Tajumulco, again

I climbed it again, for the fourth time. The first time I climbed it we had beautiful views all day long and I saw into Mexico and I faintly saw the Pacific Ocean for the first time in my life. The second two times were horrid, cold experiences where we were lucky to see more than a hundred feet in front of us and to have returned with our ears, fingers, and toes.

This time Meli and I climbed it with 7 other volunteers, and it was beautiful. We went most of the way up the volcano and camped about an hour below the summit. At 4am we got up and hiked our way up to the top by flashlight. At about 6am the sun came up and we were the second coldest we had been in our lives, the most cold being the second time I went up Tajumulco with Meli. However it was a gorgeous sunrise, which almost immediately started to warm us. See pics on my flickr (upper right of page). Unfortunately, my camera battery died after only the first couple shots.

Last night they burned the devil again in the town park. They do that every Christmas and at Easter they burn Judas. I think this type of violence is something that the American church is lacking. It really unites people behind a cause, I mean who's not for burning Satan? And it brings out the holiday cheer.

You're a Chub-a-tubs

Gordo, gorda, gordita, gordito that means “fatty” and “little fatty.” Awhile back my girlfriend, Meli, told me that that was a term of endearment and not an insult here. So I promptly started calling her that, but I couldn't do it. Because for me and my anorexic culture that is is just mean, or at the very least very ill put criticism; even though she is not in the least a “fatty.”

But she assured me it was okay, but at the same time I think she knew it wasn't my culture and I wasn't thinking endearing thoughts when I called her mi gordita because I couldn't say it without at least a smirk on face.

I think this common pet name may have to do with the fact that malnutrition rates are so high here. It seems that you're either malnourished or you're fat, but sadly many times you are both from a generous diet of corn tortillas and chicken, but you don't realize it until you can't give milk to your new born child or the milk you're giving isn't helping them grow, or a plethora of other problems.

Also, naturally going along with the pet name business, people will not hide their feelings about your weight, even strangers. I think it would go better for me if I was of a huskier build, because since I'm on the thinner side, I'm flaco or more kindly flaquito, “skinny” or “little skinny.” Unfortunately this is less of term of endearment than a reproach to eat more, especially tortillas and chicken.

I didn't even mean to write about this. I meant to write about how my dog was stolen, and how I was going to use that as an excuse for why I haven't written in awhile, and how I am tired of being robbed in Guatemala, perhaps another time. Sounds nice and uplifting, right?

However, I also want to mention that Lourdes, Meli's sister, had her baby like two weeks after I wrote the blog about the baby shower, and about a month premature, but it went well and may have been for the best because every woman that looked at her petite frame told her she was going to have to have a c-section, and that she should eat more tortillas and chicken. However despite all that, she had a beautiful red baby girl, Fernanda Delfilar Gonzales Abrosio. Wish I had a picture to show you.

Beibi Shawer

That’s how you spell “Baby Shower” phonetically in Spanish. I went to my first and probably last baby shower the other night. I wasn’t sure if baby showers were a female-only event in Guatemala or not. I figured since I was invited they may have taken some liberties with the with the event and opened it to males, but I was the only one.

But it was interesting to watch and participate in to an extent. However, when I was “giving words” to the mother to be, my novia Meli’s sister, Lourdes also known as Luli and Negrita[1], I felt really awkward for two reasons. One, I had to do this meaningful thing in Spanish, and two, I had to do it while a match was burning out and felt like I was doing some “cultish” ritual in a Christian girls dorm, and I felt like a woman.

Luli said she was surprised by the shower but it didn’t look it by the outfit she had on. Her chocolate blouse, slacks and high heel shoes and olive green cardigan (same colors as the Bailey’s wedding), which accentuated her enormous stomach (she’s due in a month, and she’s 4’ 3”) seemed a bit weird to wear to a family meeting, which is what she was told she was coming to.

The games weren’t as suspenseful as they could have been since everyone knows she’s having a nena, girl, but miraculously that was always the outcome: dropping the egg, popping the balloons, blowing out the candles; got girl every time. Kinda wigiboardish, and again Christian-girl-dorm-cultish.

