I've been putting off this post for a few days now, not because I didn't have anything to say, but because I didn't (still don't really) know how to put it into words that people can understand. So this is my attempt to show you and share with you my 2 weeks in Costa Rica.
When people say that missions trips change your life forever, they aren't kidding. They aren't trying to advertise them or get you to go. No, in fact, now I would take it as a warning. A warning that what you are about to see will be forever ingrained in your mind. You won't let it go; you won't be able to because it's written on your heart. You're very being has been altered by the experience.
May 5th at 6:30 am, I woke up to go to the airport where I would fly first to Houston, TX and then to San Jose, Costa Rica. The morning was hectic (of course I didn't pack until the last minute so there was stuff I still needed to put in my suitcase). I was nervous about getting checked in and through security to make my flight. I was frantic and anxious. SO many emotions.
My flight was at 8:30am. I arrived to the airport at 7:40am, was through security by 8:10am and was supposed to board at 8:20am. In those 10 minutes, I had enough time to go to the bathroom and start to lose it. I mean, I lost it, completely and utterly. I was crying--in the airport! I called my mom & just started freaking out. What was I doing?? I didn't know anyone on the trip. I was going to another country for 2 weeks, ALONE. Any of those actions by themselves were out of character for me to do, much less all of them put together! Who had taken over my body & what had they signed me up for??
Once on the plane, I began to pray. God, please please please be with me these next 2 weeks. I need someone. I need YOU. God, please let me make friends- it's going to be miserable for 2 weeks with no friends! Please let it be fun and let me not regret making this leap of faith.
That was basically my prayer for the next 2 hours on the way to Houston. Once I got to Houston, I had calmed down. Only one more plane ride until I was in another country, on the adventure that I had always dreamed of and had waited so long to begin. With excitement building, I even scanned this flight for possible teammates. Who looked like they could be medical students? Her? Him? That group?
Landing in Costa Rica was exhilarating. I can't describe it. My first flight alone & it had been international. I was now in an entirely different country that spoke an entirely different language. When I called my mom to tell her I had landed, it would be international. It was a cool feeling.
When I got my bags, got through customs, and headed to meet my team, I felt really anxious. Were they going to like me? Did they all know each other? Guess at this point it didn't really matter though! I was then greeted with a huge hug & kiss from a strange woman. A woman I now would call "mom" in a heartbeat, but then had no idea who she was. Her name is Grissel and her spirit would make any person melt into the floor. She's sweet, kind, compassionate, and warm. Everywhere we went, it was like having my mom with me. She felt like home.
I then met Stephanie and Chelsea, two girls from Pittsburgh, who had come on the trip together. Turns out they had been on my flight from Houston (I thought I had seen them!). We introduced ourselves and chit chatted until the next arrival came, Jeannie from Idaho, but she goes to school in Nebraska. The cutest little thing you'll ever see. The four of us talked for a while, apparently the others were on a different flight so here we sat, waiting for them to arrive. Noa, Ligia, and Hannah were the next arrivals. Noa and Ligia being from Chicago and Hannah coming from Michigan. Last, but not least, came Natalie, the Canadian. That was it, we could leave the airport now--headed home as Griss said. At this point, we had no idea where we were staying. Some place called Casa Concordia, but was it a hotel? Hostel? Dorm? None of us knew. About 45 minutes later we pulled up to a house, Casa Concordia- house of harmony. This is where we met the rest of our team--all 18 of them-- 16 girls & 2 guys. Pittsburgh was home to 5 more of the girls on the trip, not all of them came together. The others were from various places. Two girls, Amanda and Sam, from Michigan, and one from Georgia. And the guys both from Canada. All of us sharing 4 bathrooms and 4 showers where toilet paper couldn't be flushed. The guys shared a room, 8 girls were in the big room, 4 girls in another room, and my room had 5 girls. Plus our team leader in the downstairs room.
Our team leaders name was Daniela. We didn't find it out until later, but she's only 21! You would think based on her wisdom and personality and just overall take charge attitude that she would be late twenties. But, I'm older than she is? No way, she's much more mature than I am.
Anyway, the first night was ok. A little awkward because none of us knew each other really and we were all so jet lagged! I think we all went to bed around 8:30! The next day was orientation, so it was ok, we would have allll day to get to know each other.
