Pura Vida!

I'm sure you have heard "Pura Vida" is like Costa Rica's motto. Living here and becoming accustomed to the culture has made me begin to take in to account how meaningful that saying is to the people here. Most Ticos say it casually "Como esta mae?".."Bien, pura vida!" but the more I've heard it the more I sense how much it means. It's their blessing to one another, a greeting...a reference to pure life. David, my homestay brother, taught me to greet the driver of the yellow school bus that serves as the Monteverde bus with "Pura vida!" so that he doesn't charge me the "gringo" price :) Last night I sat leaning against the concrete of my house, surrounded by palm and lemon trees and a lush garden and remained in the ultimate silence of this pure life, watching the sunset until it began to get dark. The beautiful fading yellow light hit where I was at one point, then gradually moved, leaving me in darkness. I remembered what a friend of mine told me when we were in seventh grade about that brilliant light from the sunset. She said it was the type of light where even the ugliest person could look beautiful..
Isn't that light God? When we are in it we are beautiful, almost ethreal..content and at peace. When we leave it we are left in darkness, that though we try to light up on our own, there is no beauty like there is in the Son. Seeing this taught me so much about sharing that light. It's not something you can pick up and give..it's something a person has to enounter on their own. The best I can do is know that light and spend my time in it, then through me, people may see that there is a real light that exists and seek it. In God's love I have the power to be and through that the power to share. What a gift!

A few nights ago, a family friend came over with tamales for us. They are a common gift here and soo delicately fascinating! It is some sort of homemade tamale wrapped in bananna leaves. Often after school, a couple comes and sells their homemade cinnamon rolls and bread, pushing them in a stroller. Then there are the younger kids that climb up into the trees and pick some native fruits for me... I still have yet to find out what they are though :) All the food is so interesting and new! The other thing that has taken some getting used to but I really enjoy now is walking-twenty mintues to school, forty five to most friend's houses, an hour to the market..it's the pace of life here! God has blessed me and the routine of my life here is setting in, this is home now and I am enjoying learning and growing as this new comfort zone develops!
Thank you for your prayers and support,

Love, Emma

Tranquilo

Tranquilo is the word used by locals to describe Monteverde. You can probably guess the meaning of it...peaceful. I am enjoying the slow, yet interesting pace of life here. On Wednesday nights, I go to a salsa dancing class and every Saturday we play a long game of ultimate frisbee. Soccer isn't the only sport Tico's excel in! I also joined a choir, and we sing beautiful Spanish hymns and other pieces. This past Friday I ran into some people from choir at a Scrabble game, it was mostly the elders in the community and they played Scrabble like I have never seen before! I had my head buried in a dictionary trying to keep up. Right now the streets are running with water from the pouring rain but everything is still beautiful. The rainy season is beggining and the palm trees are a bright green, along with all the other lush plants in the rainforest. Last weekend I was in Puntarenas for the Dia de Indepencia torch run..some classmates and I got on the bus with other students from the Centro de Creativo y El Colegio esculas and we drove down to meet the torch, signifying Costa Rica's indepenence. People had been running with the torch since Guatemala, accompanied by about 40 or 50 firetrucks, police cars, ambulences, ect. Where we met the torch was where it entered a new district so all the sirens and noise stopped as the runners held the torch up high in the pitch black 2:30 AM darkness and we sung the national anthem. Then the noise started again as we lit the Monteverde torch and continued on. We ran all night long, climbing in and out of the back of a pick up truck and the buses, running hard and holding the torch high. We got to Santa Elena at about 8:30, where the people were out on the streets as the sirens echoed and our tired legs kept running...it was a truly amazing experience.
I am about to get washed away in the rain, so I'm going to begin the trek home :)
I will try to find time to update a little more but I love you all back home and hope things are great!
I'm praying for you always and appreciate your prayers too!

Emma

The Speck

Right now, there are children scared of starvation in third world countries,
people dancing in Hollywood,soldiers dying in Iraq, and you reading this off your computer screen probably halfway across the world from me. And here I
am..standing still on a spinning planet in a country that is foreign
to me. I feel so helpless sometimes, a teeny tiny speck on a spotted
globe. But I feel more alive than I have ever felt. I just finished
reading "The Old Man and The Sea" by Ernest Hemingway. At the
beginning of the book, he has dreams of lions he once saw in Africa,
then the next day he goes through the trials and struggles of trying
to catch a fish and is defeated and tested many times. The last paragraph talks about how he
lies in his bed at night, dreaming of the lions in Africa.
I feel like the old man. Tested, struggling, defeated at times, and at
night no matter what, always lying with the lions. With my thoughts of doubt, joy, fear-The
new life I am experiencing is beyond what my mind seems to know how to
comprehend, so my thoughts always wander back to the same curious place.
My friend Dan, who is also an exchange student, had a good point..we
have been here near a month, eaten the food, met the people, spoken
the language and have had the short cultural experience we are used
to. He said he keeps thinking, "Okay, I did it, it's time to go home."
Now what we noticed is coming upon us is the feeling of our comfort zones leaving, and a new one coming. We are LIVING here. This is home! The new comfort zone is
foreign, and I almost find myself not wanting to let it consume me.
It's the familiar routine of walking through the rainforest to school,
looking around a crowded church of people speaking in a new language to me, and of being alone at night in the loud
peace of the rain knowing that this experience is mine. My life. So
many people exist and blur past me daily, new faces that I am
beginning to recognize, and I think back to the speck that about a
month ago was on Orcas Island. The same little speck.
The other day in assembly, which was in Spanish, I heard whispering
behind me so i turned around...there was a small second grader translating
to his friend. The face of the boy who was translating was all scrunched up,
concentrating carefully as he listened in Spanish to pick out the
words to use in English to tell his buddy. That same day there was a scorpion in Pre-Calculus. AHH! Every day really is an adventure!

As I am learning more Spanish, I notice that I mix Spanish and
English often..there are some words that just sound better in Spanish
or vice versa. Ultimate Spanglish!


I´ve been spending a lot of time reading through 1 John in English and Spanish, this verse is one of my favorites :)

1 John 4;18-19
En el amor no hay temor, sino que el perfecto amor echa fuera el temor. Porque el temor conlleva castigo, y el que teme no ha sido perfeccionado en el amor. Nosotros amamos, porque él nos Amó primero.

I miss you all and am praying for you always. I hope the beginning of the school year is starting off well!

EMMA