A Greek New Year

I haven't written any updates in a few days because I figured that my pictures said more about this trip than I could every write. It has continued to be a wonderful trip and I feel so privileged to be a part of it.

On Wednesday we took a trip to the ancient city of Delphi. We loaded onto a coach bus and drove about 3 hours to get there. This was the first time that I had really seen any ancient ruins up close. All I can really say about it was that it was amazing. As the tour guide told us stories and facts I couldn't help but let my imagination run wild in wondering what this place was like in it's prime. I am still having trouble grasping how old the things we were seeing were. Some of the writing on the stones dates back to the fifth century B.C.! Coming from America my idea of what is really old is very skewed. The pictures I put up really tell the rest of the story. After walking around for a while we went over to the museum and got our minds blown away.

On the way back home we stopped in a little village up in the mountains to do some shopping. It was a beautiful place to walk around and enjoy.

Onto Thursday....

We spent the day in Athens. Navigated the public transit which is second nature by now (not really).

Spent the morning touring the acropolis, saw the Parthenon, read Paul's speech from Acts 17 on the very place that he read it himself. We talked about Socrates and Plato and saw the places that they would have spent a lot of time. It has been very cool to talk about these people and these historical events at the very place that they happened...history coming to life.

Friday...

After all of our adventures earlier in the week, we really needed to spend some time in the classroom. We spent about 4-5 hours on Friday doing lecture. I was able to take a nap in the afternoon and spend a couple of hours reading for class. For new years eve celebrations we all gathered in the lounge, ate food, watched princess bride, and played ping-pong. Just before midnight (which was just about 4pm in Chicago) we all gathered on the roof to bring in the new year. At the clock struck midnight we all yelled, some fireworks went off, and all headed to bed soon after. It was a very enjoyable evening.

Saturday....

Another few hours spent in the classroom. Dr. Bryan continues to blow our minds which all of this philosophy. We are all enjoying the class...being in Greece is a definite bonus. For our New Years Day festivities we all went over to Sam Amis's house for an afternoon of fun. Sam is a student at Moody who's family moved to Greece last March because his dad works with the Navy and is in charge of mail. It was a wonderful afternoon with a great group of people.

Monday we are heading to the island Andros for the day and Tuesday we are going to Corinth...I can't wait.

More pictures to come.

-Chip

From Athens to the Aegean Sea...

Yesterday was our first full day in the country. We had about three and half hours worth of lecture time in the classroom studying philosophy which has been really interesting. Nothing was planned for the afternoon so a group of us decided to go and explore Athens. We are staying at the Greek Bible College which is in a village called Pikermi that is about a 45min drive to downtown Athens. We used public transit to make our journey to the city. We were led by two students from the school...public transit in Greece is way nicer and more complex than Chicago. It would have been a nightmare trying to do it on our own for the first time. We didn't really have a plan once we got to the city so our group split up and explored where ever we wanted to go. The two students who got us to the city went off and did there own thing and left us with some hand written instructions on how to get back to the school. Honestly I was a bit nervous about navigating the system without them...

We split off into two groups. Myself and two other guys decided to head towards the acropolis. We really had n0 idea what we were doing or where we were going or if we would ever make it back but it was awesome! As we headed up towards the acropolis we saw this big rock structure that you could climb up and get a great view of the city. We didn't realize until later that we were actually standing on Mars Hill (where Paul gave his speech in Acts 17). I was going to read the plaque that was there but somebody else was reading it and I got to impatient...funny how that worked out.

We weren't able to go into the acropolis because it had already closed but were did a complete loop around the base of the hill. It was really neat just to walk around and soak it all in. At about 5:30 the sun was just about down and we decided two head back. We bought our metro tickets, after some confusion, and eventually found the right train to get on. We got off at the right stop and had to transfer to a bus. I found the bus (or so I thought) and we got on. As we started going I had this sinking feeling that maybe I had read the bus number wrong and we were heading in the wrong direction...it was dark...I didn't recognize anything...not good. Finally, we made a left turn onto Marathon Blvd. which is the road the school is off of. I only recognized the road because of the blue solid line that runs its entire length to mark the route of the original marathon. A wave a relief came over me. We made it back.

Today (12/28) the morning started with breakfast and then several hours of lecture. The afternoon was left open for a trip to the beach with the group. We went to a coastal town called Rafina which is on the eastern side of the country on the Aegean sea. When we arrived we headed to the beach (it was about 50 degrees and windy). Dr. O'neal told us a story about Socrates drawing a picture in the sand...it was really neat. The rest of the afternoon we were free to explore. We just walked around the city and enjoyed the view.

