Long day on the Finca!

Thank you to everyone for all your support and well wishes!

Today I had the opportunity to work on a finca! Also known as a farm. We left the house around 6:45 to catch our public mode of transportation: a chicken bus. Why they are called that I have no idea... Actually I do. They have bald tires, they squish about 4 people in a 2 person seat, they blast what ever kind of music, people board from the front and the back "exit door", they hall ass down side roads and their brakes well, you just hope they work. Our bus ride cost about 25 whole cents and we rode it for about 15 minutes. The town we got off was called Ciudad Vieja. We had about a 5 minute walk to pick up tools at a place called As Green As it Gets. I met a man named Pedro who was my jefe (boss) for the day. He is about 2 feet shorter than me and can carry twice as much as me. I carried a pick ax and two cement buckets (not with cement) and we headed to the finca. The town we were in was situated at the base of the volcano "Agua" and the finca was on the side of Agua. It felt like we walked forever... FOREVER... It was literally about a 15 minute walk to the finca and it felt like an hour. Our first job was to fill up the cement buckets with rocks and sand. We filled about 5 buckets with rocks and carried them down to a small creek (sin=without water) and then we carried 6 buckets of sand to the same place. The plan was to mix the rocks, sand and some cement mix to make a mixture. After those 11 buckets we had to fetch water. I had to walk up a hill to a tilapia pond with the most fowl smelling water I have ever smelled. Apparently tilapia feed on algae so the water was green and nasty. Walking back down to the creek I had to stop multiple times to switch arms to avoid spilling water on myself. The plan for the day was to build a retaining wall in part of the creek so when the rains come the water is retained and then the sediment from the rain will fill up part of the creek to make a natural bridge across the creek for motorbikes to access. Before I had got there someone had dug a trench  for us to fill with BOULDERS and cement. I started in the ditch and would pour some cement then place a boulder and pour more cement. This process was repeated for about 2 hours. When I say boulder I mean boulder. They were at least 30+ pound rocks we were using. My rock duty ended and I got to mix cement. Not much easier than lifting rocks. Mind you we were mixing with a shovel not an electric mixer. Joyous. We got to the finca at 7:30 and after all I just described it was only 9 am! Are you kidding me. Only 9am... But we did get about half of the retaining wall built and thank the heavens we ran out of cement. So we did some weeding in the farm area and had lunch in a tree! It was great but my body is in pain. I forgot what exertion was! Geez more signs of obesity ha. That was my day in  nutshell! More stories to come after I go to the black sand beaches tomorrow.

Also good news about Rulfino, my friend Lisa helped me contact a local health organization and one of the doctors have agreed to come out and check Rulfino out!!! More to come next week!

