The work begins...

It's Monday night--and we worked hard today. Half of us sanded and painted and cleaned all day, and the other half taught some kids how to play basketball. We have two sites, one at Mansion of Light--where we are painting the front gate and fence, and Cinco Esquinas, where we are teaching basketball. I was on the painting crew.
First we had to prepare the surface, so we sanded and coated it with turpentine. We also washed the cement. That took a while, pretty much all morning. I think we had at least eight kids running around the church yard and street before lunch--and they hung out with us all day. For lunch we had fish, which was very good, with mashed potatoes and vegetables. In the afternoon we started painting. By the end of the day we had pretty much done the first coat.
At one time during the afternoon, the pastor of the church took us for a walk around the community that the church was in. Once again, it was eye-opening. Looking at the small, rickety houses makes you feel bad for the people who live in them, but seeing a kid you know living in a small rickety house just changes everything. Still, for people who don't have much, they act as most people do. My Dad noticed that in the church service, during a prayer, the pastor was thanking God for the things they had. It went something like this. "God, thank you for this church, thank you for our friends, thank you for everything." Although "everything" isn't all that much--at least, not much stuff.
-Until tomorrow!
-Steven H.

Well, I didn't write a blog Saturday so this one will have to cover Saturday and Sunday. On saturday we got to be tourists for a while. Most of us had an excursion in the rainforest--although a few went to the beach. I went to the rainforest. Getting there took about an hour of driving--and a little more to get ready and get to the station. The first thing we did was zip-lining. Here's how it works, you wear a harness, which attaches to a long cord above your head. You then lift your feet off of the ground and slide down the line. The lines we were going on were about 50 feet in the air--and the views of the rainforest were absolutely beautiful. Once we were back on the ground we took a hike through the forest, it was really something. The plants look exactly like the ones you see in pictures, except they were real.


On Sunday we went to two church services, one in the "Mansion of Light" y le otre en "Cinco esquinas." Mansion of Light is in a very worn down neighborhood--but the people were clean and nice. They played a lot of music. The music was wonderful--even though we didn't know what they were saying. I figured it was about Jesus and/or God, and they seemed like they meant it. It was a very different feeling, trying to worship without knowing the words. Anyway, after some music they introduced us, the whole congregation came up and shook hands with us. Afterwards Bob Ogle and my dad, Mark Hussung, played amazing grace, and then I played the old rugged cross. Then they had a sermon--althogh we had to leave in the middle.
At Cinco Esquinas, again, they played a lot of music--which seems to be common in Costa Rica, and then welcomed us. The neighborhood they were in was nicer than Mansion of Light. After the music they had a sermon, and they had a translator tell us the sermon in English. It was nice to be able to follow along. After the sermon they played a little more music, and then we were done. The rest of the day we saw a cathedral, the ruins of a cathedral, and went shopping. Tomorrow we start working.