This week was the first week back to school of the year. It feels good to get back to my 'normal' routine after the last very full month, in which I hosted 4 different guests since Christmas.
The week before Christmas my friend Erin, a former Peace Corps volunteer in Peru who's now in medical school in Chicago, came to visit. I first met Erin in Peru when I led trips there for Broadreach during the summer of 2007. I spent 3 weeks with her helping coordinate a health-education service project very similar to the work I'm doing here in Guatemala. It was a wonderful experience and really motivated me to continue my efforts to join the PC. I was really excited to have the chance to show Erin my life and work here in Guatemala and we had a great time talking about the many similarities and differences between these two indigenous Latin-American countries. Erin was here on a scholarship from her medical school, and as part of the scholarship had to do some sort of community service while she was here. Since it was the week before Christmas (ie. When nobody was working) we decided to do some home visits in the communities I work in. We spent 3 days—a day in each community—walking from house to house, talking with the kids I work with and their families. We did a variety of activities, such as reading 'Mariquita Cochinita', a story about a little girl who learns about healthy habits, playing a matching game with one good habit and one bad habit (e.g. one card with clean hands and one card with dirty hands), doing a simple nutrition-themed jigsaw puzzle, and singing the various healthy schools songs. I was a bit nervous beforehand. If someone showed up at a typical American's door, invited themselves in, and told everyone inside to wash their hands and brush their teeth, they would probably get kicked out pretty quickly. But I was happy to be warmly welcomed into nearly all the homes we visited. Most of the houses had kids I knew (at least by face) from school, and most of the parents seemed to know who I was. I even got to use the little K'iche I know to explain who I was and why I was there. We worked primarily with the kids but also encouraged the adults and older siblings to join in. While many were shy and only wanted to watch at first, they all seemed curious and by bit they began to participate more in our activities. Many families gave us something small to eat or drink—an orange, a piece of bread or a cup of juice—a Guatemalan tradition for visitors to your house. Erin even was able to borrow some traditional clothing in a few of the homes and we took some laughter-filled photos with the families. It was an amazing experience for all of us, and quite useful for my work for several reasons. First, it allowed me reinforce the things I've been working on with the kids for the last year with the entire family. Second, it helped me build and strengthen relationships with parents, whose support I'll need in order for the project to be truly successful. Finally, the visits gave me a much more complete picture of the home environment the kids I work with live in on a day to day basis. I saw that there's a pretty wide spectrum of conditions, from relatively better off families that have nice homes with running water and letrines, TVs and other electronic equipment, and even a computer in at least one case, to families on the other side of the spectrum that live in complete squalor, with garbage strewn everywhere, no sanitary latrines or running water, and sick looking kids running around barefoot and filthy. The majority of the houses were in between these two extremes, and I think the experience gave me a much better (though still far from complete) perspective of the challenges rural Guatemalan kids face.
From my site we headed to Lake Atitlan for Christmas eve in Jaibalito, the same beautiful town Aaron and Aneta spent their honeymoon in.
We made reservations for dinner on December 24th at La Casa del Mundo, one of Guatemala's nicest hotels, and when we showed up to eat I was delightfully surprised to run into Jamie, one of my closest friends in the PC, who just happened to be staying there with his mom. We joined them for dinner, then had an unforgettable time partying it up back at the hostel afterwords—as with all Guatemalan holidays, there were lots of fireworks lit off, and also lots of food and drink.
We headed to Antigua on Christmas day, then on the 26th I went to the airport to pick up my brother Eric, who had a ticket to spend almost a full month with me in Guatemala. From the airport we went straight to Xenacoj where we spent a warm, laughter-filled afternoon with my host family.
I cooked curry for everyone, and my host sisters and mother braided Eric's hair in corn rows for him.
That evening we headed to the bus station in Guatemala city where we got on an overnight bus to Flores, far off in Guatemala's largest, jungle filled northernmost department of Petén. The plan was to spend 5 days hiking through the jungle to El Mirador, the remote ruins of an ancient Mayan city almost to the northern border with Mexico. In addition to Erin, Eric, and myself we were joined by another of my PC friends named Judy.
