(Sunday, December 30)  After breakfast, Anna, Ale and some friars assisted Tom in the clinic.  Ale’s Spanish came in handy, while Anna’s biggest challenge so far has been the language difference.  Father reminded all of us of the foreigners we’ve met who experience the same thing in America and all the saints whose missionary journeys began in allowing the native populations to teach them like a child and being vulnerable to people, even those we’re trying to help.  Ale said that the people were so kind and slowed down their speaking and how much she felt their Christ-likeness to her through their awareness of her limitations and accommodations of them.  While clinic was going on in the morning, the rest of the group had free time.  During our free time, Stacy feels like she’s running her own mini-clinic for the team.  We brought a large (HUGE) supply of first aid and we’ve needed every bit of it.  The brothers are throwing bamboo spears they’ve made at each other and needing repair to their bodies as a result.  They’re slipping on the mossy concrete in bare feet, and they’re also catching the cold we brought with us as a little slice of Indiana in Costa Rica.

We had Sunday Mass at St. Martin de Porres.  David and Quinn Mitchell served with Father David. The people, as usual were warm and welcoming.  It’s much smaller than I expected from seeing the pictures.  Our team of 19 took up a full half of the church.  It’s also much poorer than I expected from the pictures.  That may sound silly since we’re here to serve the poor on a mission trip, but everyone at Mass from the pictures on the St. Bryce Foundation is so well dressed at Mass and the church looks lovely.  It turns out that they dress up like crazy for Mass walking the dirt roads in high heels, but that is their one nice outfit.  We’ve found that they dress up to go ANYWHERE.  Sort of like the 50’s where a woman didn’t go out unless she had her good dress on.  Our team in shorts and tennis shoes really stands out (let alone the Friars being barefoot).  From what we understand from our hosts, the UN came in several decades ago and had a big push for education about immunization, wearing shoes, and brushing your teeth.  The people carry a toothbrush with them if they’ll eat a meal away from their home to brush after each meal (literally), even the school children brush after lunch and carry a tooth brush with them.

After lunch Dr. McGovern took me, Michael, AJ, Brenna and Katie Killen to clinic and again served the people.  In two days’ time he saw, maybe 40 patients over the course of about 6 hours, but his valiant efforts at communication take their toll on his energy and he is tired when he comes back from clinic.  We met Fanny, one of our translators on Sunday and she helped with clinic.  She’s 18, a junior in high school who is taking 14 classes and earning college credit at the same time.  Her parents moved from Costa Rica to Utah when she was 2 and they lived there until she was 14 when they moved back to be closer to family, so her English if fabulous!  She’s a smart BEAUTIFUL young woman who is lovely to work with.
During clinic the rest of the group learned Spanish songs from a teen who came to the mission base just to teach us and was so generous with his gifts. They went to youth group at Dulce nombre (it means sweet name of Jesus), and Fr. David said Mass afterwards.  While the language barrier has a been a big deal for those who know Spanish in our group and especially, those who don’t, Emma has been singing at the Masses with Br. Leo and whomever usually leads the singing for that group.  Fr. David was struck by the barriers that are broken by joining in song with the people.  During youth group, Emma was pushed by Katie, her sister, to sing some of the modern Christian Spanish songs she taught herself in preparation.  Emma was reticent, but complied and Fr. David told us that the eyes of the girls in the youth group lit up as she sang.  Colleen motioned for the girls to sing along and they all sang together.    Another experience during youth group was when all the kids in the youth group began dancing to the music.  They invited our team to dance with them, and while many of the teens couldn’t bring themselves, Katie MacDonald had a blast dancing with the youth group.

As we acclimate to the culture, we are moving in our church visits higher up the mountain and closer to the reserve of the indigenous people, the Cabacar.  It turns out we were pronouncing the name of the people wrong and instead of (KA*buh*kar) , it is actually pronounced (kuh*BECK*er).  Fr. David is chomping at the bit to get to the Cabacar and is exhibiting much patience to allow the team the time to acclimate and move systematically into our evangelization purposes.  The churches started as small, beautiful, vibrant communities of poor Catholics who sacrifice much to support their church.  The further we get from the mission base, the churches are getting smaller, more rustic and less populated.  Another new thing for our eyes is the music of the churches.  It’s definitely Latin American in flavor, but lots of hard rock instruments and if the church has electricity, it has huge speakers and microphones.  The lights may flicker, but the music is boomingly loud and rowdy and FUN!  Not at all the Gregorian chant we’ve grown to love of the friars.
Each team member is having a different experience and different struggles.  Obviously, the language barrier is a frustration for many of the team. Some of the teens are struggling with the vulnerability of a lack of communication.  Others of the team are struggling with the non-verbal communication of the people, touch.  We are grabbed and kissed by men and women and have our backs, shoulders and hands pulled away from us in embrace, people are kissing our hands, cheeks – it’s A LOT of touching.  Quinn said that the kisses are more like a hug, only with their mouth.  I fell on the floor laughing at that.  Some of the team are struggling with their colds and having to stay back from all the activities to rest.  It’s a bad cold we brought and we’re passing it around, in such close quarters to each other.  I personally – am DESPERATELY struggling with the bugs.  They are many and large and really all over the houses where we stay.  Our host from Louisiana says it’s just like home.  It’s not like Indiana.  Other people seem to be fine with it, but I’m struggling to sleep.

Thank you for your continued prayers.  The striking beauty of the location, the remoteness of our activities, the warmth of the people – coupled with the tremendous effort to acclimate to the climate, ecosystem, language, culture are making us all feel very inadequate to the job we have before us.  Fr. David reassures us that all that is part of every mission journey and that we’re all doing great.