Gema, Lauren, & I - ps, I'm wearing glasses because I have a double eye infection =(
Ames & I playing a game outside!
SANGRIA- well done!
me, gema, and iain in Bajo for the night party!
Lauren and her "Hello Kitty" ghetto pinataFriday, December 14, 2007
Some random photos for your enjoyment
Gema, Lauren, & I - ps, I'm wearing glasses because I have a double eye infection =( Ames & I playing a game outside! SANGRIA- well done!me, gema, and iain in Bajo for the night party!
Lauren and her "Hello Kitty" ghetto pinata
T-giving & Xela living
It you think they don’t celebrate Thanksgiving down here – YOU’RE RIGHT! Luckily, they still sell turkeys down here, and although pricey, we bought two big birds for the big day. Gladis, the school director made the turkeys and everyone else brought a dish. The dinner turned out perfectly, and as always, I felt sick after eating so much food. But don’t worry; we still got a pretty traditional Thanksgiving even though we’re down in the Guat.
Since returning from El Salvador, the last 2 weeks have been somewhat crazy but also relaxing. Everyone started full time classes again (4 hours a day, 5 days a week). We also have been writing theses in Spanish, which is pretty tough in many different ways. Apparently, our teachers haven’t heard of a little thing called “plagiarism,” and they insist daily that we copy and paste articles into our papers. I’m writing my thesis on Child Trafficking in Adoptions and New Reforms to the Adoption Laws. The majority of the paper is done, but there’s still a lot left to correct. Sadly, the weather in town is ABSOLUTELY AMAZING (70-80’s), and it’s difficult to want to stay inside and work when you can be in the sun….especially since I know I’ll be returning to the FREEZING COLD of the Midwest in a week. We’ve been spending a lot of days chilling in the park- reading and playing cards, and I’ve now finished my second Spanish book (The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe). I finished 202 pages in Spanish in 2 days, so I know I’m learning something still! The nights are filled with Discotecas, Bars, and the usual nightlife- always a guaranteed good time. One night at the local club, the “GALLO GIRLS” were there- the U.S. version of Miller Light Girls…you know, just promoting the beer and such. The sweet thing is that I happened to win a dance contest with the girls as judges. I won a beer baseball hat, which is pretty ghetto, but also pretty awesome. As if winning the contest wasn’t good enough, the Gallo Girls (who had fake boobs that touched their chin and look disgusting) asked me for advice on how to dance. Yes, they asked me, because they were very impressed with my skills. YEA ME!
The last couple weeks have also been filled with a bajillion hospital visits. Since a little after Tgiving, Amy felt pretty bad- but in kind of a weird, intense body ache type way. After her initial visit, the doctor said everything was fine. We waited a few more days, but she woke up a heck of a lot worse one day with a pretty sore throat, and we decided to return to the site of my nightmares – Hospital Privado. She ended up seeing the same crazy doctor I had, and we lost it laughing as soon as the poor guy walked in the door. All he said was she had a throat infection and everything else (including the bad aches) were secondary effects. We left and got some meds for her, but she kept getting progressively worse. Finally, third times a charm, she went to a hospital that actually ran tests…and found out she had MALARIA. We chilled in the hospital for a 6 hour IV drip, and left under the assumption that she was cured. About a week later, I woke up with mad shoulder pains and had to return to yet another doctor from my August bus incident. Apparently my nerves were all out of wack and muscles swollen, so I’ve been on some strong meds for a couple weeks. The following day, Amy woke up with a bad rash, so we called around and found an infectious disease doctor. After a thorough blood test – she has in fact also come down with Rubella – despite being vaccinated in 6th grade …MMR is now proven to be somewhat ineffective. As of now, the rash is finally going away and the doctor gave her the go ahead to be ACTUALLY TREATED for Malaria with a serious combination of meds in about 20 days (it turns out the IV was not enough to cure Malaria, and if she didn’t research treatments she could have been in serious trouble). Between the two of us, we live at the hospital and have by far dropped the most dough on hospital visits.