We arrived in Flores the following morning and spent several hours walking around the small city on an island in Lake Peten Itza. Eric and I saw a group of people gathered around the shore, looking at a small crocodile (it may have been an alligator, I'm not sure). We decided against swimming.
In the afternoon we climbed up onto the most decrepit, broken down looking bus I'd ever seen (after living in Guatemala a full year now that says a lot!) for the 4 hour journey further north to Carmelita, the tiny village of mainly wooden huts where we were to begin our hike. It was a beautiful ride through windy dirt roads surrounded by jungle and grassy fields, into a Guatemala I'd up to then never experienced.
The following morning we met our guide Wilter, our mule driver Nino, and the 5 mules who would be carrying our supplies—food, water (there were no sources on the route), tents, sleeping bags, clothes, etc. It felt like quite an expedition for only the 4 of us! Still fairly clean and well rested, we headed off on our 5 day hike. It took 2 full days of hiking to arrive at the main ruins. As much as I'm tempted to write about the miserable conditions we had to heroically forge through, the truth is that, fortunately, it was flat almost the whole way, the trail was good, it wasn't too hot or buggy at that time of year, and it didn't rain too much for the most part. Nonetheless, it was a long hike—I was told over 40 miles one way—and fairly monotonous. We had fun though, talking and getting to know our guide. While we quickly discovered that Wilter was not particularly knowledgeable about Mayan history or archeology—he was an illiterate campesino who'd lived his entire life in that one small village—he was a really fun, funny guy and nonetheless had lots of interesting information to share with us. He told us about harvesting 'chicle', the sap which comes from the tree of the same name, which is the main economic activity and source of income for most families in the region. He also told us about what it was like as a worker excavating the ruins at El Mirador, a job most of the men in the area had partaken in at one time or another. More than anything, we all agreed that he was a warm, friendly guy who genuinely did his best to make us feel comfortable and enjoy the trek. He was also a great cook—even if not the most sanitary one—and we enjoyed delicious, often freshly cooked meals throughout the entire trek. Nino, our 'arellero' –mule driver—was more quiet and reserved. I couldn't tell if he resented us or not, but after a few days he started to warm up to us and shared some of his stories and experiences as well.
During the trip we saw lots of wildlife—groups of spider monkeys in the canopy high above, jumping fearlessly from branch to branch; toucans, parrots, and many other tropical birds calling through the trees; coatis—kind of raccoon looking mammals with long tails (one got into our food one day and we found a hole bitten into our honey). We also saw some sort of wild pigs as well as two wild cats which quickly darted away as soon as they saw us, among various other birds, mammals, and insects.
After 2 days we arrived at our destination. While I hadn't done an overwhelming amount of research about El Mirador, I knew that it was a major ancient Mayan city which contained the largest Mayan temple ever built, and that it was also less restored and less visited than other ruins such as Tikal. I pictured vine covered stone temples, in the style of Indiana Jones. The reality, I was soon to discover, was quite a bit different. While El Mirador had indeed been an immense city, and indeed did contain the largest Mayan pyramid ever built, the city had been abandoned a thousand years ago, and in the meantime the entire site—including all the immense temples—had been completely buried under dense jungle. Instead of being covered by a few vines, the ruins were completely entombed by many feet of dirt, trees, and other vegetation. While some select parts have been excavated and restored, walking through most of the site you'd have no idea that you were in the middle of an ancient city. Even the largest temples looked like at first glance like steep hills (almost like mini-volcanoes), and the whole experience required a lot more imagination than I'd expected.
Nonetheless, once I adapted my expectations to meet reality, the ruins were no less impressive and breathtaking. It was impossible not to appreciate the immense, patient, power of nature; Earth's ability to reclaim what his hers and destroy even the most ambitious works of man. At the same time, it also made me begin to grasp the amount of human effort required to excavate and restore ruins, and gave me a new appreciation for more restored ruins I've visited such as Macchu Pichu in Peru and Teotihuacan in Mexico.
