More Random Events and Thoughts

-It’s much more fun playing the license plate game here:   1. You can find license plates from countries other than Canada.  2. Even finding license plates from the States is exciting.   Yesterday Leah and I were walking, and all of a sudden I go, “We have to cross the street, now!”  I quickly cross the street, and Leah follows a little bit after me with a strange expression on her face, and I told her, “I really only wanted to see that license plate on that truck.  I hadn’t seen it before, and I couldn’t tell where it was from.” 

-There are foods here that I like that I don’t like in the states:  guacamole, cantaloupe, and watermelon.  Even eggs are growing on me.  Yesterday I had an egg and cheese omelet and watermelon for breakfast and actually kind of liked it.  That would have NEVER happened a few weeks ago.

-There are foods that I miss from the states:  hot chocolate, chocolate chip cookies, peanut butter, real homemade jelly, cold milk, and good cheese (Colby jack, marble jack, and shredded cheese).

-Houses like the ones here in Guatemala with parts without roofs on them that lead outside are awesome…until your neighbor gets a puppy and it cries ALL night long!

-This week we saw all the students of a local school parade through the town.  They all had their little uniforms on and had pom-poms and there were drums and each class had their own chant.  It was SO cute!  

-There is definitely not a “no PDA” rule here.  People, mainly high schoolers and couples around my age, will eat each other’s faces anywhere, anytime.  You would think that couples would try to find a quieter, more secluded place to make out, but no.  Every time Leah and I walk past central park there will be a couple (the only people hanging out on the entire street) just standing next to the building not caring who walks by.  You would think they would be afraid their parents will walk by, evidently not.

-People here have to find their own blood donors before they can have a surgery.  My language teacher needs to have surgery on her feet, but she doesn’t have the donors now so she can’t have the surgery now.  She will go back to the doctor at the end of April, and if she has the donors she will be able to have the surgery.  Otherwise, she’ll have to keep waiting.  Leah was talking with her language teacher about this and sometimes people have to wait in the hospital for up to six months to have an operation because they can’t find blood donors.

One of the paintings we saw in Colmalapa.

-Field trips here are structured very different than in the US.  The 6 students that are taking the same class as me and all our teachers went to Colmalapas, the city where a specific type of Mayan art we have been studying was founded.  We left without knowing what we were going to do once we got there or anyone, including the driver of our van, knowing how to get there.  We stopped three times on the way to ask people what road to take to get there.  –We eventually made it there, and after looking for a while, we did find a small museum and house of a famous artist and talked with his daughter-in-law for a while.  We also saw some absolutely beautiful paintings.  I have never seen more colorful paintings! 

-I was very pleased that I found the largest spider I have ever seen in the bathroom last night, and not in my bed!  After going to get Leah to share my wonderful find, I killed it with my shoe and continued getting ready for bed.

Shopping, Shopping, Ice Cream, and Shopping!

Leah and I had a great Saturday shopping and exploring Antigua all day.  We started off at the main market by going to the Pacas, the used American clothing part of the market.  It was fun to look at all the ridiculous items of clothing they have there.  Then we went to the artisan market, and I got this great red quilt.  It gets kind of cold here at night, so I went to the market on Friday to get a brightly colored, typical Guatemalan blanket for at night.  While I was there, I also saw this great red quilt.  I decided to go back today to check out how much they wanted for it, and since it was a really good price I decided to get it.  I felt guilty for getting two blankets, but I use blankets all the time and they were both really good prices.

After lunch Leah and I did some more exploring.  We found the indoor market, and basically went in every shop we passed on the streets.  Because we didn’t eat much for lunch, we decided to find food, and by food we mean ice cream.  We didn’t really plan that, it just sort of happened.  While we were eating our ice cream Leah goes, “I love how we’re so hungry and need food, and we end up in an ice cream shop!”  We did some more exploring and went in more shops after that, and by then it was time to head home for supper.

Shopping in Antigua is kind of intense.  I’m the kind of shopper that likes to take my time and really look at all my options before making a purchase.  This kind of shopping isn’t really allowed here.  As we walk through the market, every vendor is talking to us trying to get us to come into their store, so there isn’t time to really look at the stuff without someone standing there talking to you, most of the time we play the dumb Americans and act like we don’t speak Spanish.  Then they will usually try a few English phrases to get us to come in their store or buy whatever it is we’re looking at.  “Looking for something special?”  “Something for your mother, enemy, boyfriend, cousin”  “A special price for you.”   “What is your price?”  “What you pay?”  These vendors also have the best ears ever.  Leah and I will whisper something about one of their products and within 2 seconds they will show us 5 different styles of whatever we just mentioned.

