Day Three: Meeting the Kiddos

On this trip, we are focusing on the fruits of the spirit. Every day has been assigned a fruit of the spirit in order to study in devotion and try to embody throughout the day. Today at breakfast we talked about the fruit of love. We have also decided that if any of us see another team member exemplifying the fruit, we will take a picture of it and post it on the blog, so keep an eye out!

Fruit of the Spirit: Love (Anne Fawcett & Josey Silldorff)

This morning after breakfast we left the house at 7:30 to go to Hogar Escuela. Upon arriving at the school, we unpacked our supplies and set up for VBS. Our four stations--games, arts and crafts, music, and storytime--set up shop across the school. All throughout the morning we have been conducting various VBS activities. The children are beautiful and so well-mannered. Despite the language barrier, we are communicating just fine. Smiles and gestures are fairly universal. The children are thrilled  to see us and shout "Hola!" wherever we go. The entire team is interacting with both the children and each other. It is amazing to see what connections and relationships are already being built.

A-a-arte! Me gusta el Arte! 

As we prepared for lunch at the school, and a rigorous work day this afternoon, we enjoyed each other's company around a big table in the main hall in the school. Camaraderie is growing amongst our team members as we get further into the day and share more experiences.

Our lunch was prepared by the staff at Hogar Escuela and was absolutely delicious. After lunch, we began our work for the day. Our projects are painting a mural on the outside wall of the school and one on the inside of the gymnasium, and also painting the gymnasium floor and wall. The murals we are painting are "paint by numbers" and have been designed and will be "fixed" by a very kind professional painter, Pamela. We have made a lot of progress on the murals, as is evident in the pictures below. We did not start painting the floor or large gym wall today but plan on beginning the latter tomorrow. Pamela has informed us that she wants the boys to work on painting the monochromatic wall while the girls handle the detail work! We took a break from our work to take a trip down the block to the bakery. The bakery is but a small storefront  on a huge industrial building that supplies all the country's baked goods. We all enjoyed gesticulating and communicating in broken Spanglish in order to order our delicious pastries.

After our hiatus, we went back to the school to wrap up our work and play with the children. It is amazing to experience their love and happiness that they are all too willing to share with total strangers. It is a cultural difference that we all shared our awe at later at our reflection for the day. We were tired but happy at the end of our work day, and we all piled into the bus to head back for a little relaxation before dinner.

After dinner, we once again got on our bus to go to the gym at the San Lorenzo School to play soccer with the bishop and another youth group that hails from the great state--but not quite as great as S.C.--of North Carolina. The bishop means business when it comes to soccer; he shows no mercy when aiming for a goal. We left the school at around 10 and are back at the house now. It has been a long but successful and happy day, and we all can't wait to see what tomorrow brings.

God Bless,
The Costa Rica Mission Team