Internship and Random Thoughts

Yesterday I went to Buena Vista which is a small town about 20 minutes away from Antigua. I again rode on the back of Daniel's moto bike (he is the travel nurse) this time with a huge box of vaccinations and we had to go up a hill... Yea I think we had to stay in 1st or 2nd gear the whole way. At one point I kind of just giggled to myself and Daniel leans over and says "Courtney... Tu pesas mucho!" Translation: "Courtney... You weigh alot!" I must say I laughed pretty hard. He was completely joking but earlier I had told him I am "gorda" or heavy because I have been eating so many tortillas. He is a jokester. We pulled into a small alley and walked into a room that was about 6ft by 30 ft. It had concrete walls and was just baren. This is the "clinic" we were working in. I could not believe it. In the front of the room there was a small table where Daniel and I would check each patient in and then they would sit on a wooden bench next to me and we would give them their shots. Mostly children received vaccinations but a couple of mothers had a complete check up. The women would go into the back of the clinic where a small medicine cabinet stood and a single cloth divider quarded them from the rest of us. Through the course of the day small children, dogs and even a couple chickens ran through the clinic. Have you ever heard of ANY type of animal in a clinic in the US?? I think not, the only animals I have seen in the US clinics are the screaming children haha. At the beginning of the day we gave vaccinations to babies and towards lunch we gave dogs rabbi vaccinations. I actually gave some dogs the vaccinations but when a dog looked suspicious to Daniel he'd say no no I ll do it. He was afraid of a dog biting me so he took the naughty ones. For lunch I learned how to make tortillas!!! It was soooo hard. The girl that showed me how was only 16 years old and she probably made 16 tortillas to my one! How embarrassing. I just did not have the proper hand clap down right to flatten out the dough! But to get the dough I sifted through corn kernels that had been soaking in water, drained them and then took them to a grinder or mill that literally ground the semi wet corn into dough right in front of me. From there she kneaded the dough and then we made small balls and started "clapping" the dough into circular forms. The only two I made were disfigured and had holes. Fail. They were the "special" ones out of the group. After lunch I was waiting outside the clinic and saw a woman maybe 4 ft tall and had a small child with her not more than a year old and she had this huge jug of water she had filled up at the local water faucet. She started walking away so I asked her if I could help. She looked at me funny and reluctantly gave me the water. Oh I failed to mention she had been carrying it on her HEAD!  She lifted it off hers and placed it on my head. HOLY CRAP. It was so heavy. I could not help but laugh and neither could she. She saw me sway a little bit with the weight and thought I was crazy for wanting to help. She tried to take it back and I insisted I would take it to her house. She was amazed I even made it! It was an incredible to see how grateful and shocked she was I wanted to help. It's the little things right. After that Daniel asked me if I wanted to meet his friend Rufino. Without hesitation I said yes and he proceeded to warn me that he had a "sickness" of the skin. I still wanted to go so we bought Rufino a couple cookies and juice. We had to walk maybe about 5 minutes up part of a hill and we finally came to his small little property. Daniel called out for him and Rufino came out. I have no words or emotions to describe the health condition of Rufino. His entire body was taken over by his health condition. I can not even put into words how horrible Rufino's condition is and is getting. His mother apparently left and he is only 21 years old. He has been living like this for most of his life and has never been seen by any medical professional besides Daniel. He has 3 of his little cousins living with him (all around 3 to 5 years old) and his dad works somewhere close to the house. I am not kidding when I say if I was 3 years old and I saw Rufino I would think he was some kind of "monster". As horrible as that sounds, I am not exaggerating when I say his body is deformed because of his condition. I completely lost my appetite and just was in utter shock. How could someone go so long without medical attention. It broke my heart and made me feel guilty for ever feeling sorry for myself about anything for that matter. I talked with my friend Lisa about things I could do to help Rulfino, so right now we are in the process of contacting organizations in the area that could get help for Rulfino. Keep Rulfino in your prayers and hearts, for now we are in limbo. We left Rulfino and walked in silence back to the clinic. We gathered up all our gear and headed back to Antigua. Daniel asked if I was ok and in my best Spanish I told him I was just in shock. He gave me a hug and we were off. I did not sleep as well last night, one: I was thinking about Rufino and two: I was so SORE from that stupid water jug... How pathetic. Early signs of obesity from tortilla intake!

On a lighter note here are some observations I have made:

1. My Mayan Kaq'chikel teacher, Osbilda is an indigenous Mayab woman. She has taking a liking to me since I am the worst spanish speaker in her class and yet maybe one of the better Kag'chikel speakers. The other day I had made a small "chiste" (joke) about something and she had the deepest belly laugh I have ever heard. I couldn't help but laugh harder. Her whole body kind of shook with her laugh it was great!
2. Outside of Antigua there are many small towns that are situated in the valley and some in the mountains. Every town I have been to outside of Antigua alot of the women walk around barefoot. Barefoot. My feet hurt from walking on the concrete floors in our house. These women are a complete different kind of tough.
3. The gardening done in Antigua is done with a machete. A couple mornings ago I was walking in the street and saw a man just carrying a machete in a holster on his belt. UHH woaaah dude. Before I saw what he was doing I made sure to cross the road... Like a street would stop someone with a machete but you know. I kept watching him and he came up to a couple of bushes and went to work.
4. If you ever see a woman carrying a babe here is the amount of clothing the baby is wearing:
      -A diaper
      -A light onezy (think I spelled that one wrong)
      -A sweater
      -A pair of pants
      -Socks
      -Sometimes shoes
      -A beanie
     -And finally a blanket
     -Sometimes two blankets
Poor kids they can barely breath or move!
5. I saw a little boy wearing a U of A sweatshirt in the street two mornings ago! How ridiculous!
6. I have noticed a lot of children are semi abusive to animals here. It breaks my heart, the other day I saw a little boy no older than 4 kick a puppy because the dog was in his way. It wasn't my place to tell him no, but I almost wanted to kick him back and see how he liked it. ( Ok not really but kind of).

