Christmas

 Writing now with yet another holiday post, after a nice two days spent celebrating Christmas in different ways.  I started out in a pueblo called Pasac Segundo, in a municipality called Cantel which is just outside of Xela.  Its more or less the countryside, populated by indigenous people, mostly Quiche.  I went out there to spend Noche Buena, or Christmas Eve, with a family that works with the volunteer organization I work with.  Quite a different experience than Im used to in so many ways.  There are kids everywhere, and the family working on preparing a typical dinner.  We made a traditional item called Pache, which on Christmas consists of a Rice Flour concoction, chicken or steak in a tomato sauce, and a raisin, all wrapped in a banana leaf and baked.  Yum.

We also had a fresh turkey, which my friend Mateo helped to kill and pluck. Ive never seen an animal killed before, let alone eaten it the same day.  It was really good, and we ate it in a sauce called Pepian which i mentioned earlier on this blog.   The family was incredibly welcoming to us, and I had various conversations about all types of things with the family and their various kids and grandkids.  At midnight, the tradition is to light fireworks, or bombas, and this was crazy.  Lots of young kids, running around without supervision, lighting fireworks.  Beautiful, also quite scary.  And so different from something that most people in the States would allow.  At one point, the two year old girl in the picture below was pointing a sparkler directly at me…

Christmas day I spent with some friends I have made locally, on the roof of a building, eating, listening to music and enjoying the sunshine.  They are good folks, teachers, djs, an internet cafe owner. Its good to know people in a town who are the same types of people I would know at home.  They made me feel very welcome as well.  Afterwards, I was the Bee Movie, overdubbed in Spanish, sans subtitles or the voice of Jerry Seinfeld. Not quite the same as home, but a nice Christmas Day Activity.

Otherwise, life continues in Xela. I made a great Pepian with the people at my hostel and a local woman that works there, have been speaking Spanish a lot and continuing to work on my projects.  Ive been on some nice hikes, heard some nice Cuban Son music, shared lots of music and had some fun nights out.  Guatemala continues to feel quite comfortable, though tomorrow I leave to Chiapas, Mexico to explore a bit, spend NewYears Eve, and, of course, eat some tacos.

I sincerely wish everybody happy holidays of the various types, and of course Happy New Years.  As always, please keep in touch, it warms my heart to hear from my friends and famly back home.

Adios y que se vaya bien!

Josue.

Amoebas

A quick post today to report a couple of things.  First off, I´m finally feeling better after a long week or so of dealing with a stomach illness caused by the ingestion of Amoebic Cysts, generally found on improperly washed vegetables.  Now I know that Amoebas cause more than just the death of record stores.  In my case, I´m guessing they came from some cabbage that I ate with some tacos last Thursday.  Even though common sense dicatates otherwise, its hard to stay away from the street food, and somtimes this results in problems.  As of now though, I´ve finished the Antibiotics course and all seems to be well.

Last Saturday I helped teach the computer class I mentioned in my previous post, and regardless of my illness had a good time demonstrating all the various computer parts in Spanish in a classroom setting.  We also spent some time trying to explain a computer´s BIOS menu, which unfortunately is alwaws in English and quite hard to explain to a classroom of Spanish speakers.  Teaching the class was great though and I look forward to others.  The enthusiastic “students” (actually teachers from local schools) are really great to work with, and I like the thought that they are able to go back to their communities with their new knowledge and use it to provide computer access to their students.  One student even invited us to a local wedding, which I attended yesterday, but more on that later.

After some rest on Saturday, I went with a friend on Sunday to San Pedro La Laguna, on Lake Atitlan, for what turned out to be…more rest and a reoccurence of stomach illness.  No, it was a beautiful, if slightly difficult, trip.  San Pedro is an interesting place, mixing indigenous living & culture with a sort of modern day hippie enclave.  Its intersting coming from Santa Cruz, being quite used to the hippie culture, and reading about San Pedro on the net.  Lots about dreadlocks, drums, pot smoking etc.  Which really is all true, and is true about Santa Cruz to some extent, but San Pedro is a more intense version of these stereotypes.  There is a certain lack of law there, at least in side of town frequented by travelers, and poeple seem to do as they please more or less.  Pot smoking in restaurants and on the streets, lots of people showing the obvious effects of heavier drugs as well, with many of the town´s establishments set up to serve this crowd as well.

The businesses set up around lake are pretty much exclusively to serve Gringos, which serves as a stark contrsast to the locals walking past with heavy loads and crops, which they must carry up the hill to the indigenous areas. And all this, setup against the simply stunning, gorgeous backdrop of mountains, volcanoes and the lake itself.  Peaceful and quiet, with indigenous fisherman in wooden canoes.  Beautiful sunsets.  The lake truly is beautiful, and even an ideal place to be sick, if one must choose one.  I reccomend Hotel Almanecer to anyone looking for a nice, private room on the lake.  Nice owner and nice gardens, with an amazing view.

