The last couple of weeks of service have been bittersweet. I´ve really enjoyed working with the kids and the people of ADISA. On the last day the children sat still for a whole, maybe 7 minutes, while they had a small going away ceremony for us. That was impressive. However, I´m not sure they understood that we were leaving for good because they all said hasta mañana when they left. I´ve frequently heard that service does more for the students than the actual organization and having completed service I agree with that statement. We were sad to say goodbye to the adorable, albeit crazy, kids but for them there will always be more volunteers. And that´s a good thing.
Saying goodbye to the ADISA workers was less dramatic and a lot more relaxed. Many of them weren´t actually there that day. They let us pick out a pair of earrings (beautiful, all hand made check it out..... ADISA) from their shop, so that we ¨would never forget,¨ as if we could actually forget the big smiles we got everyday when we arrived, usually slightly late, to ADISA.
It was the hardest leaving my host family, which includes a brother, sister, mom, dad, three room mates and a crazy but cute dog. It was a lot of fun living with them and getting to know people from all different walks of life, and through my room mates I got to know other U.S. students staying in Santiago as well. As beautiful as th lake and volcanoes are in Santiago, it´s the people I will miss the most. Everyone I have met have such big hearts.
The last night in Santigao my host parents talked about the civil war that they lived through and terrors the military caused for the town. We talked about the mudslide that happened during hurricane Agitha and how my host dad helped recover the dead, many of them children. I knew my host parents have been, done, and seen a lot but it was a whole different experience hearing them talk about it all. They have been through so much, as has the whole town, and are truly some of the kindest, warmest, wonderful people I have ever met.
While this entry has been slightly more reflective that the others, I want to officially finish out this blog with a list of what I will miss about Guatemala and a list of what I will not miss. These aren´t in any particular order but the first is probably the thing I will miss most.....
Will Not Miss - a noticably short list
- people staring, whistling, cat calling, etc. No I will not be your baby. No I do not want a latin lover. No I don´t love you too. Sorry but you cannot win my heart. and.....No I am not looking for a real man and I´m not sure why you think you fit that category to begin with.
- the winding, bumpy roads
- dodging dog poop, dead rats, etc in the street
- cold showers
-speed bumps ever 10 feet
Will Miss
- Pan Dulce (I don´t like to discriminate any pan dulce but the kind from the unnamed panderia which I like to refer to as the ¨hole in the wall¨ literally, has the best pan dulce ever.)
- Melissa shrieking and grabbing my arm when she sees a squished rat on the road
- Me shrieking and grabbing Melissa´s arm when I see a slithering movement in the ¨grass¨
- Reggeatone music
- choco bananos (in Santiago, not in the city. Sorry I just have to clarify that)
- amazing view of the lake on our walk to work
- adrenaline rush from dodging tuc tucs
- the unimportance of being on time
- Seth´s weird/awkward pictures
- soccer everywhere
- all the host family stories......¨guess where I went last night?¨ ¨you´re mom said what to you?¨ or ¨guess who peed on me this morning¨
- buying DVDs for a dollar
- buying everything for cheap, except Taco Bell which is the same price but these guatemaltecos don´t want to believe us when we tell them they´re getting ripped off
- food made with real sugar not corn syrup.....por ejemplo ketchup/salsa dulce and coca-cola/agua (don´t ask me why they call it agua I´ve been here for three months and still haven´t been able to figure it out)
- pitayas and avocados
- tortillas with every meal....though it´s probably better for me not to eat so much of them
- desayuno chapin! eggs, bean paste, fried plantanos, coffee, and of course tortillas. I will especially miss the fried plantanos.
- and course the wonderful friends I´ve met
The past three months have gone by super fast and I am going to miss the friend´s I´ve made and the shear beauty of Guatemala. Of course I want to return some day, I can´t imagine never visiting again. But for now I have tons of great, and not so great but of course character building, memories. And right now I am ready to be home with my wonderful family and friends, and to start a new semester. I´m starting off with a bang, flying to Colorado to be at pre-season with the volleyball team. Que alegre!
Tuesday, August 9, 2011
Wednesday, July 27, 2011
¨This isn´t Guatemala, people don´t just go missing!¨
So I´ve been in Santiago Atitlan for a little over a week now and it´s been quite interesting. For one, right now the annual Santiago fair is going on which means the town is pretty much hoppin all the time. EVERYTHING is celebrated with fireworks here in Guatemala, and people set them off what seems every ten minutes. Everytime I am forced to fight my innate instinct to duck and cover. There is a giant ferris wheel in the church square that makes me cringe everytime I see the people rocking back and forth on it. Apart from bringing rides and activities, the fair as also brought out a certain type of rather drunk people. Our previous rule of never turning down someone to dance does NOT apply anymore. But the fair has been pretty cool to experience and the crowning ceremony for the Mayan queen of the town was really cool.
For service Melissa and I spend the mornings at a school for children with disabilities which is fun to hang out with the kids but also hard because in addition to a language barrier there´s also a physical or emotional one too. There are about 30 kids and only 4 professors so it can get a little hectic and the disabilities range from a kid with no hands, down syndrome, a little girl whose left side of her body doesnt function properly, and a girl with ¨emotional problems.¨ Whatever that means. So the profs have their hands full. It´s been difficult to get to know the children but we made huge headway when we gave the girls drawings to color. And there is a little boy named Samuelito with down syndrome who always greets me with a hug and a huge smile. If only everyone greeted me this way!