Yesterday, the 12th, was Lauren’s 22nd birthday. It was a pretty exciting and eventful day. We had classes in the morning, but left a little early with our teachers to get ice cream in Parque Central. It happened to be the Day of Virgin Guadelupe, so there was a big fiesta in the Park all day long. It seems that Guatemalans have more holidays than anywhere else in the world- its somewhat ridiculous. After lunch, I treated Lauren to a pedicure for her bday present, even if it was a bootlegged trip…the ladies didn’t exactly know what they were doing, but I guess it was the thought that counts. At 4pm, we had an amazing dessert buffet at Lauren’s house & her family also planned games and had a piñata for her. After the party winded down and everyone left…Lauren & I helped her roommate from Spain, Gema, make SANGRIA. We ended up taking the Sangria to Bajo La Luna and had a party for her there from 8pm-10pm. At 10, we headed out dancing for the rest of the night at got home at 3:30 in the morning. Needless to say, the her birthday was simply amazing and the day that followed was full of absolutely nothing since were all dead at school, as we sprawled across the lawn for classes and talked the whole morning.
Since returning from El Salvador, the last 2 weeks have been somewhat crazy but also relaxing. Everyone started full time classes again (4 hours a day, 5 days a week). We also have been writing theses in Spanish, which is pretty tough in many different ways. Apparently, our teachers haven’t heard of a little thing called “plagiarism,” and they insist daily that we copy and paste articles into our papers. I’m writing my thesis on Child Trafficking in Adoptions and New Reforms to the Adoption Laws. The majority of the paper is done, but there’s still a lot left to correct. Sadly, the weather in town is ABSOLUTELY AMAZING (70-80’s), and it’s difficult to want to stay inside and work when you can be in the sun….especially since I know I’ll be returning to the FREEZING COLD of the Midwest in a week. We’ve been spending a lot of days chilling in the park- reading and playing cards, and I’ve now finished my second Spanish book (The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe). I finished 202 pages in Spanish in 2 days, so I know I’m learning something still! The nights are filled with Discotecas, Bars, and the usual nightlife- always a guaranteed good time. One night at the local club, the “GALLO GIRLS” were there- the U.S. version of Miller Light Girls…you know, just promoting the beer and such. The sweet thing is that I happened to win a dance contest with the girls as judges. I won a beer baseball hat, which is pretty ghetto, but also pretty awesome. As if winning the contest wasn’t good enough, the Gallo Girls (who had fake boobs that touched their chin and look disgusting) asked me for advice on how to dance. Yes, they asked me, because they were very impressed with my skills. YEA ME!
The last couple weeks have also been filled with a bajillion hospital visits. Since a little after Tgiving, Amy felt pretty bad- but in kind of a weird, intense body ache type way. After her initial visit, the doctor said everything was fine. We waited a few more days, but she woke up a heck of a lot worse one day with a pretty sore throat, and we decided to return to the site of my nightmares – Hospital Privado. She ended up seeing the same crazy doctor I had, and we lost it laughing as soon as the poor guy walked in the door. All he said was she had a throat infection and everything else (including the bad aches) were secondary effects. We left and got some meds for her, but she kept getting progressively worse. Finally, third times a charm, she went to a hospital that actually ran tests…and found out she had MALARIA. We chilled in the hospital for a 6 hour IV drip, and left under the assumption that she was cured. About a week later, I woke up with mad shoulder pains and had to return to yet another doctor from my August bus incident. Apparently my nerves were all out of wack and muscles swollen, so I’ve been on some strong meds for a couple weeks. The following day, Amy woke up with a bad rash, so we called around and found an infectious disease doctor. After a thorough blood test – she has in fact also come down with Rubella – despite being vaccinated in 6th grade …MMR is now proven to be somewhat ineffective. As of now, the rash is finally going away and the doctor gave her the go ahead to be ACTUALLY TREATED for Malaria with a serious combination of meds in about 20 days (it turns out the IV was not enough to cure Malaria, and if she didn’t research treatments she could have been in serious trouble). Between the two of us, we live at the hospital and have by far dropped the most dough on hospital visits.