This trip has been wonderful. However, I have found it VERY difficult to adjust to the time change. It is hard to fall asleep and I keep waking up multiple times throughout the night. Hopefully in the next few days things will get better sleep wise.

The most interesting thing I have found in regards to food here is that they put honey in the yogurt...if you eat it without honey it is very bitter and grainy. We also had pizza with corn in it.

I will be posting pictures periodically on facebook.

Off to Delphi all day tomorrow.

-Chip

Across the Big Pond...

On Christmas day I awoke around 8am. I still needed to pack for two weeks in Greece. I pack best under pressure. I was supposed to leave my house at 11am to get to the airport. 3 hours to pack...no problem. Amidst the packing I decided to download an audio book to help ease the many hours of travel ahead of me. I chose 127 Hours which is a true story that was just made into a major motion picture. I saw the movie last week and figured I would listen to the book as well.

I arrived at O'hare International Airport promptly at 12pm and met up with my friend Andy Smith who had flown over from Detroit earlier that morning. We waited about 15 minutes until the rest of the group arrived. My dad assisted in taking our first group photo and then we said our goodbyes and headed to the check in counters. We still had about 3 hours before the flight was to depart so we spent about an hour perusing the food court before tackling security.

I had been looking forward to trying out the new body scanners that the TSA has become so infamous for. Personally I don't give a hoot what kind of scanners they use. I stepped into the machine and put my feet in the correct position. The "friendly" TSA officer who looked thrilled about his job told me to hold my hands up like I was about to catch a football. It was pretty cool if you ask me, however, he also told me not to move so I didn't know when to leave my Desmond Clark stance. I stood there for about 15 seconds longer than I needed to until the guy yelled at me to move along. It was embarrassing. Like I always say...you win some, you lose more.

Our entire group made it through security with no issues and we were quickly off to the gate just to wait another hour before we boarded.

I have never been too Europe or been on plain flight that was more than 5 hours. I really wasn't looking forward to a 9.5 hours flight, but it ended up going much better than I had imagined. The plane took of almost on time and before I knew it we were flying over the Atlantic Ocean. At around 6pm (CST) the flight crew served us a gourmet Christmas airplane style dinner dish. I chose the chicken over the fish. It tasted how it looked; bad. However, it was edible and I scarfed it down with ease.

I listened to my audio book for over half of the flight an periodically glanced at the tv monitors that had a gps map of our location. I was also mentally preparing for the time change that was about to rock my world. We left Chicago at 3:45pm and arrived in Rome at 8:15am on December 26th. Getting through the airport in Rome was a bit of a challenge. We had to get on a tram and switch terminals and then find our way to our connecting gate for our flight which was boarding a few minutes after we got off the plane from Chicago. We all got a sinking feeling when we turned a corner and saw a massive line at a security checkpoint....there was no way we would make our flight. However, myself and another student saw a man dressed in a nice suit who looked like he had some authority. We approached the man and he asked us if we were traveling with a large group. He then said something over the radio and said to us, "This way please." A moment later we were standing in the priority access security line bypassing the huge crowd! (SWEET) We pulled a Home Alone through the rest of the airport and made our plane with a few minutes to spare. Next stop: Athens.

We arrived in Athens and went straight to baggage claim. (I'm not really sure where Customs was but my passport was never stamped anywhere) My bag was the first in our groups to come over the belt: score. We then had about a 25 minute bus ride to the Greek Bible College and the rest of the day has been a bit of a blur. The time change is 8 hours ahead over here. They told us to try and stay awake until 9pm to help with the jet lag. It is now 9:15pm. I am going to bed.

Class starts tomorrow. We will have a 4 hour lecture almost every day in the morning and then do our traveling in the afternoons. This Wednesday we are traveling to Delphi and next week we are heading over to Corinth.

More updates to come.

-Chip

Train accident kills two panda bears

We were watching John play with his Brio train set today and as he was pushing the train past the Brio zoo the train fell off the Brio track and took out the two Brio panda bears...hence todays post title.


Yesterday was very eventful. We leave for Ecuador a week from monday and in order for us to get back into Costa Rica we are required to have a yellow fever vacination. So we left the house around noon to meet David Obando at the hospital in San Jose. I am going to bullet point the process of getting the shot for ease of understanding.