Our daily tasks thus far have included tracing drawings out of a book to make photocopying easier and making sure the boys don´t beat each other up, which is a very realistic possibility. Our first day one kid got full on punched in the ear and responded by kicking the culprit in the leg. The result was two screaming kids and two dumbstruck gringas trying. We finally were able to deduce that no one appeared seriously injured as there was no blood. We also figured out that first day that kid with no hands can be surprisingly mischeavous.
In the afternoons then we work at ADISA, an organization run by adults with varying physical disabilities, almost all in wheelchairs. They make beautiful crafts out of recycled newspaper and they sell online so you should go check it out. They make all sorts of things from bags, to coasters, and jewlery. The workers are great and we basically get to sit in the shade, do crafts, and joke around with them. No so shabby.
And another plus of the fair that I forgot to mention is that we´ve had time off work so we´ve traveled around the lake to San Pedro, La Casa Del Mundo (a famous hotel built into a cliff), and Panajachel. And Friday we almost had a heat stroke after walking in a parade for 4 hours in traditional Mayan clothing - very gorgeous but very hot. Then we went to play soccer with some guys from ADISA. That was a lot of fun because we finally played a competitive game after watching so much of it on tv. We had to work Saturday but that just meant helping give out wheelchairs to kids and elderly people who otherwise wouldn´t be able to get around at all. It was so great to see their faces after getting fitted into their chair. I did manage to shock the mission workers and wheel chair shop owner with my liberalness. The owner was commenting on how the Presbyterian church is now letting homosexuals become pastors and I replied ¨good.¨ Flipped him out. I enjoyed it.
However, the highlight of the week is the reason for the title of the blog, in case you were wondering about that. Melissa and I happened to watch maybe 20 minutes of a Law and Order episode when we heard that line - ¨this isn´t Guatemela, people don´t just go missing.¨ We looked at each other stunned and just laughed for about ten minutes. I wonder if the writer merely picked a small Central American country or if he/she chose Guatemala specifically. Either way the irony is quite something. It reminds me what many people think of smaller, less developed countries such as Guatemala. And the sad truth that there are 50,000 people still missing from the civil war. In any case it was a strange and odd comment for us to hear on tv.
For service Melissa and I spend the mornings at a school for children with disabilities which is fun to hang out with the kids but also hard because in addition to a language barrier there´s also a physical or emotional one too. There are about 30 kids and only 4 professors so it can get a little hectic and the disabilities range from a kid with no hands, down syndrome, a little girl whose left side of her body doesnt function properly, and a girl with ¨emotional problems.¨ Whatever that means. So the profs have their hands full. It´s been difficult to get to know the children but we made huge headway when we gave the girls drawings to color. And there is a little boy named Samuelito with down syndrome who always greets me with a hug and a huge smile. If only everyone greeted me this way!
Our daily tasks thus far have included tracing drawings out of a book to make photocopying easier and making sure the boys don´t beat each other up, which is a very realistic possibility. Our first day one kid got full on punched in the ear and responded by kicking the culprit in the leg. The result was two screaming kids and two dumbstruck gringas trying. We finally were able to deduce that no one appeared seriously injured as there was no blood. We also figured out that first day that kid with no hands can be surprisingly mischeavous.
In the afternoons then we work at ADISA, an organization run by adults with varying physical disabilities, almost all in wheelchairs. They make beautiful crafts out of recycled newspaper and they sell online so you should go check it out. They make all sorts of things from bags, to coasters, and jewlery. The workers are great and we basically get to sit in the shade, do crafts, and joke around with them. No so shabby.
And another plus of the fair that I forgot to mention is that we´ve had time off work so we´ve traveled around the lake to San Pedro, La Casa Del Mundo (a famous hotel built into a cliff), and Panajachel. And Friday we almost had a heat stroke after walking in a parade for 4 hours in traditional Mayan clothing - very gorgeous but very hot. Then we went to play soccer with some guys from ADISA. That was a lot of fun because we finally played a competitive game after watching so much of it on tv. We had to work Saturday but that just meant helping give out wheelchairs to kids and elderly people who otherwise wouldn´t be able to get around at all. It was so great to see their faces after getting fitted into their chair. I did manage to shock the mission workers and wheel chair shop owner with my liberalness. The owner was commenting on how the Presbyterian church is now letting homosexuals become pastors and I replied ¨good.¨ Flipped him out. I enjoyed it.
However, the highlight of the week is the reason for the title of the blog, in case you were wondering about that. Melissa and I happened to watch maybe 20 minutes of a Law and Order episode when we heard that line - ¨this isn´t Guatemela, people don´t just go missing.¨ We looked at each other stunned and just laughed for about ten minutes. I wonder if the writer merely picked a small Central American country or if he/she chose Guatemala specifically. Either way the irony is quite something. It reminds me what many people think of smaller, less developed countries such as Guatemala. And the sad truth that there are 50,000 people still missing from the civil war. In any case it was a strange and odd comment for us to hear on tv.
Thursday, July 14, 2011
The beautiful Lake Atitlan followed by U.S. Politics
This past weekend we took our last group trip to Lake Atitlan and visited the towns of Santiago, Panajachel, and Panabaj. We spent most of Friday traveling on relatively straight roads and stopped at the CCDA, an organization the helps defend and keep land in the hands of local farmers. They specialize in coffee and have worked really hard to be able to sell their coffee with an organic label. They served us not only the best coffee I´ve ever had, but also hot chocolate (and I mean pure hot chocolate not like Nestle) and banana muffins. So good. We spent the evening in Santiago playing soccer with some little boys (girls vs boys....of course the girls won), and sitting on the top of our hostel watching a lightning storm come in over the volcanoes surrounding the lake. It was absolutely beautiful. I´m going to be spending my service time, starting on Monday, in Santiago and I can´t wait to go back. We also ate great food courtesy of a nice restaurant owner named Pedro or Juan, his name depends on if you ask him or Andrea. Here´s the view from our hostel.