One of the more vicious ones!

One of the chicken visitors 

Puppy in the clinic :(

Our tiny clinic

The three little boys that live Rulfino

Giant water jug... Look at the tiny woman in front of me!

My first animal vaccination!

Trying to make tortillas! Failed attempt about 2 secs later I dropped the dough

Ok that is all for now! Love to all
Abrazos!

Sorry for the Grammatical Errors

Warning. My brain is tired and there are probably alot of grammatical errors since I am trying so hard to think in Spanish. Lo siento! Xoxo

Semuc Champay Weekend Getaway

I want to first comment on the title. "Getaway", isn't this the term we use when we need to have a short vacation to relieve stress etc.. It's funny I'm getting away from my getaway. On my bus ride back home today I was thinking ok Court, back to reality time to get back into school mode. What am I thinking... Reality? I am in a dream world right now. Every day is a new experience, a new adventure!

Ok now to start our weekend. I will start by saying we got "played" by a couple of tour agencies. Trying to make a trip for eight women (who choose not to say what they actually want to do) is very difficult. After a minor freak out with my roommate Colleen we were set to be picked up at 5:30 am. Yes even Courtney was ok with that. The night before all the girls were asking what do we bring, what food should I pack, etc etc etc. I am not your mama, figure it out, your an adult!! Holy cow, future note to self, big groups are hard to plan for. But despite that, the girls that came on the trip were all amazing people. About 5:32 the roommates and I showed up to the van and we were missing 3 of the girls... We waited... and waited. Thirty minutes later three figures in the distance were SLOWLY walking towards the van. If that were me I would be sprinting and out of breath. Mind you the reason we were leaving at 5:30am was to avoid Guatemala City traffic. So much for that plan. Apparently the reason for their tardiness was one girls forgot her wallet. Trying to control myself right now and not blow up on her. In the realm of things, what ever, we were late and I am no candidate for being early but the idea was too get to Semuc early in order to see the national park before it closes. So much for that plan and the extra 70 quetzales (currency) we paid to leave earlier. It ended up being about a seven and half hour drive through jungles, valleys, alot of Guatemala City traffic, ghettos, and bumpy, pot holey dirt roads. We had about a 1600km difference in altitude change. I usually never get car sick... I can read in the car, I can sit upside down, turns in the road dont bother me but the altitude change got me feeling green. For the first half of the ride the girls and I were chatter boxes, we played middle school car games and as soon as the altitude started to change we all slowly got quieter and quieter. After about 7 hours we came into a town called Lankin and had to switch vehicles... Hmm our guide said you needed four wheel drive to get to our hostel and the "new" vehicle only runs at certain hours of the day. Comforting. But anyway all 10 us unloaded and transferred into a truck smaller than my f 150. Four of us piled into the backseat and the other 6 in the bed of the truck... (Don't worry parents I sat in the cab). But then our driver took off, hauling ass through the tiny cobble stone roads of Lankin. I gasped about 3 times thinking we almost hit dogs or pedestrians! Then we stopped at a little hostel and picked up two Brits who both sat in the front seat. Fortunately it was a couple, and they were able to sit on each others laps. So finally we were off to our 4 wheel drive adventure to Semuc. The road was... there was no road. It was a dirt path that had severe erosion from the rains. I quietly sat with my eyes closed suffocating from how many people were in the cab and not being able to roll the windows down since it started pouring again. I have to say our driver was terrific. His truck was older than me, his clutch seemed to be going out and he had to feather the gas every time he shifted. Reminded me of when I started driving stick "A LITTLE GAS... A LITTLE CLUTCH!" (famous last words from dad before I got the car stuck on a hill). But eventually after many bumps, jolts, hills, and mud puddles we pulled up to our rustic, quaint hostel situated about 200 feet away from the river.

