Another big Change...

Well people get ready for a very interesting post! The Martinsen Family has moved to Costa Rica!! That’s right….Costa Rica.

One full week of living on a remote island in an extremely third world country was just a tad more than we bargained for. Ok, well it came down to the fact that after Lane trying desperately for a week to get high speed internet set up at the house, he realized it simply was not going to be adequate for him to still be able to work his business, so we made a very quick move today just a little ways south (about 90 miles) to the beautiful land of Costa Rica. This was an adventure in and of itself so settle in and let me tell you all about it.

Costa Rica was our plan “B” in case the internet was a problem and it became apparent yesterday that yes indeed, we needed to proceed with plan “B”. (I have to admit that I have never been so grateful for failed internet in MY LIFE!!!) Now, don’t get me wrong, our family is truly grateful for the experience that we had in Nicaragua and we learned things this past week that will forever be part of us. Our kids had their eyes opened as to what real poverty is and they suddenly became extremely grateful for the simple things that we all took for granted at home. This is something they could not have learned any other way. The way that people live in Nicaragua and on Ometepe Island specifically is so totally different than anything we have ever experienced before.

While we were all pretty excited to leave, there were a couple things that we knew were going to make it difficult for us. One, leaving the tiny branch of members of the Church there who were so excited to have us, including the missionaries who we knew had prayed for help and hoped that would be us. We knew this was not going to be an easy phone call to make.

The second thing that was going to be even more difficult for us was trying to explain to our wonderful caretakers on the property that we were leaving them. It makes me want to cry all over again even reliving that moment. First of all we cannot really speak their language at all although we had gotten fairly good at figuring out what each other were talking about and so we knew it would be difficult to express how sorry we were about leaving them. You might say, “you only knew them for a week…how hard could it be to leave?” Well, let me just tell you that this little family was one of the sweetest that we have ever known. They are humble and hardworking and we grew to absolutely love them in just one week. Emerson watched over us like a mother hen and had something new and exciting to show us every day or a new food to try, the kids were sweet and happy and always wanting to play and Leyla….it broke my heart to leave her. I type this with tears flowing even now, because I just can’t even tell you how much I love this sweet woman. We worked alongside each other each day and communicated through our smiles and laughter and a little sign language. She was truly an angel to me and she has such a heart of gold. When I saw what she lives in and how she cooks over an open pit and does her washing and takes care of her family…I just was so amazed. She taught me so many things and I am a better person just for knowing her. When we hugged goodbye, it just broke my heart as we wrapped our arms around each other and cried. We both know that the chances of us ever seeing each other again are slim to none. She is my island sister and I will love her forever.

Well, we got ourselves loaded onto the ferry and said goodbye to the Island that we called home for a week. It truly is a beautiful sight from a distance as you see the majestic peaks of the volcanoes rising up through the clouds. I only wish it were that beautiful on the streets. The people have not been taught to take care of their land and it has become somewhat of a garbage dump and is not a desirable place to live in the slightest bit.

Well, we were a bit apprehensive about how to get all of us and our bags across the border and into Costa Rica, but we knew that the Lord would watch over us and show us the way just as he has done since we left the states. We asked the taxi driver if he would be willing drive his van onto the ferry and take us as far as the border and he was willing to do it for a fair price. This was truly a blessing because it made it so that we didn’t have to unload our bags onto another taxi and go through all that hassle. So far all of the taxis drivers that we have met have been super great and helpful to us. Marvin was no different.

So, he got us to the border which is only about 30 miles and then WHOA!! If you have never been to an international border crossing, then you haven’t really lived..ha ha
It was CRAZY! This is where the story gets good so get comfy here…. We had hoards of men all jabbering in Spanish all coming up to the van wanting to help with our bags etc…the taxi had no choice but to let us off here because he could not drive his taxi across the border. There is a large space in between the borders called “no man’s land” that we were going to have to walk with all our bags. It had just rained and so it was extremely muddy which was going to make this a most miserable walk. Plus, you do not feel entirely safe at this point in the journey. It was right at this point that I spotted a big guy that had a CSI Miami t-shirt on and I hollered out to him…”Habla Englais??” He turned around and said “YES!” He turned away for a sec to talk to a border patrol agent and it was his wife who said she spotted Emma and saw the look on her cute, but terrified face and she came over to us and said, “you guys are coming with us.” She had a friendly smile and she spoke English and they had a huge RV so we didn’t hesitate at all!