Orientation day, we learned about Costa Rican culture. We talked about the people and the government and we compared it to the United States as well as to it's neighbor Nicaragua. The statistics were astoundingly similar in some areas and extremely different in others. Daniela explained the healthcare system to us and why it is so difficult to get an appointment to see a doctor. When they schedule an appointment, it could be years before they will see you! YEARS. That is unheard of in the US! Surgeries are planned years in advance. If you have an emergency, the hospital is the only place you can go and even then you must have social security or they won't see you. Children get social security up until age 12 for free. After that it's $20 per month. Not a bad deal if you have the money, but the communities we saw, did not have it.
After the culture orientation, we had a medical orientation where we learned what signs to look for in a physical exam, how to take blood pressure, and how to ask patients in Spanish to explain what was wrong with them. It was a long first day.
Day 2 was our first day of clinic in a community named Los Diques. We spent 3 days here working out of a church gymnasium. We set up clinic with 4 triages with 4 students and a translator for each and one pharmacy with 2 students. We had 2 doctors rotating in and out, seeing all of the patients. Daniela took appointments for the patients as they came in. It was just like a doctors office. The community itself was something I had never witnessed before. It was unlike any homeless area I have ever been to in America because the people have homes. Their homes just aren't our homes. They have houses made of scrap metal, pieced together with anything they can find. Their sewage systems are almost non-existent. Running water and electricity are two things that I found in almost every house though. It was really interesting to pass by a shanty house with a big television in it. There were animals everywhere- dogs mainly, but lots of chickens too. The people here welcomed us. They came to the clinic to just see us, even if they didn't have anything wrong with them. They just wanted to see what was going on. Children would come outside during our lunch time just to watch us. One day, we picked up a game of soccer with two boys- Justin and Kendal. They were awesome kids! Clinic in Los Diques was hard--hard to watch people with what we would consider ordinary problems, have to suffer because they can't afford Ibuprofen or Advil or Tums on a regular basis. This was my first culture shock experience.
The last day at Los Diques we threw a party for the kids with a pinata and candy. They loved it!! I can't explain how great it was to see the smiles on their faces. Leaving after that party was even tougher than I imagined though, it was our first goodbye. Knowing that I was leaving them there to live like that and that I just got to keep moving on just didn't seem right. In any way.
That feeling continued on into our recreation day the next day. We went to the hot springs, which is about 2 hours from Casa Concordia. It was a really extravagant and fancy resort with 25 different temperatures of pools. We spent the whole day laying out and swimming, eating two wonderful meals for lunch and dinner. How is it that we were just serving in a community where they didn't have proper sanitation, but now we are at a spa? That was really hard to wrap my mind around- I actually still haven't done that one.
The next day was the start of a 6 day stretch of clinics where we would spend time in 3 new communities. First was a 3 day stint in Las Palmas. This community was a little nicer than Los Diques. It was still a community of shanty houses, but their floors were mostly tiled and they had nicer refrigerators and sewage plans. People in this community were inquisitive. This was the first time ISL had ever visited this community, so we were the first faces they had seen! We did house visits for this community and took a census, which was really cool to be invited into the people's homes. Each family that we visited, we gave a ticket as an appointment for the clinic, so it served as invitations for them to come be seen by us! Really cool way of advertising! Clinic was set up the same way those days, except this time we had movie theater seats that were a little harder to deal with but as Daniela always said "It's part of the adventure!" At the end of our time there we had another party for the kids, this time an ice cream party where we played "pato pato ganzo" (duck duck goose) and a few other silly games with the kids. It was my favorite share with the community day! They were all so happy and laughing the whole time. I could have stayed forever.
The third community we visited was San Felipe. We only had clinic in San Felipe for one day, but that one day we saw manyyy patients. This community was the worst we had seen this far in the trip. We took time to go out into the community to invite people to clinic and what we saw was just heart breaking. Houses were built around trees, the same shanty way we had seen before. Floors were all dirt and mud, doors were nothing but pieces of metal. There was no real walk way between houses, usually just some cinder blocks or pieces of wood to cover the running line of sewage. Children and puppies were sitting on the "porches" of the houses, watching us go by. Dirty, smelly, sad. That's how I would describe this community, but most of all sad. The people weren't sad, they were happy, always thankful to us and smiling at us. They were very welcoming and warm. I was the sad one. Sad we couldn't help the 67 year old woman who had smoked all her life and probably had some form of lung/throat/esophagus cancer. Sad that the 10 year old little boy who came in with a sty looked 6 based on his height and weight. Heartbroken and longing to do more for them besides take their temperature and check their throats.
