four months later

I'm not quite sure what to write here anymore. It's not as if interesting, note-worthy things haven't happened; I just get to wrapped up in all the little things to write on this. Maybe I can get into the habit of writing again. I don't really want to say that's my new year's resolution, because those seem too easily broken. But the beginning of the new year is as good a time as any to try to reinstate good habits. So here goes.

The holidays were fabulous. Truly. I learned to snowboard (more or less), dug my old ice skates out of my parents basement and spent an hour or so one day remembering how much I loved to ice skate, had a great Christmas with my family, my little brother proposed to his girlfriend (excuse me, fiancee) -- who is wonderful and perfect for him so I'm excited for them and their winter wedding to be held next year, I spent a crazy week (including new year's eve) in Chicago with my best friends from DePauw, and made it back to Dallas after the 20 hour car ride, just as I was starting to miss my friends here.

Work continues to both challenge and fulfill me. I'm considering spending another year at Wesley-Rankin, but have not made that decision final yet. A couple months ago I was trying to get a scholarship to study in Ireland for a year, but since that didn't go through, I had/have to rethink my gradschool plans. It most certainly will happen before too long. But I think I might be able to tie up a few more loose ends if I stay a bit longer here. But I (should) will delve more into that later. For now, I'll just be satisfied with this first step back into keeping up with this thing. Although now I doubt anyone bothers checking it anymore! (Sorry guys!!)

back in the states.

So here I am, back in Dallas. The last week week, or rather the last 10 days, have been interesting readjusting to my "normal" life. Making it even harder to re-adjust was the fact that the after school program kicked off again last Wednesday, so it was a crazy past week here at work. But things are basically settling down now, and I'm doing fine.

This past weekend I went to Austin for the Austin City Limits music festival. I had tickets for the Saturday (final day) concerts. The music was great, but it was HOT.

I'm also working on finishing up my scholarship application for grad school starting next fall. I'm hoping to get a scholarship to study in Ireland for a year. Wouldn't that be fantastic?

Well, this was just a short post to let those of you who were checking up on me know that I made it back. I'll try to get in the habit of writing once a week, as well. But until then, Adios!

One week left...

I originally thought I'd be traveling again, on my final weekend hear in Guatemala. I had a long week, though, for various reasons, and thus I'm staying in Antigua. At least for now. Maybe I'll go somewhere tonorrow, but if I do, I'll just be winging it.


Last weekend was amazing. No, that's an understatement. The school curriculum came with package deals for different trips throughout Guatemala and even into other countries like El Salvador or Honduras. But these trips can cost up to $300, whereas you can arrange trips yourself, making your own bus and hotel reservations through one of the probably almost 100 little travel agency shops in the city. I went the cheap route, and left a week ago Friday night at 6:30 pm on a bus to Guatemala City. From there, I caught the 10pm bus to Flores, Guatemala, about an hour from the site of what is claimed to have been the culutral epicenter of the Ancient Mayan world, Tikal. After sleeping (more or less) for about 8 hours on the bus, I arrived in Flores at 7 am, and by 10 I made it (on my own!) to Tikal. Yes, I traveled solo. But no worries (Mom, Grandma...) -- I recieved conformation from various people before I left it would be a safe trip to make on my own.



The National Park of Tikal is roughly 6 or 7 square miles large, so in my 2 or 3 hour visit, I only saw a very small section of it. I saw the main section, though -- basically the main square of the old city. Pictures to follow:





