Tico Tuesday, May 13th

This past weekend I had the opportunity to attend United World Mission's (UWM is the organization with which the LAM merged) Latin America conference. We spent a nice long weekend at the beach with worship, field reports, and forums/workshops in the mornings, and then nice afternoons and evenings of time to enjoy the beach, pools, and one another's company. Two other "LAM background believer" families were there for most of the weekend as well (and my friend short-termer Kiki helped out with the kids).
 Callie, my new kindred spirit who works in Mobilization (formerly with LAM and now UWM), and I were there the whole time. Callie and I first met at the LAM/UWM retreat a couple months ago and enjoyed the brief time we shared together. This time I picked her up at the airport and we were buddies all weekend. We were the only young single women participating in all the sessions. I am SO grateful for her! We have a lot in common--she actually served here in CR for a while, so she speaks Spanish really well, and with tons of tico slang that cracks me up! I was relieved she wanted to be active and swim in the pool with me. I was afraid I would be missing my mom, since we have always been hotel pool buddies. (Did you remember to call your mom for Mother's Day?)
The weekend was a wonderful opportunity to gain a better understanding of UWM and how it works. It was also neat to meet the other UWMers who are in Latin America and get to know them. I now have friends in Chile, the DR, Argentina, Colombia, and a really sweet couple is on its way to Peru!
The downside of the weekend: the violent 24 hr stomach virus that hit many of us. But God was gracious, and miraculously I did not give it to Callie, Kiki, nor the Kamper kids whom I was babysitting when it hit me. Another upside? The last morning I got to have breakfast with John (the president) and another leader from the office in Charlotte. Our conversation was a great blessing to me and I cannot say how happy and grateful I am for the leadership of UWM. I admire them deeply. I'd love to say more about my weekend, but it's late and this is already getting long. Maybe another blog post later. My next semester starts on Monday!
There are UWM board meetings the latter half of this week. Please join me in praying for them! Gracias!
Peace and good health be with you,
Carrie