Saturday we had a tour from the organization ANADESA, who took us to the neighboring village of Panabaj and showed us the different places people were martyred in the civil war and where hundreds of people died in the mudslide caused by hurricane Stan and Agitha. It was a very sad to see the vast areas of land where about 400 houses used to be but also great to see the work that ANADESA is doing to help rebuild and support the community. Plus it was a beautiful day, clean fresh air, no rain, and we were surrounded by mountains and volcanoes.
Sunday we took a boat over to Panajachel, which is a bigger, more touristy town. We shopped (I bought more DVDs) but unfortunately it started to downpour so we didn´t spend a whole lot of time in Panajachel. A very long, nauseating as always bus ride and we were back in the city. It was a fun weekend and we got a chance to get to know other Semilla workers Andrea and Alex (whom Andrea loved to call ¨such an idiot¨) who for all given purposes were our wonderful leaders in the absence of Vicki whom we sorely missed =(.
This is our last week for study and it´s been very bittersweet. I´m ready for classes to be over but I don´t want to leave my family or our great CASAS leaders. We had our final exam for Spanish class today and all we have left are presentations which mostly involve cooking food so it´ll be a lot of fun. We had our last ¨visit¨ yesterday and it´s very fitting that it was the U.S. Embassy. First of all it took us 30 minutes for them to even let us into the marble floored, ugly grey block building. Then we were given passes in exchange for our passports and lead into a conference room with skushy (that´s for you Heidi) black chairs. This was a stark contrast to the rooms were were in to listen to the organizations this weekend. Interesting cultural side note - the U.S. Embassy was the first organization that did not offer us coffee or refreshments of any kind. Anyway I´m not sure which part of the presentation was my favorite. Here´s what we learned.....
1. The U.S. single-handedly saved kids in the Middle East from becoming terrorists by teaching them English in a U.S. sponsored program named ¨Yes.¨ Now I´m sure it was just a poor choice of wording, but I quote ¨if they hadn´t been in the Yes program they could have been the terrorist who flew the planes in 9/11¨ We spent a lot of time laughing at the ridiculousness of this statement. Great lets teach them English and bring them to the U.S. to keep them from becoming terrorists......or wait now they can speak English and they know what to do to get into the country...no!!!!!
2. Tax payer dollars are being spent to teach State Department workers languages for 8 months that they don´t even need. At least in Singapore. Of course they speak Spanish! Everyday! They just brought in someone who looked suspiciously like a translator who looked at us and said, ¨well I don´t think you need me for this group.¨
3. The Cultural Affairs office is in charge of bringing U.S. culture to Guatemala, but they couldn´t give us an example of what that is. Unless Gospel Choirs and a Navy Band clarify that for you.
4. It is in fact ILLEGAL for them to bring Guatemalan culture back to the U.S.
5. State Department officers are positioned at any given place for 2-4 years because any longer than that and the person might start actually caring about the country they are living in (heaven forbid) and worse case scenario, maybe even more so than the U.S. (because that would be absolutely terrible). And I´m not exaggerating she honestly said that was the reason for the short tours. That you can see the world on shorter tours.
So take your pick on the best part. For our part it provided us a lot of laughs while we were waiting in the lobby afterwards. So I´m pretty sure we wouldn´t allowed back in even if we wanted to. Ah well. Sorry, I couldn´t take any pictures of the U.S. Embassy. It´s not allowed.
Saturday we had a tour from the organization ANADESA, who took us to the neighboring village of Panabaj and showed us the different places people were martyred in the civil war and where hundreds of people died in the mudslide caused by hurricane Stan and Agitha. It was a very sad to see the vast areas of land where about 400 houses used to be but also great to see the work that ANADESA is doing to help rebuild and support the community. Plus it was a beautiful day, clean fresh air, no rain, and we were surrounded by mountains and volcanoes.
Sunday we took a boat over to Panajachel, which is a bigger, more touristy town. We shopped (I bought more DVDs) but unfortunately it started to downpour so we didn´t spend a whole lot of time in Panajachel. A very long, nauseating as always bus ride and we were back in the city. It was a fun weekend and we got a chance to get to know other Semilla workers Andrea and Alex (whom Andrea loved to call ¨such an idiot¨) who for all given purposes were our wonderful leaders in the absence of Vicki whom we sorely missed =(.
This is our last week for study and it´s been very bittersweet. I´m ready for classes to be over but I don´t want to leave my family or our great CASAS leaders. We had our final exam for Spanish class today and all we have left are presentations which mostly involve cooking food so it´ll be a lot of fun. We had our last ¨visit¨ yesterday and it´s very fitting that it was the U.S. Embassy. First of all it took us 30 minutes for them to even let us into the marble floored, ugly grey block building. Then we were given passes in exchange for our passports and lead into a conference room with skushy (that´s for you Heidi) black chairs. This was a stark contrast to the rooms were were in to listen to the organizations this weekend. Interesting cultural side note - the U.S. Embassy was the first organization that did not offer us coffee or refreshments of any kind. Anyway I´m not sure which part of the presentation was my favorite. Here´s what we learned.....