And on our way home we saw a bakery a block from our house that we tried this morning for breakfast, and it was SO good!  We definitely hit the jackpot!  I got a muffin and pan dulce (sweet bread) for about $0.50!  So great!

It was a really fun day, and I’m so glad Leah loves looking in all the shops as much as I do!  I’m sure there will be more of these days in the next few months! 

Happy Sunday everyone!!

Guatemala City

The flag in front of the government
 buildings in Guatemala City.

Last Saturday we went to Guatemala City for the day, and a seminary/language school gave us a tour of the city.  We first went to Central Park and had to walk around the city and find answers to different questions such as how much do different types of fruit cost at the market and how much does it cost to see a movie?  (It costs 18 Quetzales to go to a movie, which is about $2.25!) 



 After lunch we went to the cemetery and the landfill.    Cemeteries here are a lot different than in the States; none of the caskets are underground.  At first I wasn’t super thrilled to be visiting the cemetery, but it turned out to be a very interesting and educational experience.



A private grave site at the cemetery.



  There are two parts of the cemetery: one part is private grave sites and the other part is the public grave sites.  The private grave sites are little lots in the cemetery that families buy where all of the family members are “buried.”  They build what (in my opinion) look like play houses.  We saw the grave site for the richest family in Central America and the grave sites of former presidents of Guatemala.  

Some of the public grave sites

                The private grave sites look like giant walls of caskets.   Families can rent these spaces out for the caskets for up to 14 years.  After 14 years, the bodies are put in a “pit” (obviously not open) somewhere in the cemetery.  I was grateful we were never went to this pit –at least we weren’t told if we did!  The bodies in the privately owned grave sites will stay there forever.

                From the cemetery, you can see the city landfill, which was a pretty heart wrenching experience.  There are several people who work at the landfill and get paid to work there, but the majority of the people in the landfill pay Q 2. to go to the landfill each day to find food and other things to live off of.  It was super hard to see all the people down there.

                After that we went to Miraflores, the mall in Guatemala City where the richest people shop.  There isn’t really a middle class in Guatemala; either the family is poor or extremely rich.  We saw some extremely rich people at the mall.  As Becky said, “You see some of the kids walking around that mall and can tell they have everything.  They’re worth more than everything my parents own.”   When we went down the escalators looking for other stores in the mall, we saw these glass doors that led out to a bunch of parked cars.  I thought it was a new car lot, not the parking lot.  That gives you an idea of the types of cars the people shopping there own!

Eating at Luna de Miel.



                Sunday I went to a bilingual church here in Antigua, Iglesia del Camino.  I really liked it.  We sang songs that I know, which was awesome, and an added bonus was they had the words projected on the wall!  The church is completely bilingual; the pastor is from the States so he preaches and then there is a translator for the Guatemalans.  The songs are sung in both languages; one verse will be in Spanish and the next in English.                 

                On Sundays we don’t eat at our house, so after church we went to a crepe restaurant.  It was a lot of fun.  The tables there are very different from what we’re used to.  We sat on benches about 8 inches off the ground, and I wouldn’t have fit in some of the chairs when I was in kindergarten! (Notice in the picture Brita to my left, she's sitting in one of the tiny chairs!)  The experience was all the more interesting in our skirts!  It was a lot of fun though, especially because I got to eat with a bunch of other people from Bethel, which is something I miss since coming to Antigua.  In Magdalena we ate at least one meal a day as a group, and in Antigua we only get to on Sundays.  After lunch I did homework until our group dinner that night at a local restaurant.  It was a great weekend!

                School this week is the usual.  There’s not much else I can say about it.  There’s lots of reading, papers, and homework.  It’s crazy that after this week, I’ll be half done with my first class!  SO CRAZY!

Some random thoughts I've had this week

The view from my new room in Antigua.

• I still can’t believe that I’m actually in Guatemala.  I really just feel like I’m at college somewhere in the States, even though everywhere I go people are speaking Spanish, and I can’t understand everything that people say on the streets or in stores and restaurants. 

• The bugs here like me just as much as they do in the States.  I was really hoping to escape them here.

• As much as I dislike wearing skirts in the States, I don’t mind it here.  We have to dress up every day for language school, and we can only wear jeans on Fridays.  Of the 13 days I’ve been here, I’ve worn a skirt or a dress 6 of them.

