different then where we are in the central valley. Much flatter and many open fields for cattle and horses. It’s also our dry season here and it wasn’t as lush as it would be in a few months when the rainy season starts, but it’s still very beautiful. The roads where much straighter and in better condition also, so that made it nice.
We got to the Barbary’s about 1:00 and had a nice visit catching up and Elise and Ken made a fantastic spaghetti dinner before we headed out for there School and Service meeting. It starts at 7:00 and they have a hour drive to the meeting. Taylor rode with us in our car to show us the way and Elise and Ken drove ahead to try and secure us some seats. They have a nice hall with about 29 in the congregation and the group that Ken and Elise are in has about 15. They join together on Tuesdays for the School and meet separately on Sunday. There were about 96 in attendance that night, the largest so far. So as you can gather, it is mostly visitors. Dad loved not having to wear a suit coat and the brothers wear no ties in service. It’s way to hot and humid for it.
Thursday after a wonderful breakfast by Ken, we went sight seeing. We took a few pictures ot one of the marinas down there so Ken and Terry could look at the boats and dream for a bit. Hahaha.
That evening they took us to one of there favorite spots for drinks at half price and to watch the beautiful sunset. Wow did we feel special! Dinner was next with friends and then home to bed.
Friday was adventure day for Meg and Taylor and some of her friends from the congregation. Terry and Ken wanted to kayak and Elise and I chose to just kick back in lounge chairs at this beautiful beach and watch the local people. It was wonderful. After some dinner and the ride home we changed again into our swim suits and jumped into the pool to cool off. What a great way to end a great day.
Saturday was our day to leave, so after coffee and fruit and our good byes we headed out for our trip home. It was a experience all it’s own. But I’ll let Meg tell you about that. We did get some great pictures of the area and the Barbary’s home. One shot is standing just out there front door. Another is standing in the doorway looking into the house. Hope you enjoyed the pictures and our trip to the coast.

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Playa Hermosa and the Barbary’s

Meg Writes:

We have been busy busy busy over the past few days! I’ll give you a brief breakdown. I have some pictures and my mom will have to post the rest.

So let me backtrack to last Sunday, January 22nd. We left early to Sunday meeting so Dad and I could catch his return visit at work on the way to meeting. He called on a man named Miguel who’s an owner of a gym. We walked up and had a brief but great conversation with him and my dad left the latest copies of the magazines. After that we headed straight to the Kingdom Hall. There was a visiting brother and sister along with 2 friends that joined them from the newly formed English group in La Fortuna. The brother gave a fabulous talk on how the natural disasters we see today are not ‘acts of God’.

Service in Sarchi

Monday I worked online all day and we just laid low pretty much.

Tuesday Dad and I went out in service with Marci and Linda D. and had a great morning. My dad got 2 more great calls, one even saying that he wanted to come to the Kingdom Hall — he invited himself! So Dad is really getting some awesome calls – 3 in total. I have yet to develop a good call but there is so much good response that I am sure I will shortly. Tuesday afternoon was packing for our trip to see the Barbary’s in Playa Hermosa.

Wednesday morning we drove for about 5 hours and had a stop at Monteverde Restaurant. They have fantastic milkshakes of just about any kind. We arrived at the Barbary’s home around 1 pm. We visited, took a short stroll the beach – they are like 2 blocks away! – and then it was time to get ready for the meeting. For Wednesday night meeting they meet with an English congregation in Huacas. The meeting in Huacas is pretty warm. It’s an open air Kingdom Hall like the one in Sarchi but because it’s much warmer there there are oscillating fans hanging from the ceiling. The brothers don’t wear coats at the meeting and in service they apparently don’t even wear a tie! But once you’ve experienced the heat there, you know why. The night we went to meeting there was 96 in attendance! Half that amount was JUST visitors. People had to stand outside the hall and listen in because it was completely packed out.

So I know the Barbary’s keep up with the friends but I wanted to relate from our standpoint they are doing well and were such an encouragement! They have a beautiful home in Playa Hermosa and we were able to stay at their home. Mom will be posting pictures of their home very soon.

