Editor’s Note: This article was written Gina Horkey. A resident of Stacy, Minnesota, Gina and her husband Wade (son of Myron “Mike” and Nancy Horkey of Heron Lake) have two children, five-year-old Braxton and three-year-old Shelby. Gina, along with her mother – Donna, sister – Amy and niece – Kyleigh, traveled to Costa Rica earlier this month as part of a mission trip and to deliver food bags to Nicaraguans who migrate into Costa Rica for a few months each year to pick coffee. Gina’s husband, Wade, remained in Minnesota and cared for their two young children at home during the mission trip. While in Costa Rica, Gina spent time with the Hutchins family, formerly of White Bear Lake, MN. She had known them through a group at Eaglebrook Church before they moved to Costa Rica.
Costa Rica is just under five and a half hours via direct flight (not that we were able to snag one of those!), but worlds away when you compare it to the culture we’re used to here in the good ol’ US of A. I’m not going to pretend I know which one is better, but I do want to share with you some of my learnings from earlier this month.
My mom, sister and 10-year-old niece, Kyleigh set out on our adventure on December 1st, returning a mere week later. Our goal was to see firsthand the conditions that the thousands of Nicaraguans experience when migrating to the mountainous regions of Costa Rica each year for a few months to make their livelihood picking coffee.
You might be wondering why they pack up their families and travel hundreds of miles to (often illegally) cross the border? Well, it’s because they can earn $30 per day working in the fields of Costa Rica – 30x what they’d gross in their home country and enough to support their family for the rest of the year.
Given the choice, you’d probably do it too.
Children – that’s the reason we were called to travel thousands of miles south. See children under five (yep, including the babies!), just kind of “hang out,” while their parents and siblings pick coffee all day long. Often not in sight of said parents, they are exposed to risks such as poisonous snakes and insects, abuse and more.
And imagining my three-year-old daughter Shelby just “hanging out” among some snakes, while myself, Wade and our five-year-old son Braxton picked coffee all day long… well. Suffice it to say that it breaks my heart.
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