From Karen: House of Hope & Costa Rica Update

Dear Friends and Family,

I’d like to first start out with the most recent news and then work backward to our exciting trip to Costa Rica.

One of the ships that frequent the pier here in Puerto Lempira sank at the mouth of our lagoon just before we returned. Two men lost their lives and all the ships cargo still lies on the bottom of the ocean. Huge propane tanks were lost. Most people here use it to cook with. Roger came over to see if they could borrow our spare tank. They were in the middle of baking bread at the House of Hope, ran out of propane and found there was none in town to buy. I said sure. He lifted up our spare and found it was empty. He then asked to borrow the one hooked up to the stove. “Sure, I don’t need it until dinnertime,” I replied. He picked that one up. It felt lighter than the empty one. So guess who went without warm bucket baths and ate sandwiches for dinner? Gabrielle pointed out that that’s how our time in Honduras started, out in Cauquira, and so it was fitting that it should end in the same manner. Fortunately the propane dearth lasted only a few days.

Roger had an extra computer monitor in storage that Ed asked if we could borrow. We have no working laptops. Ed figured we could get one of them to work, even though the screen is not working properly, if we had a monitor to connect it to. While searching for it in one of the storage rooms at the House of Hope (“H. of H.”), Roger was stung by a scorpion. Ed said he jumped up and down and yelled loudly for quite some time. The next time I was over there, a family whose house burned down came looking for any help we could give. Katrina had some clothes that had been donated to the kids at H. of H. that were in pretty bad condition. Because she had been given so much in certain sizes we had weeded through them and put the really soiled
stuff aside to give away to someone even more unfortunate than the H.of H. children. Here they were. Believe you me, I was so cautious going through the box of discarded clothing- I was on high scorpion alert.

The newest addition to the H. of H. family is a little malnourished baby girl. I don’t know if any of you remember, but when we first got here, I wrote how Katrina and Roger had a malnourished little girl they were caring for. That girl ended up in the hospital with pneumonia at the same time as the 17 year old burn victim. This is her younger sister. She is 18 months old and weighs about 10 pounds. She looks as if she is about 5 months old, but her physical abilities (or lack thereof) are that of a newborn. She can’t even steady her own head with her weak neck muscles. The grandparents brought her to Katrina after the birth mother ran out on her children. Supposedly, the mother starves her kids in order to “get back” at their biological father. Don’t even ask. The doctor at the hospital told Katrina she got the baby just in time. She was literally at death’s
door. Bethany and I went to the H. of H. the following day. We both fell in love with her. The next day Michaela came with us. She’s smitten too. We took her home from church with us on Sunday to give Katrina a break and to spend some time doting over her. Bethany and Michaela named her Noelle (she had no name). In just 5 days time, she’s gone from no expression to occasionally smiling when we blow raspberries on her belly. How overwhelming it is to see my Bethany cherishing, nurturing and nourishing this starved fragile life.

Holding Noelle in church Sunday morning, looking around at the meager, dirty surroundings, the missing ceiling tiles (if you stare long enough you can spy a rat or two up there), the nursing dog standing in the doorway, and singing one of my favorite worship songs, I realized how hard it will be to leave this place when the time comes.

Now about our trip. We all enjoyed a wonderful time in Costa Rica and have decided that each of us will pick a portion of the trip to write about. I had a hard time believing this country was in the same region of the world as Honduras. Costa Rica is prosperous, modern, clean, ecologically conscious (eco-tourism is big), and breathtakingly beautiful. Chaela absolutely loved it, especially the Paloma Lodge located on Drake’s Bay-due south, on the west coast. She plans to spend her honeymoon there--that’s how great of an impression it made on her.

I have never stayed in a rainforest before. It is not for the faint of heart. The humidity was unreal. When we would hang up a damp t-shirt to dry, it would actually be wetter in the morning. Once something became damp (from sweat) or wet, that’s how it stayed. There were no screens on the window frames, only slatted shutters. The bugs, which were more numerous than those in Puerto Lempira (and in some occasions, BIGGER), flew in and out our bungalow at will. The surrounding grounds were very steep and at night down-right treacherous. Gabrielle wants to write more about the Lodge, so I’ll say no more. Our stay at the Paloma included two excursions. One, a day trip to a rainforest national park (6:45 am departure) is Bethany’s designated topic to write about. The second excursion involved snorkeling off an ocean island (Chaela’s subject).

