We spent the week visiting schools and churches, and ministering to kids. I got to meet new people, spend time with old friends, and help teach God's word. Really long post warning.
Day 1: Doing nothing
On the day we arrived, our team leader had given us the entire day to rest. We rested for about 2 hours. Then the lot of the kids began milling about the hotel looking for stuff to do. Back up a little: The hotel we're staying in is more like an inn. It doesn't have an elevator, but it's 3 stories. The hotel had one or two other guests.
The trip kids consisted of 6 girls and 9 boys. The team had 4 moms and 4 dads. (I think) THis doesn't include the trip leaders.
So anyways, A lightning storm prevented up from going swimming, and so we spent the afternoon doing lame attempts at mafia, card games, and this lame dingdong ditching thing which I will explain later.
Our room had electronic keycard lock things. Our room had four beds, a kitchen and a balcony.
BTW An Iphone noob is someone who uses an Iphone during ministry.
Groups of people: Overall there were about 4.
1. Tyler's group: Tyler is so awesome that he doesn't even bother trying to make friends because everyone already looks up to him. His two younger brothers stuck with him as well. Their dad is their adult.
2. Our group: Me, Amaranthine, and Wubz already made a sizeable team of peoples.
Throw on a couple of old friends and we're good to go. I actually don't want to use names, but Amaranthine freely did, so I'll add names of awesome people only. Faith, a long-time-no-see family and family friend, and Jeremy and Jonah, our two see each other every week also good family friends. They aren't very outgoing, but they're really awesome. Our group has 2 dads and 1 mom.
3. Boys group: Purely the boys. 3 people. 3 good friends. 3 sorta annoying but cool people. They are standard people. Not too hard to imagine them. Video games, competing, outgoing, MCdonalds fans, coca cola... ETC Kind of hard to describe them. One of them is an Iphone noob. One of them started homschooling. 2 of them came with their dads and 1 came with their mom.
4. Girls group: Evidently completely made up of girls. 4 girls. 2 groups of 2 friends. Another Iphone noob. I don't like one of them, but don't mind the others. That much. One of them is a hyper-but-genrally awesome girl. There's a shy person, an awesome girl who sometimes does unnerving things (stabbing at food with a 2 foot backswing) , and a type-of-person-which-I-don't-like-person. 3 moms and 1 dad.
When I say standard, I mean one the type of usual nice people.
Day 2 Childrens conference: That morning, we went to Sindero de Luz. This was another sorta- Hands off day. We went to a lot of the resturants which I went to on my last trip. Oh yea. A bunch of people ordered pork, and got sick the next day. I shared some of my pork ribs, so I really dodged a bullet there! :D Tyler kept telling me I had a stomach of steel. :D
Day 3Sunday morning:
Today we were scheduled to help teach the church's childrens services. However, the twist was that first, there were some kids already helping, and second, the moms who planned the service had no idea what they were doing. At first it was really awkward, but as the time passed, we got more comfortable in playing with and talking to the kids there.
We went to this place for dinner, and it was kinda no good. It was a cafe, not meant for groups of 30+ people. Long waits, running out of certain foods, and my drink tasted like orange juice. :-) I
used the waterbottle prank today!! :D
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| yayy rainbow |
Day 4 monday "Finally! A real fight!"
Today was our first day of ministry. We visited Pastor Rudy's church, which was a really nice place. Also, they had a theater which was run by kids, where they put on performances and spread the gospel to teenagers who wouldn't usually go to church or learn about God.
We went to schools and held programs to teach kids about Creation and God. It's very ironic. You see, Costa Rica, as far as I know, doesn't have many laws concerning religion. The U.S does. Costa Rica is a Democracy, too. It's very strange. In the U.S, the land of the free, we can't go to schools and teach about God BECAUSE of laws that ensure freedom of religion.!? In Costa Rica, we are free to do so, so long as the school allows it.We went to this other resturant for dinner, and the girls were stabbing at each other with knives, pouring hot sauce onto their sandwiches and drinks, and forking at each other.... -.-
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| We cut some fruit up! |
Day 5
The next day, we visited two more schools and did our awesome programs on Sin and Salvation. We were in an indoor basketball court inside the school, and there were soccer goals under the net. So, whenever I felt like it, I could either: drop-kick an soccerball which was being used as a basketball, or scoop up a soccer ball and shoot a hoop or two. A lot of the kids practiced English with us.
They had recess, and the place was crazy!! There were kids running around playing soccer and tag and soccer and running and yelling and it was fun hanging out with them.
Humph. This one person's mom knew that she was talking to young kids, so she talked really slowly.
Alright
so
now
we
are
going
to
tell
a
story.....
