Food, Waves and Digging!

We hope you all had a delicious and belt-bursting Thanksgiving! And don't worry, we didn't miss it. All the volunteers banded together and created Thanksgiving here in San Juan Comalapa. We each prepared our favorite dishes (fresh bread, garlic mashed potatoes and Green Bean Casserole for us), and invited over some of our Chapino friends to experienceour traditional American holiday of stuffing faces. There was talk of somehow showing a football game, but gladly weopted for playing horseshoes, instead. Fidelia, the owner of our favorite tienda, loved "our" food so much, we walked her home with two overfilled plates of leftovers. At that point, we'd done the Thanksgiving holiday justice.

The next morning, 6am, Keri, Cali and us, were on our way to the black sanded beaches of Sipacate! Six hours, three chicken buses and a lancha later, we reached the warm and sunny ocean. Unfortunately, we had to stay at an overpriced resort, Rancho Cabrillo, that had a complete monopoly on the Sipacate ocean. But the four of us threw our bags in the room, jumped into our suits and ran for the waves.

The waves were short, but incredibly powerful. Cali and Rebecca were almost pulled out by a gigantic wave before the super-ripped lifegaurd called us all to safer areas. We swam for hours the next day as well, but we decided to depart our friends and head to Antigua for a night of real showers and our favorite resteraunt that has both veggie burgers and a Peruvian pan-flute band. We came to learn later, that only hours after we left the beach, two men were pulled out by the current, and sadly, the lifegaurd could only make it to one. Such a things reminds us how important it is to always be cautious and protect each other.

We returned just in time for the town´s big dig day. A new water pipeline was going in, and every family who were to use it was responsible for digging as much as 25 meters in length and 80cm deep. Because we had about 10 people in our crew, and Rebecca´s impressive experience, we dug twice as much. It was great to work side by side with the people of Comalapa. We even shared in the refraccíon of Pepsi and pan dulce. After digging for three hours it suprisingly hit the spot.

We saw seven volunteers come and go in these two weeks and said goodbye to the two that welcomed us a month ago. Now we are the welcoming committee at the Casa de Voluntarios and are looking forward to completing the retaining wall of the garden and the kitchen of the Casa de Llantas.
Escribamos Más Pronto!

Into the Gardens of the Highlands

Our adventure has taken us into the Central Highlands of Guatemala, and to the artisan town of San Juan Comalapa. As we entered into the town we saw the expansive and famous mural. The quarter-mile painting tells the history of the Kechi-qel people from their part of the Mayan empire, the arrival of the Spanish conquistadors, civil wars and dictators to their hopes for education, community development and self-empowerment. It is breathtaking to walk along. The mural lines the outer wall of the town's cemetery. From the outside, we can see the colorful tops of the graves lined with flowers and candles. We are eager to walk through the cemetery one day.













We came to Comalapa to volunteer with Long Way Home, a nonprofit organization that works with the surrounding communities on development projects such as reforestation, alternative building methods, water improvements and community parks. But most importantly, the website said they have an organic garden that needed work. We were also told they would welcome help on building a kitchen out of rammed earth bags, but the moment Matteo (Project Coordinator) heard Andy had done web design work, Andy has been working overtime redesigning Long Way Home's website. Check it out at: longwayhomeinc.org, it is a really amazing organization.

My assigned project has been to paint almost every day! I have painted fences a beautiful green
and painted signs for leading to the campo de futbol at Parque Chimiya, the protected community park, the organic garden, and the Casa de Voluntarios, our home. We have spent a lot of time together in the garden and have found so many pottery shards and obsidian flakes that we are fantasizing about conducting an archaeological report...
We have been here two weeks now, and we are sublimely happy. We believe in the organization and the people who work in it. We love Comalapala, the beautiful people and the incredible green hills of pine trees. Less than two hours west, are the ruins of Ixsmiche in Tecpan. We spent two days in the town and hours climbing up and down the ruins. We even happened upon an area that was stills used for Kechi-qel rituals and sacrifices today. As we walked up, the central pit was smoldering from a fire and there were freshly lit candles placed in
the towering altars. We looked quickly, and respectfully returned to the public site.

We are entering our third week here, and both have exciting projects to work on. We hope to be sending good news about our vegetables and the kitchen we will build out of old tires and earth bags.

We hope you have a delicious Turkey Day! We will be spending that holiday on the beaches of Sipacate! Don´t worry, we will tell you all how incredible the waves are!













Picture of two of my students at Casa Guatemala; Jennica and Karla! They loved the book Shelley! Thanks!