All in all it went really well. Everyone had fun during the activities, everyone got a least one piece of cake, and two chuchitos, directly translated: little dogs, they are like tomales, but smaller and always have chicken in them, and tea and/or Pepsi. And of course we sang “Happy Birthday” in English, Guatemalans do that whenever there’s a cake, seriously. It was a delightful experience.

[1] which is the Spanish name for my dog since Gabriela is kind of a common name here. So when people ask me what Gabe means in Spanish instead of Gabi I just you can say Negrita in Spanish. Mama Meli, my grandma here, still wants me to legally change her name.

I got a dog

I need to mention that I bought a dog three weeks ago. Her name is Gabe, which about a week ago I realized that I had subconsciously stolen from the Gate’s old lab, family friends. That was disappointing, but it’s done now.

She already know the name, and I love it because Guatemalans can’t say it. They don’t have the G sound, and nothing ever ends in a short “ba” sound either. So often they’ll be way off and say Kevin, or a bit closer and say Yabay. I give that one to them, especially if it’s their fith try.

She is a lab-boxer mix I bought from some missionaries that Seth was staying with when he was working here in Guatemala. She’s a great dog.

I think whoever said that imagination is what separates us humans from animals was full of it. So many times when I call Gabe and she’ll come running towards me then suddenly stop, stare intently at my shoes and begin to prowl slowly towards them like a cheetah approaching a grazing gazelle. Then she’ll pounce and vigorously try to break the neck of my shoe laces.

Now this is not the behavior that I wanted to see. I wanted her to come up to me waging her tail and perhaps sit politely waiting for my affirmation, but how can be upset with that? And you can’t tell me that isn’t imagination either. You can’t say that she thought my shoe or the rope bone was a unsuspecting mouse, she knew what she was doing and she was imagining.

Also, having this dog has drastically changed my daily conversations here in Guatemala. It used to go Buenos días, Buenos días, and usually nothing more. Sometimes a “how are you?” then how long have you been here? but most times they jump straight to the personal ¿Como halló aquí? which directly translates: “How do you feel here?” but how I like to think of it as: “Are you accustomed to the life here?” which may be more accurate. Then “Oh that’s nice, ¡Qué le vaya bién!” which means, poetically translated, May it go well with you!

But now conversations go: “What a cute little dog, buenos días. How much was he? Oh, it’s a she. They weren’t any males in the litter? (they’re quite sexist when it comes to dogs) Are there more? No? Vendamela. Sell me yours. No, come on, sell me yours. What do you feed her anyway? Just dog food! Hmm. She sure is a beauty, sell her to me.”

Or many times people just say ¿Cuanto? How much? or ¿Compro? Can I buy?

I think when she’s bigger this insistence on buying her will subside. It seriously happens 5 to 10 times a day. Reason being, that in a developing country where 2 in 3 rural children are under-nourished not much food gets down to the dogs. In a litter of 10 in normal for 2 or 3 to make it. That’s just how it goes.

So when they see an energetic, playful puppy that doesn’t have her ribs showing, they have to have her. Who cares if she’s not a macho, male. They like males because they don’t have babies nor go into heat. Spading is practically unheard of here.

Now many of my conversations end with: “Well, what are you going to do with her when you leave? When are you leaving, anyway? Oh, well, sell-her-to-me when you leave in a year and a half. ¡Que le vaya bién!”

Elección de Señorita

That means “Beauty Contest.” That one I knew because I was robbed after one with my friend during the town fair. However that wasn’t mentioned. Aniversario del Instituto that one I picked up alright. It was just one word I couldn’t understand: Calificador. That means judge, well judge particularly for beauty contests. (Just tried to find it in the dictionary to check spelling. Not there. That consuls me abit.)