After returning from the lake, antibiotics in tow,  I spent the week in Xela, doing some volunteer work and seeing some friends, while doing far too much resting to try to cure the Amoebas.  This time was broken by attending a Posada, which is a processing which takes place in the days before Christmas, where Joseph and Mary statues are carried between local houses, where they are given shelter for the night.  The procession was in a town called Cantel, the house it took place in was the same place where Partners in Solidarity stores their computers.  Interesting to see such a large group of locals, who gave a small service and a teenager spoke of some of the problems experienced by people his age.  The family is great, espescially the kids, and we helped them serve 200 hundred hamburgers and cups of “coffee” (watered down nescafe with LOTS of sugar) to everybody.

Finally, yesterday attended the wedding in a town called Salcaja, a small place where many of the fabrics worn by indigenous women are made.  The overpowering sense of the wedding was the noise, caused by 4 huge sets of peavey speakers placed side by side, right next to my head more or less.  The wedding was quite Western/American in style, with champagne and modern dancing.  I wished it was quieter so we could have talked and gotten to know people better, but the food was incredible and it was great to see a wedding here.  I had a funny conversation with a guy who couldn´t understand 1) that I didn´t believe in Jesus and 2) that I wasn´t interested in sports.  He figured nubmer 2 had to do with number one, asking me if sports were prohibited in my religion.

I´m loving my hostel/home in Xela right now, Hostal Don Diego, but am pondering how I will spend the holidays, with some traveling possibly  to the lake and possible to San Cristobal in Mexico, before returning here for some more work in January.

Much love to all and please be in touch.

Chanukah!

Well, is looks like htis is going to be another holiday post.  Not that that´s a bad thing.  Time continues to  pass in Xela, with things going along quite well. The major events of the past week or so have been a great Chanukah celebration, continuing to work with Partners in Solidarity (see previous post), DJing and further exploring my Spanish and getting to know this city.

Starting with Chanuklah, another Jewish girl and myself sought out to present Chanukah to about 30 people, none of whom were Jews. We found a Chanukiah & candles, made latkes, explained the story in Spanish and sang songs. It was really great to be able to share my own culture with others, as I am in another country learning and exploring their culture. I left the experiecne feeling really happy to have my Jewish culture, and happy to be among good people here in Xela in the abscence of my friends and family at home. At the end of the night, the 14 year old son of the family who hosted the party song some songs in Spanish and danced, which was incredible.

I have also continued my work with Partners in Solidarity, the organization I work for now which donates computers to rural schools and teaches how to repair and maintain them. Last week, we went to an inaguration party for a school that was opening up its computer labs. That was a neat experience to see how much respect they gave to the organization and how much it meant to them to the computers. We ate a communal meal of tamales made with Rice instead of corn - delicious.

Its great work, and on Thrursday I went out to the municipality of Cantel to view the family’s home where the organization stores their computers and recieves a lot of community support. A great family, we ate brocoli and rice with Tamalitos and played with the kids. Also took a drive around to some of the schools. They are truly isolated, and it feels great to bring them the computers and share what has always been so readily accesible to them. We’re also discussing a plan of bringing internet to some or all of these schools, which is exciting. Today, I hepled teach a three hour class on troubleshooting and maintaining computers. I gave a 30 minute presentation on the internal parts of the computer, and afterwards helped to explain troubleshooting processes and the BIOS. Quite great again to share this knowledge. One of the people presesnt invited us to a wedding next weeked, which should be a nice cultural exchange. We will also share Christmas with the family in Cantel.

Here in Xela, I’ve befriended some folks, both a DJ from DC and a local DJ, and have had the opportunity to DJ twice already, at a party and at a lounge, even getting paid. Its great to have music and software with me that facilitates these friendships and allows me to work even here in Xela. Its a great way to get involved, and meet local people who truly share my interests.

So, that is the current update. I hope to travel to Lago Atitlan for a few days tomorrow, then come home to Xela to teach another class on Chanukah to English students, and see some traveling saint statues at the family’s home in Cantel. I really enjoy being able to leave behind the normal tourist paths and get to know some of the local culture, which is the main reason I am still in Xela and not traveling about.

I’m sitting now in my hostel bed, listening to the pretty, if stale, sounds of a Marimba concert outside my window and nursing a bit of a stomach bug. I hope that all are well and look forward to hearing any stories from back home.

All my love.

Thanksgiving!

My time here in Xela since Thanksgiving has truly been a time to give thanks, through some ups and some downs.  Starting with Last Thursday, Thanksgiving, when I had a wonderful potluck dinner with some other American folks away from home and a few locals as well.  Eating chicken (not turkey but almost), potatoes, gravy, FRESH salads, and baked mac’n'cheese was really incredibly after subsisting off of a cheap Guatemalan diet for a while.  The dinner was with some nice folks affiliated with a volunteer organization here in Xela called Entremundos and I really did feel quite at home.  The next day, I moved out of the local family’s house and into a rental room in search of a little more privacy and my own (relative) choice of food.  This was just in time to get my things ready to go on an overnight backpacking trip to the volcano Tajamulco, which is the highest point in Central America.