It was gorgeous completely made out of bamboo and wood. We only had electricity from  6pm til 10pm, I am pretty sure the entire hostel was run off of one generator! But we were placed in dorm style rooms so 5 of us were in one room and 3 in the other. The beds were... well a little questionable. The first bed I chose had a GIANT stain on it. I am going to assume for my own sanity that it was a water stain from the storms but who really knows. So I switched beds closer to all the spider webs.. Lovely... Our first night we just walked around the area. Our hostel like I said was right next to the river. At the waters edge there was a huge swing that you could launch yourself into the river, so fun! Then we walked up the road which I might add is all jungle forest with wild turkeys and chickens just grazing the side of the path. Along the path we came upon a huge suspension bridge that led to the national park. I might add the floor of the bridge was wooden and shooooot I was nervous if it was going to hold my weight ( in reality cars drove on it everyday I was just being dramatic). But then we had a lovely dinner of fried chicken, rice and the most soggy, squishy, gooooeeeey salad I had ever seen, I said seen because I did not touch it. But after dinner we were all enjoying our two hours of electricity and in the meantime got salsa lessons. One of the guys that worked the hostel was also a salsa instructor. Man were we the entertainment for the night. Eight white girls with 16 left feet. It was hysterical but, he was patient and at least some of us have the basic steps down. The night was over lights out just before ten. We all proceeded to bed. I wore long sleeves, long johns and socks with my long johns tucked in. Mind you it is about 80 degrees out and 100% humidity. I was not about to get anything crawling all up on me. It took me awhile to fall asleep but eventually I fell into a coma.

The next morning was gorgeous. I woke up around 6 30 and no one was up. It was quiet and peaceful. It was slightly chilly out and the river was calm. Our tour of the cave was scheduled for 9 30. Enough time for me to lose my cell phone and 100 quetzales. Not the end of the world, but I have no recollection of where I put both of those things... Early Alzheimer's. Yikes. But all the girls slowly woke up and we got our bathing suits on, head lamps and water shoes to go spelunking! The cave we went to has a river that runs through it and feeds into the river. At the mouth of the cave there is a semi large waterfall. Hmm how our we starting this little adventure. The guide gave us all two candles and we started the trek. We hiked up the side of a small hill and entered the mouth of the cave, also known in the Mayan world as the mouth of the alligator which leads into another world. We lit our candles and slowly walked into the dark, cold, mysterious water. I must say our Guatemalan guide was smeagol (the creature from Lord of the Rings that can climb crazy stuff and dive in dark water). I kid you not we are walking through the cave by candle light, very eerie feeling. Our guide was incredible he would tell us where rocks were in the water, steer us from room to room. Some of the rooms, we had to ascend ladders (again looked older than I did) and then descend some. As we were getting further back in the cave I could hear rushing water. Ummmm.. Thoughts in my head, great the cave is filling up with water. But to my surprise we crawled through this small opening and we were in this room with an actual waterfall. You could barely see the water was gushing everywhere. The candles went out and the guide grabbed my hand ( I was in front) and said hang on to this rope and without a word he swung me THROUGH the waterfall. I have never felt water so forceful before. He placed me on a little ledge bench thing and swung back through and started bringing everyone over one y one. Once everyone was over he told us to climb up yet another later to get to the next room. The last person came through and no guide... Heart drops for about 2 minutes and all of a sudden a man emerges from the waterfall, like I said SMEAGOL! He climbed up the center of the waterfall using the rope we swung from side to side with. He did it effortlessly. About another 5 minutes of swimming slash walking we came into the last room of the cave. Once again the guide disappeared and all of sudden a man flies in the air and lands in a cannon ball in front of us all. So of course I had to do it to. It was only about 3 km high but still cliff jumping in a cave! I was so nervous. Everyone kept chanting for me. I told them no I don't want to! But they were persistent and I couldn't be a chicken so I did it. What a rush. After our cliff jumping excursion, by the way I was not the only one to go, we headed out. The pure excitement from seeing natural light is overwhelming. Even though I knew Smeagol would get us out it was relieving. After the caves we got to tube down part of the river. It was freeeezing! So not enjoyable. But I was floating along keeping to myself and all of sudden someone says what is that... Of course I jump and there was an otter right next to me! Are those dangerous? It freaked me out. The guide said to me "Don't worry mi amor, it's only a perro de agua." Translation, "Don't worry my love its only a water dog!" Oh great I feel much better now. But after our tubing we grabbed a quick lunch and headed over to the national park to see the natural pools, also known to some as Eden. It was about a 15 minute walk along the riverside to get to these series of natural pools that are crystal clear. The pools are on top of a massive natural bridge that the river I have been talking about runs under! How crazy is that. These pools that we swim in are all above the river. Nature at its finest! The water was refreshing and cool. If you keep your feet still enough the little tiny fish in the pools will eat the dead skin off your heels! I am way too ticklish, but the fish sure liked mine for some reason. We spent the rest of our day just enjoying the pools and returned back to our hostel for the night. Ate another appetizing dinner... (sarcasm). We had a long day and an even longer drive home the next day. The girls turned in pretty early so we could get up early and catch our lovely four wheel drive truck home. That is about all I have for this weekend. I could go into so much detail about the pools and the history and the location but I would never be able to justify the beauty of the river, the cave and the pools! All in all a  great weekend. Drive back was slow, boring,  and well boring.

