Okay, pictures in order.
1. my sisters, Laura and Milagro (means miracle).
2. Laura and me
3. Mocha and me

onto the entry!

Over three weeks now! This last week was so fast... everything is in place and will be flashing by.

This past weekend we went to Limon. We, as in everyone in LASP. We saw coffee and banana plantations and a pineapple field... amazing! We wandered through the streets of Limon and talked with Ticos about their lives. We met with an Afro-Costa Rican and an Indigenous Costa Rican and heard about their lives and their hardships with racism and many other aspects of their lives in Costa Rica. The racism here really does surprise me. I guess I thought the rest of the world was a little bit better than people from the States. Even my own family's (tico family) opinion on the subject disappoints me a bit. Well, I guess, we're all human and most of the time we're very ignorant. God's grace is amazing to cover these sins. On the way back the rain was horrible. It caused a car accident where someone died... and then I believe there was a land slide. So, we had a five hour detour after waiting for two hours. Everyone handled it well with good conversation and some good singing.

It's good to be back home after such a long weekend. I really do enjoy my family. To showed my sisters how much I appreciate them, on Thursday, I bought candy bars (one of their favorites, Snickers) and wrote them some notes in broken Spanish. They flipped out. They loved it and hugged me. Laura, the sister that I room with, even shared some of it with me. I told them I was really happy to be home last night.

On Tuesday the LASPers went to Cartago to check out what sustainable development is all about. It was very cool. It's just... a bit mind blowing. It gives me hope... then... I also feel completely hopeless as to how I'm supposed to use this knowledge. It really gives me the urge to try to not learn... so that I can still be ignorant... but it's too late. So yeah, through a lot of the things I'm learning here I feel a hopelessness... like there's nothing I'll ever be able to do... when some things really need done.

Anyways...

Let's see. I think next weekend I'm going to hang out with some Tica friends that live in San Jose. They invited me to stay the weekend and my sisters will be working at church camp, so it's the perfect opportunity. That's exciting.

I think the weekend after that my family wants to take me to the volcano and I'm really looking forward to spending time with them outside of the house and learn more about what they're like in those situations.

On this weekend I was thinking I would go to Cartago, but I may do that the next weekend.

I want to go to Cartago to visit a ministry called Dios nos Envia (GodSend). I made contact with a lady who works there and I just want to visit and see what's up with them. She called me last week and said if I ever need anyone then to just let her know... which is awesome to have such a welcoming invitation.

And then... well after those three weekends full of things... I'm off to Nicaragua for two weeks. I definitely won't have internet connection there.

After Nicaragua the semester will be halfway through. Too fast! Okay. much love and God bless.