Let me tell you, this family…the Ballantine family are just the most incredibly awesome people! They were truly good Samaritans and didn’t bat an eye at all our bags. They just started loading them on and told us to get in. Turns out, we have much in common with them. They are crazy Gringos just like us! They were traveling with their 3 kids and one very new daughter in-law. Their oldest son just got married one month ago and has a darling wife, then they have a 17 year old son and a daughter who I think was also 17. They did exactly what we are doing when their 3 kids were exactly the same ages as ours are now. We had so much fun hearing all about their adventures! They are wonderful Christian people who do missionary work all throughout Central America. They helped to start a foundation that provides clean water filters to under developed countries like Haiti. They started in Texas and actually drove their RV all the way down Central America to Costa Rica and are headed to Panama. They speak perfect Spanish and really know the ropes of being on an adventure such as this. Although we learned from them that there are definitely times when it is best to pretend NOT to know Spanish! Ha ha

Anyway, the fact that we came across this family today was NOT a coincidence and we definitely realized what a huge blessing it was for the Lord to put them in our path. I just get choked up thinking about that. They got us to the nearest town that they were going to and then waited with us until we were able to find a taxi van that brought us all the way to this wonderful little house that I am sitting in now typing this post.

I am unbelieveably tired and so I will end this for now and fill you in on our NEW home tomorrow. Let me just say that it feels the Hilton compared to the Island and we have clean sheets and AC and I am so excited for a nice shower with a fluffy soft towel!

We are happy and healthy and excited for this chapter of our adventure to begin!

Laundry in the rain

ok, I need to get up to date here so I don't get too behind, but right now all I can think about is all my hard work of doing laundry ALL DAY yesterday is now back at the house getting wet from the rain.....
I honestly do not have a handle on how to deal with this yet, so I guess I am not going to worry about it right now.
Well, I think I left off at the end of our first evening in the house.
THe next day we went into town. It is called Moyolgalpa and it is where we need to go for any shopping etc. There is a very tiny store basically at the end of our driveway that does have a few things as well, but not much.
So we spent the day in town on Friday and picked up some things that we needed at the house like hangers, toilet paper, just a few essentials and a few small grocery items. It rained hard in the afternoon so we had to take cover in a little store and we ran into the missionaries there. They actually had Abe with them, we had hooked them up earlier in the day so that he could pal around with them. This was just a long interesting day and very eye opening as we kind of explored our new town.
Leyla brought over some rice and beans to us for dinner that night and even though it seemed a little scary to us, we were hungry so we ate it.
Oh I forgot that on this evening we also had a branch activity at the church that the missionaries really wanted us to go to so we did. There were just a small handful of us and the missionaries were teaching the members how to lead music. We brought Hiedo with us (Leyla's son who is 11). Lane volunteered me to sing a song at the end. The church house is very very small. Maybe about 15x15. It was interesting.

Ok so the next day was saturday and our plan was to stay home and try to get the house into a condition that was liveable for us. That sounds crazy if you see how everyone else lives here, but for what we are used to, it was not at all up to par. Very dirty and stinky. Leyla came over as soon as she noticed we were up and moving and she worked along side of all of us all day long until late afternoon. We got up at 6:00! If that tells you anything about how bad it was. I was wishing for my Aunt Kathy and her power cleaning skills right about then! Lora was a total trooper and she and Leyla actually spent 2 hours scrubbing down the tile stairs. Lane tackled the kitchen and I did the bathrooms. The house has a big porch pretty much all the way around and so Leyla also scrubbed that down and mopped the floors. It was a long sweaty day and we were more than tired by the end.

