It's a 350m vertical climb with an amazing view of the ocean as well as of San Carlos:
The ocean on the left, San Carlos on the right in the distance.
It might be the fact that I grew up in Manitoba where the only escape from the flatness of the prairies was driving up the "Pembina Hills" (hills being a fairly generous term!) but I love being able to hike up and see the perspective that many of the hills here around San Carlos offer.
I've hiked Tetakawi many times over the years and had in fact been hiking it once a week for about a month and a half, and never with an incident. That was about to change a week and a half ago!
As it turned out, as I was on the way down (after a gruelling hour-long ascent) I heard this cry for Auxilio (help) and sure enough I came across this young man who had fallen and was significantly injured - it didn't appear that he had broken any bones; he was able to move around but had been bleeding significantly from his head and was in need of help. I couldn't get to him because of some cliffs between him and myself, though I was probably within about 50 feet of him. I could converse with him and he was lucid enough to respond but the guy definitely needed help and I don't know how far he would have been able to make it on his own. Calling the ambulance I stayed with him for a bit before I realized that I had better try to get to him as he didn't have any water and the sun was beating down on us. So, with the emergency help on the way, though because of the height at which we were at, it would take some time for them to arrive, I began the decent so that I could come back up to him from a different route. With the obvious urgency in mind and feeling comfortable on the path I went down at a good rate until I twisted my ankle good and proper, hearing and feeling that popping sound that you never what to hear. My personal rescue mission quickly came to an end as I had to now concern myself with just getting down myself! It's a fairly steep descent and so it lent itself to getting down practically sitting, little by little, until I made it to the bottom.
To make a long story short, I made it, and the young man was rescued as well, over 3 hours after I had made the initial call, as it was a difficult ascent for the rescue crew to get to where he was. Praise the Lord he was OK; after being rushed to the hospital it was reported that he had broken his nose and had chest injuries, along with bruises and cuts. He needed surgery but he was ok!
So, of all the times that I have hiked, probably one of the most inopportune times to twist an ankle was exactly when it happened! One has to wonder about timing sometimes, and why God would allow these things to happen, but one also has to be thankful with how things do work out in the end, though often not in the ways that we (in our humble opinion) would have thought best.
It's been a week and a half and its slowing getting better. It has lent itself to allow me to do other things that have been neglected - things that we've been wanting to do with regards to the school, things that can be done from the couch! One of those is developing a website for the school, which should be ready for viewing soon - I'll keep you informed! Another has been putting into writing and restructuring many things with regards to the school. With 8 generations of students having passed through the school, we've learned a lot along the way and feel we're getting more established in the way things are done and how we want to move forward. There's always changes and tweaks needed but we have felt that it was time to define some of who we are and how we do things more clearly. One of those tasks has been to collectively write a Mission, Vision, etc. statement. It's still in the fine tuning stage but I wanted to include it here so that you could get a clearer idea of what we are about as Centro Educativo Cristiano.
Before I post it though, I've found it interesting, with more time needed keeping this foot up, I've been able to do some reading. I've been reading the book by Dietrich Bonhoeffer, The Cost of Discipleship, (an excellent read!) but along with that a biographical book on his life. He was truly a visionary and a forward thinker in his time and perhaps one of the most impactful things about his life is that, though he preached, taught, and wrote some difficult things, he absolutely lived them out in his life as well - it wasn't just talk. Of particular interest, he lead for some time a Bible School in Germany, as Hitler was coming into power, but it was a Bible School of a very different variety to what was common in the day (typical seminaries). It was a school based more around discipleship, and living in community - practical, personal, not merely theoretical or theological. As the biographer was describing Bonhoeffer's focus and passion for the school, I couldn't help but see how similar the vision for CEC is - what a neat realization to see how God is indeed timeless, that He speaks and moves today just as he did almost a hundred years ago.
Please take time to read our Mission and Vision statements - I hope that it resonates with you as it does for us. Pray for us and for the mission of this school! Thank you so much for all the prayers! ¡Dios les bendiga!
If you can't see the Mission/Vision document, just click here to view it.
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