The pools!

The river going under the pools!

Aerial view!

Girls in the water! I am in the middle!

Ready at 5:30 waiting for the other chicas...

Still waiting!

Finally in the van and loaded!

The girls! After about 4 hours of driving... Notice I lost the socks

Our dorm room... You cant see the spider webs or the stains...

The outside! A nice little loft upstairs!

Girls walking to the river from our room!

The river! And the swing!

Very sketchy dock!

Tight tree walking!

The start to a new day!

View of the river!

Covered from head to toe!

Trying to go to sleep!

Part of the ghetto!

Centro de Salud

Side note: I spelled Guillermo about ten different ways! Sorry typing fast!
Can not figure out how to put the pictures on the bottom! Grr technology

Loaded down with the bags
The blue box hanging down is the vaccinations
Look how huge I am compared to the actual bike...Yea

Rodolfo! A farmer in Hermano Pedro

Cocha and Me at one of the higher elevation houses!

3 kids in the picture and 2 more inside and this mother only sells tortillas for a living

My delicious lunch!
Now look at the small bowl in front of my plate, it has carrots in it..
Do not be fooled this vegetable mix is absurdly spicy! 

Daniel (the nurse) and me
I am wearing Cocha's head outfit

Switch!

Beyonce Booty! It is literally just a pillow

Yesterday was my second internship day! The week before, one of the nurses had asked if every once in awhile I would want to travel with him to some of the surrounding towns. Of course I said no... Ha yea right I was so excited he asked me! So yesterday we met at Centro de Salud and packed our ice box full of vaccinations and  a couple medications. I grabbed both of his bags and was ready to walk out the door. It was fuuny he bent down to grab his stuff and realized I had it all. He was slightly shocked. We walked to the front of the clinic and he said ok wait here. In my head I'm thinking ok he is probably going to get the car... Never make assumptions. He rode up on a dirt bike that looked like it was from the 70s. There was no shocks left and well its from the 70s, get the visual. So reluctantly I hopped on and we were off. He took all the back roads of Antigua in order to get to the town we were going to, Santa Ana. I felt every rock the road had to offer, small and large it jarred the whole bike. My "lethargic" self, and all the bags weighed that poor bike down. It took us about ten minutes to get to the town. We arrived at a very small house and dropped all of our stuff off and proceeded up the hill to another town called Hermano Pedro. This was a tiny, tiny town situated on the side of the mountain. We met an older man named Rodolfo, who was the main farmer and health coordinator for the town. He told us the town did not have their papers ready so we were to come back another day. Yes, everything is still on papers. No central system to organize health records. On our way back down to Santa Ana, the nurse, Daniel was asking me about school and life and I told him I was taking a Mayan language course. Turns out he speaks Kaq'chikel! What a blessing, I now have a new tutor! But after our visit to Hermano Pedro, we went back to the small clinic owned by a guy named Cocha. For the rest of the morning we did paper work for the women and children. We had to mark down which women needed Hierro and Folico and which kids needed their DTAP and polio. After we sorted out all the paper work we loaded all our supplies and set out on foot. Yes, on foot. We went to about 15 homes all with children. Its interesting, when you walk up to a house all the front doors and walls are the same. However, once you enter you will either see a dirt floor and card board walls or an actual foundation, with tile floors and concrete walls. Some people invite you in and others make you wait outside. If we