1. The U.S. single-handedly saved kids in the Middle East from becoming terrorists by teaching them English in a U.S. sponsored program named ¨Yes.¨ Now I´m sure it was just a poor choice of wording, but I quote ¨if they hadn´t been in the Yes program they could have been the terrorist who flew the planes in 9/11¨ We spent a lot of time laughing at the ridiculousness of this statement. Great lets teach them English and bring them to the U.S. to keep them from becoming terrorists......or wait now they can speak English and they know what to do to get into the country...no!!!!!
2. Tax payer dollars are being spent to teach State Department workers languages for 8 months that they don´t even need. At least in Singapore. Of course they speak Spanish! Everyday! They just brought in someone who looked suspiciously like a translator who looked at us and said, ¨well I don´t think you need me for this group.¨
3. The Cultural Affairs office is in charge of bringing U.S. culture to Guatemala, but they couldn´t give us an example of what that is. Unless Gospel Choirs and a Navy Band clarify that for you.
4. It is in fact ILLEGAL for them to bring Guatemalan culture back to the U.S.
5. State Department officers are positioned at any given place for 2-4 years because any longer than that and the person might start actually caring about the country they are living in (heaven forbid) and worse case scenario, maybe even more so than the U.S. (because that would be absolutely terrible). And I´m not exaggerating she honestly said that was the reason for the short tours. That you can see the world on shorter tours.
So take your pick on the best part. For our part it provided us a lot of laughs while we were waiting in the lobby afterwards. So I´m pretty sure we wouldn´t allowed back in even if we wanted to. Ah well. Sorry, I couldn´t take any pictures of the U.S. Embassy. It´s not allowed.
Thursday, July 7, 2011
Salvadorian Adventures
This past week CASAS finally let us loose on Central America. We had about five days to travel around raising all sorts of havock as we go. Needless to say we were stoked. No leaders, no rules (they´re more like guidelines anyway), the possibilities were endless! After much discussion (that went sort of like this - so what do you guys want to go? oh I don´t know, somewhere with a beach.- Because that really narrows down the places to go in Central America). We finally decided in a relatively cheap, all-inclusive hotel. I know not very adventurous but we were smart/ scared enough to realize that no leaders also meant no translator to tell us what important information the check in lady is trying to tell me......and it was just easier on, at least my mind.
DIGRESSION
I find it very ironic that most of the waiters responded to us in English, no matter who many times we spoke to them in Spanish. However, it took us a long time to find someone to go through the check in process with me in English and check on was solo espanol. For crying out loud, ordering food is sort of like the one thing we are fantastic at with Spanish, not dealing with how/when/where to check in or out.
And the whole no rules thing, while being a great rule for us, also seems to apply to a lot of drivers here. Honestly the driving here makes me look tame and downright cautious. Our hotel driver almost drove someone off the road, and I´m not using that as a figure of speech, I mean the other car had to swerve off the road, scaring the shit out of Seth and I. However, this extra cost transportation turned out to be a much better option for us, even if it was less adventurous. I am not ashamed and I can honestly say I was 100% okay with driving past a public bus stop where a group of men were sitting with machetes, while I sipped my complimentary apple juice and munched on my flavorless galleto.
So anyway we spent four days in El Salvadorian paradise. The days were packed with swimming, reading, hanging out, falling alseep on the beach, and playing soccer with little kids (the oldest was maybe 10 years old but they cheated by keeping the score wrong and we actually won. just to clarify). The evenings included slightly racist and very permiscuous resort shows that usually involved dancing, and discotecas where we danced with some friendly gentlemen who in no way weirded us out. At all. There was gold tooth guy, Columbian drug lord (suspected) aka Clara´s sugardaddy, and Jaime - Clara´s coulda-woulda-shoulda been latin lover. You might be noticing that Clara´s name pops up here a lot, at least in association with two of these fine fellows. We were all quite popular and there´s nothing like being a gringa in a discoteca to boost your self-esteem. Guys ask you to dance, shower you with compliments (you´re so pretty! you speak spanish really well! etc), and it´s not until they tell you that you´re a fantastic dancer that you start to really question their honesty. Clara on the other hand was extremely popular. Now some superficial people might say it´s her blond hair, blue eyes, and downright dashing good looks, but I´m telling you it´s really just her charming personality.
One of the aforementioned guys, Jaime, took a particular interest in Clara. He spent two hours whooing her and artfully dodged our ¨I´m tired I need a nap¨ by smoothly suggesting that I did in fact look tired and I should probably go take a nap, but Clara really didn´t look tired at all. Long story short Clara played the ¨Seth¨ card and told Jaime that Seth was her boyfriend. Sitting next to her I found this extremely funny as Seth was on the other side of the pool, completely oblivious/not caring at all that some guy was clearly hitting on his ¨girlfriend.¨ However, Clara was quick to explain that the reason they weren´t really talking, didn´t dance at all together last night, Seth clearly didn´t care Jaime was talking to her, was because they had a huge fight. Of course I varified this story, but as Jaime said ¨sometimes love just isn´t right¨ or something elequent like that. As soon as Seth was informed of his role he played it quite convincingly, acting pissed at Clara. I suggested that Clara should slap him, you know just for emphasis, but she didn´t go for it. Eventually Seth distracted him enough with booze and he ended up jumping into the pool, probably not the best idea, and he left the next morning, no harm done.