Yesterday, the 12th, was Lauren’s 22nd birthday. It was a pretty exciting and eventful day. We had classes in the morning, but left a little early with our teachers to get ice cream in Parque Central. It happened to be the Day of Virgin Guadelupe, so there was a big fiesta in the Park all day long. It seems that Guatemalans have more holidays than anywhere else in the world- its somewhat ridiculous. After lunch, I treated Lauren to a pedicure for her bday present, even if it was a bootlegged trip…the ladies didn’t exactly know what they were doing, but I guess it was the thought that counts. At 4pm, we had an amazing dessert buffet at Lauren’s house & her family also planned games and had a piñata for her. After the party winded down and everyone left…Lauren & I helped her roommate from Spain, Gema, make SANGRIA. We ended up taking the Sangria to Bajo La Luna and had a party for her there from 8pm-10pm. At 10, we headed out dancing for the rest of the night at got home at 3:30 in the morning. Needless to say, the her birthday was simply amazing and the day that followed was full of absolutely nothing since were all dead at school, as we sprawled across the lawn for classes and talked the whole morning.
El Salvador Pics
War Memorial Wall
Lookout on the Nature Hike in Cinquiera
Coffee Plantation- the sole workers in the joint this day
Arts & crafts with the indigo project!
BEACH DAY & the Group on the beach!El Salvador
After a long and somewhat miserable week in Mexico, I was hesitant for El Salvador. Again, we left at 4:00am, but this time around we were taking first class buses (Greyhound-esque), all the way there. We also happened to plan for a 12 hour day and brought plenty of snacks to hold us over. The trip went well minus the fact that we had to watch the movie “White Chicks” on the way in Spanish, and I was sitting next to “Smelly McSmellsBAD” who laughed at every line in the worst movie ever and made me nauseous from his stench. As soon as we arrived in the capital, San Salvador, we met our host organization, CIS (Centro de Intercambio y Solidaridad), waiting for us with our “coaster”, or a private bus and driver to lug us around the country for 2 weeks.
The whole trip turned out to be the exact opposite of Mexico- and by opposite I mean organized down to the very second. Our guide for the week was Cristy- and maybe because she was younger she had a better understanding of what we wanted to do. The 2 weeks started off with some orientation meetings about El Salvador and some trips to museums and the Cathedral. We also headed for the private university (UCA) for a big festival to see “carpets” done on the streets again (in sand this time) and chill for outdoor concert during the night.
During the weekend, we traveled to the small pueblo of Cinquera- a town in which a lot of warfare took place (their war ended between 1991 and 92). There happened to be a pretty big meeting in San Salvador that weekend though, so most of the inhabitants were MIA. Either way, we met our host families for the night- pretty much the only 8 people still in the town. After, we took a nature hike through the war zone up in the mountains, which included an awesome lookout point and ended with a waterfall where we went swimming. Amy and I stayed with the same family, which was only a host mom (the rest of the family went to the meeting), and we were barely there to sit down and talk with her. At night we shared the most uncomfortable bed I’ve ever laid on which sunk drastically in the middle so we couldn’t help but roll into each other. In addition, we had to be covered by a mosquito net which wasn’t really big enough for this size bed – so our feet and heads were touching the net thus rendering it clearly ineffective. The following morning we all looked liked zombies- no one really slept – but we pushed through a long war testimony, which was pretty depressing.
The next few days were PACKED with meetings, and that’s a LOT of Spanish to listen to each day. But, the best of the meetings included a morning trip to the U.S. Embassy and an afternoon trip to talk with the two major political parties of El Salvador. The Embassy meeting was unreal, and I was somewhat embarrassed to have these people representing the U.S. – they were pretty ignorant about the situation of the country, and it was very clear they rarely left their country club like compound. As for the political party meetings, they parties were like night and day. ARENA was first- and we sat in a huge a/c conference room, while their leader gave us quite the show and answered our tough questions by saying LIES LIES!, without really making a sensible point. The FMLN meeting that followed was the exact opposite, where we sat in a small kitchen, were served tea, and the woman calmly and clearly answered our questions with sensible answers.