I think it can also be shortened to calidor, which they might have used when the student of the high school in Campachan asked me to be one next Wednesday, which was yesterday. In any case, I didn’t know the word, and I am sure elección was not used. However, I felt I just given a pretty good lesson in the high school, and didn’t want to show any Spanish weaknesses, so I just said: of course, I’d love to.

Later that day I asked the women in my office what calificador meant or something that sounded vaguely close to that. The first thing I thought was, oh no, first I don’t want to endorse that sort of woman demeaning activity, especially in a society so filled with machismo, and after being robbed, well even before being robbed after one, I was thinking one 5-hour beauty contest would do me for this lifetime.

But I’m glad I unknowingly said yes. It’s a completely different experience when it’s “performed” by a high school in village of 70 people and you have judge (calcular) it, and perhaps give a speech in Spanish at the end. It’s more like a talent show that has three girls that do most of the dance acts.

Unlike the Tejutla show, all of the entertainment was in town. Actually, they did get a pretty good lip-sync girl from the village on the other side of the mountain. In between the particapaciónes of the three contestants practically every student in the school: sang, danced sometimes quite provocatively (so much so that one time I couldn’t take a picture because I was sitting in the front row as a calificador’s table, and I didn’t want to seen as a one of those guys), or lip-sync which at it’s best is sexy dancing, and at it’s worst a 10-year-kid wearing shades, a telephone headset, and baseball cap to one side, stepping off beat and looking terribly nervous through two ranchero songs.

My favorite was the kid who looked 8 but was probably 13 at least. He sang his own songs, scared as hell, but not to bad a singer, probably the best. And what gestures. Every climax of the chorus his hand would raise in a fist every sinew taut, eyes squinting, teeth bared and still mostly hitting the notes. He was the highlight. I’d have given him Señorita del Instituto, first place, if I could have. (see flickr for more pics)

My nervousness about presenting the award turned out to be unwarranted. Nobody cared what I had to say, they just wanted to know who got what. Of course I said the expected and cliché thing anyway, “It was hard to the choose the winner among such beautiful and talented contestants…” They didn’t need to listen.

Also, the great thing about beauty contests in Guatemala is everyone gets something; there are no losers. If there are five candidates, there are five awards. You still have feel bad when you get Señorita Simpatía, “Miss Nice Girl”, or perhaps better translated “Miss Congeniality.” However, we made that one second prize, even though I think it’s usually last. How can you judge someone’s “niceness” from a couple dance acts in different outfits, and a memorized expressionless speech which you don’t understand all of anyway? I gave them all and 8 out of 10 in niceness.

shiny silver pistol

Well, again much has pasted since my last post. I´ve gone home and seen my family and some friends, I´ve been robbed twice, and been visited by two good friends from the States. Almost all of which were great experiences (the second robbery wasn´t fun).

The first wasn´t that bad. I was on a bus early morning when three sleepy looking men entered the bus and sat in different places on the bus. After about five minutes the middle man who I was closest to pulled out and cocked a shiny silver pistol. My first thought, ¨Oh, hey, we´re getting robbed,¨ then, ¨Sweet, I have my iPod, but shoot I also have my camera which is not a scheduled item on my personal items insurance (that means there´s a 100 dollar deductible on it)¨

They immediately searched a few men they thought might have a weapon or might put up a fight, strangely I, the gringo, was not one of them. I think then the guy with the gun went and kept it on the driver and the ayudante (guy who takes the money) telling him to keep driving but not too fast. While the other two men methodically went through everyone´s things including all pockets.

This is where it gets really strange. When one of the men came to search me with his cellphone flashlight. He took everything out of my pockets wallet, cellphone, change and threw it on the seat. Then looked in my wallet which had around Q200, not a huge sum but something, about 26 dollars, and some credit cards, then he shut the wallet with out taking anything and threw it on the seat. After this, he continued to go through my backpack felt where my iPod and camera were but didn´t bother to find the opening. I had mixed feeling about this failure on his part, because I wasn´t exactly sure how this deductible thing worked. After that he told me to stand up so he could see if I hid anything in the seat cushions. I this point I found out that my Spanish isn´t so good when I´m being robbed.