SO the next day is sunday and we had prearranged for a taxi van to pick us up for church at 1:30 so that we could be to church in plenty of time at 2pm. Sure enough at about 1:00, it started pouring rain. Apparrantly the guy with the van couldn't make it so he sent a "moto taxi" for us. This is basically a motorcycle with a buggy like contraption on the back with 2 more wheels. At least it had a covered roof so we would not get wet. The problem was that Leyla and 3 of her kids wanted to come to church with us. I don't mean to make that sound like a problem, I mean that is great right? The only thing is, that made 10 of us including the driver! Oh my goodness....it got us some great stares from others. It was a hot humid cramped ride but at least we made it. Actually we were WAY early because church didn't even get started until about 20 after anyway. That is just how they do things here I guess. Pretty much the branch president's family are the only active ones and a couple others. The missionaries, and us and then our new friends that came with us. There are also a couple other ladies from the states visiting their father, so they were there too. In fact, they are Amparo's aunts. Matt knows Amparo and her family from when they lived in Utah. Anyway, these two women have been so helpful to us and we will be sad when they leave soon.
SO, I led the music for church. Surprisingly enough it is the same as leading in English. ha ha
They only hold church for 2 hours instead of 3 since they have no youth for young mens or young womens. Well, there is Abe now and then the Branch Pres. has a 15 year old son, but they just went with the men.
They asked me to go into Primary with the little kids and the Branch President's wife. It was not the greatest hour of my life, let's just say that. She is a very timid woman, although very sweet but she was totally looking to me to take charge and I wasn't prepared for that. I had about 8 little sweaty children staring at me the whole time. It was a sweltering hot room and I kind of wanted to scream, but that is not appropriate for church right? So I didn't.
We made do with some half wet and wrinkled gospel art pictures that she had in her bag and I basically pointed to the pictures and got out whatever I could in Spanish to talk about the pictures. Then she had a half box of melted broken crayons and some wet paper for them to draw on. Is this sounding pathetic? I am not exaggerating one bit. Everything is like wet here from the humidity and to begin with the quality of everything like paper and crayons is not at all like what we have in the states. I thought Lora and Emma were going to die. You should have seen how they were looking at me. They didn't know whether to laugh or cry. I felt the same.
K, so church ended, we made our way home in another taxi, a bigger one this time and we had some spaghetti. We had bought some sauce and pasta the day before. It was all we had, but it was fine. I can't explain it but it is just so hard to figure out how to eat and cook here.
OK, so then the next day was Monday and Leyla and I spent the entire day doing wash by hand in the "pila" which is a cement scrubbing washboard sink thing. You can probably look one up online to see what I am talking about. Lane took some pictures of that which we need to post soon. This was a very hard and tedious process and then of course the afternoon rain came and we had to hurry and move the clothesline in under the porch. After the rain stopped, we put more line out front so it would be more in the sun. It rained again and we had to move the clothes again! ugh!!! I told the kids they have to wear their clothes at least 3 times before they even THINK about putting them in the hamper!! Underwear being the exception. (maybe)
Lane waled up to the store and brought home some potatoes and onions for dinner. Do we just sound like ma and pa Ingalls or what??? THat is what it feels like. I always loved that show and thought it would be fun to be them. It's not people.
So, we had that for dinner. Our favorite time of day had become bedtime where we all get in the same bed and read "The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane". IT is a children's book that Josh Eyre gave us.

So that brings me to today...my birthday. I had not even given it a thought at all, but the kids remembered and had little notes waiting for me and Lora and EMma gave me $10. Ha ha...it was theirs that they found and so it was sweet that they gave it to me. No pedicure or nice dinner out this year for my birthday, but instead I stepped in pig poop and noticed that the cute little geckos that are ALL over in the house actually poop in the house too. Nice. They seriously are all over the walls and you can hear them all night. Sometimes it sounds like they are laughing at us.
We rode our bikes out to some other gringo peoples house today. They have been living here for 4 years. We picked their brains for awhile and honestly I don't know if I feel better or worse after talking with them. Hard to explain.

So that brings me current on our time here so far. It is hard. I won't say that it isn't. I know that we asked for this and so I don't expect any sympathy. Honestly it lifts my spirits so much to hear encouragement from all of you. It makes me want to keep going because there has been more than one moment so far when I have totally wanted to come home. Lane and I just keep trying to remember that we felt so good about this and we feel like there is a reason the Lord has brought us on the adventure.
We are worried about not being able to get internet connection at the house like we thought, which could really change things for us. If that does not work out then we may end up having to go to Costa Rica because Lane has to have internet and Abe has to have it for his online school that starts in the fall. We will have to see.