• After a week of being here, there are times I feel my Spanish is getting better and times when I think that there’s no chance I’ll ever be able to carry on a conversation without struggling.  My language teacher is constantly correcting my same mistakes over and over again.  On the bright side, when I was reading my econ book in English, I got to a date and started reading it in Spanish.  Also, when someone asked me what I did today, I told her I went to Café Barista and then started to continue in Spanish because the name of the restaurant was in Spanish. 

• To everyone who makes fun of my early bed time at Bethel, I go to bed even earlier here!  I’m so tired all the time.  I usually start getting ready for bed around 9:00 and will journal and read my bible and then I go to bed.  I stayed up until 11:20 one night we were here, otherwise I’ve been in bed around 10:00, and I get up at 7:00.  It’s wonderful!

• As much as I miss everyone at home, I really can’t imagine being anywhere but here right now.  I constantly see things that remind me of home (The dogs on the streets remind me of you, Mom, because I know they would break your heart every time you looked at them, which would be way too many times to count in a day.  Dad, I know the first thing you would have bought here would have been a 3 liter bottle of Diet Coke.), but I know that this is where I’m supposed to be right now.

• The longer I am in this room in Antigua, the more I love it.  It reminds me of a loft, one of the ones you read about in books.  It’s SO great!

• It feels like I’m sleeping through a thunderstorm every night because of the traffic outside our window.

The view of the volcano from our house.

• Leah is bound and determined to turn me into a tea drinker before we leave.  I have already found one hot tea that I like and an ice tea that is good.

• Even while I’m here, my mom still has to remind me not to be so cheap and actually spend my money.  She chewed me out today for getting the cheapest thing on the menu at Café Barista.  Some things will never change!

• There are mass amounts of Christmas candy and other goodies at the grocery store, along with all the Valentine’s Day stuff.

• Security guards/policemen with guns in cafés, on the streets, and in the bank are a common occurrence here –I don’t know if they make me feel safer or not.

• When going into the bank Guatemalans have to have their purses checked, but American’s don’t.  Also, at the grocery store, Guatemalans have to put their bags in lockers so that they can’t steal anything, but Leah and I (and other American’s) were allowed to walk in with our huge backpacks.  I guess they figure that American’s have enough money and won’t steal anything, but Guatemalan’s are going to steal stuff…

• We have Spanish speaking birds in our house.

• SMILE!  It's the weekend, and life is great! =)

Life in Antigua

We left Magdalena Sunday afternoon for Antigua.  We had about 20 minutes to get settled in at our new house before we navigated the streets to find the SI office to go to Fernando’s house to watch the superbowl. (Fernando is the director of SI.)  Fernando’s wife Marionela made homemade pizzas, which were amazing, and we also had ice cream.  She told us, “If you get homesick, come here.  I make cookies.”   She’s wonderful!

                After the game when Fernando drove us back to our house, he told us that he didn’t realize how far away our house was and that he was going to talk to Becky about switching houses.   On Monday after class Leah and I moved houses.  I was glad that we did because it took us almost 20 minutes to walk to school, and our house was at the end of the road and there wasn’t much traffic, so it probably wasn’t the safest. 

Our new room is really nice!  There are a lot of little things I have in this room that we didn’t have in Magdalena such as a nightstand with a lamp.  However, Leah and I were most excited about the hooks to hang up our towels, and the amount of water pressure in the shower.  This house is 3 blocks from the school and takes about five minutes to get there, which is super great!  The only catch is that we might only be able to stay here for three weeks.  Becky is hoping that now that we’re here, we’ll be able to stay the whole time. 

                The host families here definitely host people more as a business.  There are seven other people staying in the house, and we definitely see them more often than we the owner of the house.  It feels a lot like a bed and breakfast, but it’s been fun getting to know the other people staying there. 

                I’ve had two days of language school so far, and it’s been going ok.  Classes are one on one and are four hours a day from 8:00-12:00 with a half hour break.  This is great for me because I can’t hide in the back of the class because I am the class.  My teacher, Veronica, is really nice.  Bethel writes the curriculum and then the teachers teach it, so it’s different having a teacher that isn’t familiar with the curriculum.  So far the homework hasn’t been too bad either.

                Today I walked to school, home, and to the SI office without getting lost, or feeling like I was lost.  All the streets here look the same and street signs are few and far between.  There’s a lot more traffic here, and pedestrians definitely DO NOT have the right of walk, which makes walking an adventure in itself!