Thrown headfirst into the labyrinth of Casa Guatemala

We left Hotel Backpackers in an overcrowded lancha past 1am during a hellacious downpour.
Most of the other volunteers were drunk and, unlike us, not particualary warmed by the promise of our destination. But, Andy and I, drunk only by excitement and anticipation, were two of the first in the lancha, and the only two with huge, foolish smiles. Without stars and the
moon as a guide, we reached the dock and unloaded our drenched bodies and possessions. We followed our future housemate and were shown our room; small but private, four walls and two soiled mattresses. We huddled together on the better of the two, protected against it's foulness by our light, yellow bedsheet and held eachother in the wet dark. I had a nightmare that night, that is what Andy insisted it was, that a gargantuan rat pissed on my face as I slept. Yet, in Andy's protective arms, I groaned my way back to sleep and awoke to the jungle, roosters, birds and monkeys howling.

Our first day began with a volunteer meeting, which was to introduce the others to us, and us to the organization. Thirty mintues later, Carolina (one of our new housemates from France), took us on a tour of the orphanage. The buildings are pretty impressive. The dorms for the children are seperated by age and gender. Both buildings are two stories with large communal areas, balconies and multiple bathroooms. Previous volunteers had painted the walls and floors with brillant colors and painted the bunk beds with amazing pictures and designs. I could tell that the construction of the dorms had undergone conscious planning because the girls' dorm opened out to the courtyard for easy access to the hussle and bussle of the mealtimes, and the boys dormitory opened to the river so that they can easily jump (or swing) off their patio straight into the water. I knew right then, and still believe now, that the children at Casa Guatemala are very happy.

Working with the Kindergarden children has been an amazing and amazingly difficult experience. Although no single child is over five years old, together they are, at times, an insurmountable firing squad of little fists and biting insults. But, the next minute they are calling me "sueno" and smothering me with hugs and kisses. There are also some little dramas I have already observed. For instance, there appears to be an attention triangle between Jennica, Cesear and Rudy. Jennica appears to also be the ring leader of all the girls in the class. Then there is Diego, the shyest boy, who shows up to class with the tidiest clothes and ALWAYS with his immaculately organized backpack. Selvin is the troublemaker, but I know he only wants attention. It also doesn't help that his mother serves him coffee every morning. Last but not least, there is Edy and Lily. They are two of the youngest, always together and call eachother "novios". Erik is the only three year old and mostly speaks Quechi. We are doing all we can with him, but keeping him out of soiled clothes seems to be our best achievment everyday. There are others, but I will save that for the next blog.



I have been told that it is difficult to see the true expanse of the storm while you are in the center of it. Sadly, it appears that all the volunteers, paid workers and it's founder all live within the center of El Tormento de Casa Guatemala. School is almost out and the majority of the kids will go home to their families, only the ones without somewhere to go will remain. We both have a desire to work in a project that needs our help so we decided that 20 volunteers for 50 kids is probably enough. We are going to move onto a project that could use our help.

Some more Pictures!!!


One of the farm workers shot this bird because it was eating a papaya, he was delicious.

Andy, Erik and Selvyn.


Edi and Lily



Our house as seen from our room.

Pictures, Pictures, more Pictures.

Check out that tiny Banana!!! Makes me like bananas again.


First day at Casa Guatemala. It rained 3 days straight, not
a break for even a minute. Yay Tropical Depression 16!

Casa Guatemala is low on money so no gas for cooking. Now
they cook outside over a fire on some cinder blocks.

A couple of big centipedes on the way to our house.

The freshly planted corn field. Its been a week and they are
already a couple inches high. Stay away birds!


So we didn't end up going on break yet... Instead we are now at the orphanage for a week or so, then we will get our break after working at least 22 days. A traveling englishman was at the hotel for the last week or so, he has been riding his motorcycle for the last 5 years or so. After riding all the way down Africa he started riding from the tip of South America 5 years ago. His goal is to make it to Alaska and catch a boat over to Russia so he can ride home. http://www.hebdenbridge.co.uk/news/news06/17.html He taught us the best lesson we've learned here. When someone gives you a time estimate it means it won't be anytime before that. For example, the lancha leaves at 5:30 really means don't bother showing up before 5:30 because there is no way it will leave before then. If you do you'll probably be the only one there.

We have been in Casa Guatemala for the last few days and will be spending the next week there. We have both spent a little time in the kitchen and Rebecca has been working with the girls activites and today with the fishing and basketball activity. I have been working in the fields scaring the birds away from the newly planted corn. Check out some of the recent pictures.

