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.