The last community that we visited was Los Cuadros. This was the worst of the communities. It was the first time ISL had ever stepped foot into this private community. 60 families lived there and our goal was to see each family. This was a different experience. We didn't take our backpacks in with us, only what we could carry. We didn't have chairs or even a real building to set up in, so we just kind of make shifted a clinic with a tent and some tables. Most of us stood the whole day, letting patients have the few chairs that we did have. We were all climbing all over each other those two days. The patients here were different. They would walk into the clinic and just start talking about why they needed to see the doctor even though they hadn't been given an appointment yet and every group already had patients. When we asked some of them how old their children were, they had no idea what the childs birthday was, only that they were around 6 or 7. Several of them had only a few teeth. Only a few of them came in with shoes on and I vividly remember this one little boys feet protruding greatly out of his boots. All this to say, they were in need. It was a greater and more obvious need than the other communities. In our first half day of community there, each triage saw around 8 patients. That's how many we had been seeing in a whole day! This community brought the whole family when they came to the clinic though. I worked in pharmacy that day and would fill 5 prescriptions for the same family because every one had come in together. It was a busy two days! Our time at this community had just ended on Wednesday and we were about to pack up when all of a sudden, the policia came. They weren't after us, they were looking for a member of the community, but it was enough to get us to go to the bus--very quickly.
Our clinic days were over. Where had the time gone? Two weeks had flown by !! The next day was our last recreation day, where we went zip lining and then to the beach. That day seemed wrong somehow too. We had just spent 6 very long and tiring days working clinic, but it didn't seem like we had earned a retreat or break like this one. It seemed bad to enjoy the time off and to relax. There was so much more that we could do with that time and money. Nonetheless, it was a good day. It was our last day together as a team. For some of us, it was the last time we would see most of the people we had come to know and love. It was another day of goodbyes.
Leaving Costa Rica was the hardest thing that I've had to do in a long time. Usually when I say goodbye, I know that it's just a temporary sentiment and I will be seeing the people or place again soon. Its usually a placeholder for a time spent apart- a "see you later". But this time, it was more than likely permanent. I had gotten to know everyone so well, the translators, the doctors, Daniela, Grissel, and especially my teammates! The first group left at 4am and you better believe that most of us woke up to see them off. That was the first round of real goodbyes. I was in the next round along with almost everyone else on the trip. That ride to the airport was the absolute longest 45 minutes of my life. I cried the whole way while reminiscing about the trip to Amanda and Sam. When we finally made it to the airport, Grissel started telling each one of us bye. She hugged us just like our mommas would and told each of us how beautiful we are and how God is with us where ever we go. Well if that doesn't make you cry, then I don't know what will!!! All of us made our way into the airport, checked into our airlines, and made our way through security. On the other side is where the last goodbyes took place. Each of our flights leaving at different times and from different gates, we had to part ways. Those last hugs were what got me the most. Knowing it would likely be the last time I hugged them or even saw them was so hard. We had shared two weeks of our lives together, in another country, serving other people. That's a bond that most people don't share. Its unique.
Getting home was the best/worst thing ever. I loved having my own bed and my own shower and not having to use a water bottle to brush my teeth and most of all being able to flush toilet paper! Hallelujah! But all I could do was cry. I cried because I missed my teammates. I cried because I missed Los Diques, Las Palmas, San Felipe, and Los Cuadros. I cried because I missed Iris cooking rice and beans for every meal at Casa Concordia and Omar's awful bus driving. Most of all I cried because what I came home to is a million times more than any of those communities have.
And that's why it's taken me so long to write this, because I'm blessed. We're blessed. And we don't even know it. We're privileged in different ways than the members of those communities. We are not better than they are or more entitled. We aren't more special or higher in any way. We were just given a different path in life. It makes you wonder why. Why was I given this path in life and not that path in life? Why wasn't I born in Los Cuadros? It's made these few days home a real culture shock and reality check. My time in Costa Rica has lent me a new viewpoint and perspective that I didn't know existed. I find myself crying tears of joy that I am able to write this blog or call my mom from Wal-Mart. Or most recently, eat a good meal at a nice restaurant (yes this happened just a few hours ago!)
But I think what I've concluded, or the conclusion I am coming to, is that it just happens. God has given us all blessings. They just come in different packages. It's what we do with the blessings and how we share them with others that makes us who we are, and that is how I can continue to take Costa Rica with me where ever I go. The four communities we went to gave me perspective. They lent me a new lens on life that I'm not going to lose. While I'm sure I'll be wrestling with the fact that I can go shopping and eat whenever I want to but they don't have that privilege, for a little bit longer. I think I can rest easy in the fact that I wasn't just the one giving in Costa Rica, the people gave me a lot too.
And I am definitely changed forever, for the better.
I can't wait to go back someday. soon.
Pura Vida.