Thursday we hung out with the Barbary’s, took a drive and saw a few views of the bay. It is gorgeous where they are and the water is fantastic. There are so many different beaches – dark sand, light sand, sand with shells and the list goes on and on. Thursday evening they took us to a great spot called Pacifico’s. We enjoyed comfy seats and a beachfront view of the sunset and best of all – half price drinks for happy hour. I’ve posted pictures of our evening there below. We ate at a steakhouse in Coco later that night with some of their friends and had a good meal and a great time.

Friday was adventure day for me, Taylor, Jaime, Michelle, Kaitlin and Christopher. Here’s what it involved – a drive into Rincon and then we ziplined, rock climbed road horseback to a waterfall, then kept riding on to a river rafting (inner tube) deal, then back for lunch, then off to mud bath and hot springs. Needless to say I was wooped by the end of the day. I had a hard time keeping up with those fit 19 year olds but had a great time trying! I would have to say my favorite part was tubing although ziplining is a close second. The really really nice thing is, we spent a considerable amount of time with each activity. It wasn’t just a tiny bit of each, it was enough to be satisfied and then move on to the next. On our way home we stopped in Liberia for… Papa Johns pizza. And it tasted just like it does in the states!

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Saturday morning (today) is when we left. We woke up early and visited before taking off at 9:30 in the morning. We took a different route home so we enjoyed some new scenery of Bramas (?) cows and bulls, horses and cowboys. Later we decided to get home through driving through Atenas. It is GORGEOUS up in the mountains around there.. But it’s also hard on  your car. In short the car began to stutter and stall and bucked like it was running out of gas. We paused a few times and would try to keep moving but the same thing happened over and over again. Finally Dad pulled over on the side of the road and looked under the hood. I was so thankful that we had broke down somewhere that was cool since it was such a HOT day just about everywhere else. Just about 60 seconds into popping the hood a car pulls over and it happens to be a Costa Rican man that spoke perfect english. He stopped the car, hopped out to give Dad a hand and within 5 minutes we were up and running again and tackling the large mountain terrain. Before the man left, mom was able to give him 2 tracts. We felt that it was a blessing from Jehovah to have someone stop, especially someone with such great english. All in all we had a great trip and got home safe and sound.

World of Snakes!.. and the end of Week 1

Meg Writes:

Hello friends! We’ve had a good past few days. We’ve done some resting, some more shopping, service and World of Snakes!

Service was fantastic as my mom explained. Canvassing was a pretty new experience for us all so it was so nice to do something new! To break it down for canvassing we get a territory and then go from house to house and business to business. The businesses are not worked separately and often times you can find more english at the business then you might at their homes. The homes we were witnessing at were clearly locals but even if they are local and their main language is spanish you will still preach if you find an english speaking person. So I got out first with Linda, she took the first door, I tried at the second. The presentation goes something like this: “Buscando por personas que habla en Ingles” which means that ‘we are looking for persons who speak English’. So during the morning we were able to reach some Costa Ricans who spoke english. They were so kind! The man my dad witnessed to was a business owner, he spoke very good english and he said very enthusiastically ‘ANY TIME you want to come back you are welcome to come in and speak with me’. Can you imagine getting response like that in the states? And then the young 14 year old boy I witnessed to was very eager to speak to us! I’m waiting for him to come up with an excuse to go back inside but he read the tract and read out of the bible and was genuinely interested.

Shopping is such a new and fun experience to me. Today we got to go to the Farmers Market (only open on Friday afternoon/eve and Saturday morning). We had a great time and ran into the witness friends who were out there after service. The Farmers Market is huge and they have a little bit of everything but mostly load and loads of fresh fruit & veggies. So today we got some normal staples then we grabbed some yucca root and star fruit which are things we haven’t ate yet. When you’re in the market if there is something unfamiliar to you most of the time the vendor will slice of a piece to let you try it. So I got to try a sour mango, a small mango – about half the size of what we’re used to – and some cheese.

