School ended on Thursday, the 23rd. The 24th we woke up and I think we both knew we had to make the decision right then if this weekend was going to be good or hard... in retrospect, I think we fought hard for the good.
Christmas Eve is the day of big celebration here. Everyone cooks all day, wraps presents and then around 8 family gathers together and FEAST. We skipped the wrapping presents part (since our gift to ourselves is going to the Pacific coast for the week, 28th-the first. But we did bake for the first part of the day. I made choc chip and coconut cookies. Made about..4-5 dozen. Made baggies of cookies for our apartment mates (single guys, one from Maryland and one from England). And then packed a jar for the family we spent Christmas Eve with... The Miller clan skyped with us early evening. Bittersweet to see everyone... made Matt want to grab the next stand by home... we kept it together though...
Around 7:30 we taxi'd over to our new friends Carlos and Tatiyana's family's home. Should have known that 8 meant 9 but... it was all good :) I put some pics up... cousins, aunts, uncles, and the mama and master cook of it all- Grace. Very sweet. We had a pig roast (with some cloves and cinnamon marinade that honestly is making me salivate right now...salad, yuca, rice, beans, and a merengue apricot pie that..again...salivating). This to say, my cookies were not touched much, but its the thought that counts. :) We were quite comfortable to tuck ourselves in the corner to make room for everyone around the tree during gift opening time (which happened around 11) but were very surprised to find that we had gifts under the tree as well! Cotton socks..yes, the best. It was very thoughtful. We got back to our apartment around 1 am. Carlos and T were still there but... Matt and I started pumping ourselves with Tico coffee around 11:30 to stay awake and it wasn't kicking in fast enough so we called a cab... when we got in the door, the coffee had kicked in so we caught some more infamous "House" episodes in Spanish until we fell asleep.
Christmas morning was hard. We woke up around 8:45 in time to set up our 9 am skype to visit with my parents and sister. It was my turn to end our video and want to catch the next flight home..again, we kept it together. We cleaned the apartment up a little bit, made a fresh batch of coffee and french toast and settled on the balcony to read the Christmas story together in the fresh air. We prayed and thanked God for everything, especially His gift of Jesus. We stayed out and read for a little bit. But around noon I knew we had to do something..for our sanity... so we decided to do some city exploring. We figured robbers would all be hung over or sleeping in so our guard was down a little bit. Really.
We were in "luck..." the central park area of San Jose was SWARMING with people. It was like Mall of America on Black Friday. Everyone was out shopping, and eating ice cream on park benches. I found a hair shop and got some long needed leave in moisturizer. Matt and I got sundaes from Mc Donalds... and then walked the few miles back to the spot. We got back early evening and I fixed a step child Christmas dinner, but dinner nonetheless (since I do not have an oven, just a toaster oven and a stove top). Then I introduced Matt to the classic Black Christmas movie "Preachers wife".. we downloaded it from I Tunes. He was pretty disturbed that Denzel was an angel but still trying to get with Whitney...lol. sigh...
Sunday morning we had house church, a little worship service even thanks to you tube and i tunes. Made a big rice and chicken lunch and while Matt caught Futbol americana on cable the rest of the afternoon, I actually picked up the canvas I bought from an art fair not too long ago. Started sketching...it felt good. I plan to work on it a little more each day. Around 7:30 we left for Castros in Barrio Mexico. Caught a cab, ate dinner and stayed late into the night for some dancing. It was a lot of fun actually. Matt busted out his salsa, bachata, merengue moves. I let my BC club days come out a little bit and Matt and I put on a reggaetone show...had to show'em how we do it in the US...lol. sigh. we left smiling...
And today...we pack and clean in prep for our week trip to Montezuma, off the Pacific. We are taking a detour this evening with Matt's Spanish teacher and family to some carnival and new year festivities in the city. Matt is very vocal about his excitement to jump in the bull fighting ring... Ill let you know how that goes :)
God is faithful... As good of a Christmas away from family and snow as it could be I think.
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