The following weekend was spent in the tiny town of Comasagua. We had a meeting with the City Council and visiting the health center. The afternoon was arts & crafts time – as we learned of the Indigo Project run by the women of the community who make t-shirts & bags & other clothing – think T-dye but cooler. Saturday we rode in the back of a pick up truck for 3 hours to get to an even smaller community called La Loma. Once we got off our 3 hour truck ride, we had to hike up a pretty steep hill for about an hour just to get to the place. Some older Canadians were there with the CIS organization too – so almost their entire group took horses up to the community. Unfortunately, one lady tried to hike with us, and she was NOT cut out for it. We waited for her at the top of the mountain, and the second she got there she laid down and PASSED OUT in under 1 second. She must have just exhausted herself or something, but it was pretty ridiculous. We finally got to the community who had lunch prepared and gave a speech. The town was completely wiped out by warfare, and no aide was given to help repair the town after. The community has no light, no water (they hike an hour a day to get water), no schools, no books, NOTHING. It was pretty sad – the community leader was teaching the children, but had never gone to school before in his life. After a big lunch, we returned 3 more hours via pickup to the town and hung out with our families for the night. Amy, Joe, Elise, Antonette, and I shared the “mansion” as we called it. We lived in luxury compared to the other houses- and I slept like a rock. On the way back to the capital we visited a coffee plantation. It just so happened to be the 1 day break between working rotations, so we actually saw virtually nothing and it wasn’t too exciting.
Back in San Salvador, we returned the International Guest House, our base for the whole 2 weeks. I shared a gigantic warehouse looking room with 5 others dubbed “The Party Warehouse.” The place was a little sketchy and not the nicest, but nonetheless it was a hostel. Since our group so big we ate breakfast everyday in a big meeting room instead of the small kitchen table. However, 2 days during our stay, we had to eat in the kitchen because there was going to be a “conference” in the other room. We clearly obliged and thought nothing of it, until we saw what kind of conference it really was. Let’s just say….it was a Prostitute Convention, full of old nasty women learning about safe-sex, condoms, and STD’s. Only in the International Guest House I suppose!
The last day was BEACH DAY, full of FUNTIVITIES- about 1.5 hours outside the capital. The beach was BEAUTIFUL- and the food at the restaurant was simply amazing. After a week full of “papusas” which are tortillas stuffed with cheese, beans, or a combo of the two (which are El Salvador’s claim to fame), a change with seafood was delightful. The waves were huge, the weather hot, and it was the perfect last day for the trip. We headed for Guatemala City the next day, but 6 of us decided to stay behind in Antigua for the night. Antigua is a pretty tourist city, but I hadn’t yet been there for more than just a night and I wanted to see what it was all about. We had a pretty good time and returned to Xela on the 21st, just in time for Thanksgiving!
The whole trip turned out to be the exact opposite of Mexico- and by opposite I mean organized down to the very second. Our guide for the week was Cristy- and maybe because she was younger she had a better understanding of what we wanted to do. The 2 weeks started off with some orientation meetings about El Salvador and some trips to museums and the Cathedral. We also headed for the private university (UCA) for a big festival to see “carpets” done on the streets again (in sand this time) and chill for outdoor concert during the night.
During the weekend, we traveled to the small pueblo of Cinquera- a town in which a lot of warfare took place (their war ended between 1991 and 92). There happened to be a pretty big meeting in San Salvador that weekend though, so most of the inhabitants were MIA. Either way, we met our host families for the night- pretty much the only 8 people still in the town. After, we took a nature hike through the war zone up in the mountains, which included an awesome lookout point and ended with a waterfall where we went swimming. Amy and I stayed with the same family, which was only a host mom (the rest of the family went to the meeting), and we were barely there to sit down and talk with her. At night we shared the most uncomfortable bed I’ve ever laid on which sunk drastically in the middle so we couldn’t help but roll into each other. In addition, we had to be covered by a mosquito net which wasn’t really big enough for this size bed – so our feet and heads were touching the net thus rendering it clearly ineffective. The following morning we all looked liked zombies- no one really slept – but we pushed through a long war testimony, which was pretty depressing.