While there was much more to see, by 1/1:30 it was crazy hot in Flores, and while I had slept at least 8 hours on the bus, it wasn't what I would call a great night's sleep, so the combination of those two factors meant that I was ready to leave by mid afternoon. Back at the bus station in Tikal, I bought another bus ticket for the supposed 3.5 hour bus ride to Rio Dulce. Ha! 3.5 hours turned into about 5.5 hours, and I would have been extremely ticked off, as I was already tired, had I not made a new friend on the bus, also headed to Rio Dulce/Livingston, and together we laughed at the absurdity of the multi hour+ stops our bus made before getting the first 60 miles out of Flores. My new friend, Henry, was from Mexico City. When we finally made it Rio Dulce, it was probably about 11:00, and I was so tired I was starting to doubt my decision to leave Flores/Tikal. I thought perhaps it would have been better to spend the whole weekend there, get a hotel room at that place in the park, and spend more time the next day seeing more of the park. However, after a good night's sleep in an actual bed (even though it only had one sheet and a questionable pillow -- I'm so glad I bought that litte fleece sleeping bag) and waking up to a beautiful Sunday morning, I began to think the bus ride had been worth it. On the beautiful 2 hour boat ride down the Rio Dulce (rio = river) to the Caribean port town of Livingston, I was absolutely convinced I had made the right decision.






In Livingston, Henry and I met up with a "rasta man" who said for 40 quetzales (a little more than 5 dollars) would take us to this waterfall where we could go swimming. Even though Livingston is on the Caribbean, the beach close to the town is pretty disgusting, full of garbage. But the hour hike down the beach brought us out of the dirty part of the beach, to the beautiful part, and then up a little bit into the mountain/forest to the waterfall. It was a small waterful, with only perhaps twice the force of a bathroom shower, the water ran off rock cliff about 12 feet up -- the perfect height to jump from into the deep pool of fresh water below, as was demonstrated by a few other hikers already at the falls. It was a fabulous place to spend a few hours in the afternoon, and there Henry and I also met another friend, Manuel, from Argentina. The three of us had dinner that night at a little cafe place, and the two guys (who both spoke English as well as Spanish) decided to "help" me learn spanish by switching the language of the conversation back and forth. At times I was getting frustrated by how little I could understand -- I thought my Spanish had gotten better thant that -- until Manuel pointed out that I was listening to two people talk with completely different accents, which could only add to the difficulty. All of a sudden I realized this was true: I could more or less understand Henry, from Mexico City, but it was Manuel's Argentinian accent that was confusing me. After dinner the three of us went to this restaraunt/club where a group of Livingstonians were playing drums in the local style of mixed African/Carribean/Latin rythems, called Garifuna. All of a sudden the power went out, and the restaraunt was pitch black. Soon enough the staff brought out some candels to provide a little light, but until they did, people were flipping open cell phones and Manuel had a bright flashlight in his backpack that he used as a spotlight for the group! The power outtage was caused by a storm, which only got worse as the night went on, and so there was no power all night long. It was a hot, fanless night in my hotel room.

My original plan was only to spend the day in Livingston, and leave on the last boat that evening to catch a bus back to Guatemala City/Antingua. But, in part, I think, because of the storm, and also in part, I think, because things like boat schedules are not always (ok, hardly ever!) foolproof in such laidback places as Livingston, the 6:00 boat that I thought I could take out of the town back to either of the two towns with bus stations, Rio Dulce or Puerto Barrios, didn't run. Thus I had to change my plans and leave on the first boat out the next morning, making it to Puerto Barrios by 7:30 and caught the 8:00 luxery class double decker bus to Guatemala City. I made it back to the capital about 1:00, meaning I missed the first half of classes that day, but was convinced I could make it to Antigua by the start of the afternoon classes at 2:00. That would mean, however, that the "chicken bus" -- what they call the public buses (in Engligh -- I hear the tourists started it, but now that's just what they're called) were out as it would take more than an hour. So, I forked over $20 for a cab ride straight to the doors of the school, and made it sweaty, probably a little stinky, and tired but content to the school by 2:00.

The funny thing is, even though $20 was the bargained-down price of the cab ride (I told the driver, who originally wanted almost $30 that $20 was all I had left, which was basically true), the ride from Guatemala City to Antigua -- probably about 40 miles -- was nearly the most expensive part of the trip. The original, 9 hour bus ride was $25. All the other bus rides, lasting 5 hours our more, were the equivelent of $11-15 dollars, the hotel rooms were about $7 a night.
And even though I missed a couple hours of school, I figure the fact that I navigated my way, solo, from nearly the southernmost to the northenmost corners of a foreign country count as a learning experience as well!