• Go to E.R. to find that lady who gives shot is on lunch break
• Another lady says we can go to the pharmacy and buy the vacination there and bring it back and have another person give the shot.
• We go to pharmacy and buy shots. Get paper work stamped by pharmacist saying we purchased the shot.
• Go back to E.R. and get the shot in right shoulder...pain was a non-issue
• Get the paper that the pharmacist stamped earlier stamped by the nurse saying that we were actually given the shot.
• It's not over
• Then we walked several blocks through downtown San Jose to the ministry of health.
• We gave the paper that was stamped earlier to another person who then gave us a piece of paperwork to fill out
• That same person then fills out a little yellow card which is virtually our ticket back into the country.

THE END

So that was the first half of Friday. Eric and I then traveled to a mall in Tres Rios. Youth group was at 7 but it didn't make sense to drive back home and then drive through rush hour traffic (which would be a nightmare) to get to youth group. We went and saw Slumdog Millionare at the theatre in the mall and then grabbed some food at the food court before we headed to youth group. The movie theatre here sells carmel corn and it was goood stuff. '

Youth group was fun, it was good to see everybody. It was the first night that the group had met in the new youth room upstairs so at the end of the night there was lots of food and games. They made a circle for breakdancing....I stayed far away.

Today was a pretty relaxed Saturday. Eric has been doing a lot of catching up on finance stuff so I have had a lot of time to read, play with John while watching Thomas the Tank Engine, and hang out with Caroline. I learned how to play Carcassonne with Eric and we've played twice today and I've won both times. I'm pretty sure it's beginners luck but we will see.

Tomorrow we have church in the morning. The Oscars are a big thing around here with some people on the team so tomorrow night we will be having a little watch the Oscars party. I'm not sure that I have ever watched it but I am not opposed to the idea, it should be fun.

Well, I am off to bed. Goodnight all.

From a place where it never snows,

-Chip

First Post of 2009!

I will be the first to admit that I am a slacker of a blogger but hey...I do my best. I am in Costa Rica once again and am very excited for the next three weeks. Ironically my last blog post was when I was in Costa Rica last June. Maybe it's just that blogging about life in Fox River Grove isn't all that interesting. Maybe when I get home I will try it and see what you all think.

Getting here was pretty uneventful but in my mind uneventful is much better that than a huge pain in the neck. My flight out of ORD was at 6:55am so we left my house at 5am which meant get up at 4:30am to finish the packing I should have done the night before. I felt bad making my dad get up that early on his birthday but hey...life is not like a box of chocolates. I checked in and got through security with no issues. My flight was delayed about 20 minutes because the plane was making a strange noise which turned out to be a faulty cargo cooling fan. The problem was solved by turning the fan off and I was on my way to Ft. Lauderdale, FL. I sat next to some woman who hogged the arm rest the entire flight but other than that it was fine. The delay ended up being a good thing because it shortened the lay-over time. I stopped in at one of the shops in the terminal to buy and over priced turkey sandwhich and a soda. After about and hour and a half wait it was time to board American Airlines flight 2113 to San Jose, Costa Rica. That plane was bigger than the first and was much more comfortable. I sat next to a father and son and the son was sleeping horozontially on the seat next to me and kept kicking me...but other than that it was fun.

My plane landed at SJO a few minutes ahead of schedule and I booked it to beat the line at immigration. I waited 5 minutes for my bag and slipped right through customs and before I knew it I was outside in the warm sun waiting for Eric to arrive. I had misunderstood where Eric wanted me to wait so he could avoid entering the parking garage but after dropping $2.50 to leave the parking garage we were on our way back to San Isidro. Caroline made a delicious casserole for dinner and John was cute as always. I was very excited that I was able to watch LOST last night...so much good.

Today I learned how to make homemade bagels. I don't actually remember how to make them but they sure were delicious. Tomorrow Eric and I have to go get our yellow fever shots for our trip Ecuador, that should be interesting. I will be sure to write about that tomorrow.

From a place much warmer than Chicago,
Chip

Can I borrow your mulch monkey?

Once again, the title of this post if a Corner Gas quote...you should watch it.

I forgot to mention this earlier...
This is officially the longest I have ever been out of the country

Saturday was quite a day. It was just like a saturday back home...and just how it should be. Eric mowed the hill part of the lawn and seemed to injure himself more than I have ever seen anybody injure themselves mowing the lawn. The Holland vs. Russia soccer game was on saturday afternoon so I showed my support by taking a nap on the couch in front of the TV. We went to Youth Group at Princepe de Paz last night which was nice. I saw a lot of the people I spent a week with last summer there.