The next few days were PACKED with meetings, and that’s a LOT of Spanish to listen to each day. But, the best of the meetings included a morning trip to the U.S. Embassy and an afternoon trip to talk with the two major political parties of El Salvador. The Embassy meeting was unreal, and I was somewhat embarrassed to have these people representing the U.S. – they were pretty ignorant about the situation of the country, and it was very clear they rarely left their country club like compound. As for the political party meetings, they parties were like night and day. ARENA was first- and we sat in a huge a/c conference room, while their leader gave us quite the show and answered our tough questions by saying LIES LIES!, without really making a sensible point. The FMLN meeting that followed was the exact opposite, where we sat in a small kitchen, were served tea, and the woman calmly and clearly answered our questions with sensible answers.
The following weekend was spent in the tiny town of Comasagua. We had a meeting with the City Council and visiting the health center. The afternoon was arts & crafts time – as we learned of the Indigo Project run by the women of the community who make t-shirts & bags & other clothing – think T-dye but cooler. Saturday we rode in the back of a pick up truck for 3 hours to get to an even smaller community called La Loma. Once we got off our 3 hour truck ride, we had to hike up a pretty steep hill for about an hour just to get to the place. Some older Canadians were there with the CIS organization too – so almost their entire group took horses up to the community. Unfortunately, one lady tried to hike with us, and she was NOT cut out for it. We waited for her at the top of the mountain, and the second she got there she laid down and PASSED OUT in under 1 second. She must have just exhausted herself or something, but it was pretty ridiculous. We finally got to the community who had lunch prepared and gave a speech. The town was completely wiped out by warfare, and no aide was given to help repair the town after. The community has no light, no water (they hike an hour a day to get water), no schools, no books, NOTHING. It was pretty sad – the community leader was teaching the children, but had never gone to school before in his life. After a big lunch, we returned 3 more hours via pickup to the town and hung out with our families for the night. Amy, Joe, Elise, Antonette, and I shared the “mansion” as we called it. We lived in luxury compared to the other houses- and I slept like a rock. On the way back to the capital we visited a coffee plantation. It just so happened to be the 1 day break between working rotations, so we actually saw virtually nothing and it wasn’t too exciting.
Back in San Salvador, we returned the International Guest House, our base for the whole 2 weeks. I shared a gigantic warehouse looking room with 5 others dubbed “The Party Warehouse.” The place was a little sketchy and not the nicest, but nonetheless it was a hostel. Since our group so big we ate breakfast everyday in a big meeting room instead of the small kitchen table. However, 2 days during our stay, we had to eat in the kitchen because there was going to be a “conference” in the other room. We clearly obliged and thought nothing of it, until we saw what kind of conference it really was. Let’s just say….it was a Prostitute Convention, full of old nasty women learning about safe-sex, condoms, and STD’s. Only in the International Guest House I suppose!
The last day was BEACH DAY, full of FUNTIVITIES- about 1.5 hours outside the capital. The beach was BEAUTIFUL- and the food at the restaurant was simply amazing. After a week full of “papusas” which are tortillas stuffed with cheese, beans, or a combo of the two (which are El Salvador’s claim to fame), a change with seafood was delightful. The waves were huge, the weather hot, and it was the perfect last day for the trip. We headed for Guatemala City the next day, but 6 of us decided to stay behind in Antigua for the night. Antigua is a pretty tourist city, but I hadn’t yet been there for more than just a night and I wanted to see what it was all about. We had a pretty good time and returned to Xela on the 21st, just in time for Thanksgiving!
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