Last week at Hotel Backpackers

Only two days left at Hotel Backpackers in servitude. We're both a little tired of people waving their empty beer bottles ( or sometimes not empty ) at us. All the people who work here are really nice and respectful but the same cannot be said about all the patrons. We may not be Chapinos but the sure treat us like we are. But working every night has really improved our spanish, so much that we are having real conversations about American politics, vegetarianism (though everyone still thinks we're completely loco!) and deadly spiders here and back home. Sadly, business has been very slow at the restaurant, but that did give us the chance to check out the latest novella from Mexico (Amor Real) and for Andy to play Sudoku with Edi. Tonight is the weekly barbeque, so it is sure to be bumping with Tourists who want to eat a gut full of meat for 65Q ( $9 ). That is the equivalent of six nights lodging so Chapinos, us and our hotel guests usually don't eat it.

Last night, I ( Andy ) spotted what looked like some big fish right near our room in the river. Some looked about two feet long and some of them were really skinny. Since they seem to feed off the surface we put a bobber on and baited the hook with cliff bars and then Bimbo® bread. First cast I got hung up on part of the framing that holds our room up. I had to climb out a small ledge to untangle it. I looked down and saw that the fish were not fish at all, they were eels! Rebecca cried out "Those are the shrieking eels!", "They always grow louder when they're about to feed on human flesh!" That didn't really happen but it should have. We have been hearing the eels for many nights but never saw them until last night. They feed on the surface and make a lot of noise as they slither around on top of the water. They don't seem to like bread though. As soon as we figure out what they do like to eat, we'll break out the Sushi set and make Unagi for everybody!



Two new volunteers arrived a couple days ago, one from Finland and one from France, which means two things; 1) There are a lot of good people who want to help the orphans of Guatemala and 2) WE GET TO GO TO CASA GUATEMALA FINALLY!! We had the choice of going straight to work at the orphanage for three more weeks or take a week descanso now and work at the orphanage for four weeks.... we talked about it for about 20 seconds and we decided to go to Livingston and hang by the Carribbean ocean for a week. We are going to have a groovy time so look forward to our next post everybody!

Mucho trabajo en el Hotel Backpacker

We fell asleep last night to fish jumping out of the water, que bonita! We finally figured out a comfortable bed using a couple of pads and our net tied between some bunk beds. Nobody is staying here in our dormitory right now so we have it all to ourselves. Showers and bathrooms all to ourselves. Looking out over the river with a hammock outside the door. The kitchen and main building is right across the way and when people get partying it is pretty loud but luckily we are tired from working all day and fall asleep anyways.

The next picture is looking out over the river towards the largest bridge in central america. It is pretty impressive they got so much concrete and steel here. I'm not sure how high it is but I certainly would not jump off. A lot of people like to stop on the top and tranquillo (chill) with their friends and usually an ice cream bar and drink a lot of beers. Nobody seems to mind this even though they are blocking quite a bit of the road. The trucks are no joke here, I've seen semis here that are just as big as anything in the US.

This morning I, Rebecca, was given an amazing suprise.... we had tamales for breakfast!!! Andy prepared our plates; frijoles negra con crema, a triangle of white cheese, tortillas and the tamale. Ademas, we finally found the salsa hidden in one of the refridgerators. Now, we eat like the King and Queen we are! Everyone said we were going to hate the food here, because it is mostly rice, beans and tortillas cada dia, but what these people didn't realize is that is exactly what we choose to eat everyday. AND we get half price beers from the bar which is the normal price in town, but we do get a river side view. Andy fished with the other cooks in the kitchen again today. But it seems he only hooks the ones that are too big to fit through the hole in the floor. He just too good... But Reyna catches enough for all of us. Andy concedes that she is the champ. We worked side by side today shelling about a hundred shrimp. (Mom, I thought of you, and how you could have eaten them all yourself. )

After work, we got a ride across the river from our new friend, Miriam. Her boyfriend, Manuel, picked her up from work in their lancha so we hopped on for the ride. It was a blast. We are in the process of figuring out how we are going to get our own sweet lancha, so we will let you know when that happens. Fronteras was muy bueno today, except that Andy got slightly side swiped
a motorcycle! That just made us realize that we should be cruising down the streets in a motorcyle too, you know, preventative measures. We also found a groovy tienda that sold fishing supplies. We picked up some line, hooks and weights. That's pretty much all we need to catch the fish here, so we are about set. The man at la tienda said they sell lanchas there too, so we will be talking to him some more...

I (Andy) noticed the guy tied a pretty interesting knot to attach the hook to the line. It involves a bunch of twisting and overhand knots that makes the end result look pretty thick. It would never work in Oregon because it looks really obvious. The fish here don't seem to care, they will eat bread off the hook in two seconds. The hard part is hooking them before this happens. In the kitchen we catch tiny fish on 50 pound test line that is doubled up and twisted. We could easily catch enough to eat well every day.

We also stopped at the pharmacy today to get some cream to rub on insect bites. The man recommended a cream that looked like a normal over the counter antibiotic but had gentamycin and two other hard core antibiotics. He seemed to be a bit hurt that we didn't take his suggestion, but I don't think we need to be jumping into the hard core anti biotics just quite yet.