We miss everyone alot. We feel your prayers and your love for us. Other people are anxious to use this computer desk so I have to go now. Please keep writing encouraging notes. I really love that. We are happy and healthy and together so don't worry about us. I asked the Lord for some personal growth and I am totally getting it. Be careful what you pray for! :)

Martinsens arrive in Nicaragua!

Well, it is Sunday morning here on Ometepe Island, Nicaragua and I finally have time to sit down and make my first blog entry. I need to do this before all the days start melting together. I want the details to be fresh in my memory as I document our life here. So…I will start at the beginning….

We arrived in Managua on Wednesday, July 14, 2010. It did not take any time at all to know that we were definitely not in the USA anymore! The airport is very small and “primitive”. We were quite the sight with the five of us and all 20 bags. Lora and Emma were following directions well to stay attached to my hip as we made our way through customs etc..which made things even more difficult to manage our bags with 2 kids hanging on me.



To back up just a little, I happened to sit next to a young guy on the plane who was born and raised in Nicaragua, but now working in the states. He was on his way home to visit his wife. They were married 2 months ago and this was his first visit home to her. He speaks English quite well and he and I talked almost the whole flight. He was an angel and did not leave our side until we were safely in the taxi that we had prearranged to meet us at the airport. He even insisted on paying the tips for our bags and when some little boy gave the girls some flowers made out of leaves, he quickly gave the boy some money for that too. His name was Fernando and I will not forget him. That was the first of many tender mercies that the Lord has given us so far in these first few days. We could not have made it easily through the airport process without him.



The half hour taxi ride from the airport to the Hotel was an experience in and of itself. I don’t even know if I have words to describe it. None of us really even spoke…we just sat there with our eyes open wide, trying to take it all in. Extreme poverty. We are talking like the most extreme thing I have ever seen. Dirty and chaotic. By chaotic I mean that there are just people everywhere. They walk in the street, like right in the middle of the street! The cars just swerve and honk like crazy. Women walking everywhere with baskets of fruit on their head and when the taxi has to stop for a light, the women come up to your window (which is wide open) and they ask you to buy from them. You might think that some fresh mango would be something to snag, but no. When you see them sitting there on the side of the road cutting them up and putting them in bags with dirty hands and laying them on a nasty old board, you just know that you can’t eat it. They have bags of colored juice that they are selling as well, which is just made with the local water, so you cannot drink that either. I have to be honest and say that during that ride, my heart was in my throat and I wanted to cry. I sat there looking at Emma who was in complete shock and I wanted to cry for her. I thought of the faith of a child and how hard this must be on her to see what we were seeing. She is extremely sensitive and seeing all the poverty was making her really sad. It seems that they have no concept of garbage cans. They just throw trash everywhere, therefore, things are just horribly dirty.



Well, we made it to the hotel, “Los Cisneros”. It was a colorful little building with lots of beautiful flowers and trees around. The office lady was so sweet and helpful as well, although she spoke no English at all so we did a lot of smiling and hand gestures. Ok, the hotel room…..oh boy. I will just way that it was not a Holiday Inn and I will spare all the details. I was so sweaty an stinky, but preferred not to shower in that shower, if that tells you anything. Our bags filled up the entire room and so we had very little space to walk around at all. We sat on the beds and stared at each other for a minute and then decided to take a walk to Price Smart. We had been told that Price Smart is like a very small Costco and it has American food. The walk was another experience. Don’t worry, we had asked Fernando if this would be a safe thing for us to do, and he had no worries about it. Just like any big city though, he said you don’t want to be walking around at night. There are really no sidewalks. The sides of the road all are just broken up. All along the way are street vendors cooking various things and cutting up fruit. They have these strange little things called “mamones”. They look like a very small lime. I was asking a woman what they were and she broke one open and gave it to me. I did not want to offend her, so I ate it. Now don’t panic everyone….It is like a little lime that you pop open, so the fruit is nice and clean inside. I realize that her hands were not the cleanest, but I wiped it off on my shirt first. It tastes like a grape sort of but has a big pit in the middle and the fruit is a little hard to get off the pit. Anyway, that was my first taste of any native food.

