Sorry, couldn't help myself with that title. Yes, I know Easter was ten days ago, but I never got to blog about my Easter Sunda,y and today I just so happened to receive an Easter package in the mail from my kindred spirit, so here are some highlights from my Easter, as well as what I've been up to these last two weeks.
sabado negro
(Black Saturday) April 7th
Easter Vigil
Saturday night I went with my host family to the community Easter vigil. It gets dark here around 5:30 PM (major bummer) so we arrived in the dark and gathered with many other believers around a fire pit outside. A Catholic priest (similar to the one in this picture on the left-I felt like it would be disrespectful to take a picture of the actual priest, so this Google image will have to suffice) was singing/chanting something in Spanish when we arrived. He had a huge white candle, which I learned is the "Paschal candle." The priest dipped the candle into the fire and the flame began shining. I found out that this flame is supposed to symbolize Christ as light of the world and His presence in the midst of His people. Everyone around the fire had a candle (similar to the ones I've seen at church advent services around Christmas time) and the priest began a domino effect by using the Pascal candle to light another candle, which lit another candle, etc...
Next, the priest led the congregation into the church, where it was pitch black. This darkness was supposed to represent the darkness of a world without God. A few other rituals took place, which you can read more about at this link: Paschal-Candle. Suddenly, the candles were blown out, the lights all turned on and people began hurrying about with flower arrangements, banners, and a variety of other things (it was so fast and I'm sure I missed things). And we began celebrating Christ's risen body. We sang this familiar Easter song:
| Cristo ha resucitado; ¡Aleluya! Hoy gozoso oíd el canto; ¡Aleluya! Con trompetas proclamad: ¡Aleluya! Cielo y tierra entonad: ¡Aleluya! Nuestro Rey hoy tiene vida; ¡Aleluya! y la muerte fue vencida; ¡Aleluya! Él murió para salvar, ¡Aleluya! y la tumba conquistar; ¡Aleluya! Su amor lo ha logrado; ¡Aleluya! Redención Él no ha dado; ¡Aleluya! Su agonía terminó; ¡Aleluya! En fulgor se levantó; ¡Aleluya! |
That was a whole new experience for me. Sunday was spent with my host family and extended family. Tata and Tita came over before lunch, along with cousin Josue (4 years old), Tio (Uncle Julio) and his wife and daughter (little Mai!). We celebrated the Passover Seder together. The Seder is a ritual performed by a community or by multiple generations of a family. It was pretty cool to see three generations participating in our Seder feast.
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| Vero & Mai on a mission for eggs |
Afterwards the moms prepared lunch and Vero and I took the two little cousins out to find chocolate Easter eggs. Here are some pictures from our adventures outside:
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| Egg in the hanging plant! |
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| Más chocolate, por favor! |
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| Attack of the chocolate Easter eggs. |
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| Josue began his egg search |
Thankfully we are on good terms now and he even knows how to say "Rachel" and speed talks to me in Spanish, as if I was fluent or something :)
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| All three Tico's still searching |
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| Found one! |
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| Me showing Mai how my camera works :) |
Altogether it was a wonderful Easter celebration with my Costa Rican family.
We went to church in the afternoon, where I learned to say ¡Cristo ha resucitado! (Christ has risen!) And the response: "¡En verdad ha resucitado!" (He has risen indeed!)
And that was my eggsperience of Easter with my Costa Rican family.
Two more things to highlight before I go finish my lesson plans for tomorrow:
#1. I didn't know (but I do now) that maids in Costa Rica are rather troublesome. The difficulty is finding a good/honest maid. Unfortunately this week we have now reached maid #4 in the house, since my arrival here. The 1st maid we had ended up having some other duty to attend to, so my host mom interviewed for another one. The next one was one of my favorites: Lorena. She was an excellent cook and she loved to talk to me in Spanish...even though I could hardly understand her accent. But my host mom caught her stealing food, my camera went missing, and she disappeared. The most recent when we had to let go was a sweet young girl, but we found out she was stealing my money. Quite a lot too :( The worst part is that I am afraid she used the money for drugs or some other bad reason. That is a long story, but she did confess to taking it, which was a start. I don't think I'll see this money again, but God has given me peace about it all and I'm going to continue to pray for her. We hit maid #4 today and she seems really nice...obviously I'm going to do take more precaution with the things in my room, but hopefully this maid works out. The house was looking sweet today and she was so cute and even put a hat that was laying around on the teddy bear's head.#2. School Update: I only have 10 days left of teaching! That seems so strange. I've slowly been decreasing one subject each week and this week I'm down to teaching Science and Social Studies. My students are still full of energy and lately they've been drawing me a ton of pictures and writing super cute notes. Here are some examples:
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| One of my students loves jokes...the answer to this riddle is: Student Teacher :) |
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| The students call me T. Rachel (T.R for short) and my cooperating teacher T. Priscilla (T.P) |
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| Baby dedication at church on Sunday |
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| Mision Carismatica Internacional Church in San Pedro, Costa Rica |
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| Matter-Mixture-Masterpiece Projects |
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| One of my students' mixture projects for science-she made an extra one for me to keep, since she said it was so yummy :) |
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| "Singing in the rain..." Welcome rainy season! |
***Oh, side note: I got a job as a summer nanny for a family in Highland park (we Skype interviewed ;) So I will be sticking around Chicago from June 1st-July 20th.***
Things are quickly wrapping up, which is bittersweet, but I am so thankful for all that God has taught me. Time to catch some zzz's!
Until next week :) T. Rachel
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| Parent-teacher conferences-which I led :) |
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| More rain |
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| One of my favorite places to enjoy the rain, read, and right (write ;) |
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| Still can't get over the amazing sunsets |
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