A Day in Antigua

We spent the day today in Antigua touring different places and visiting the market there.  To be honest, it was all a bit overwhelming; I was just starting to get used to Magdalena.  However, I'm excited to move there.  It's beautiful!

The view from the school in El Gorrion.

We took the public bus to Antigua, and when we got there we toured an old convent.  The architecture was pretty amazing and very interesting.  After that we toured a coffee plantation which was also interesting.  At the end we sampled the coffee.  I tried it black first.  Gross.  Then I added tons of cream and sugar.  Better, but still not great.  Both of the tours were in English, so I felt very much like the tourists we are.  After the second tour, we ate at Pollo Campero, a fast food chain here.  It was very American, and I really liked the food.  Then we went to the SI office in Antigua and then to the market.  I was pretty much overwhelmed at the market and was really glad we were with Becky.  (Becky is the Bethel staff that stays with us here, and she's awesome!)  However, I'm excited to be able to go back and buy some things.

It was a really fun day, and I was glad that I was able to experience Antigua before moving there tomorrow.  It's a beautiful town with a lot of tourists.  Right now, all the streets look the same, and I was really overwhelmed.  I'm hoping it won't take me long to feel more comfortable there.

I can't believe that it's been a week since I've come here!  In a way the first week went fast, but it also seemed to go on forever.  Here are a few highlights from the week:

1.  The hike to the ecological park.   Although it was a challenge, it was well  worth it.

Me with some kids at the school in El Gorrion.

2.  My host family here.  We ate dinner with them on Thursday night, and we all ended up laughing uncontrolably for a good 10 minutes!  My stomach hurt so bad, and I can't remember the last time I've laughed that hard.

3.  Working at the school in El Gorrion, and getting to play with the kids.  The kids had SO much energy all the time, and it was so fun to love on them for a week.

Tomorrow we are moving to Antigua, and we start language school on Monday.  I'm not sure if I'm ready to go back to school full time, but I guess I don't really have much of a choice!

La Escuela en El Gorrion

Ok, so I feel like I just updated this, but there’s so much stuff I can tell you about.  (I know this got sort of long, so if you don’t feel like reading all of it, just read the last paragraph- it’s a super cute story!)

I now understand what my grandparents meant when they say they had to “walk uphill both ways to school.”  We live sort of in the mountains, and there are hills everywhere!  I also haven’t completely adjusted to the altitude yet which makes it harder.   The hike on Sunday we great; it was probably one of the hardest walks I’ve ever been on, but it was fun.   At the top was an ecological park that the Peace Corps built a few years ago.  At the top of the mountain was a park built out of tree trunks and wood.  It was pretty cool.

We started our ministry sites this week.  I’m going to a school in El Gorrión, a town that is about a twenty minute walk from Magdalena.  The school is a lot different than schools in the US.  There are four different classrooms there; one for kindergarten, and then the rest is like a multi-age classroom in the US.  School here starts at 7:30 and is done at 12:30.  They have recess at 10:30 and there is a concession stand out front where the kids can buy snacks during recess for super cheap.  One little bag of chips costs about 6 cents compared to the 75 cents you would pay in the US.

The kids there are SO great!  I love them SO much!  They are constantly climbing on me.  When I put one down, there is at least one more right there ready to jump on me!  The kids are constantly saying “Vuelta! Vuelta!” (Spin me! Spin me!)!   Yesterday we played “Pato, Pato, Ganso” (duck, duck, goose)

                The site leader at la escuela is Marcos, and he teaches art, music, English, and phy ed.  Today Tara and I taught the kids parts of the body and we played Simon Says and sang “Head and Shoulders.” We also do other random things at the school and in El Gorrión after school.  So far, I have helped clean out a cistern by carrying five gallon pails of water, moved cement bricks into classrooms, went to houses within the community to talk with them and pray, and currently we are working on painting a woman’s house in the community. 

I know this is getting long, but I have the cutest host brother ever.  On Tuesday night he wanted to go to bed because he was tired, but Leah and I weren’t home yet (our curfew is 8:30).  Because he is our big brother, he wouldn’t go to bed until he knew we were safe and at home.  Then on Wednesday night Leah and I were at home, but we weren’t in bed yet, so Wilmar wouldn’t go to bed yet because he wanted to make sure that we were safe and in bed.  By the way, Wilmer is probably about 13!  SO CUTE!!

PS.  I'll try to put pictures up soon, but I haven't taken a ton yet.