We continued on our walk and I said to Lane, “I just want to run into some Mormon missionaries. It would just be comforting to see something familiar.” I was feeling so foreign and unsettled. Soon we saw Price Smart up ahead on the corner and it was a good thing because we could see that a torrential rain was about to unload on us. As soon as we got inside, BAM! The rain began and let me tell you, it was no drizzle.



We took a few steps and who do you think we saw standing there with big smiles? That’s right, 2 Mormon missionaries! I was so happy I wanted to run and hug the guts out of them! Of course I didn’t, but I sure wanted to J. One of them was from Sandy, Utah and the other from Las Vegas. Both English speaking! We all went and sat in the food court and we talked their ears off. Their comment to us was, “wow! You guys are famous! We have been waiting for you to get here!” ha ha…that was funny. Lane and I had called the Mission President months ago and told them that we were coming and these Elders work in the office so they had been told about us. We walked around the store with them and got a few things that we thought we could manage to carry in the ferry to the island. We bought 2 loaves of bread, a brick of cheese and some ham. It was all food from the U.S. that we recognized the label so we felt safe. As we made our way around the store we ran into 2 more sets of missionaries as well as the new mission President from the Nicaragua North mission, which is not ours, but it was still fun to meet him. There is just such a special feeling about missionaries and we just felt so happy being with them.

There actually was a McDonalds across the street so we all piled in their truck and we treated them to dinner. They said they eat there quite a bit and have never gotten sick so we trusted them. I think McDonalds would be pretty standard anyway.

While we were eating, Elder Pulley called the missionaries that are serving on the island and he told them about us and that we would be there tomorrow. Apparently the island elders had not heard we were coming and they were excited.



Well, they gave us a ride home and even though it was only like 7pm, we decided to just go to sleep since we had a big day ahead of us tomorrow and there was nothing else we could really do anyway. I slept with one eye open since I wasn’t sure what might be lurking around on the ceiling. All through the night we heard this funny little sqeaking noise that sometimes sounded almost like a giggle. We had no idea what it was until we found out the next day, that is the sound of a Gecko. More about them later.

Day 2: We had breakfast at the hotel café which was a plate of fruit and a cheese sandwich. Emma was the only one who would not eat a bite. She was just feeling too uneasy to eat. We had bought some bottled water at Price Smart so that is all we were drinking.

Our taxi driver arrived about a half hour late, but at least he came. A young boy had spotted our bags in the lobby and so he hung out until the taxi arrived so that he could help us with our bags and have the opportunity to get a small tip. This is the case everywhere we go. People are clamoring to help you so that they can receive a tip. I think it is great that they are so eager to work, but you have to be careful or else you will have 50 people helping with a 2 person job.



Well, the 2 hour ride from Managua to Rivas was very interesting. Crazy driving, people in the road, cows, horses and pigs in the road as well. The cows and horses are all so skinny and lots of skinny dogs everywhere too. But the women…plump. We waited by the ferry for about an hour or more. Talked to several tourists who were waiting as well. Most of them were from Australia or Germany. At least it was fun to speak with the Australians who spoke English. Emma had to use the bathroom really bad so they pointed the way and as soon as she saw it, she suddenly did not have to go. You see, the ferry dock area was swarming with millions of these little tiny water gnats. They are harmless, but just so annoying! They were literally covering the entire seat of the toilet and the floor, etc. She decided to wait.



We were having a fun conversation with some Nicas (native people) who were hanging out with us to help us load our bags onto the ferry. Something we notice right away is that the people in general are very un-animated. They are sober faced and quiet until you smile at them and act interested in them and then they come alive and want to be your best friend. It is like they are very shy and insecure and it is our job to make them feel comfortable. Luckily Lane and I are not shy about meeting new people and so we love that challenge of making them feel comfortable. Anyway, we were trying to talk to these guys who were waiting with us and we were all laughing together as we tried to understand each other. The urge hit Emma again so this time we walked onto the Ferry to see if the bano (bathroom) was any better. There were no bugs because they all died within a 50 radius from the SMELL! Oh boy… it was this teeny tiny closet with a toilet and we held our breath the entire time. You see, here in Nicaragua they do not flush any paper in the toilet so all of it goes in a can next to the toilet so the smell is…..well, you can imagine.