However, I should mention that we met lots of extremely nice people. Some more gringos, some nice guys from El Salvador who have their own production company. They were at the hotel because they needed to take time to think and ¨refresh their minds.¨
All in all it was great week with a perfect amount of having fun and simply relaxing. Here´s a short list of the highlights that I didn´t mention above.....
- attempting to dig up a ¨small¨ crab that jumped out as all 6 of us were leaning over it. Consequently we screamed, drawing even more attention to ourselves, and a young kid ran past us yelling ¨puchica!¨
- I got pooped on by a bird while we were biking. I mean seriously what are the chances of that happening? There´s a great picture of Elizabeth laughing at me but karma almost got her back when she slipped and barreled into the wallin her attempt to outrun the rain.
- Seth´s jokes. Him and Elizabeth spent several hours on the way back making up diarrhea songs and dead baby jokes. In closing here are the best ones.....
What´s the difference between a dead baby and a trampoline?
- you take your shoes off the jump on a trampoline
What´s the difference between a Corvette and a pile of dead babies?
- Seth doesn´t have a Corvette in his garage.
¨If you´ve eaten Pollo Campero and it´s coming out in barrels....¨
¨If you´ve dranken lots of Gallo and it´s coming out in piles.....¨
DIGRESSION
I find it very ironic that most of the waiters responded to us in English, no matter who many times we spoke to them in Spanish. However, it took us a long time to find someone to go through the check in process with me in English and check on was solo espanol. For crying out loud, ordering food is sort of like the one thing we are fantastic at with Spanish, not dealing with how/when/where to check in or out.
And the whole no rules thing, while being a great rule for us, also seems to apply to a lot of drivers here. Honestly the driving here makes me look tame and downright cautious. Our hotel driver almost drove someone off the road, and I´m not using that as a figure of speech, I mean the other car had to swerve off the road, scaring the shit out of Seth and I. However, this extra cost transportation turned out to be a much better option for us, even if it was less adventurous. I am not ashamed and I can honestly say I was 100% okay with driving past a public bus stop where a group of men were sitting with machetes, while I sipped my complimentary apple juice and munched on my flavorless galleto.
So anyway we spent four days in El Salvadorian paradise. The days were packed with swimming, reading, hanging out, falling alseep on the beach, and playing soccer with little kids (the oldest was maybe 10 years old but they cheated by keeping the score wrong and we actually won. just to clarify). The evenings included slightly racist and very permiscuous resort shows that usually involved dancing, and discotecas where we danced with some friendly gentlemen who in no way weirded us out. At all. There was gold tooth guy, Columbian drug lord (suspected) aka Clara´s sugardaddy, and Jaime - Clara´s coulda-woulda-shoulda been latin lover. You might be noticing that Clara´s name pops up here a lot, at least in association with two of these fine fellows. We were all quite popular and there´s nothing like being a gringa in a discoteca to boost your self-esteem. Guys ask you to dance, shower you with compliments (you´re so pretty! you speak spanish really well! etc), and it´s not until they tell you that you´re a fantastic dancer that you start to really question their honesty. Clara on the other hand was extremely popular. Now some superficial people might say it´s her blond hair, blue eyes, and downright dashing good looks, but I´m telling you it´s really just her charming personality.
One of the aforementioned guys, Jaime, took a particular interest in Clara. He spent two hours whooing her and artfully dodged our ¨I´m tired I need a nap¨ by smoothly suggesting that I did in fact look tired and I should probably go take a nap, but Clara really didn´t look tired at all. Long story short Clara played the ¨Seth¨ card and told Jaime that Seth was her boyfriend. Sitting next to her I found this extremely funny as Seth was on the other side of the pool, completely oblivious/not caring at all that some guy was clearly hitting on his ¨girlfriend.¨ However, Clara was quick to explain that the reason they weren´t really talking, didn´t dance at all together last night, Seth clearly didn´t care Jaime was talking to her, was because they had a huge fight. Of course I varified this story, but as Jaime said ¨sometimes love just isn´t right¨ or something elequent like that. As soon as Seth was informed of his role he played it quite convincingly, acting pissed at Clara. I suggested that Clara should slap him, you know just for emphasis, but she didn´t go for it. Eventually Seth distracted him enough with booze and he ended up jumping into the pool, probably not the best idea, and he left the next morning, no harm done.
However, I should mention that we met lots of extremely nice people. Some more gringos, some nice guys from El Salvador who have their own production company. They were at the hotel because they needed to take time to think and ¨refresh their minds.¨
All in all it was great week with a perfect amount of having fun and simply relaxing. Here´s a short list of the highlights that I didn´t mention above.....
- attempting to dig up a ¨small¨ crab that jumped out as all 6 of us were leaning over it. Consequently we screamed, drawing even more attention to ourselves, and a young kid ran past us yelling ¨puchica!¨
- I got pooped on by a bird while we were biking. I mean seriously what are the chances of that happening? There´s a great picture of Elizabeth laughing at me but karma almost got her back when she slipped and barreled into the wallin her attempt to outrun the rain.
- Seth´s jokes. Him and Elizabeth spent several hours on the way back making up diarrhea songs and dead baby jokes. In closing here are the best ones.....
What´s the difference between a dead baby and a trampoline?
- you take your shoes off the jump on a trampoline
What´s the difference between a Corvette and a pile of dead babies?
- Seth doesn´t have a Corvette in his garage.