¡Párate! ¡Párate! He kept shouting, however I´d never heard this command in the tú form, because it´s kinda rude even in the best of circumstances, even parents use the usted form when telling their son to do something, but really, I think it was an appropriate use in this case. After the fact, I wished I had hide the iPod in the seat and left the camera in the bag (it´s a really old iPod). But how could I have known? And if I had known that would be insurance fraud or something terribly close, collaboration or coordination or something.

In the end, they peacefully left the bus with all of our bus fares and maybe a few nice cellphones and watches and things of real value. I wouldn´t have lost a thing except for that the ayudante owed Q50 in change.

Guess, I´ll get to other recent events later. I can´t write a short blog.

El martes, y world traveler missionary friend

Much time has passed since my last blog. I´m now working in two schools and with two community groups. Currently, I am exclusively working with ADICTA´s groups with the possibility of working with one of Intervida´s groups in the future. However, right now I would like to focus and do good work in the four communities I´m in right now.

On Tuesdays, I work in a village just down the road from my house called Villa Nueva. This is my favorite worksite thus far. I´m working with a small school there that has about 65 1st through 6th graders and only two teachers. This is a quite common ratio in Guatemala, and in fact, a bit better than most.

I met these teachers as I was walking back from Tuisinsé which is where I go on Thursdays. They were very open to starting a school garden, and also wanted a English class, and help with their new donated computer lab, which they hardly know anything about. So I´ve had my hands busy with this school, and have really been enjoying it. This is the school that I´ve quasi recently posted a bunch of pictures. Yesterday we finally planted! I really hope we have some success. The kids seemed to be really into it.

I´ll talk about the other communities and my activities there in upcoming blogs... do you believe me?

In other news, I saw Seth, my world traveling missionary ex-roomate from U, this weekend. (http://sethbarnesjr.theworldrace.org/) It was a great and surreal experience. Great in that we caught up and had good conversations. And surreal in the fact that I played Settlers of Catan, a good strategy board game, Halo 1, and took the best two showers I´ve had since coming to Guatemala at the missionary´s house in Chimaltenango. It was kinda like being in college again.

Jueves, Viernes, Tarantula

Thursday and Friday are now my favorite days of the week, and possibly Wednesday too. I have successfully unwed myself with ADICTA and I believe that now we have a more healthy relationship as divorcees than we ever had while so intimately united.

Thursdays I now work in solely in Tuisinsé (possibly Wednesdays too) and Fridays in Armenia. As already reported, I told one of my NGO's that I was not pleased with my current working situation. I said that I wanted to work more on my own and focus on only two communities to start, because as things were, I was not accomplishing the goals of my program: to start family vegetable gardens to promote better nutrition in the homes of subsistence farmers.

ADICTA was very supportive of my taking initiative and helped me select and a couple nearby villages. Tuisinsé is right across the valley from my home, it's on one of the ridges below Tajumulco if you're looking at one the photos from my front porch. I could hike there in two and half hours I think. So far I've only hiked from about half of it and taken the surprisingly good public transportation they have here for the rest.

Yesterday, I visited a home near Tusinsé and we planned out their garden together with a neighbor. I'm going to return there Wednesday and we're going to plant, then I'm going to the neighbors house to help her plan her garden.

Side note: While in training I thought how can I teach these people anything; they are farmers, they're great-great grandparents were farmers. What's a punk kid with a philosophy and English degree and 3 months of training going to be teach them. However the truth is that many of the farmers here know how to grow corn and beans and that's about it. They have no or very little experience growing hardly ever any experience growing without using chemical fertilizers and pesticides. My program promotes organic methods because it more feasible for the families because it uses resources that they already have, is safer and produces vegetables with more nutrients.