We got back out onto the dock as quick as we could. Right then we hear someone say. “Lane Martinsen family?” It was Adam Harris who is the son of the owner of the house we will be renting. He had made the journey from San Juan Del Sur which is about an hour or so away so that he could meet us and help us get to the house. We had hoped he would be there but were not sure. He is about mid 20’s and just the nicest guy ever. He was born and raised in Canada but now lives in Nica and started coming here to live off and on since he was 9. He is very familiar with the Island and Central America in general so it was just awesome to talk with him for the whole ferry ride (one hour) and he put us at ease about so many things. He was able to explain why there are so many misconceptions about Nicaragua in the U.S. It is largely because of what our media chooses to portray and that is not always the true picture. True, there was a huge civil war here in the 80’s but since then there has been peace. He is a really fun person and set us at ease about many things. He told us about some fun things to see and beautiful places to explore on Ometepe which got us really excited. Looking at the Island from the ferry, is a sight I will not forget. It is lush and beautiful and the volcanoes are so incredible! The five of us all had butterflies as we anticipated getting off the ferry and making our way to our new “home”.



The dock was swarming with boys and men wanting to help this “Gringo familia” with all of our 500 bags! I am sure they just thought they had hit the jackpot! Adam quickly told them that we would only pay a certain amount and they would need to split it up, so that we didn’t get stuck paying them all separately. Thank you Adam. This did not discourage them at all. They would rather have something than nothing so they just kept right on lifting and loading. It was about a 10 minute ride to the house. It was just so interesting to look out the window and see all of our new friends and stores that we would be getting to know. The village is called “Moyogalpa.” It is pretty hustle and bustle…lots of action going on but has a quaint feel to it. The entire feel was so completely different than Managua, thankfully. I mean, don’t get me wrong, it is still dirty and very poverish, but just a much safer and nicer feel to it. Everyone stares at us though. Not to worry, they will all be our friends soon. They just don’t know that yet. Well, I don’t know quite what to say about the house except that in this case, the pictures that we had seen online did not capture the smell or the filth in the corners that was the reality when we opened the door. I don’t want to be too negative, but I will say that my heart sunk when I saw it. I hid my feelings fast so that it wouldn’t carry over to the kids too much and add to the culture shock that they were all in already.



We put our bags in the rooms and said goodbye to Adam who had to hurry and catch the last ferry back to the mainland. We just all stood there wondering what to do next and I was honestly trying to fight back the tears. I could not wrap my brain around living in this house which was maybe a step above camping and I don’t even like camping for more than one night! Well, we look up the hill and we see these two smiling missionaries and another man who they introduced to us as the branch president. We all sat on the porch and talked for a couple hours. Elder Young is from Missouri! That is fun huh Elder Martinsen? J He thought that was just awesome when we told him about Alex. Alex is helping his friends and neighbors and he will be helping Alex’s family here in this strange land. The Lord works in wonderful ways. This sweet Elder could very much sense our feelings at this point and how overwhelmed and apprehensive we were at this point. He looked us each in the eye and said, “ I want to tell you something….this island has been a difficult place to try to do missionary work thus far. I have been feeling a bit discouraged. I prayed my heart out to the Lord to please send help to us. Please send a family who knows how the church works and that can be a strength to the people. I didn’t know how this was going to happen but I had faith that Heavenly Father would answer my prayer. Yesterday I got the call from the office Elders that you were coming.” He then said, “I know this is hard for you right now and you are feeling so overwhelmed, but please remember that I prayed you here.”

It was a very tender moment for all of us and we felt the spirit testify that we truly had been led to this place for a reason. The other elder and the Branch President do not speak any English but we could feel of their goodness and gratitude as well.



They left. It was dark. We were pretty hungry since all we had was the few things we had bought in Managua. We got ready for bed and all gathered in Lora’s bed to start a new book together, thinking that would help the kids get their minds off of things. At least we were together and safe and at that moment that is all that mattered. We would tackle the house as soon as we could and try to get it feeling a little like home.



Ok…I have to get ready for church now, so I will have to post this and write more later. Lane actually has to run up the road a little ways and do this at the internet café because we do not have internet access at the house yet but we realize that you are all probably anxious to hear from us, so this is it for now.

I love you all. I love Lane and the kids. I love my Heavenly Father so much and am so thankful for how he has blessed us so far.javascript:void(0)