Anyways, we usually were running dry on time, and so after she handed off the mike, I scooted over, and was like
"HeyCouldYouSpeakAlittleFasterBecauseTheTranslatorSpeaksFast
AndTheKidsOnlyUnderstand
WhatTheTranslatorSaysSo
TheresNoPointInTalkingSlowlyWhenTheKidsDontUnderstandYou."
I said it as fast As I could because I had the feeling she wouldn't take the comment lightly. I was right. She didn't yell or anything, but she said "Quiet I'm listening to the story."
A lame excuse, as this was the 7th time we did it today. :=P NTL, she did talk a little faster, and so I'm glad I asked. :-)
Day 6 "One day more"
Cast your cares upon the lord, for he cares for you.
Faith was like: Wow Amaranthuine ! this is a cool story!
Amaranthine: THanks! God wrote it!
:D
This wasn't actually the last day, but that was one of the songs we sang in the car. Today, we went on a 2 hour-ish drive to a school in the mountains. However, when we got there, our team leader was like:
"Does your program mention God or Jesus?"
Us:"uhh. Yeah. Worshiping God mentions God".
It turns out that we weren't allowed to speak freely about God or Jesus, and instead, people from the church dressed up as clowns and we spent most of our time on games, which sorta put me in a bad mood. We went to their church and ate lunch there. The girl who I sorta didn't like threw away her entire plate of food because it didn't smell good. -.- We did our Worship program, and it was only exeptional. :-( We agreed to meet next morning to work on our skit a little better.
Our skitt!! :D I was the judge! P.S these are for like 2-10 year olds
Faith is the person, and this other guy was God. :P
How God is!
Skit number 2: Don't stop praying!
Jesus cares about us, and he will answer, even if it is not the answer you want.
Before I forget, "One Day More" is a song. It's part of the musical "Les Miserables". Great musical BTW. Really good song and story line. The link is too a live performance concert of it. The description tells the story.
BTW TOns of awkwardness and bad words.
There's like, twelve parts to it, so listen when you have a lot of time.
Seriously though. Watch it. It's really good.
Look down, Look down, don't look em in the eye".
Gavroche rocks.
And little people know
When little people fight
We may look easy pickings
But we've got some bite
So never kick a dog
Because he's just a pup
We'll fight like twenty armies
And we won't give up
So you'd better run for cover
When the pup grows up!
We went to a dam, and we saw a huge beetle!! Tyler was talking about how much it's bites hurt,
And this one guy kicked it off a 300ft drop. He looked over the side and was like !IITSS FLYGNNGGG AHHRRHRHH AHHRHRHWWAHHHR
and we took off running to the end. :P
Day 7: "You didn't come to Costa Rica to eat hamburgers did you?"
We went to another
church. This next place was really hot and humid. Really. Baking. However, this place was my favorite outreach. We split the kids into two groups, little kids and big kids. Well. Not really. That's just what I remember.; :P The older kids (4-6 grade) went outside. Outside, we did a few games, but the program dissolved when the kids split again. Half of the kids played soccer, and the other half (and me) headed over to a stream next a grove of coconuts!! :DDDD We spent the rest of the time talking to the kids, and smashing coconuts! YEahh!!! Lots of fun. I met this cool guy named Ronvolio or something. He's what I would call ruddy, but he's really caring and fun. He's a pro at de-fibering coconuts. He's a really cool guy. Tyler gave him his watch. I cracked open some coconuts and brought them to the part of the team working with the younger kids. One of the girls was like:
"eww what is taht" (Referring to the coconut meat)
"Coconut meat. It's good. You didn't come to Costa Rica to eat hamburgers did you?" :D
Well you see, this person was the kind of picky person who ordered fries with cheese, and coca cola.
Do this aloud to yourself
knock knock.
:
you say this part
i eat mop
:
you say this part too
Day 8: Travel to Jaco:
Today, we traveled to Jaco, a really hot place as well. The place we're staying at rocked. It was a resort. That afternoon, we went to a park and a slum to do more ministry. The place we ate at was an awesome buffet. They had fresh juice every meal, and the menus and juice changed every day. It was really humid.
We stopped on this bridge, and I picked up some rocks to thow at alligators!! :D
I got a couple, and they tried to eat the rocks! There's a video of us feeding gators on the bottom!! :D Here are some epic shots of alligators!
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| got this guy with a stone! |
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| awesomeness | |
We went to the same resturant where the poisoned pork was and we were like
Dont ordur the ribbzz LOLLOL IT"S A TRAP
and later we were trying to order stuff and this person was trying to speak spanish, and the waiter said "I speak english."
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| He heard us making fun of the food |
Anyways, Girl's Group decided that I had a crush on Faith (she is awesome)
and decided to start making fun of me. The hyper active girl told me to look her in the eyes and tell her that I didn't have a crush on Faith.
"I am special. Because I know how to escape the time meld."