World of Snakes was pretty interesting. While my mom was resting this morning my dad and I went over. The best part of it is most of the snakes didn’t like me. I’m guessing it’s probably the color of shirt I was wearing but many of them coiled up and got clearly agitated at my presence – especially the Cotton Mouth and the Diamond Back Rattlers which are not local snakes. Thankfully, Costa Rica’s most poisonous snake the Fer de Lance could care less about me. However the Cotton Mouth was striking the glass at me. I have to say the most disconcerting part was when several of the cages said there was supposed to be 2 or more snakes and there was actually only 1 in the cage. Needless to say we watched where we were stepping the whole time.

So thats about all for now! We’ll be writing again soon.

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Thursday in service

Sandy writes:

Well we were awake at 5:30 and up at 6:00. We were determined to be there early for service arrangements. We got there and the Spanish group was just finishing up so we got to meet some of our Spanish family. Everyone is so welcoming. We were assigned to work with a sister who has moved here from Minnesota,she’s been here 3 months. She speaks Spanish very well and is one amazing sister. She has no car and walks miles to the Kingdom Hall and to and from her territory. We really gleaned so much information from her and she taught us what we should say for our introduction. We practiced it and then each of us went with her for a door. Then off we went! Meg and I took some business’s and although we didn’t find any English speaking people they all were very courteous. meg got a call with a possible study with a young boy and Terry got a call also. The sister Linda started a bible study. So it was a wonderful day. Afterwards Linda’s house was near two of her calls so she invited us to go and see her little place. It was so cute and just perfect for her. We all went out to lunch and met up with some other friends at the restaurant . So we learned a little more things that we can use during our stay. Where to get Dads suit cleaned and some shopping tips. We learned where there was a wonderful thrift store that had American cloths that were very nice and some even new. Soooo all in all we had a very good morning. We have plans to meet tomorrow at the hall for another morning of service. now it’s time for a nap after I throw in a load of cloths in the wash. That never ending chore! More later.

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The last few days

Meg Writes:

The general stuff: It truly is beautiful here. We’ve done more driving over the last few days. As mom has said, the roads are really steep and winding. We got up so high yesterday that it turned chilly and the lush jungle turned into mostly pine trees; it was like being in Big Bear. In fact we even found a log cabin up in the mountains of Poas. There are relatively little bugs here and mom and dad virtually have no bites but as usual, even though there are no swarms of bugs, whatever bugs there are they have found me. I’ve got about 50 bites all over from the little no-see-ums and the mosquitos. Most of the Costa Ricans are very helpful and try to communicate with you even though there is a language barrier.

The congregation: I haven’t had a chance to take a picture of the Kingdom Hall and brothers and sisters – soon though! But they are a wonderful congregation. I think I heard that there is 29 publishers. Everyone has been so warm and welcoming to us. We got a nice surprise on our first meeting. There was probably about 35 or so persons in attendance. We stand up to sing and I’m expecting to hear them sing lightly. The music starts and the brothers and sisters sang out at the top of their voices. It was like singing with a massive crowd at the district and it was beautiful and very moving. If someone was off key you couldn’t tell, in fact you could barely hear your own voice.

It’s so nice that even with a small congregation there doesn’t seem to be any trouble with people putting their hand up and commenting. Sometimes even in a large hall it can be hard to draw out the brothers and sisters to comment but so far there doesn’t seem to be as much of an issue here. At the bible highlights comments it seemed like half of the congregation raised their hands to comment right away.

Central Market: Dad and I went shopping in the central market. It’s almost like an indoor farmers market but they have permanent little stands set up throughout this large area. So you have to go from stand to stand and compare prices for the meat and fresh  vegetables and fruit from the different vendors. Some actually charge quit a bit more then others so it is really helpful to shop around. We had a great time, tried to speak mostly spanish when we could – which meant a lot of ‘cuanto vale’ or ‘how much is this’? I also got this yummy coconut that they poke a hole into and put in a straw. You then drink up the fresh coconut water right out of the shell. It’s pretty fantastic and was only about .50 cents. When I got home I busted it open and ate the inside coconut flesh too. The prices are really reasonable. We got what would amount to a large basket full of fresh fruits, veggies then 3 chicken breasts and 2 lbs of hamburger and spent about $25 american dollars all in all.