¨If you´ve eaten Pollo Campero and it´s coming out in barrels....¨
¨If you´ve dranken lots of Gallo and it´s coming out in piles.....¨
Saturday, June 25, 2011
Vamos a la playa....oh...oh...oh..oh!
Last weekend was a whirlwind of events. Friday was Father´s Day here and boy do they like to celebrate their holidays. Signs everywhere, car windows painted, even ground beef at the grocery store was molded into ¨Feliz dia de papa!¨ Now that´s dedication. My family celebrated with Pollo Campero (a sort of KFC - but do NOT compare the two restaurants to a Gautemalteco) and then we watched Wild Hogs on tv. I made it halfway through before I went to bed early. Wild Hogs isn´t my favorite movie in English and while it was slightly better in Spanish I thought sleep was a better option.
On Saturday I went with two of my brothers and my sister, and nine kids from their church, to Cerro Alux, which is a huge ecological park basically on top of a mountain. It was beautiful but very cold and wet as we were essentially in the clouds. It was fun to interact with kids but also frustrating because its hard for me to understand them. And naturally they were shy and slightly wary of the tall extra-white gringa. But they cheered for me on the swing and gleefully pulled me up and down a hill on a zip line. After a long day of rain, mud, cold and mixtas, it was a relief to go to Melissa´s house where we ate pizza, ¨watching soccer,¨ and avoided Melissa´s soul mate, a.k.a a Michael Jackson impersonator. Now I´ve got your attention haven´t I? Well long story short, and I have her permission to tell the story just FYI, Melissa went on a date with a guy named Brian, slightly against her will but her mom sort of pushed her into it. He also gave her a watch, which I mean come on, when does that ever NOT work? So they went to get ice cream and instead of going to any ice cream store within 100 feet of her house he took her to Antigua, roughly 45 min away, where she found out he works as a Michael Jackson impersonator. Okay so the point of this whole story is that he told her they were soul mates because they liked the same things. So yeah, she´s been avoiding him ever since.
The next day we all went to the beach, minus Seth because he doesn´t really like the beach. Melissa´s parents took us and it was a great day. Without going hour by hour here is a rundown of the day:
- Jammed to Spanish music while hammering Bethy (Melissa´s mom) with questions about the volcanoes, ocean, food, etc. (p.s. Cristy if you´re reading this Bethy said there are a TON of sharks in Guatemala. Just saying.)
- Sang Vamos a la playa, a song we still do not fully understand to this day, nor do we actually know the beat. However, that hasn´t stopped us from singing it yet.
- Drank coconut water with Melissa´s parents hovering saying ¨que rico!¨ roughly every minute or so. It tasted good for about 5 minutes and then I had to force it down. It´s definitely an acquired taste. Some us feigned interest in the actual coconut meat, some actually liked it, and others were not as quiet about their dislike. ·cough· Melissa.
- Burned out feet on the black sand
- Burned out bodies from the hot as hell sun
- Got our asses kicked by the waves. Like seriously, at one point I bit the sand so hard I had sand all the way up my nose. And in other not for friendly places. Now when I say sand I really mean black pebbles. So we all had black pebbles, everywhere, and at some point or another everyone bit the dust, even Bethy who spent most of the time yelling ¨Cuidado mis hijas!¨ (be careful my daughters!)
- Slept in hammocks under palm trees
- Stopped to get ice cream and walk around in Antigua on the way back
Perfect Day
On Saturday I went with two of my brothers and my sister, and nine kids from their church, to Cerro Alux, which is a huge ecological park basically on top of a mountain. It was beautiful but very cold and wet as we were essentially in the clouds. It was fun to interact with kids but also frustrating because its hard for me to understand them. And naturally they were shy and slightly wary of the tall extra-white gringa. But they cheered for me on the swing and gleefully pulled me up and down a hill on a zip line. After a long day of rain, mud, cold and mixtas, it was a relief to go to Melissa´s house where we ate pizza, ¨watching soccer,¨ and avoided Melissa´s soul mate, a.k.a a Michael Jackson impersonator. Now I´ve got your attention haven´t I? Well long story short, and I have her permission to tell the story just FYI, Melissa went on a date with a guy named Brian, slightly against her will but her mom sort of pushed her into it. He also gave her a watch, which I mean come on, when does that ever NOT work? So they went to get ice cream and instead of going to any ice cream store within 100 feet of her house he took her to Antigua, roughly 45 min away, where she found out he works as a Michael Jackson impersonator. Okay so the point of this whole story is that he told her they were soul mates because they liked the same things. So yeah, she´s been avoiding him ever since.
The next day we all went to the beach, minus Seth because he doesn´t really like the beach. Melissa´s parents took us and it was a great day. Without going hour by hour here is a rundown of the day:
- Jammed to Spanish music while hammering Bethy (Melissa´s mom) with questions about the volcanoes, ocean, food, etc. (p.s. Cristy if you´re reading this Bethy said there are a TON of sharks in Guatemala. Just saying.)
- Sang Vamos a la playa, a song we still do not fully understand to this day, nor do we actually know the beat. However, that hasn´t stopped us from singing it yet.
- Drank coconut water with Melissa´s parents hovering saying ¨que rico!¨ roughly every minute or so. It tasted good for about 5 minutes and then I had to force it down. It´s definitely an acquired taste. Some us feigned interest in the actual coconut meat, some actually liked it, and others were not as quiet about their dislike. ·cough· Melissa.