Also in town I have been looking for a camera or memory card adapter for my phone. I brought my phone down to use as a camera, calculator, and for playing sudoku. Turns out it was a good idea since I lost my camera on the bus ride here. They only seem to have kodak cameras and everyone wants 200 dollars or so for them. I found a new 2gb card for my phone that came with an adapter. The guy wanted 250 q. for it and punched it into his calculator. He turned the calculator towards me and I promptly divided the number by 7 to approximate the dollar equivalent which was around 35. He must of thought we were bartering because he then typed in 200 on the calculator and asked if that was ok. I said yes and we walked away with the deal. I figure 28 dollars is a pretty good deal on a memory card and it was probably the only one in Fronteras. Needless to say I will be employing this technique in the future.

We will exit this days blog post with some pictures for ya'll. Enjoy. Tranquillo mis amigos!



The bridge over the Rio Dulce. View from our room looking towards Fronteras on the other side.











We had dinner one night at what looks to be the nicest place in town. Some good crab and fish. They have their own six year old greeter as well.

















Wassup with Walmart? This isn't even inside a Walmart, its the biggest store in Fronteras which is not very large. Did they really have to keep the title "Item Spanish Description"?

I wonder if it is really 3x3 meters like the sign says, or if its 2x3 like the box says....

First Days at Hotel Backpackers

So here we are at Hotel Backpackers, the first stop of our trip in Guatemala. This is where all volunteers at Casa Guatemala come before taking the boat trip down the river to the orphanage. We showed up here on Thursday after flying into Guatemala City. We hopped a bus rather quickly, neither of us was very excited about the masses of American fast food and the condition of most of the city. In our 20 minute trip from the airport to the bus station we saw Macdonalds, Taco Bell, Wendys ( I fought the temptation to get a frosty actually ), Burger King, Chucky Cheese, etc.

It was a six hour trip on the nicest bus I've ever been on probably (way better than greyhound!) The road was paved the entire way here as well as being in very good shape, surprising to me as my bus time in Costa Rica was a very different experience. It was dark when we arrived in Rio Dulce and we still thought we would have to get a ride to the backpackers hotel. It turns out our place was only a short walk from the bridge where we had the bus drop us off. Here we met a few volunteers who showed us the ropes to staying at the backpackers hotel. Amalia from France who showed up the same day we did. She managed to meet up with the guy who was meeting us at the airport, but we didn't see him! There is also a couple from Spain who are here working on a web application that the hotel staff will use to book guests at the backpackers hotel, they also have improved the Internet situation here ( its ADSL if you were wondering ) Lots of Guatemalans seem to be into gadgets, cell phones are very popular. So is putting some sort of meat on everything, powdered chicken broth seems to be the biggest thing. I know this because I've been working in the kitchen here.

Rebecca has been working in the restaurant waiting on some tables, cleaning glasses, and counting silverware ( they do a daily inventory of the few precious items ) I have been working in the kitchen doing dishes, chopping things, and hoarding forks to throw Rebeccas count off. Today I caught a fish through a hole in the kitchen, did I mention the whole place is built above the river? It sure makes the sink drains easy to maintain. I think it was a bluegill, one of the cooks caught more of them and then fried them up for a snack ( after coating them in powdered chicken broth of course ) As volunteers, we get to order off of a smaller menu which includes food that they think we would want such as Hamburgers and Fries, Deep fried eggrolls ( they call these tacos ) Deep fried rice, Spaghetti with powdered chicken sauce. Needless to say we have been trying to eat what the Guatemalans are eating. They all get made their own food which is usually black beans, rice, eggs with peppers, and tortillas. The tortillas are pretty different, they are thicker and are some blend of corn and wheat flour. The best thing is they are made every day by a Qechue woman who doesn't do much else but smile a lot. Everyone says we are going to get sick of rice and beans so we should eat restaurant food, but we are already sick of deep fried things coated in chicken flavoring.

And now for the living situation. We began with an entire room for ourselves but all the beds were smaller than a twin size. We haven't seen a bed bigger than this anywhere yet so it looks like we will spend the next six months sweaty and smothering each other but we are happy we got the mosquito nets. We actually haven't seen any mosquitoes yet but are getting bit by something.... When we go to Casa Guatemala we will be living in the couples house. This may or may not mean a bigger bed but it does mean less housemates.

We're going to be here for at least a week, everybody working here stays at the backpackers hotel so they can determine if you are a weirdo before they send you off to work at the orphanage. It seems to work well, today they effectively weeded out a guy that definitely not here for the right reasons. After asking us if we did drugs, insinuating he wanted to do some with us, he told Amalia that he had 8 months to live and various other conflicting stories.