This past week has flown by. Days spent studying in school, evenings doing homework and occaisonally going out with a new friend or to I've made in the city. Two more day trips were made: one this past week to a Macadamia (nut)farm and a weaver's coopertive, and one last week to lake Ataitlan and a few of its surrounding towns. The day at the lake was nice, but not of the nicest weather, so I wasn't as impressed by that trip as I hear most people usually are. There was another run in with Maximon there: we visited a small little "shrine," really just kind of a room in a random building near the market, that was much more Catholic this time -- while the figure of Maximon did have the main spot in the center of the room, he was just chilling on the floor this time -- no alter -- and meanwhile a huge crucifix and also a figure of Mary were in the corner of the room, behind this glass coffin -- Sleeping Beauty style -- with a figurine in it which I think was also supposed to be of either Mary or Jesus, but I really wasn't sure. You had to pass by all these relics before you got to Maximon. So again, there was this mix of different religions and cultures, but in this place I had the sense that the dominant one was Catholocism.

The trip this week, to the nut farm and weaver's cooperative was also interesting. At the farm, they sold all kinds of macadamia nut products. Food products, obviously, but also soaps, cosmetic cremes and oils, and the like. They gave "free" (+ the cost of a tip) facials so you could sample their products. Then we visited the weaver's cooperative, set up by a group of woman trying to preserve some of the traditional customs of their village. They put on a demonstration of the significants of the different patterns and products of their weaving, and explained the significants of the traditional clothing and gifts made and worn during weddings.

One last notable part of the past week or so: there has been a lot of rain. Every day it rains for a little bit, even though it might be perfectly bright with not a cloud in the sky an hour previous, and then after it rains the sky is clear again. So out of nowhere these rain storms appear, and just flood the streets. Thursday, heading back to class after my 12-2 lunch break, one such storm came up, and by the time I got to the street in front of la Merced church around the corner from my school, the street seperating my from the church was one big brown, rapidly flowing river. About 8 people on each side of the street stood there looking across to the other side, trying to figure out the best place to cross, and silently daring each other to be the first to try it! I debated taking of my shoes like one lady did, but decided there really would be no point, as they were already soaked. So after about 5 minutes of my own personal stare-down with the river, I decided just to go for it, and in the middle of the street, the water was only about an inch and a half below my knees! (By the end of the school day at 4:30, it was bright and sunny again, and most of the water had drained from the streets.)

a Tikal yo voy...

In about 30 minutes I am leaving, via an overnight bus ride, to visit the ancient Mayan ruins of Tikal!! Expect to hear more about it when I return, either late Sunday or (very) early Monday! Until then, have a great weekend!!

el fin de semana numero uno en guatemala...

So much for posting something every other day. It’s not the beginning of my second week here, and I’ve yet to post an update. However, I have been keeping up in my journal, and so I will try to pull some excerpts to catch you all up on my past week, which was chocked full of some pretty amazing experiences.

The adventure began last Saturday, as I flew into Guatemala City around 2 pm. As the plane circled the city, preparing to land, passengers aboard were provided a spectacular view of the city, built (like most cities, town, villages, municipals, etc in Guatemala) on the mountainside. From the air, I could see great houses and buildings on cliff tops, seemingly built right up to the edge of the cliff, which then dropped down to the barrios, full of the one-room brick or shack homes, below. Also visible from the plane window: a river winding through the city, and occasionally tumbling over the cliffs in the form of beautiful waterfalls. One sight in particular that caused a ripple of excitement throughout the plane was a thin stream of water ribboning down the inside center of a half-tube-shaped giant cove in the cliff side.

I found the van driver holding a sign with my name pretty easily. Also taking that particular van into Antigua was a mother and her two middle-school-aged children from DC, also spending (only) the next week at PLFM language school. What a great way to end a summer vacation – if you’re into that kind of thing!

