This morning I left the house early to meet up with some friends in front of the National Theater (our central meeting spot for everything!). Andres, a tico friend of ours, was taking us to Cartago for a huge Catholic parade and celebration. The best way I could explain it is a Catholic version of the Eugene celebration. It started out wit the parade. The parade’s purpose was to transfer a statue of a virgin saint from one Catholic Church to another. We watched the statue come out of the first church, and then after it came out the parade turned into mad chaos, as it became more of a pilgrimage than a parade. Everyone followed the small statue throughout the city. After the parade we wondered around Cartago, which was a new city for all of us (it felt so good to get out of the everyday life we’ve been living in San Jose. Plus, the weather was beautiful! We were a little unprepared for the sun, so a lack of sunscreen led to minor burns, but nothing serious…sorry Mom, I’ll make sure to pack sunscreen next time!) After visiting these really neat ruins of an old Catholic church, we bought some lunch and sat in the central park and enjoyed the music, dancing, and all around cultural events of Cartago. Some old retired Jehovah’s witnesses from Michigan witnessed to us while we scarfed down our lunch. We eventually made our way back to San Jose after a wonderful day of exploring. When we came back to the big city life, we stopped and celebrated Melissa’s (girl from our group) birthday with some ice cream from none other than Mickey D’s. Sunburned and being on our feet all day, we all went our separate ways home. After talking on the phone with my wonderful mommy, spending some time with my tican host family, dinner and some TV, it was off to bed.
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