Side-Side note: Unlike in the states it's not a fad of the rich and informed to eat organic and local here, it's natural and a necessity. However, here chemical and organic produce is not differentiated in the markets. You could ask the vendors who are also the growers but of course they will say anything to get you to buy. So on the downside growers are not rewarded with higher prices for using organic methods like they are in the states, because here the people just want to buy the biggest watermelon. They don't care how it got that way or perhaps that it has less vitamin B, they just want that big one, and they'll pay more for it.
However, none of that really applies that much to my work because I'm working with small family gardens. The produce is for feeding the family, so it's irrelevant what price they can get in the market for it. The important thing is that it's feeding them (and feeding them well) and hardly costing a thing.

As you can see, I have faith in my program.

Back to my recent divorce from ADICTA, I went to Armenia today and was able to help advise Doña Elda Días with her little garden that already looked quite beautiful but was lacking a few major elements and later another family. Then afterwards in the group meeting we fixed up the demonstrative compost pile so it will actually start composting and made some progress on the group garden! It's really good to finally get into some work that I can sustain and have complete of which I have complete control. Meaning it's not dependent on program of ADICTA or Intervida which may or may not receive funding. This I can simply do.

In other news, this Tarantula scared the hell out of me a few nights ago. I was throwing a beetle out of my room that landed on my head while I was reading so I went to throw him out of the room and felt something touch my bare feet so I looked down and found this delightful little creature. I´ll post more pictures on flickr shortly, but I´m out of free space this month.

I was telling my landlord, Don Catilino, about it (he likes to come and hang out almost every night and chat. I think he's quite worried about me, and thinks me a bit odd for living in a house by myself.) When describing the incident, I just used the word "araña," spider, and after viewing the picture, he said, "no that's actually not a spider that's a 'tarantula!'" so he gave me a little life science lesson and then reprimanded me for not killing it. I really ought to have caught it and put it in a glass jar. I think Don Catilino is greatly entertained by me.

Volcan Tajumulco Yet Again

Tajumulco looms over my village Tejutla at a height of 4,220m or 13,845 ft. or 2.62 miles above sea level, making it the highest point in Central America. If you have a clear day you can see into Mexico, the Pacific Ocean, volcanoes around Xela, and if your really lucky volcanoes surroundingthe capital. It takes 4 to 6 hours to ascend and 2.5 to 4 hours descend.

Paul, Maureen, Kelly and I climbed it yesterday. It was the girls' first time, Paul's second (read about his first and my second on his blog), and my third. Kelly is a volunteer in village about an hour and a half from Tejutla, and Maureen is a volunteer in Huehuetenango. We were planning to climb and descend in one day, but bought 3 sleeping bags and a 3-person tent to share amongst the four of us in case something went terribly amiss. Or in case the weather looked like it was going to clear up, and we wanted to freeze our asses off in order to see a stunning red sunrise from the top of Central America.

We began hiking around 10am and it was a pleasant hike for the first half, mostly cloudy with some views. However, by the time we reached the summit there it was completely overcast with occasional distant thunder.

We had lunch on the peak around 2pm, grasping onto the slim hope that we would catch a glimpse of the crater, rumored to be used as a soccer field by some Guatemalans, or the afore mentioned spectacular scenery, but it only grew colder and the distant thunder became not so distant.


3:00pm: As we were descending it began to sprinkle, then rain,
then hail and rain. At first it this was fun and nice little something to take my mind of my aching right knee and exhausted and quivering legs. However, after sometime the awareness of my muscular fatigue returned and now I was cold, wet and a little worried we wouldn't make it to the base in time to hitch a ride back home to Tejutla.

But, of course, we arrived at the base at 5:30pm and twenty minutes later were able to catch a bus going our way. After arriving in Tejutla, we took hot showers changed put on dry clothes and made soup and grilled cheese sandwiches and watched a movie. All of us quite pleased with our decision to return and were not at that time freezing our four wet asses off on the mountain in a three person tent.

initial sucess

I went to Tuisinsé yesterday and told them that I would like to start family gardens with anyone that is interested. Also, that I would like to begin giving charlas (talks) on topics of organic agriculture: composting, organic pesticides, good gardening practices, etc. Eight people showed interest and I got their names and several phone numbers! I´m really excited about this. If only half of these people start gardens with me I will be ecstatic.