We spent a full day exploring the different parts of the city, including a number of different temples of varying sizes and a piece of a wall which had been restored. Underneath one of the temples there is also a locked door leading to a series of tunnels. By giving the guard a few quetzales tip he will open the door for you to go on a self-guided tour of the tunnels, including to see some 2,000 year old paintings with the original paint still undisturbed.
The entire place is a living archeological site. While other ruins and museums I've visited have lots of fenced off areas, no such barriers existed in El Mirador, and we were free to explore pretty much wherever we wanted. I was curious about the impact visitors had on the ruins, and tried to be conscientious to look and not touch. At one place we observed several dozen plastic bags of broken stone fragments, artifacts that we assumed had been categorized and organized like giant jigsaw puzzles to be reassembled at a later time and place.
We ran into 2 other trekkers and their guide, who it turned out knew about the Maya and the history of the site, and they graciously invited us to tag along and listen to his informative explanations of things, which I found quite interesting. Both days we climbed to the top of large pyramids to watch the sunset. While the afternoon clouds frustrated our efforts, the view was still amazing—the various pyramids were the only places to go to get a panoramic view of the surrounding jungle for many miles in every direction.
After 3 days—2 days hiking and 1 exploring the ruins, we spent 2 more days hiking home. The trip back was quieter, as we were getting tired and wanted a shower, but still fun. The last night in the jungle was New Years eve, and we camped at El Tintal, which we learned was a smaller ancient Mayan city (apparently there are quite a few of them in northern Guatemala) with a pretty large pyramid of its own. We climbed to the top and were finally rewarded with a proper sunset. I stayed up for an extra hour, and as the sounds of the jungle at night began to come alive I was rewarded with an incredible full moon rise over the horizon. Using the moonlight, I carefully walked down the steep steps of the temple, through a bit of jungle back to our campsite, where our guides had made a fire for dinner. I had bought supplies for s'mores back in Flores and was saving them for New Years, and in addition to ourselves we cooked marshmallows for our guides and other hikers camping in the same site.
At a few minutes to midnight the 4 of us climbed back up to the top of the pyramid, where we counted down to the new year and probably woke up the entire jungle with our shouts of celebration.
After a cold but glorious shower back in Carmelita the next day, we bid goodbye to our guides and headed back to Flores, where we again took the night bus back to Guatemala city. After bidding goodbye to Erin, who had to fly home to begin classes, and Judy, the group was reduced to Eric and myself.
I spent the next several days preparing for the workshops I had planned to conduct with the 3 schools I work with the following week. I created and edited documents and other materials for a variety of activities, typed the agenda and went over it numerous times, called the school directors and the school superintendent (my boss) to confirm the plans, bought snacks and drinks for everyone, and ended up making hundreds of photocopies and spending several hours just organizing all the materials. I had warned Eric that I really needed to focus for these days, since it was really important for me to start the year off on the right foot. He helped me organize some of the handouts I prepared. The night before, I baked 2 loaves of banana bread, the finishing touch, and was ready for the 5 hour workshop the following day.
I was really nervous—my time in Guatemala has prepared me to expect the unexpected, as well as the nearly given rule that nothing will start on schedule. Sure enough, we started 45 minutes late, but after that everything went great. My primary goal this year is to work with the teachers and transition them into taking more direct ownership of the healthy schools program, with the long-term goal of making it a fully self-sustainable program in the future. With that end in mind, I divided the activities into 3 parts: First, addressing general teaching techniques and methods; second, reviewing the Healthy Schools program and the tools used to implement it; and third, setting priorities and formulating specific plans and strategies for each school. I tried to plan activities that would force the teachers to take initiative and participate actively, and was nervous about how willing they would be. Nonetheless, they really impressed me by taking each activity seriously, participating more than I had expected, and even taking notes on a lot of the things we did. In the end we actually ran out of time, which was fine because it gave me the chance to do the planning activities another day with each school individually. At the end of the day I gave out official diplomas to each teacher, and had them fill out evaluation forms. I was very pleased to receive very positive feedback as well as some great suggestions.
