Today our class took a field trip to the city of Cartago, about 40 minutes east of San Jose. We visited a family who run a quasi-orphanage out of their home. It all started 33 years ago when one of their five children was in the hospital. They were asked by the doctor to take care of a boy whose parents had abandoned him after learning that he had terminal pancreatic cancer. They agreed, and today that boy is 42 years old. Adopting that boy began a process of bringing abandoned children into their home and adopting them when possible. Over the years they have fostered or adopted dozens of children. Currently they have 29 foster and adopted kids living in their house! Over the years many people have helped them, adding rooms to their house (there are 14 bedrooms), donating appliances (they have 4 washing machines) and providing food, clothes, or other necessities. It was fun to visit with this family and hear their stories. Many of the children have difficult stories of disabilities, abuse and neglect. Thankfully, now each of these kids is in a loving home, where they are provided for, shown love, taken to school and to church every week. It was a wonderful day!

Marissa chats with a couple of kids on the couch. Many of the older kids are learning English, and they were all anxious to try it out on an American!

This little boy was left on the family’s front door when he was 20 months old. He has cerebral palsy and had been severely abused. Although the doctors said he would never crawl or meaningfully interact with people, today he walks, plays and loves to be around people. He was a lot of fun!

When the government took this girl from her parents, she had over 30 infected cigarette burns on her body, two broken legs and a fractured skull. She was two years old. Since then she has been adopted, and was sent to the US to have surgery to repair her legs. Today she runs and plays with joy!

Despite his metal handicaps, this guy was so sweet. He had a toy airplane that he loved to play with, despite the fact that it fell apart every five minutes. Here Doug attempts to fix it, again.

Hey parents…how would you like to do laundry for 30 kids? How about with no dryer?