- Burned out feet on the black sand
- Burned out bodies from the hot as hell sun
- Got our asses kicked by the waves. Like seriously, at one point I bit the sand so hard I had sand all the way up my nose. And in other not for friendly places. Now when I say sand I really mean black pebbles. So we all had black pebbles, everywhere, and at some point or another everyone bit the dust, even Bethy who spent most of the time yelling ¨Cuidado mis hijas!¨ (be careful my daughters!)
- Slept in hammocks under palm trees
- Stopped to get ice cream and walk around in Antigua on the way back
Perfect Day
Friday, June 17, 2011
Never Short of New Experiences
The past two weeks were packed full of lots of different things. Yesterday we visited the Foundation of Forensic Anthropology of Guatemala where they are working on exhumation and identification of the over 50,000 people missing from the civil war. It was a very intense experience, packed with a lot of emotion. We saw some remains and while it was extremely hard to see, it is very important to see as well. It´s important to know what happened here. What made the experience even more real is that we had heard the stories of the women from Chichicastenango whose husbands had gone missing. It was a very emotional experience to say the least, that words can´t describe.
However, I had many new and much lighter experiences the past two weeks as well.
Doctors appointment
I went to the doctor on Monday with Vicky and Christy, and it was interesting to say the least. I realized I am not a fan of having doctors appointments translated even though I did have two excellent translaters. for anyone who wants to know¨baso¨ is spleen in spanish. Howver, the highlight of the doctors appointment was the the waiting room watching Animal Planet. It was really touching to watch that young girl conquer her fear of seals at Sea World. Powerful stuff. And then they took it a step further as she attempted to touch seals in the wild. I have to admit I was slightly disappointment that the seals didnt get fed up with the crazy human trying to touch them and attack her...again. Sadly they did not. The moral of this story is really we should be afraid of seals and not sharks in the water. Especially in Guatemala.
Movie night!
Clara and I went with my sister and younger brother to see Pirates of the Caribbean 4. It was actually pretty good. We got McDonalds for dinner and it was the first time for Clara in Guatemala. So naturally she decided to go big instead of go home and get the ¨grande¨ meal. Now when I say she decided to get it, I really mean she said ¨yes¨ to a question she didn´t understand. I, on the other hand, was at the register next to her staring blankly at the worker and eventually saying aqui to the same question. So much better.
The best part of the night by far was when Clara and I realized that some jokes simply don´t translate into Spanish well. In case anyone wanted to know, the joke was ¨I support the missionary´s position.¨ What happened was that Clara and I both laughed pretty hard, but no one else in the theater laughed at all. So either it really didn´t translate or no one thought it was funny. I´m going with the translation issue, but it could go either way really.
San Lucas
On Sunday night my family took me to San Lucas, a smalll town on the way to Antigua. We walked through the market and ate amazing food. When I saw a sign for gringos, naturally I asked my sister what it meant. She promptly pretended to cut off a part of my arm and eat it. This is only one of the several lies she has told me in the brief time I have been here. I´m getting much better at separating the lies from the truth - I wasn´t fooled at all with her gringo comment, north american´s are much too bitter to eat anyway as my brother informed me later - but I did hesistate for a little bit when she told me that it was going to cost me $50 a person to cross the border into El Salvador. But only $20 for Guatemaltecos, of course, because they are just better. That´s when I knew she was joking.
After dinner we went to an overlook where we could see all of Guatemala City, complete with lightning over the mountains in the background. It was nighttime so all I could see was beautiful twinkling lights. Our group has talked a lot about having moments when it really hits you that you´re in a different country and this was one of those for me. It was breathtakingly beautiful - please excuse the cliche - I took pictures but really failed at capturing the awesomeness.
However, I had many new and much lighter experiences the past two weeks as well.
Doctors appointment
I went to the doctor on Monday with Vicky and Christy, and it was interesting to say the least. I realized I am not a fan of having doctors appointments translated even though I did have two excellent translaters. for anyone who wants to know¨baso¨ is spleen in spanish. Howver, the highlight of the doctors appointment was the the waiting room watching Animal Planet. It was really touching to watch that young girl conquer her fear of seals at Sea World. Powerful stuff. And then they took it a step further as she attempted to touch seals in the wild. I have to admit I was slightly disappointment that the seals didnt get fed up with the crazy human trying to touch them and attack her...again. Sadly they did not. The moral of this story is really we should be afraid of seals and not sharks in the water. Especially in Guatemala.
Movie night!
Clara and I went with my sister and younger brother to see Pirates of the Caribbean 4. It was actually pretty good. We got McDonalds for dinner and it was the first time for Clara in Guatemala. So naturally she decided to go big instead of go home and get the ¨grande¨ meal. Now when I say she decided to get it, I really mean she said ¨yes¨ to a question she didn´t understand. I, on the other hand, was at the register next to her staring blankly at the worker and eventually saying aqui to the same question. So much better.
The best part of the night by far was when Clara and I realized that some jokes simply don´t translate into Spanish well. In case anyone wanted to know, the joke was ¨I support the missionary´s position.¨ What happened was that Clara and I both laughed pretty hard, but no one else in the theater laughed at all. So either it really didn´t translate or no one thought it was funny. I´m going with the translation issue, but it could go either way really.
San Lucas
On Sunday night my family took me to San Lucas, a smalll town on the way to Antigua. We walked through the market and ate amazing food. When I saw a sign for gringos, naturally I asked my sister what it meant. She promptly pretended to cut off a part of my arm and eat it. This is only one of the several lies she has told me in the brief time I have been here. I´m getting much better at separating the lies from the truth - I wasn´t fooled at all with her gringo comment, north american´s are much too bitter to eat anyway as my brother informed me later - but I did hesistate for a little bit when she told me that it was going to cost me $50 a person to cross the border into El Salvador. But only $20 for Guatemaltecos, of course, because they are just better. That´s when I knew she was joking.