had to wait in the street, we would administer the vaccination in the street. There is no formal form of health record, just a piece of paper that I (a person of no medical qualifications) can fill out. All the mothers had a little booklet that told them when their child would need their next vaccination. One child we saw was a year behind on all her vaccinations. Some of the children looked like they did not have a bath in about a week. One child had a large scrape in between his eyes from falling in the street. By no means am I discrediting the care of the mothers, however the idea of hygiene and safety is very different. Hard to take in. I never felt uncomfortable or unsafe in any home but rather shocked and amazed at the conditions of some of the homes. Daniel was great he explained everything to me. I have no idea how he did it but somehow I understood everything. Or maybe it was an understanding that we were helping this community and that was all I needed to know. I took a liking to him. Sorry I had to say that it just felt so appropriate and well "Little House on the Prairie" like. After the 15 homes we headed back to the clinic slash house and Cocha made us a delicious lunch of chicken and tortillas! Daniel insisted on having me try all the salsas and even the jalapeno vegetable mix. He insisted. So I tried them and my mouth was on fire. Daniel and the doctor got a kick out of that. They laughed at my pain (ironic right). But both in good character. After lunch we were packing our things up and of course like clock work it started to pour (remember our mode of transportation). We decided to wait it out. In the meantime I asked Cocha to show me pictures of his family etc. He showed me all his immediate family and then his extended family that consisted of about 100 more photos and then he showed me a picture of a man and woman in cowboy outfits... I said "Oh that's nice who is that?". He goes, oh that's me (pointing to the woman)! What????? I was at a loss for words. I just said wow that is a great outfit... Really Courtney... I don't care what his sexual orientation was but I was just caught without words. He was a very pretty woman though. So we talked about that for awhile and then he got out his outfits. He had a whole bag of them. High heels, dresses, skirts the whole shebang. More clothes than I have probably. I told him to put one on so he disappeared for awhile then came back with a long skirt on and a wig. He turned around and had a FAKE butt! It was hysterical. He had a "Beyonce" butt or a Sheniqua butt! He was so open with me and I could tell he appreciated the fact that I did not judge him or even look at him different. After our little rendezvous with outfits the rain held up a little and Daniel and I made a dash for it. I had all the bags again and I strapped my rain coat on over everything. As I walked outside a car drove by and soaked the backside of me. Thanks alot buddy. So now my butt was soaked and I had to ride on an outdated, no shock motorcycle back to town. We hit so many puddles it just drenched my shoes and my pants. The only part that was dry on me was my mid section. As we were cruising back Daniel asked me if I was ok. I said "DUH! Es una adventura!". In his head he was saying crazy American girl. But we made it safely back to the clinic in Antigua and I proceeded to smash my thumb in the gate that let us into the parking lot. Cold, wet and a pinched finger. Daniel looked at me soaked from head to toe and we just started laughing hysterically. We looked like drowned rats. It was a sight to see. But, he invited me on all his future small town excursions! I would consider this day a huge success. I walked home wet, was splashed by another car, but I was so happy and felt that I had really experienced something that can not be explained but simply appreciated.

