Making a Difference for the Maleku's

An interview with Daniel Vargas, our delegate from Costa Rica and resident translator, revealed that the highlight of today was “dancing with the Maleku kids.” His opinion conflicted with mine; I believed the days’ highlight to be the hot spring surprise.

Today began with another early morning wakeup call – 6:00 AM. We all gathered for breakfast and gazed upon the roosting iguanas joining us for breakfast, for the last time. It was our last meal at the Tilajari Hotel. Butterfly gardens, memorable talks, and unripe star fruit are all things that remain in our memories from the Tilajari.

Our bus departed at 7:30 for the Maleku Indian school. New friends and old friends greeted us with, a now common, Costa Rican amiability. We arrived sporting yesterday’s painting clothes. Blue was the dominant color of our work. Blue doors. Blue walls. Blue hands. Blue stains. Everyone worked together and, at the end, we finished painting the entire school which consisted of three buildings. Due to the overnight drenching of the land and descention of many “gatos y peros,” at times “la pintura no quiere pagar.” I learned the phrase from one of the local community members who got his hands dirty with us and helped us in our efforts to beautify the school. We did what we could to saturate the wall in paint, hoping it was a sustainable coating. Ourselves saturated in blue paint stains, we departed our friends of the Maleku tribe.

Shrouded in whisps of cool, grey clouds, the renown and active Arenal Volcano was shrouded from our view. We arrived at the Volcano Lodge and ate lunch in Styrofoam containers. I didn’t realize the material our lunches were served in until Daniel Vargas made a comment about the millions of years of decomposition required. I later regretted the container of the tasty and small, avocado, cheese, and tomato sandwich served to me.

My moment of the day occurred in our next activity: hot springs - a surprise that our tour guide, Fernando announced! The cascading water rushed down waterfalls. 10 different pools awaited our wading pleasure. Volcanic rock and undisturbed habitat surrounded us. The air smelt of faint sulfur. The hot springs made for an incredible afternoon. We also tried strange fruits without English translations. “Cas” and “Sour Sop” were the delegate favorites. Our stay was not to be spoiled by the intrusion of a snake onto one of the numerous palm trees; however, it was shortly removed.

Today, I had time to reflect and realized that all the people so foreign to each other three days before, were now a tight knit group of companions. The rain began to fall as I thought about the nature surrounding us. We are so fortunate to experience Costa Rica like this.

After we returned to the Volcano Lodge, we had a buffet dinner and headed into our second Sustainability Session. Our awesome delegation leader, Rod Hister, gave an empowering presentation entitled “Making a difference: What I can do.” Our discussions ranged from fundraising to addressing needs. We will meet more in the next few days to develop a project about how we can make a difference; we will then present this to the group.

Undoubtedly, the day was filled with a variety of inside jokes that classify as, “you had to be there” moments. Just an idea of our inside jokes of July 19th for those not on the trip and incapable of fully understanding the meaning or humor – cottage cheese, lemon lime, woods to grandmother’s house, and Patrick is an accessory. You can only wonder!
- David Hines