Among the mango trees and little fighter dogs- Back to Atenas

After leaving Tuis (where the language school was at), which is on the east side of Costa Rica, we headed back to the west side to the town called Atenas. Atenas is where the eMi office is located, it is a rather small town with only one traffic light, but doesn’t quite have the farm town type of feel, it feels more like a bustling city. The town has a few really nice parks, a central area for many restaurants, and has a major road that goes to the coast running through the town.

Sidenote: We had a pretty adventurous travel time back to Atenas. On our third bus of the day, heading back into Atenas, we were on a bus that only had around 10 people on it, so we didn’t think there was much to worry about. Josh had put his backpack, which had his laptop in it, in the overhead shelf thinking it would be fine there. To our horrible surprise as we were trying to get off the bus, Josh’s backpack was gone! Someone must have grabbed the bag when he wasn’t looking and went out the back door of the bus. Wow now that was not a happy moment. But the Lord is so mighty and good. Since Josh needed that computer to do his work with eMi, it seemed even more tragic, but that next day Josh had talked to the pastor of his church back home. His pastor said that he would let the church know, and they would all pray for Josh’s situation. A few days later, the pastor reported back to Josh that the church had decided to buy Josh a new computer! So now Josh has a computer to do his work with eMi on! Praise the Lord!

Since returning back to Atenas, I have moved in with my new Costa Rican host family here in Atenas. The family consists of Oldemar and Maresa, and their two young adult children: Jazmine (18 yrs) and Brandon (15 yrs). Oldemar is the pastor of the local Bible church in Atenas that all of us interns attend. Jazmine just finished 10 months of English study, and is now attending the National University in Heredia, which is north of San Jose, so she travels back and forth to school. Brandon is still in high school. The family also has a little black dog named Nina. Now when first meeting Nina, she comes off as a very mean, barking dog that wears a doggie shirt. Cute on the outside but vicious on the inside. At first, every time I would even look at her, she would growl and act like she was about to launch at me. But sure enough, time has healed our broken friendship, and now Nina usually doesn’t bark at me and will sometimes even let me touch her. Talk about a strange dog! She is the first dog I’ve met that doesn’t like to be pet.

The family is very nice and welcoming. It has been really good practice for me to live with a Spanish speaking family. I have been learning A LOT of Spanish, when looking back to when I first arrived in Costa Rica barely knowing any words- to now being about to build friendships with Spanish speaking people is so incredible.

So life here in Costa Rica has been slowing down a lot these past few weeks. Us interns have been working in the office everyday 8hrs/day like a normal office job. We have been working on the various aspects of the projects in Guatemala. I have been working a great deal on the Agros project- developing computer-generated drawings on a program called AutoCAD. The structural engineering volunteer for the project sent me over 25 structural drawings to be drafted in AutoCAD, including learning how to design a roof truss. It has been a lot of work so far, but I have been learning a lot! I know that I have so much to learn, and that school has only set the foundation of me becoming an engineer. It has also been hard for me to adjust to life in an office. Since I am a very active, love to be around people person, being in an office not exactly what I’m used to, but I am learning to adjust. Being able to work on projects that are for ministries helping the poor, gives me great motivation to do the best work I can on these projects.

Also during the week, us interns, our two eMi leaders, and one Costa Rican friend are getting together once a week to learn what it means to be a true disciple of Jesus Christ. We are learning what disciples back in the days of the bible were required to do and how being a true disciple requires commitment and desire to lay down everything for the sake of becoming like Jesus.

I am so thankful for having this opportunity to work with eMi, and to be able to serve using some skills that I have learned. Yes it has been a CRAZY couple of months, but I have definitely learned a lot through my experiences here so far. I want to be stretched for the sake of becoming a better person and learning how to love God and people better.

(Pictures: 1. a spontaneous symmetrical picture 2. area around Atenas 3. a view from our office 5. during a morning worship time)