Today I awoke promplty at 6:30am. Eric and I had to leave the house by 7:30 so I decided to get up early and head up to the Rancho to do some reading and praying and such. This was our free day so we decided to do a horseback ride, canopy (zipplining), cascades tour. It was really a blast. The resort was only about an hour away, up throught the mountains. We saw a tipped semi-truck on the way. We payed the toll of 50 cents and had no problems on the way there. I was the first one to mount a horse. The asked me if I had any previous horse riding experience and I said yes...though I failed to mention thats its been at least 8 years since I had been on a horse, OOPS! I also made the mistake of wearing boxers to go horseback riding. Wow... It was about a 45min ride up to the first zipline. Let me tell you, going from riding on a horse to wearing a harness...not the best combination but I digress.

The zipplining was very cool. This was the second time I had done this but enjoyable none the less. After the canopy tour they took us to this place called the cascades which was a place in the jungle with some water falls and a pool...very nice. We took a visit to the butterfly garden which was also near there. Instead of taking the horses back we took what they called "the jeep" It was really an ancient Toyota Land Cruzer that they had modified to accomodate a group. It was the most uncomfortable ride ever!...the horse was 10 times better. However on the way back we saw 2 weasles, a tiger snake and a few "Jesus Christ Lizzards" (named because of there ability to run across water). Eventually we got back to the main resort and they provided lunch for us. Then the journey back through the rainy mountains home.

I was exhausted when we got back so I showered and took a nap. Caroline made us Costa Rican style chicken fingers for dinner...which I didn't really get the difference but it wasn't worth asking, but they were good. Now I'm watching the Cubs eat up the White Soxs once again.
This trip has been wonderful since day one. I am so greatful that I have had the opportunity to come back, see old friends and live the life of a missionary for two weeks.
With all that said I am also excited to go home. I have three days of rest and then I'm off to Salt Lake City for a youth conference for a week and a half. I'm keeping as busy as I can...

-Chip

Thursday/Friday

I applogize for the lack of posting over the last few days...by the time I would have time to write I would be too tired which of course leads to lame posting. Yes...I am just coming up with excuses.

Thursday:
On the campus here there is a building for temporary housing for work teams and such. The first two times I came to Costa Rica I stayed in those houses (oh the memories). As I mentioned in an earlier post a group of highschool kids were coming thursday night. So I was put on prep duty which consisted of putting together the welcome bags, sweeping rooms, making beds...oh yeah, and testing the food in the welcome bags to make sure it was ok to eat ;-) Michelle Mcqueary and I were the people who made up the prep team and it was quite a fun couple of hours. Thursday afternoon was pretty relaxed. Eric and I had originally planned to go on my free day thursday but this that and the other all seemed to happen at the same time so it didn't work out. So that evening Eric and I headed to the mall just to get away from the campus for a little while. We found some tables outside of a Cinnabon (which almost seems more popular here than in the States) and studied a couple days in the Life of Christ.

I saw an interesting thing at the mall...relating to the lack of trust everywhere here in Costa Rica. We walked past an ATM machine and there were 3 men standing by it. One man was repairing the machine, another man was the security guys watching as people walked by and the third man had a video camera and was tapping the guy who was repairing the machine. Can you guess why he was video tapping the whole thing? It was so they couldn't be blammed for taking any money out of the machine...PROOF! This fascinated me. I thought it also provided for a good joke "How many Costa Rican men does it take to fix an ATM machine?" Well the answer is really just 1 but that 1 man won't do it without somebody video tapping him and somebody else watching the people. WOW. Ok...I digress.

There was a pizza place in the mall so Eric and I ordered some pizza for take out and headed for home. We were talking about movies while eating dinner and it came up that I had never seen the movie "V for Vendetta" So of course we watched it and I thought it was fabulous. And thus ends Thursday.

Friday:
About wednesday afternoon I started to feel a little crummy, cold symptoms. Thursday came the sneezing and headaches and Friday was the peak of crummyness. So I spent most of Friday morning laying in my bed with a shirt over my eyes. Thus I have survived on expired Advil and plenty of kleenex. However, today I am feeling as though the cold is coming to the end of it's course and I have become a stronger man (wow, must be the expired advil talking).
It has been great being able to wake up around 7:30, shower and dress and go off and find a quiet place here on campus. As I have been studying the life of Jesus I have begun to realize how important it was for Him to be able to go off by Himself and find a solitary place to pray. It is so easy to do that here, there are very few distractions. However, I know I can't just wait till I am here again to find that place...the challenge is on.

Friday afternoon we went to a mall by Princpe de Paz (the church I worked with last year) to meet Jonathan (who I stayed with last year). After Jonathon arrived we headed over to Marlons house to meet Jose Luis and David Obando. We played video games for a couple of hours and then headed to youth group. YG was interesting...they made me dance, I looked like a fool but I guess it was all in good fun.

Well, thats all for now.

-Chip