I Went with  a local group called Quetzaltrekkers, made up of volunteers who donate money to a local school for street children.  The trip was with two friends from school and  about 20 other people.  We woke up at 4:30 am on Saturday morning to take a pickup-truck ride to the bus station, where we took a chicken bus to a halfway point.  There we ate breakfast and continued on another bus.  We started hiking around 10am and arrived near the top of the volcano around 3:30.  It was really an ideal situation; there was an Israeli guy with us who brought a whole coffee kit onto the mountain & I had a little scotch.  We did some yoga on the mountain while a rainbow was visible below.  Afterwards, we hiked up to slightly below the peak and watched what was truly the most magnificent sunset of my life.  Being so high above the clouds was spectacular; the shapes and the colors mind blowing.  Afterwards was a nice night of card playing and we went to bed at 7:15 in anticipation of waking the next morning at 3:30 for the sunrise.  Another spectacular experience, though incredible cold on top Central America at 4:30 in the morning.  I really enjoyed the opportunity to hike up there and Quetzaltrekkers did a great job of leading the trip.

Since then I have been studying and enjoying my time here in Xela.  Its very easy to feel at home here and I definitely feel the pull to stay here for some time, though am not at all sure how long that is yet.  I will be doing some volunteering, which started today with a trip to a computer lab in a rural community just outside of Xela.  The school was inaugurating the lab which had been setup by Partners in Solidarity  which is the organization that I’ll be working with.  Its amazing to see the technological junk of the US relished by communities here which would otherwise not have computers to learn on or about.  The community the school is located in is only 1.5 km outside of Xela but lacks paved roads and potable water.  Quite a contrast to the city I’m living in now so close by.

 I am going to take a week off of school next week to relax and hopefully do some traveling.  After three weeks of 25 hrs studying I’m ready for a little break from learning and would like to continue building my Spanish through practice with local speakers.  I will probably continue with private lessons (which are SIGNIFICANTLY cheaper) when I get back to Xela and before I set off again.  I’ve been on-again/off-again sick and have spent a lot of time looking for good places to live - but otherwise things really are nice here.

 You are all in my thoughts and I look forward to being in touch and hearing about how things are back home.

Xela

I have now been here in Xela since Thursday night, and am actually becoming busy and developing somewhat of a routine.  Last week I chose a language school named the Proyecto Linguistico, or PLQ (link), and signed up to start Monday.  Choosing a school was hard as there are probably 50 to choose from, all which offer essentially the same thing.  Howver, the PLQ is a non-profit cooperative that focuses on the social issues in the past and current lives of Guatemalan people, of which there are many.  It seemed to me the best way to gain an understanding of what the lives of locals are and have been like.  So far, I think its been the right choice.  Sunday night I moved in with a local family, where I have my own bedroom with a double bed , TV and small table.  The family is Mom, Dad, a 7 year old son, a 17 yeard old son and a 19 year old daughter, plus many other people rotating in and out.  Meals are eaten with some or all of them depending on the time and the day.  None of them speak English so its a great time to practice my Spanish.  Sometimes they don´t say much and watch TV, but I have been able to speak a fair amount with them and feel quite at home at the house.  If only the water were hotter…

 I am about to start my third day of school, which consists of five hours of one on one instruction with a teacher.  We converse a lot, and also do exercises practicing verbs and vocabulary.  I.m remembering a lot, but the practice is very important.  I´m really pleased at how fast my Spanish is coming back and how much I am able to speak with people.  There are also conferencias at the school where locals come in and discuss topics from the present and the past.  Yesterday we learned about the situtation in Guate´s liberal colleges during the 80´s, which was marred by violence and repression.  Quite a sad situation and one that made me think a lot about how different attending college is these days, espescially back in the states.  Everybody here has a story, so many of which are heartbreaking. The amazing thing is that when they tell the stories, they come out as quite normal and my reactions almost seem out of place.  So bascially, being here in the school and with the family is allowing me a chance to see the culture here from a more involved place than traveling form place to place usually allow for.

 Xela itself is pretty large and located in the Guatemalan highlands.  The sorroundings are beautiful, though the town is rather decrepit and full of diesel fumes.  I do like it here a lot.  The central park of the the town is a bizarre remnant of German occupation, feeling like a European square that somebody forgot about with many faux Romanesque details.  There´s some good food here, though mostly now I am eating meals with my “family”.  Today I went to a town called Almolonga, which is the wholesale vegetable market for the area and walked through fields.  Afterwards we took a hot spring bath in a small room from natural hot springs.

One more interesting thing was that last Friday night, in the Casa Argentina where I was staying, I had a Shabbat dinner that was cooked up by 18 Israeli people.  It was very homey and great to be invited.

Volcan Santa Maria

Just a quick post today to tell about my hike to the top of a 3700 meter volcano yesterday.   It was one of the hardest hikes of my life but well worth it.  The terrain was nice, passing through forests and farms, and the view from the top was stunning.  The first photo above shows the volcano from where we started hiking.  The second shows a friendly group we met at the top who made us coffee, and the the third a view from the top. Many more photos are on flickr.