Cooking lessons and random thoughts

So on Monday night Guirellmo, also the bike tour guide invited me over to his house with my friend Teresa to learn how to cook rellenitos! We started off with boiling bananas cut up, but still in their peels in cinnamon and chocolate water! After they became very suave(soft) we mashed them up like mashed potatoes. Meanwhile we had black frijoles heating up on the stove with azucar(sugar) and chocolate powder and a little bit of oil. Once the bananas were completely smashed we wet our hands with water grabbed about two tablespoons of banana and started patting them down like tortillas! Once we had a nice little banana tortilla we put the frijoles in the middle and proceeded to close the tortilla. In the end it looked like a little nugget. Once they were completely sealed we placed them in a pan with oil and let them fry away! Yum, food for the soul!

Oh so this past weekend I wore a pair of shoes that gave me a gnarly blister on the bottom of my foot. You know a SIMPLE blister. Well, one of my roommates thought it would be hysterical to tell me about the girl who fell off a zip line in Costa Rica and got a FLESH EATING BACTERIA! Great now I have that. Don't be surprised if I'm missing a foot or leg when I get back. Jessssus. Why would she tell me that!  I have been scrubbing the crap out of my foot. Wish me luck! (More hypochondriac moments to come).

Another entertaining story. Our CIRMA group (which is just 11 students) got together to discuss our current experiences and how we are handling everything. You know spill our feelings about life. Anyway, pretty nice to hear how everyone is experiencing everything but I must say this and forgive me for being rude, or for just being brutally honest. One of the students commented on how lethargic she was. She went on to discuss how she wasn't eating  like she normally does (hmmm beans empanadas and fried bananas), she wasn't in a routine, and she wasn't running like she used to... LETHARGIC... Now, what comes to everyones mind??? Without actually saying it or rather just in my head, I said "Dear, its called getting fat." I feel I am allowed to laugh at this since I myself feel "lethargic". That cracked me up. I think my grandparents might get a kick out of this one.

Me and Guirellmo at his house!

Teresa smashing bananas!

Yum!

Mixing the frijoles!

Our little tortilla with frijoles!

Almost done!!!

My spanish teacher Nori! This was where we had class, with ice cream!
The U.S. should adopt this idea! 

Side note: My Mayan language course is not getting any easier. Who would of thought, a Mayan class being easy.

Scatter Brain

This is a very scattered post:

This past Friday I spent about half of my day reading for HOURS! My geography class (which all the reading is for)  is looking at the concept of Globalization and how the "global" effects the "local". We are looking at the idea of globalization in rural areas in relation to Guatemala and even Antigua. I tend to have the literal brain and not the conceptual of lets ponder huge concepts with thousands of different answers brain. If anyone has any opinions on this topic please feel free to share.

Ok now I am going to complain for a second. I think being here makes you appreciate the little things in life like wi-fi, as horrible as that is. Unfortunately, my house does not have internet. This makes doing homework and communicating very difficult. In order to use the internet I have to go to a cafe, buy something then use the internet. As you can see, minor problems in life in the realm of things, but a pain none the less.

This past weekend I had my first adventure with street food! I had a fajita thing... Fried onions, bell peppers and some kind of meat(honestly who knows what is was, I chose not to ask). I will venture to say chicken (more wishful thinking than anything). But, it was delicious with HOT HOT salsa and something of a soft green sauce. So far so good, have not gotten sick (fingers crossed). Advice: do not eat the ceviche here. If you do eat it and its chewy spit it out immediately and make sure to be close to a bathroom at all times.