After dinner we went to an overlook where we could see all of Guatemala City, complete with lightning over the mountains in the background. It was nighttime so all I could see was beautiful twinkling lights. Our group has talked a lot about having moments when it really hits you that you´re in a different country and this was one of those for me. It was breathtakingly beautiful - please excuse the cliche - I took pictures but really failed at capturing the awesomeness.
Tuesday, June 7, 2011
Chichicastenango
This weekend was a whirlwind. On Friday we left Guatemala City for Chichicastenango, a city with a large population of idingenous people. We stopped at Iximche to see some Mayan ruins which was awesome. It was very weird to know that what we saw is only the top of what was once a huge city. The rest is yet to be excavated. After being in Guatemala for two weeks now we finally ate Pollo Campero, which is similar to KFC, but its huge in Guatemala. Although the food was good, it didn´t sit well with most of us when our bus climbed the winding mountains roads. There is a picture up of Seth that explains the feeling.
On Saturday we talked to idigenous women who survived the extremely violent civil war. The stories they told about their husbands who were killed or are still missing were heart wrenching. It was definitely an eye opening experience. To support themselves and their children after their husbands died, the women began to weave BEAUTIFUL blankets, tableclothes, scarves, purses, hats, you name it they make it. Needless to say we bought a lot. Later that night we played a pick up game of soccer with some kids in the neighborhood we were staying in. We also visited the Catholic church in ChiChi which is actually where the Popol Vuh was discovered. Crazy. The Methodist Mission home we stayed in was awesome as well. As Clara pointed out, it was like camping, in a good way of course. We ate our meals mostly outside and were up at dawn for breakfast. The temperature was ¨freezing¨ for our leaders Christy and Andrea but for the rest of us it was like a warm spring day in Goshen, Indiana haha. It was a great place to stay. Sunday morning we went to Mass at the church and spent time in the famous market where we also bought a lot of stuff. The market was huge, beautiful, and there was no person space whatsoever. It was a lot of fun but very overwhelming and I think we were all ready to go home. Plus I suck at bardering.
As the weekend went on things got crazier and crazier so we started a list of things that we did not in anyway expect to happen this weekend.
1. to see tigers, and african and mountain lions in Guatemala. There was a traveling circus that was in ChiChi and we stopped by but quickly realized it was very sketch and left.
2. For Seth to catch a pony. With one eye. The pony had one eye that is, Seth did not catch it with one eye....he´s not that good. Again this was at the sketchy circus.
3. To see a Catholic Wedding at the famous church. We tried to blend in but tall white folk don´t blend into the crowd, though I did try to blend into the white walls. That was more realistic.
4. For a camera to be stolen (along with other peoples money), sold, switched to Spanish, and then returned all within roughly 10 hours.
5. For Christy to laugh so hard at dinner that she spewed her food/tea all over the floor. There are pictures of this but they aren´t up yet. Stay tuned. Honestly what I said wasn´t THAT funny. (The next night she enforced a ¨spanish only¨ rule. If you spoke any word in english you had to pay 1 Q. I lost four).
Overall and emotional but great weekend!
On Saturday we talked to idigenous women who survived the extremely violent civil war. The stories they told about their husbands who were killed or are still missing were heart wrenching. It was definitely an eye opening experience. To support themselves and their children after their husbands died, the women began to weave BEAUTIFUL blankets, tableclothes, scarves, purses, hats, you name it they make it. Needless to say we bought a lot. Later that night we played a pick up game of soccer with some kids in the neighborhood we were staying in. We also visited the Catholic church in ChiChi which is actually where the Popol Vuh was discovered. Crazy. The Methodist Mission home we stayed in was awesome as well. As Clara pointed out, it was like camping, in a good way of course. We ate our meals mostly outside and were up at dawn for breakfast. The temperature was ¨freezing¨ for our leaders Christy and Andrea but for the rest of us it was like a warm spring day in Goshen, Indiana haha. It was a great place to stay. Sunday morning we went to Mass at the church and spent time in the famous market where we also bought a lot of stuff. The market was huge, beautiful, and there was no person space whatsoever. It was a lot of fun but very overwhelming and I think we were all ready to go home. Plus I suck at bardering.
As the weekend went on things got crazier and crazier so we started a list of things that we did not in anyway expect to happen this weekend.
1. to see tigers, and african and mountain lions in Guatemala. There was a traveling circus that was in ChiChi and we stopped by but quickly realized it was very sketch and left.
2. For Seth to catch a pony. With one eye. The pony had one eye that is, Seth did not catch it with one eye....he´s not that good. Again this was at the sketchy circus.
3. To see a Catholic Wedding at the famous church. We tried to blend in but tall white folk don´t blend into the crowd, though I did try to blend into the white walls. That was more realistic.
4. For a camera to be stolen (along with other peoples money), sold, switched to Spanish, and then returned all within roughly 10 hours.
5. For Christy to laugh so hard at dinner that she spewed her food/tea all over the floor. There are pictures of this but they aren´t up yet. Stay tuned. Honestly what I said wasn´t THAT funny. (The next night she enforced a ¨spanish only¨ rule. If you spoke any word in english you had to pay 1 Q. I lost four).
Overall and emotional but great weekend!
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