The van ride into Antingua was also an adventure, as in Guatemala City, the lines dividing the lanes on the roads seem to be optional! Once out of the city, drivers aren’t provided that luxury, though, as drifting out of your particular lane might mean you topple over the edge of the cliff. Great vistas all the way into Antigua: mountains, valleys, hills, banks, all covered in brilliant shades of dark green. We also passed a processional of cars and trucks decorated with bright colors and green posters, playing music and projecting an announcement – via a speaker system Blues Brother style! – to vote for their particular candidates on the upcoming presidential election, to take place the day after I leave Guatemala in September.

I am living in the home of Doňa Olga, who boards all sorts of foreign visitors in her cozy home. Her home is part of a gated complex, including a small hotel and restaurant on the corner, and the homes of a few other people. I live in the small private room she rents in the back of the complex. When I first arrived, I made number foreign border number 8 staying with Doňa Dona Olga. Now we’re down to three, as only the two Hollanders remain, but I hear more will be arriving this weekend. (Actually, by the time I post this, they will probably already be here!) The two Hollanders, a guy and a girl, are my age, here with a larger group of Hollanders staying at various places throughout Antigua, as they work on a project, for the past 6 weeks volunteering at a primary school and a hospital with disabled children, and are also taking Spanish lessons at a different language school. (There are upwards of 30 different schools here!). Apparently, when they first got here, neither of them spoke any Spanish, but now – at least Brejia (I know I’m butchering the spelling of her name!) – is doing quite well, and while I wouldn’t call her fluent, she can definitely get by. So I’m excited to see how much progress I can make in my four weeks. At any rate, the two of them, along with their other friends, have been a lot of fun to hang out with during meals, after class, and sometimes in the evenings. I will be sorry to see them go next week.

Antigua is a charming city. I can’t think of a better word to describe it. It was at one point, the capital of Guatemala, during the time of Spanish colonialism. Therefore there are many old buildings, especially large catholic churches, built in such a style, with lots of arches and ... well, I’m not that great at architectural styles, so I’ll try to put up some more photos to speak for me. A lot of these great buildings were partially destroyed in a large earthquake in the 1970s, so there are many interesting ruins that all of the foreign tourists here (there are so many more than I ever would have expected!) like to visit and explore. There’s an old church almost next to my house here, where a wedding party was held yesterday.

Antigua’s charm, I think, comes from the mix of this grand Spanish style mixed with the simple Latin American style of small but brightly painted and inviting buildings: stores, homes, restaurants, all are painted a bright blue or yellow or red. Well, my home, and its entire complex, are white. But it’s only one of just a few white buildings. The streets are cobbled, but not in the way I’d ever imagined a cobblestone street to be: the stones are very irregular, and the streets are in no way smooth. But it’s just as well, as stop signs on the corners also seem to be optional, and with the uneven streets, no vehicles can really go that fast, so I think that prevents a lot of accidents! Antigua is surrounded by three volcanoes, one of which is pretty active – small eruptions (mainly of thick smoke) take place every couple of days.
(the plume of smoke mixing in with the clouds is an erruption of volcan de fuego on sat. morning)

Fundacion Proyecto Linguistico Franciso Marroquin, the school I attend, is the oldest school in the city, and one of the best. The school also offers Mayan language lessons, so a person wanting to learn one of the 32 or so Mayan languages spoken in Guatemala could do so. I’m happy sticking with Spanish. The classes are one on one, and so each day, for about 6 hours, I sit in a cute little maybe 4X4, open door, outside “classroom” and only speak Spanish with my teacher, trying to improve my vocabulary and get down all the rules of grammer. I’m pretty sure I’ve already improved, but I think that’s because in order to carry on any kind of intelligible conversation, I have to start thinking in Spanish, but as soon as I start thinking in the language, picking up on new words or rules becomes so much easier.