Today we are going back to town so dad can get a hair cut – that should be fun for him – and mom and I are going shopping together to get a few more fruits and veggies for the next couple days. We’ll report back later on our next adventures!

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Wednesday

Sandy writes:

Hi FOLKS, well we have experienced some driving around in our new country and have found that its quite a fun and scary experience at the same time. We are in valleys and hills and mountains. Very little straight or flat land that we have found in this area so far. Of course there are some, we just haven’t got there yet! The area is very green and beautiful. But we are in the dry season right now that goes for six months out of the year and then the other six months is considered the wet season. Although they get a lot of rain during the wet season , the sun still comes out every day.
Our house is pretty modern, it has two bedrooms and one bath. By the pictures you can see that we have a nice sitting area off the dining room and the other room is where the tv is. My kitchen is big enough but no prep area. We have had to beg for pots and pans and a sharp knife.:). It’s been a real challenge for me to make a meal. But Meg and Dad have not complained at all. The food here is not like we are use to from Mexico. No tacos, burritos etc. the only tortillas I have found so far in the markets is small corn tortillas that are kind of dry. Man I wish I had my tortilla press! No pinto beans, but all kinds of others. They love there fried chicken and spaghetti. But it’s not the Italian kind, it’s mixed with some kind of sauce and seasonings, but very good and tasty.
We got ourselves ready for service Tuesday and when we arrived a few minutes late most of the friends were gone except one car group. The brother who was driving is the service overseer and he wanted to send us off on our own with territory. We explained we don’t know the area and would need someone to help us with what to say at the door because we don’t know the language yet. So he said he didn’t have a solution for us that morning and we told him no problem we would take care of some thing that day and try again today. He wanted us to meet with him at another kingdom hall to go in service in another town they haven’t canvased yet for English speaking people. At meeting we got the feeling he was going to send us off on our own again with our own territory. We felt very unprepared but we prayed and Ofcourse Meg was all hung ho to do it. She was the one who reminded us that we have Jehovah with us. I still want a sister with me the first few doors. So we will give you a update on how this turns out. Enjoy the pictures.
The first few are of our back yard and patio and the other are of the inside of the house.
The caretaker here said what we have been hearing in the trees is a toucan. We haven’t spotted him yet but our cameras ready! We had a duck in the yard yesterday, but we couldn’t be bribed with bread to get any closer.

Greetings from Costa Rica

Meg writes:

Well it’s late at the end of our 3nd full day here. We were supposed to fly in at 4 pm on Thursday. Well, the plane had problems before it even took off so we waited on the plane for it to get fixed, un-boarded, waited, got back on after an hour of waiting and flew into El Salvador. I had the window seat so I got to see that we were passing towns and cities and then after awhile just lots of farm land… and then we started to descend. The El Salvador airport is located in the middle of nowhere in a farming area. There is no city close by, no Best Western, nada. So I got that sinking feeling as I realized, if we can’t get another flight out of El Salvador, we’re sleeping in the airport.

We missed our connection by 2 hours but thankfully they assigned us to the next flight out which was supposed to be around 7.. then it turned out to be 8… then they delayed for 1 hour to 9 pm then another half hour. So then by the time we board and left it’s probably 10 pm. So anyway we didn’t get to the bed and breakfast until about midnight or so. So we were dragging. However, here in Costa Rica is sunny by 5:30 am so we didn’t get to sleep in too much.

The next day we met an elder and his wife from a spanish congregation near Quepos who delivered a vehicle he rents to us. They were extremely nice and we had a good but brief time getting to know them. They drove us to the Sarchi Kingdom Hall – which will be our home base – and the Kingdom Hall in Belen which is housed on the property of the closed grounds of the Costa Rica bethel – sorry no photos since I didn’t bring my camera but I’ll get more soon. Anyway, the property was gorgeous and as usual you could spot it a mile away from the surroundings because of how immaculate it is.

The following days have gone fast. We have walked around the town of Grecia, drove around a bit, grocery shopped, went to our first meeting at the Sarchi English congregation and then moved out of the B&B to our new home for the time being. Lots done!

So in the meantime enjoy some of the photos I’ve taken on our drive.