Today, I´m going to Armenia to offer the same deal. I hope they are interested too. We are going to plant a demonstrative garden today, and possible work more on the abonera (compost pile).

reconnect

Well, I just got back from Reconnect. I was dreading going and spending a week in Antigua but it turned out to be alright. We had two days of general sessions, where we talked about our frustrations and problems and strategies to overcome them. Then we had several days of Spanish classes. It was great to see how far I have progressed.

I have resolved to work more on my own and less with Intervida and ADICTA because with them I´m not accomplishing my program´s objectives. What this will look like I´m not sure, but I´m sure that it needs to be done.

I was told yesterday by the cordinator of Intervida Tejutla that the program of seguridad alimentaria (food security, my program) would continue. This is good news because recently I haven´t been able to work in my field, other than selling seeds, because there hasn´t been funding.

I told him that I was not content with the work that I have been doing that I would like to do more. He told me to be patient and more work would come, and so I felt encouraged and decided that I would give Intervida another chance.

Yesterday, yet again, they did not have transportation for me so I was stuck in Tejutla left to study spanish and agriculture. And then I remembered why I need to work on my own. I would love to colaborate with Intervida but that is really not a possibility right now.

Likewise with ADICTA, they also are not really working with family gardens anymore nor small animals. They have one project right now that´s keeping them somewhat afloat: Veterianarios sin Fronteras (Vets without Borders). However, that´s a small project that´s paying two salaries and giving micro loans to buy livestock. Also, not exactly in my area.

My sitemate, Paul has been working with them on a solicitud for NED (National Endowment for Democracy). It´s a US organization that promotes civic particapation. http://www.ned.org/ Also, not in my department of promoting vegetable gardens and better nutrition.

Also, today I was asked if I could get a couple ¨vasitos de miel¨ bottles of honey in the US Embassy... Olivia?

What I need to do is make a Work Plan and execute it. Focus on just a few communities and try to do my work. But first, I´ll try to help Virginia, my counterpart in ADICTA, type up some ¨solicitudes¨ for micro loans...

neglect

I'm going to do a few rapid posts because alot has happened and I didn't really have time to blog about it.


First, I helped out an organization called AMA a few weeks ago based in Xela (Quetzaltenango, if your looking at a map). I ask Mamá Meli, the mother of the directors of AMA, what it stood for but she replied: "who knows!" in spanish (saber). However, I think it represents Altiplano de Mujeres Asociación or something meaning The Woman's Highland Project or something.


I was translating for a group of mostly gringas from U. of Florida and U. of Richmond, Virginia. We were doing art projects in a school around the theme of "what do I want to be when I grow up?" In a 4th and5th grade class we made dolls of yarn, which turned out quite nice. Then in a 1st grade class we did body cut outs and put them on the wall for them to decorate. We also played games like Simon Says, Duck-Duck Goose (which is duck-duck chicken in español) and sang some songs. They knew the itsy-bitsy spider in español!


AMA also had a stove project going but since they didn't need translators I was in the school most of the week. Wood burning stoves are huge down here with NGO's. The advantage of the stove is two fold. One, the people stop inhaling smoke into their lungs which causes a plethora of diseases and problems. And two it uses alot less firewood (leña) so the people save money and the environment at the same time.


Loved spending time in Xela working with AMA. Xela is quite possibly my favorite city in Guatemala. Good destination for the sophisticated traveler.


Two: I moved. I now live in a one room house with a red floor, white walls and raw wood ceiling. The exterior is white with a almost hideous light-green trim. I love it. I was supposed to move the first of March, but my family told me to expect the mid-March. I was still hopeful for a bit that I would move sooner, but alas no. And I still don't have a shower which was promised about 2 months ago. However, it is almost done and I have faith it will be completed soon. I have been using the shower of my old host family and my site mate Paul (Pablo).


Just today, 28 marzo, I finally organized and put away everything that Olivia and Jake, the volunteers before me, left/sold me. I've been doing that little by little since I moved in but today I finished the job and it feels so good. So good like before with my room I took pictures which you can see on my flickr site.