The school also offers ½ or full day field trips to learn cultural lessons as well. Wednesday I visited the ruins at the site of the original Guatemalan capital, Iximche. Iximche was the capital city in the early 1500s. Now only ruins remain, but it was so interesting to wander the grounds, and see the remains of what was this great, important city at a time when our great, important country was not even anyone’s idea. It was also interesting to think about how what existed at that time in Guatemala still had cultural relevance to their modern cultural (you could still visit the ancient capital), and how some traditions from that time still remained are still important to many Guatemalans, where as any culture that existed at that time in what is now our country was more or less purposefully eliminated.

We also visited a couple of the neighboring towns and municipals, visited a great, old Catholic cathedral, with some of the most elaborate wood carvings along the walls and at the alter area I’ve ever seen. We also visited a “temple” of another sort: “el templo de San Simon.” At this temple, I witnessed the mixing of two more cultures: Catholic and Mayan. San Simon, or Maximon, is who many indigenous people believe is more or less the protector of the Guatemalan people. When the country became Catholic, Maximon began to be referred to as a saint – by the people, not by the Church. The Catholic church condemns the practice of visiting his shrine or temple, as was made obvious by the postings at the second Catholic church we visited. Still, his temple had many elements of Catholicism, mixed with rituals more pagan in origin, as well. We entered the outside courtyard of the temple, which was bare expect for two or three large bonfires, fed scented candles and thick-smelling incense by a couple people in the bright colored and multi-patterned woven clothing of the indigenous Guatemalans. On the far side of the courtyard were stairs leading up maybe half a floor to the temple itself. There were two doors on the landing, one marked entrance, where a line of people holding mostly flowers and candles, queued. Our group entered through the other door, marked exist, as we were there only to see. Once inside, I realized the line wrapped around the inner wall of the temple, and led up stairs of an alter, where sat a life-size figurine of San Simon, or Maximon. The people in line, once they reached the alter, were “cleansed” by a woman who stayed in front of the alter with a bunch of palm fronds, which she brushed over the hands and face of the person in the front of the line. That person then left his or her gift, and came back down the alter, and either exited, or added another candle to the tables leading from the back the doors to the alter. The many candles on these tables, and the strings of colored party lights around the alter, provided the only source of light in the room. On the walls in the room were plaques thanking San Simon for whatever protection or gift he had bestowed upon a past petitioner. I was fascinated, but honestly, also a bit creeped out.

On Friday, I visited a folk music museum and also took a tour of a coffee plantation. At the folk music museum, there was video of a festival with San Simon in which he seemed more like a revered old friend – a spirit of the past – than the creepy pagan and possibly Satanic figure he did in his temple. So my verdict is still out. I’m not saying I’m much of a fan, personally, but at any rate, it is was it is. The folk music museum was fun and informative, and the grounds between it and the coffee plantation was a beautiful nature preserve full of bright flowers and fruit trees.

Saturday, I joined a guided hike up the volcano Pacayu, one of three active volcanoes in Guatemala. It was quite a hike – I was almost tempted to “rent” a ride on one of the horses peddled as “taxis” up the mountain. Well, not really. I had fun hiking. But it was tough work! The hike up was so worth it, though, when we reached the lava field! We walked out on top of the hardened lava, spilt from the mountain in the last major eruption (of more than smoke and small rocks), in April or May 2006. As we got further from the edge of the lava field, the hardened, hollow lava rocks got warmer and warmer, until in some places I could only stand to stand on them for so long, as it was too warm for comfort. I felt as though I was walking on charcoal, left over from some giant bon fire, and the smell of roasting marshmallows (probably actually just sulfur) further impressed the idea. The bottoms of my tennis shoes are now slightly warped because they melted a little.

Now it’s Sunday morning, and I am off to church with Doňa Olga. The plan is to find a WiFi zone after church, and post this. But now, I need to shower. Hasta Lluego…

I´M IN GUATEMALA!