-AF
She said that if I punched her, (A light arm punch, like in piggy punch) I liked Faith. So, by not objecting to anything she said, I could punch her for free. :D jk
POPs. An icecream store. Really great place. THey had mango icecream. And they really piled it on!
Day 9; Rest and relaxation Totally awesome adventures!!!
The resort place had our rooms in one place, and then down the road, there was the cool amusement stuff. THe beach, pools, coconut grove, streams, and stuff.
On Saturday morning, I woke up at 6 o clock to go on a walk with my dad and wubz. You know that post that Amarathine made about the trip? She made it while we were out adventuring. :D
lolz
We went on a walk to the beach first. I found a fallen bunch of coconuts, but they were unripe, and so I made this game, called coconut smashing. You see, mature coconuts are close to invincible. ( I consider a coconut destroyed when the inner shell breaks) You can throw them against the ground, throw them up in the air, anything, and they don't crack. The fiber beats up a little, but the inside is intact. THe younger ones break sorta easier. Anyways, they grow in clumps of 10, so I can work out by walking through the jungle carrying cocos. The grounds are covered in trees and greens. The cool thing is that there are no metal walls! All the boundaries are made of plants, so I can commando bust through anything to anywhere. :D I knew the entire place by heart, and I have really good internal navigation. :D The place is like a jungle, and there are animals freely wandering about.
* ctrl a
(Commando busting is holding a stick or something in front of you, and then running through thin bushes or tree limbs. Does not work in suburbans. :-) )
Anyways, it started heating up, so we walked back to our room, changed into swimsuits, and jumped into the pool. A guy had just added chemicals, and so we went to the ocean. THe water was really nice. We went beach running. Then, I went coconut smashing until 9. :D Our team leader promised we were going to a butterfly farm. It turns out that the ziplines were NEXT TO a butterfly farm. 12 lines. It's really epic. We go down a mountain. We zigzag from line to line. We saw some bats. The ziplines are so long and fast that for some of them, you have to use leather gloves to brake. THis isn't the kind of get-clipped-on-and-pushed-off thing. You had to brake a lot, and the lines had these braking systems on the line. (No pun intended)
After, we ate lunch, and then came back to the resort. By then it was 3 o'clock, so we went to the beach, and hung out there until 5.
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| I like pics of the moon! |
Epic part:
The water wasn't very clear, and I was one of the only people who brought goggles. Why would I need goggles if the water isn't clear? TO protect my eyes of course! :DAs I said, I have pretty good internal navigation. And so, I can submerge, swim up to people, and pop up and yell "SUPRIZE ALLIGATOR ATTACK:"""!"! While creating an enormous splash.
You know that spiky thing that holds the coconuts together?
The stem? Equipped with my "Stingray 5000", I could freak people out by submerging, then swimming up to people and poking them with it!!! :D Nothing painful, but screams, laughter, and hi5s all around. It was really funny on this one girl because I didn't surface that soon, and she flipped outt!!!! I missed once or twice, but as long as they didn't see the Stingray, then I could just launch again.
We were chicken fighting later, and Tyler's group began nailing us with mudballs. At first, it was funny, but then it started getting annoying after the 14th hit. This one particularly well aimed hit in the face caused me to fall forward, and get a leg and foot cramp. After agreeing to call it a tie, I began building mudballs to return fire, However, it was a really unfair fight. Sorta both ways.
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| Now my desktop background! :D |
Me
goggles
mudballs
Tyler's group
4 people
mudballs
You had to feel sorry for them. You see, that isn't the equation. If it was, I would have been pummeled.
Me
goggles
-cover
-stealth travel
-mudball melting capability
-salty eye-burning splash
mudballs
Tyler's group
4 people
mudballs
eyes which are defenseless to saltwater.
First, everything i'm saying is biased towards me. (Obviously)
And I don't blame them for anything.
I had severe advantages.
-A large, well aimed wave of water could melt any mudball they were making. -And that would also get saltwater in their eyes if they didn't blink fast enough.
usually, in a regular water war, splashing would be a minor nuisance at most. However, this is saltwater, and it is twice as effective as any mudball.
- A quick head-dip would remove any traces of getting hit by a mudball, plus I could sit underwater for as long as I could hold my breath.
However, they accepted terms and conditions :P by attacking me first, and they seemed to think they could hit me with a mudball and then walk off.
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| Win a mudwar |
I only hit them back as they hit me. I would pull an invisible suprise mudball alligator attack, then alligator float around until they inevitably tried to hit me again. No matter how hard they tried, they couldn't beat my ace-in-the-hole. They even tried moving to land, but I still had eye protection. I would run after them, and then throw my mudball at them.