The following day I gave a shorter, 2 hour workshop with the school directors from all the area schools—over 30 in all, more than I had originally thought. I knew that I couldn't work individually with each school, but the idea was to give an introduction to the Healthy Schools program and some of the basic information and recommendations about how to begin implementing the program in their schools, and if there were any schools that showed more enthusiasm I could give them more information and maybe make some visits to their teachers and kids. In the end the workshop was mediocre at best. I was again nervous, and never really relaxed the entire time because it seemed that nobody was really listening or cared much about what I had to say. It was discouraging, but at the same time it made me realize how much of a difference there was in the schools I've already been working with for almost a year, most importantly in the teachers' attitudes and motivation to implement the healthy schools program in their schools. Instead of seeing the less than effective workshop as a setback, I saw it as a vindication of the last year I've spent in the 3 schools I work in. Despite the slow rate of change, which often leaves me feeling immensely frustrated, my experiences from the 2 vastly different workshops showed me the undeniable progress we've made.
I spent the next week hanging out with Eric. While I was anxious to relax a bit after the past few intense weeks, Eric was understandably eager to explore my town and more of Guatemala. I spent another weekend at Lake Atitlan, first back in Jaibalito—where I was starting to become a regular—then in Panajachel, the main tourist city on the lake, where we spent a night out dancing to say goodbye to 2 PC friends that decided to leave early and go home to the U.S. We also met up with Tom, a high school friend of ours from back in Connecticut. Tom came back to my house with us, and I spent a few days showing him around my town, walking him to a few of my schools and following up with the teachers.
That Friday we headed back to Antigua where, after another night out dancing (Eric did pretty well for not speaking Spanish and having never danced either Reggaeton or Salsa...) we picked up our dad at the airport in Guatemala city the next morning. We hung out for 2 nights at a nice hotel in Antigua (the kind I would never think of staying in normally) and checked out the city. It's nice to visit a familiar place with new visitors, because they often give you a new perspective and make you notice details you would normally overlook. In my year in Guatemala I've been to Antigua many times, and am normally preoccupied thinking about where I'm going to eat or hang out with my friends. So, it was nice to have my Dad around to point out all sorts of things—stuff like old doors and other architectural details—I'd never noticed before. To be totally honest, I probably won't notice them again, but it was still nice, and more than anything it was fun hanging out with my Dad. Eric got sick and spent most of the time in the hotel room throwing up and having the runs, so I got plenty of time alone with Dad.
Before his arrival, while planning the trip itinerary and transportation, I gave my Dad a rundown of the different transportation options. I told him all about riding on “Camionetas”, the old American school buses I've written all about in previous blog entries. Thinking back on my own first impressions of this preferred method of Guatemalan transportation—the disorientation and discomfort of riding crammed in with a hundred other people, many of whom haven't bathed any time recently, passing other buses speeding way too fast uphill around blind curves, all while listening to blaring Ranchera music—I wasn't sure it would be my Dad's cup of tea. Nonetheless, he was adamant about wanting to experience how I REALLY lived and insisted on at least giving it a try.
The first bus was no big deal, but when we switched in Chimaltenango to get on the 2 and a half hour bus to Quiche, every seat was full, forcing us to sit in the perilous 3rd seats, leaving about half the cheek hanging off the edge into the aisle. I was worried about how Dad would hold up, but he said he was fine, and was at least holding in any discomfort quite stoically. Fortunately, after about half an hour the bus emptied out enough for us all to to get real seats, and the rest of the ride passed comfortably without further incident, as did as all the other bus rides we took throughout the week.
