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| A statue of Mary at the Catholic Church about half a mile from our house. |
So we've been in Costa Rica for 14 days now! This is officially the longest that I've ever been out of Wyoming at any one time, and it's still hard to believe sometimes that we won't be back for quite a while. However, we're getting settled in here better now, and we're really enjoying the area.
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| This is the main street that we live next to, just around the corner to the left from here. Behind us about 5 blocks is the school, and just ahead on the right is Parque el Bosque. |
We live in a part of San José that is actually to the south east of San José Central, in a neighborhood known as San Francisco de Dos Rios (though it's usually written out as 'de 2 Rios). A lot of people around here, including the signs on the bus, simply call this area "El Bosque," referring to the park that we live directly across the street from. (For those of you wondering, 'Parque el Bosque" means "The Forrest Park.") It's a nice neighborhood, with many nice parks within a mile of our house (Parque el Bosque, Parque Copa, Parque Sauces, and Parque Okayama, which is called by the locals "Parque China," even though it's actually a Japanese park!) There are gorgeous mountains to the south of us, and if you get up high enough, you can actually see mountains on practically all sides.
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| A view of the mountains to the south from Parque Copa. |
I've been walking a lot through our neighborhood, and have been finding lots of small grocery stores, bakeries, mom and pop diners (called 'Sodas' in Costa Rica), and other shops. Earlier today, I had to find a small bathroom and glass shop called 'Alfa' to replace a small pane of glass that Caitlynn accidently broke the other day. It was exciting to be able to ask "I need to find the store called 'Alfa' to replace a windowpane," (Turns out I was standing across the street from it :) ) and "I need to buy a new pane like this one," in Spanish and actually be understood! (Though I'm sure there was a lot wrong with each sentence, but hey, at least it was somewhat comprehensible!)
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| A few of our teachers at ILE doing some traditional Costa Rican ('costarricenses') dances for the students at the New Students Welcome today at ILE. |
One of the interesting things about moving to another country is figuring out all the things that we know and take for granted back in the States, such as: How do I take out the trash? (Answer: put it on the street on Wednesday and Saturday mornings, and they'll pick it up... but DON'T put it out the night before, because people might tear into your bags and throw trash everywhere as they check to see if you threw away any metal they can take and recycle). Or: There are no addresses or street names, so how do I receive my utility bills, and how do I pay them? (Answer: they MIGHT stick your bill in your gate (but, then again, you may not get a bill), and you can pay all your utilities at pretty much any store while you buy your groceries.) Or, what do we do about water? (Answer: San José has one of the best water treatment plants in Latin America, and the water is supposed to be clean to drink... but, we think there's an issue with our pipes here, so we're buying large 5 gal. jugs of water each week for drinking and cooking). All these sorts of issues and more keep us our our feet, but we're loving every minute of it.
That being said, pray for me this weekend! On Saturday, I'll be leaving the comfortable confines of San Francisco de Dos Rios, and I'll be making my way to the airport via bus to meet up with a missions team that's coming into CR to work with another group of Global Outreach missionaries in CR, the Turners. The team is bringing a few things for Sara and I from the states, so it'll be quite an adventure to set out on my own with my little bit of Spanish across this city of 1.7 million, but I can't wait to try it! I'll take some pictures, and tell you all about it next time! Thanks for your prayers!
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