6 Dogs, 5 Days, 4 Friends, 3 Family Members, 2 Planes, and 1 Pura Vida later...I made it!

I arrived in Costa Rica on August 15th, 2011, to begin my internship and instantly began living "La Vida Tica". "Tico" is the Spanish word for a native Costa Rican (or "tica" for a female). Clearly, I am no where close to actually being an authentic tica, but in the small amount of time that I have been here, I sure am learning more and more about what that means!

Now, to explain my countdown:

• 6 Dogs- The host family I live with owns 6 dogs. Two cocker spaniels live inside the house with us, Kiwi & Tisha, and the other 4 live outside. The outside dogs are two labs, a German Shepherd, and a mutt. 
• 5 Days- I've been in the country for 5 days. 
• 4 Friends- I work with an awesome International Schools YoungLife staff here in San Jose: Jessie, Ali, Alex, & Nicki.  These four young women have become my newest and closest friends. 
• 3 Family Members- I live with a host family in a suburb of San Jose called Escazu. My family includes my wonderful madre, Marion, her daughter, Natalia, and Natalia's son, Santiago. 
• 2 Planes- It took two plans to get here; one from Knoxville to Houston and then from Houston to San Jose. 
• 1 Pura Vida- That's the tico motto here. It applies to anything and everything about Costa Rica. Es la Pura Vida. 

As far as our ministry here is concerned, our international schools ministry is only a small part of theYoungLife/Vida Joven presence in Costa Rica. YoungLife has been in Costa Rica for almost 30 years and has a well established nationals ministry called "Vida Joven" for Spanish speaking natives. Our branch of the ministry focuses on the international schools here where the curriculum is taught and our ministry is done in English. We had our leader retreat this weekend with all of the international school staff, interns, volunteer leaders, and student WyldLife leaders. What an incredible experience that was! High school students had me in tears as they described their desire for middle school students and their peers to know Christ. It was a refreshing reminder to me about my own purpose in being here, why I answered God's call to go, and how He can take what little I have to give and multiply it to fulfill His plan. Below is a picture of our student WyldLife leaders (high school students grades 10th-12th who lead middle school students grades 6th-8th) at the retreat.

To conclude this brief summary of my first few days here in San Jose, I'll share what has been a important verse for me as I prepared to come here and is still now that I am here. It is obviously the general theme of my blog and experience, as well as the first verse I memorized in Spanish. It's John 10:10, and in the words of Jesus Christ translated to Spanish: 

"El ladron no viene mas que a robar, matar, y destruir; Yo he venido para que tengan vida y la tengan en adundancia."