Three: Going back in time: I got to see some of the gardens that my seed selling has benefited! It was in one of my communities called "Cancela Grande." That was amazing. Quite so in fact, that I took pictures of that as well, which will also be available here and on flickr.


Four: Went to a birthday party of Yan Carlo. He turned 6. He smashed his face into his batman cake. You can watch below. Also I've decided piñatas are the bee's knees, and want to have one at every birthday party I have any say in. Oh, and they also sing in English a bit...

Five: Spent Holy Week (Semana Santa) in Tejutla, well most of it. The days leading up to Easter are much more celebrated than Easter itself here. On good Friday morning, families divide up the 14 stations of the cross and then make displays in front of their houses or stores on main street to put a picture of the framed station. Then, in the road, they make rugs (afrombras) of colored sawdust, pine needles, flowers, grain, pine cones, etc. Then they bring Jesus down the road along with Mary and St. John to visit all the stations of the cross. In the process they destroy the rugs they just spent hours that morning making. It's quite beautiful.


On the eve of Good friday, they symbolically bury Jesus in the town cemetery, then promptly dawn masks and capes, dance in the street and burn Judas. I was told after missing this that's it the most fun part of Easter. I was feeling sick from climbing a volcano and almost dying of cold and exhaustion, and not seeing anything for the trouble.


Six: It was the prior Wednesday night and Thursday morning that I thought I was going to lose at least a few of my fingers and both ears to frostbite. Paul, my girlfriend, Melina and I were climbing Tajumulco. It was my second time and their first. It was also the only cold and overcast day that holy week. In the end, everyone was still mostly glad we did it, but of course bummed we couldn't see the Pacific or into Mexico or the Volcanos around Xela from the top. However, we met some neat germans and drank some good hot chocolate and almost killed ourselves with cold and exertion. When I returned to my room at 11 a.m. on Thursday, I slept five hours hardly waking.


There's a few of the things I've neglected to blog about recently.

Semuc Champey

I went to Coban this weekend to visit with other volunteers and see some sites out there. I didn't really do any research in guide books before hand so I just jumped on Kay's plan of seeing Semuc Champey. Unfortunately, we both got food poisoning the night before the trip. She didn't want to risk going in the morning. I didn't want to waste the really long trip out there so I went with some other volunteers, Mackenzie and Natalie.

It was the most spectacular natural phenomenon I have ever seen. Regretably, I forgot my camera in the van... however Mackensie brought hers so I'll get some photos some day. (only have photos of the cave here and on my flickr site)

Semuc Champey is really hard to describe, but I’ll try briefly. It a land mass over a river. The river both flows atop the land mass and below in an underground river. Atop there are several warm limestone pools that cascade down until plummeting of a 20 meter waterfall.

On either side we saw where the water enters and exits the cave below. Also, there is a lookout (mirador) where we took in the whole beautiful oddity in.

If you come, which you should sometime before you stop living, take the tour. The tour enables you to do this in one day, and climb down part of the waterfall on a rope ladder then jump 35 feet off a cliff that protrudes from the waterfall, if you so desire. Mackensie and I both looked over the cliff separately and decided we couldn’t do it. However after both a young Brit and a girl from Costa Rica did it, I had too. Call me a chauvanist. Then Mackensie after seeing her friend jump off a cliff decided it was the best course of action as well.

All in all, this was an amazing experience. When I was under the waterfall looking back I could see into where water raged on from the cave and looking forward I could see through the waterfall to the river below.

It’s really hard to describe this experience and the geological formations because it's such an oddity.

On the way back to Coban, we stopped by a cave in Lanquin, but that's not much to talk about comparatively however for this I did bring my camera. I think the cave looks better in the photos than it did in real life. It was not very well managed.

Later, I was talking to the volunteer in that area who works in ecotourism. She said that she got the a new management plan to enhance the natural beauty that is there. So perhaps in the future it will be worth your time, but now they basically strung power lines through the place and adorned them with incandescent light bulbs. They also have tacky signs on formations that vaguely resemble some animal or other common object.