Saturday morning woke up semi early and went to watch the Independence Day parade. I thought Tucson's St. Patty's day parade was a decent size, Anitgua has it beat. There were more school marching bands than schools. I can not explain how many bands I saw and dancers and costumes. It went on for at least 3 hours and then some. And then hours later there was some more marching and then about 3 hours later some more. My favorite band played "I Believe I can Fly" and had some serious swag. For my grandparents and parents swag can be defined as serious rhythm and sweet dance moves. It was a 2 day celebration.
 I must say if you are ever in Antigua and you hear a series of gunshots... 1. Don't run immediately 2. Try not to duck immediately 3. Look around. Most likely it is some kids setting of bottle rockets in the streets but it literally sounds like gunshots and it echoes through the whole town!
The rest of the day was pretty mellow but I was walking home around 9:30 with my friend Dylan and we were stopped by a group of Guat kids (college age) and said it was this girls birthday and asked to take a picture. So we took it. Warning: this is a ploy to get you to go out with them and buy them drinks. You learn quick here.

Ok now on to Sunday! My friend Guellmo who is from Guatemala City gave me one of his bikes and took my friend Colleen and I on a 10 km bike ride! It was incredible. Wow such great description right. Here it goes. I'm not going to name every town because it honestly will not mean anything but in total we went to 6 different small towns all very close to Antigua. He told us the story of how the 3 volcanoes, Picaya, Agau and Fuego  (which surrond us, Fuego is the one that has been all over the news) came to be named and then went on to tell us the history of each town.  As we were riding chicken buses would fly by us. For those of you who have never heard of a chicken bus it is the so called public transportation. I would venture to say that these buses are all the old school buses from the U.S that are deemed unsafe. Yea... They decorate them with different colors and on a good day you might get to sit in a seat. They PACK people in there. The key to riding them is sitting in the back because the escape door is there other exit! It costs about 3Q which is not even 50 cents to ride and they haul ass! Sometimes I think the driver might be slightly inebriated. This is Guatemala for you. Don't worry I have not taken them! Smart decisions. But they have no care for bikers. You best get out of their way before they run you over with their balding tires and exhaust fumes that leave you in a cloud of black smoke. As if I wasn't breathing hard enough to make it up the hill on a bike the chicken bus chokes me. Anyway moving on, town we went to had a church that seemed to server as the focal point of the town.A brief history, back in the colonial period the Jesuit order came to Guatemala and pushed Catholicism on all of these small towns. Before, most of the people were polytheistic. You can imagine this conversion for the Jesuits. In order to appease the indigenous people they built four outdoor ramadas where the people could pray. Many of the indigenous people did not believe in a building as a symbol of place or worship so the Jesuits built the ramadas. Thought that was interesting. All the towns we visited were partially dirt roads and partially cobblestone. The people were so welcoming but curious what we were doing.
The history of each town seems so different even though in reality they may only be 3 km away from one another. We rode through a lot of coffee plantations and different farms. A different lifestyle. I also saw a "pila". This is the common washing station for the town. The town women take their clothes there and do all their laundry by HAND. A woman asked me how I did mine and I was embarrassed to say I had a washer and a dryer and was too lazy to even do that sometimes. Life put into perspective again. We rode for about 3 to 3 1/2 hours and ended with some traditional Guatemalan dulces (candy)! Yum I feel like it was pure brown sugar!
I will say though, my host mom still has the common misconception that Americans (meaning me and my roommates) need super sized portions. This is not the case. She piles food on our plates and is upset when we have trouble finishing it. We have been trying to tell her to cook less food cause we simply can not eat that much but its been a slow process... Hence the reason I feel I weigh about 500 lbs. When I return please do not judge my jowels. As someone who I will not name said, "Court, your taking up space"... I AM TAKING UP SPACE. So depressing.

My new outfit for my internship! Baha

The parade begins!

Study break! This little guy got me to buy so much chicle!!!

The familia! The parade is still going on... It is dark outside

Guirellmo and I before the ride! 

One of the many iglesias we saw!

The pila! Notice in the far far background the women cleaning!

Trying to take a picture while riding... Yes almost hit a pot hole!

Mom: Proof I was wearing a helmet

Guirellmo and Colleen on the path! I was still riding my bike! Talent

Sorry my thoughts can be a little disorganized!