My dad specifically planned his trip to coincide with my town's “Feria”--the once yearly festival all Guatemalan towns have, complete with carnival rides and games, lots of vendors, music, dancing, fireworks, and of course, massive amounts of alcohol. Things often get out of hand, and again, I was a bit worried about how well my dad would fit into all this. Perhaps I should have had him come during a more tranquilo week, I thought, but again he was insistent about getting the authentic Guatemalan experience.
In the end we all had a great time. I showed him all around my town, and was always proud when a little kid (or adult for that matter) shouted my name enthusiastically, “TRAAVEES, TRAAVEES!!”, as we passed. I introduced him to some of my friends and was surprised to see both how many people I know and also to hear some of the nice things people had to say about me to my dad—though I had to translate them for him, of course! I took him to eat Guatemalan food at the many food stands set up in the streets, and we watched crazy music and dancing in the park, including Convite, the uniquely Guatemalan tradition where men and women dress up in Halloween-like costumes—warriors, werewolves and other animals, even gigantic babies, and dance around in circles for hours on end. (After watching 15 minutes of Convite Dad described it as one of the most bizarre sights he'd ever seen, I'd have to agree with him.)
In the end the only thing we saw that was a bit scary was when we walked by the town hall and saw two guys, shirtless and tied up tightly to the building's columns, surrounded by what seemed like a mob of people watching them, as well as what seemed to be their wives and other family members distraught and trying to convince people to untie the men. I saw 2 police officers walk by, not making any attempt to do anything about the 2 men tied up in front of them. I later found out the story: the men had been tied up for shooting guns off into the air—they weren't trying to hurt anyone, but nonetheless upset people with their recklessness. They were untied and let go without harm after what seemed like not too long. It was the first time I've seen the much talked about 'traditional justice' practiced in rural Guatemalan towns, and hopefully the last.
After leaving the feria in my town (delayed when I forgot Eric's passport in my room and had to go back to get it from Quiche), we spent another 2 nights back on the lake in Jaibalito—by this point I really am practically a regular in town. We rented a beautiful cottage on the lake—again the same one Aaron and Aneta rented on their honeymoon, and enjoyed some nice meals, happy hours, as well as relaxation and down time.
The day before Eric and Dad's flight we headed back by boat then bus to Guatemala city, where we spent the night at the Grand Tikal Futura hotel, one of the fanciest in Guatemala (fortunately I was able to talk my way into getting the local Guatemalan rate, less than half of the rate for foreigners). We enjoyed lounging in the pool and the hotel's 3 jacuzzis for their last afternoon.
After a short nights sleep, we got up at 4 in the morning and said our goodbyes at the airport after a really nice trip together in Guatemala—a week for dad and a month for Eric. I headed back to the hotel, where I took advantage of the fancy room, cable TV, and pool access for a few more hours before heading home.
Last week was the first week back at classes in my schools, and I'm now trying to get back to my old 'normal' routine after both the excitement and stress of being a tour guide for the last 6 weeks. I had meetings in 2 of my schools to complete the planning activities we didn't have time to do earlier, and was again cautiously optimistic about the prospects for change this year. The schools and teachers seem to have a new enthusiasm and willingness to cooperate and take initiative. 2 schools even want to do infrastructure projects, beginning with the construction of new water faucets. We'll see what pans out—whether we can leverage this early energy into real progress or whether the enthusiasm will wane remains to be seen, but I feel I've done my part for the time being.
For my first visit to the schools I didn't have a whole lot planned—the goal is for teachers to begin teaching their own health lessons this year, so I don't want to create the expectation that I'm always going to come with activities. Nonetheless I did bring one surprise—my friend Mark wrote a parody of a Vicente Fernandez song with new lyrics related to things like drinking clean water and washing your hands with soap and water. I brought the song and sang it, with backup music from my MP3 player, for all the classes at my 3 schools. I even borrowed a big sombrero to make it look more authentic. In the end I wasn't sure if they appreciated it or thought I was crazy. As normal, probably a bit of both.