TODAY IS DAY ONE OF A MONTH OF STUDYING SPANISH IN ANTIGUA, GUATEMALA. ACTUALLY, THE STUDYING STARTS TOMORROW. TODAY WAS TRAVELING. TRAVELING AND NOT SLEEPING. I´VE BEEN UP SINCE 4AM, AND SO I´M OFF TO DO THE LATTER. MY GOAL IS TO POST SOMETHING AT LEAST ONCE EVERY COUPLE DAYS WHILE I´M HERE THOUGH, SO MORE TO COME SOON! -- AND HOPEFULLY BY THEN I´LL BE ABLE TO FIGURE OUT WHICH OF THESE KEYS TURNS OFF CAPSLOCK...

Catching up Part 2

Last week (Monday-Wednesday) I went to a training conference near Los Angeles. The conference was barely three days long, and they crammed a lot of information and speakers and food into a very short period of time. They crammed so much in there, they didn't sent out a conclusive schedule of conference until after everyone arrived, probably so no one decided it looked like too much and decided not to come! A slight exaggeration, perhaps -- but the point is I had hoped I'd be able to do a little bit more in CA while I was there than just the conference stuff. (Like visit people!) Fortunately my aunt and uncle did drive over from Burbank and were able to help me escape for an hour or two. We went to dinner down the road from the hotel, had a nice but short visit (it was great to see you!!) and then back to work for me!

This past weekend I ventured north (practically to OK -- but not quite!) to visit friends of my aunt and uncle from Burbank. They live in a really beautiful rural area about an hour's drive north of Dallas. Their family lives down the road in another big, beautiful house with plenty of animals as well (4 cats and 3 horses). Escaping the city for a bit was great, everyone was so nice and acted like I was part of the family, not some stranger, and invited me back some time soon -- any time I'd like to come and try horseback riding. Here was the Texas as I imagined it before moving to Dallas: wide open fields, horses roaming about, big ranch style homes, people waving to each other as they drove by...

Well, maybe I didn't necessarily expect all of that. But here's something I definitely never even dreamed I'd see:

Saturday evening, our party-of-eleven (the grandparents, daughter and son-in-law, the three grandkids, the three grandkids' three friends, and myself) went out to dinner at this restaurant that was about as stereotypical Texas as you could get: the outside looked like a big log cabin, the inside had wooden walls and big heavy-duty wooden benches in the waiting area and the same heavy-duty chairs and tables in the dining area, walls covered with cowboy memorabilia, random knickknacks, and dead animals, complementary jalapeno cornbread came before the food, the menu featured mainly steak or other meat hickory-seasoned, and the mashed potatoes came with white gravy. MMM I hadn't had white gravy in ages, and was pretty excited to order those mashed potatoes, but almost, ALMOST passed them up for another delicious potato option: the sweet potato fries. So yes, this restaurant was about at Texas as they come. So what, you may well be asking, was so shocking?

Blue tooth phones are so annoying. I mean, yeah, they can do all this cool stuff, blah blah blah and probably won't give you brain cancer. But they look ridiculous. Well, they're ok when the wearer is in an office, or driving a car, or someplace else where it's necessary or convenient to be so attached to a phone. But anyplace else -- ridiculous. I half laughed, half rolled my eyes at the guys at the conference who had them attached the their ears all weekend, sitting in the speaker sessions, or at dinner. Guys with shaved or nearly-shaved heads who wear them especially made me giggle a little inside when I saw them at the conference, because their ill-manners were so made so obvious by the fact that they had no hair whatsoever to hide the obnoxious little clip attached to their ear as they sat eating a formal dinner. But those well dressed, nearly bald men were nothing compared to the two men I saw in that Texas restaurant, sitting there at their table with (presumably) their family, dressed in the big flannel overcoats (it was cold that evening), old dirty jeans and boots, disheveled hair, and their stinkin BLUE TOOTHs. Honestly! What self-respecting cowboy eats his chickenfried steak and whitesauced potatos, or his 14 oz hickory smoked slab of steak and homemade cornbread while remaining constantly wired to the network through his bluetooth? Definitely not something I thought I'd ever see...