But they do have some interesting spider like insects. Our guide caught one then took this embarrassing picture of me looking lovingly at this cross between a crab and a spider.
Bottom line go to Semuc Champey, take or leave the caves...

In other job related news: food security, my program, might be terminated with Intervida... I had a meeting this morning with someone in Intervida. My counterpart might change or I might be working with two different people with medicinal gardens... I don't think they really know yet. They are trying to secure funding to support the food security program but they only have a week, and it looks improbable. I'm frustrated and I'll leave it at that on this public blog.

I'm starting a blog...

I've decided that I'm going to start to a blog. Before, much earlier in my life, I thought these things were a narcissistic waste of time, however, as some of you know I do write letters and emails to a select few people and those serve as my narcissistic record of my life if I ever want to see how my former self spent his time. I also journal the dirty little things I don't want to tell other people.

I plan on keeping up with those few correspondents. However perhaps those letters will have less biographical content, so much the better as I see it. Also, it seems like a waste to be here in Guatemala and not tell people about my experience if they want to know. I have been keeping a kind of photo blog already on flickr.com, but only pictures and a few lines leave alot to be said. But enough lofty preamble.

A bit about my daily life: I get up at around 7am, however I want to change this due to a recent photograph taken of me with me shirt off. I´ve put on some pounds here and would like to begin my days with a run because I don't really want to change my eating style. I´ve found a new love of food I never had before, perhaps a sign of age or maturity. I'm okay with either, but not with the fat.

Then I go have breakfast in a house a couple blocks up the mountain with Intervida one of the NGO's I work with here. However they are having some financial difficulties right now because the administration in Spain stole a bunch of money. Currently they have half the budget they had last year. So they have decided to cut half the personal and projects they have. This is huge for Guatemala, and I don't know how many other countries b/c almost all the schools here were built by or in conjunction with Intervida. They provide huge support to the rural subsistence farmer here. There methods may not be as sustainable as they could be, but perhaps this drastic change in funding will promote change in that area.

After breakfast I go to either Intervida or ADICTA, the NGO here in Tejutla that I work with. They too are also having financial problems. I work with them three days a week, miércoles a viernes. It's weird to explain all this basic information in inglés. I've been telling it to everyone in Spanish the last three months or so. They only have one project so far this year with Veterinarians without Borders. It's a small project with micro loans for buying animals: cows, goats, maybe chickens too. I think that they are promoting "criollo" animals which is a good thing. "Criollo" means local. So they are more resistant to diseases but don't produce as much milk or and their the meat isn't as tender. The same goes for plants.

So we go out to "aldeas" and meet with men’s and women’s groups and when I first arrived here I would be introduced by my coworker, either Juan Carlos (Intervida) or Virginia (ADICTA) and then I would stand up introduce myself saying many of the same things b/c that's about all I could say at the time. Then after that I just tried to understand everything I could.
However, more recently I've been giving a "charla" about composting. That's my project here: Organic Farming. The goal is to start a bunch of family vegetable gardens so that the family can supplement their diet of chicken flavored noodles and tortillas and sometimes "tortrix" the junk food of choice here with vegetables. Malnutrition is a huge problem here. I really like the project for it's sustainability. The people only have to buy seeds which are cheap and fairly accessible here.

I have also been selling seeds in small quantities to the people in the groups. I buy them by the pound and then divide them into little baggies I can sell for one quetzal. At first I was selling what I could in "bolsitas" for 50 centavos but the people would almost always take two of the same thing for one quetzal! The idea was that they could diversify their garden without spending more than three quetzales, but it was working and costing me alot of time...currently I'm selling both sizes. (Right: One onza bolsas)

Well, that's probably too much to hold the attention of my future readership. So just end by saying I just bought some little computer speakers to hook up to my iPod, and I love them, all 30 little Watts and "bass you can feel" the box says in English, French and, of course, Spanish.