One evening we went on a two-hour bug tour with a local entomologist (Tracy). WOW. I think it was the highlight for all of us. She started us out in a small grass field and asked us to hold our flashlights up by one of our temples and comb the grass slowly with the beam of light. She asked if we could spot glints of green light, like crushed emeralds sparkling in the grass. These flecks of bright green were the reflection from spider’s eyes. She concluded that there was about one spider every 6 inches. She then led us along the steep narrow dirt roads that snake around the area. On one side of the road there was a dirt wall about 5 feet tall. This area was loaded with nocturnal insect activity. We saw and she handled some of the most gruesome creatures (mostly spiders) I’ve ever seen up close and personal. We were all ready to bolt in case the dreaded creature she was handling jumped out of her hand. Spiders that weave a net to lower on their prey, spiders that build trap doors to snatch unsuspecting insects that venture too close, and spiders that each night take three hours to weave an elaborate web resembling a strip of the finest linen (it’s rectangular, about a foot long and 4 inches wide). One huge spider, I think she called it a “wandering spider” has a relative in Brazil that is so aggressive it’s been known to chase people in order to bite them. Their bite can be fatal. We learned about a fungus that burrows inside a grasshopper and then eats the non-vital organs. The grasshopper’s brain is the next to go, the fungus eating just enough so that the grasshopper will go mad and travel up a tree--not a normal behavior. Once it reaches the top of the tree the fungus has multiplied enough to explode out of the grasshopper’s head, raining new spores on the rainforest floor. I’m not kidding! Before walking back to the Lodge, Tracy’s helper took a Tupperware container out of his backpack containing a large scorpion. He let it crawl all over his hands and arms. He’s somewhat impervious to the venom, so handled it with no fear. Tracy taught us that if you ever have a scorpion on you, just let it crawl off and don’t move. They respond to pressure coming down on them. They love moisture (in the Tupperware was a piece of damp sponge) so be
especially cautious when handling damp towels, etc. Not all the creatures we saw were of the skin crawling nature. We did see a very cute salamander sleeping on a leaf, tiny white “ting” frogs, and a poison dart frog. The tour ended in the Lodge’s open-air dining room. There were huge frogs on the floor looking for food scraps (they love dog food). The rainforest nightlife verges on the unbelievable. Would you be able to go back to an open-air bungalow and sleep tight after that?

The day before our bug education, I was about to lie down for a nap when I noticed three rodent-type feces on the bedspread. A rat in the rainforest? Then I thought “gravity”, and looked directly overhead to see the BIGGEST grasshopper/locust (?) ever. It was about 6 inches long and very juicy. Ed pummeled it and the mess was bad enough that housekeeping put a new clean bedspread on our bed the next day. YUCK!

On our last day in Drake’s Bay we zoomed through the rainforest canopy about 50 feet above the ground on zip lines. Believe it or not, it was not as thrilling as we had anticipated, but we were glad to have tried it. Because the foliage is so lush and abundant you don’t have the sensation of being very high up. Also, the equipment they have you buckled into makes it almost impossible to hurt yourself.

We left Paloma Lodge intending to fly to Tegucigalpa (capital of Honduras), via El Salvador, spend the night then make our way out to Puerto Lempira the following day. We only made it as far as El Salvador. The burning of fields in preparation for planting created so much smoke that all the major airports in Honduras were closed. We spent an unexpected night in San Salvador on TACA airlines. The next day we were only able to make it as far as San Pedro Sula (in Honduras). Eddie rented a car and we drove to La Ceiba to spend the following three days in our favorite hotel there (good food, a pool, hot showers and cable television!). The smoke finally dissipated enough for us to fly back to P.L. Due to the delays we were all ready and anxious to return home.

Thank you Lord for a wonderful trip! How awesome is our Creator! How manifold are all His Works!

We miss you and will see you all soon.

Love in Christ Jesus,
Karen and family