2023 - Day 9 & 10 - Our Last Day and the Adventure Home


Because our flights were cancelled the day before, the students had the opportunity to sleep in on Saturday and hang out at the house, while Senora Harrison and I (Clausen) went to the airport to work on fixing our flights. Unfortunately, we were at the airport for over 8 hours and nothing changed. Because Delta shopped out our flights to United, we were unable to do name changes, which meant some students would have to fly home without a chaperone. Thankfully our parents were very supportive and trusting in our leadership, because this was obviously not the ideal plan for anyone. 

While we were at the airport a group of 14 kids went with BT and Ronny to his Saturday men's league game - Talon even got to play! From our understanding he "sold" when he was on Ronny's team, but when he switched to the other team he started scoring." After the game, Ronny took them to the mall to get Starbucks and they ran into a kid from one of our clinics earlier in the week! He recognized our kids and came up to them and said hi! So cool! The other 3 kids and Mrs. Timmer stayed home - the boys played on the soccer field with Axiel (one of the farm workers kids) and Ronny's brothers for HOURS (don't ask us if they put on sunscreen)...

We got all got back to the house at the same time, packed up our bus, and headed over to the hotel that Delta provided for us. While it was nice to be in a hotel with unlimited hot water, the reality that we would not be doing much sleeping at the hotel. We went to Denny's with the coupons provided by Delta, then came back to the lobby to check in about the game plan for the next day. Unfortunately when we went to check in and pay for all of our kids bags we were made aware that the flights changed AGAIN. It was a mess. Some of our kids were on flights all by themselves, some were not scheduled to come home for another week, so Mrs. Timmer, BT, and I stayed up for hours more trying to get all of our kids home. 

Our shuttle left on Sunday morning at 3 AM, so after a maximum of 2 hours of sleep, or none for many of the kids, we headed over to the airport. Unfortunately more issues with flights and tickets and miscommunication between Delta and United continued. We were able to get everyone on a flight home though, and no one would travel completely by themselves. 

Thus began the journey of five different legs of flights to get home to Arizona. Our group stayed in communication through the Band App and our students did an awesome job staying in touch with the group and letting us know when every flight landed and when they boarded the next one. 


This was definitely a very trying day for all of us, students and chaperones, but we all ended up safe at home sometime between 2 PM and midnight. Praise God. 


I want to extend a huge thank you to all of our students for having the best attitudes that they could - I know there was a lot of frustration (from me too), but for the most part they kept things pretty positive, knowing that we had no control over the situation. 

I also want to thank our parents for not only being super encouraging, but trusting in us as chaperones. This was not an ideal situation at all, but having our parents trust and support meant a lot to us and allowed us to focus on getting everyone home. 

Now it's time to work on a lot of refunds and credits from Delta :)

Please read the next post to hear all of our kids final thoughts and reflections on the trip.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

2023 - Final Trip Thoughts and Reflections

Image
  Abigail High – My main high was getting to spend time with people and get to know them. I absolutely love people and so I loved feeling like their sister. I also loved communicating with and pouring into people and kids who didn’t even speak the same language. It seemed like a glimpse of heaven, especially with the Costa Rican worship. Growth – One thing I struggle with a lot of the time is just being myself. God placed people on this trip who helped me feel comfortable and to be able to be myself. God grew me in being able to get to know people and talk to random people which I don’t usually do, even though I want to. Takeaway – I realized I don’t treat my actual brothers and sisters as well as I do my brothers and sisters in Christ. I also saw how much joy everyone has and how hard everyone works for every little thing. It has inspired me to not take things for granted and to not be lazy. Alena High – I think this trip was such an incredible opportunity for me to grow and learn...
Read more

2023 - Day 4, Part 2: Team Reflections

 Here are our team reflections from yesterday: Jacob - the coconut guy was really generous. We found a bad coconut and he went in his house and picked out 6 fresh coconuts to open for us. He didn't have much, so him sharing this felt like a big deal! Jake - It's just a good reminder of how big the world is. While I'm at school every day all of this is going on - it's just weird to think about.  Emily - She was just impressed by the girls and Scottie working hard at painting. They just put on worship music on and sat in it for a couple hours while working. Jose - He just thought it was interesting how the kids would just swarm around these little tiny toys - it meant a lot to them. Isaac - Thought it was so cool/interesting that we ran into Ignacio three times - once when we were painting, once at the school, and once when he was walking back from school Talon - the kids know all the celebrations of all the soccer players. Also, today reminded him to be grateful for what...
Read more

Day 2 - PE Classes and a Basketball Clinic

Image
After a good night's rest we woke up early to get ready for a day full of clinics! While we were waiting on our food we got to see the property in the light and our students all commented on how close we were to the clouds and how fast they moved! The property we stay on is a fern farm set above the city, so we have beautiful views of San Jose. The Team Outside of Our House This Morning Following breakfast we headed to the Maura Hernandez School to lead some PE classes! We were incredibly lucky to have 18 students from Liberty Christian School join us to provide 1:1 translation for our first clinic! We ran a volleyball lesson on one court and a basketball lesson on the adjoining court. In total we ran four sessions on each court, teaching both high school and junior high students the basics of our sports. I was incredibly impressed by the way our students jumped in, had great attitudes, and found ways to connect with the kids we were working with! Justin Setting Up Our V...
Read more