The thing was, I didn't need my hand to protect my eyes. When I used up my shot, the chase would turn around, and I would usually make a beeline towards the ocean. So, I got TWO mudballs. I threw one with my left hand, which missed really bad, then when they turned around I would bean them with the other as he turned and ran at me, which was really funny to watch, but really mean. On land, it usually turned into a scoop-and-launch war. THe general land battle was: Run after other guy and bring a significantly larger mudball,, throw your mudball in a poorly aimed, disintegrating spray-and-pray shot: take off towards water and run zigzag: dive into water and try to avoid getting beaned
The zigzag thing worked pretty well. It's really hard to throw when you're running. They made it a lot easier by running in a straight line. :P
Although usually their shots missed, and the strikeback was sorta overkill. :-| THey had to shoot from long range, or else I could splash them. And, over long range, their shot disintegrated. However, I offered to call it a tie several times, and they usually responded with a mudball to the face. Not their face. -.-
"Let's call it a tie, and we can end this needless bloodshed".
Splat.
Also, I could convey my obvious advantage by taking my time. I literally had all the time in the world to hit them with one mudball, and so I could just stroll after them until I beaned him in the head, (I know, not nice but the only part above water) or I changed targets.
I could tell one of them one losing his cool. Tyler had kind of slipped off to the side because he knew that neither one of us would give up. Especially me. (Something similar happened last time and resulted in this annoying girl getting beaned with two paper-water-balloons.) He began trying to tackle me under water, but I could easily evade anything.
Now I'm better at keeping my cool, but I still couldn't help retaliating after getting beaned from behind. Jonah, the quiet guy, joined them just for fun. He managed to keep his cool.
The other was starting to pick up rocks.... O.o
I obviously changed my mindset as well.
Shoot to thrill, play to kill.
"What the heck Ender. It's only a game."
"It stopped being a game when they threw the rules away."
Anyways, the annoying person was getting mad she weren't beating me, and so she threw a coconut at me from 5 feet. I managed to deflect it on my shoulder, but it landed lower than expected and hit my upper arm. For some reason, she seriously thought that I would just let it slide.
But if you think that I,
Really plan to let this slide,
I am pleased to inform you that you'll be down and out in time.
P.s that song rocks.
I predictably threw it back underhand and she came up with this genius blocking move that used one finger to block a 7 pound chunk of fiber covered liquid.
She flipped out, and threw a rock at me, but (fortunately ) she lost heart halfway through, and the rock landed short. I decided to let that one slide.
However, there were a couple times when I goodguygreged and didn't blast someone. This one guy was running away from Wubz, and I came up behind him. He turned and I had a chance to bean him in the face, but I let it slide. (No pun intended) I also dissolved my case against one of the girls. (Pun intended) (I melted my mudball)
The Cool Girl swam up to the Annoying Person's mom, and I swam up right next to them. I beaned her, but didn't splash because that would hit AP's mom. The mom was sorta oblivious.
"Hey''. That's not nice''. -youdontsay- The rest of the girls kept launching from long range, and I didn't go under, causing them to hit the mom, me, and the girl. :D
And for a funny minute, she couldn't figure out what was going on.
Sorry that I'm conzt. quoting songs (and books), but we sang a lot on that trip, and the words summed up everything.
Overall, the mudwar was fun. Adrenaline. Exercise. The whole nine yards. They eventually regained their cool and we made up. I completely understood how he felt.
"We are, when the cause is sufficient, insane."
-Ender's~Game
Although a mudwar is hardly sufficient. :D
It was really hot out; even at night.
And so the early morning and sunset were the best times to be out. :D
At night a saw this cool animal in a field, and so I ran for my camera, and
Day 10 Drink with me. To days, gone by...
WAHHH WE left that day. Well, breakfast was at 9, and so I woke up at six, and my family went hiking. My dad suggested we invited Faith, and it turns out that she was sorta expecting us. (Not bad) She was already ready to go somewhere. Which is really awesome because it wouldn't ave been as much fun without her. We went on a jungle hike, and we attempted to be quiet so we could see animals. .... ....
...
....
....
:-(
On the way back, my dad was doing bird whistles with his hands, and so we made animal noises too, when something moved in the trees. We made more animal noises, and a ton of monkeys appeared. They're White Faced Monkeys. They jump from tree to tree and stuff. We kept yelling and hooting at them, and they continued to jump around. They threw some stick at us too!
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| WILD MONKY |
I accidentally sent this person in search of monkeys. I told them where I saw it, and before I knew it, they were off. :P
When we got back, I took a shower, then headed down to the beach to grab more coconuts. :-) After, another 15 minutes of commando busting through brush and carrying coconuts, I took another shower. Then, after somemore coconut smashing, I took another shower. :-) We ate breakfast, and then we drove to this shopping place. Dude it was sooo hot out. At the airport, : Everyone was going somewhere, so no one was going anywhere.
We got back home at 2. AM. :P
WAHHH ALLIGATORSS!!
Enjoyed writing this! PLZ comment! :D
