Wow time is really flying by down here! I did not think that it was 2.5 weeks
since the last post! Sorry!!!
So what have we been up to? Well…we are currently in our 4th week of Spanish
classes and we have certainly come a long ways in our comprehension of
Spanish! It’s exciting to be able
to understand what people are trying to say to us but we need a lot of
practice! We are undecided at this
point how much longer we will continue to take Spanish classes as we are very
realistic about the fact that we won’t be fluent by the time we have to return
home and we would like to have the opportunity to spend more of our time
volunteering where we will be using and stretching our knowledge of
Spanish! Currently having 4 hours
of Spanish class in the afternoon and having to do homework after supper takes
not only a lot of time, but energy as well.
We have started to be more involved with Luis Carlos as the
school year starts. It is
definitely a different world here!
For the first two weeks of classes, most schools didn’t have a full
schedule together yet and didn’t know when Luis would be teaching his
class! So that is why we’ve had a
bit of a delayed start with being involved in the schools. But Luis took us to some of the schools
last week as he went around looking and asking for schedules. Monday morning was the first time we
stepped foot into actual classrooms with students. There is a bigger group of individuals here who are taking
part in the ‘World Race’ which is doing missions work in 11 countries in 11
months and Guatemala is their first location. So we ventured with them to this school Monday morning,
which was located in a very poor village roughly 1.5 hours west of Antigua. We were in two classes – a junior high
and a high school class. The World
Race team consisted of 13 people, so after we all introduced ourselves to the
class and said a few words, we played a game with them and the actual teaching
will start in the next visit. It
was sad to see that the stats are true in that the high school class had far
less students than the junior high…but that I’ll get into at some other
point. But one comment I’ll make
is that we heard a presentation done in a coffee shop by an organization called
Familia Esperanza which works in educating the children of Guatemala and it was
an eye opening presentation to the difficulties the kids face in obtaining
education.
I started to realize just how isolated these kids really
were when some of the world participants talked about going to the beach and
the one guy sings some opera and the kids had no idea what they were talking
about. Not only had the kids never
seen a beach or heard opera, they had no idea what a beach was or what opera
is. The only reason these kids had
the opportunity to be in school was that an American organization had funded
and built the school.
Yesterday we visited a family who we may have the
opportunity to help by building them a new home they very desperately
need. The family consists of a
single mother and 6 children ranging in age from 7 months to 15 years old. The 7 month old had a very high fever
and they had no money for a doctor or any type of medicine, and the 15 year old
is in Guatemala City trying to earn some money for the family. They live on dirt floors with metal
sheeting walls and roof that leak and that community has no running water as
the mayor stole all the tax money used to pay the municipality for water so the
municipality has shut the water off.
This family like many others, are forced to buy water which they can’t
afford. This family hasn’t had
fresh water in 2 months, and the only water they had was in a small wash basin
which was completely black from overuse.
It was a very different experience to actually walk through their house
and meet the kids than to simply observe from the street and acknowledge the
poverty. It was exciting to know
that we may have an opportunity to actually help this family!
I am being more heavily challenged every day in how I am
spending my time and resources back home in the knowledge that poverty isn’t
just some tourist attraction or result of a natural disaster that strikes. The reality and complexity of poverty
is definitely sinking in! Examples
like this community where the mayor stole the tax money so now they have no
water are more common than I would like to believe! Guatemala just elected a new president who took office a few
weeks ago. Some are worried about
him since he is an ex-military leader and the first ex-military president since
the civil war, which ended 15-20 years ago. But most agree that a change was necessary as there was a
lot of corruption in the last government.
And what is odd is that most people don’t seem to think that will
change, but this new president has committed to combating violence and drug
cartels.
On Saturday we took part in Subida La Vida; which was an
event to raise awareness about the problem of violence in Guatemala! Chris and I joined 10,000 Guatemalans
on a hike up Volcan Agua just south of Antigua! It was a very early morning as we got up at 3:30 am since
events starting happening around 4:00, and buses were set to leave at 4:30 for
the town of Santa Maria de Jesus; which was the starting point for the
hike! Well…when we got to the line
for the buses, we realized that everyone had already registered for the
event! We knew the event would
cost us 50Q (roughly $6.50) but found nowhere to pay or register. We asked a few people who didn’t know
before coming across a group of individuals who landed up having 2 extra
tickets they couldn’t use!
Everyone was organized into one of six groups and the idea was that the
people in Group 1 would hike all the way to the top, Group 2 almost to the top
and so forth. Well it landed up
that we were stuck in Group 4. That
also meant that we were the 4th group to board the buses for Santa
Maria de Jesus which was a painfully slow process! We stood in line till almost 8:30am when we finally managed
to board a bus! Anyways, the idea
was that a human chain would be formed from the top of the volcano! But others
from our group continued on past the point that we were supposed to stop so we
ventured on as well! There were a
few times when we were told to stop because it was too full with people above
but we kept going anyways! Well we
didn’t make it quite to the top – we were finally turned around but we got
really close! We turned around at
1:00 pm and decided we should head back down and by the time we got back down
and waited for another 1.5 hours to board a bus for the return trip getting
back to the apartment shortly before 7 pm! It was a long day but definitely rewarding! Especially since it was likely our only
chance to hike Volcan Agua since no agency will bring people up there anymore
because at other times it is a 100% chance that you will be robbed on the way
up! We’ve heard stories of groups
that have gone up with armed security and they have still been robbed! So we were glad to have the
chance!
It’s again time to have some lunch before the next Spanish class
so I’ll end here. Sorry again for
the long delay in an update! I
will try to be more conscious of how much time is actually passing in the
future!
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| Some pics around Antigua |
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| Doing laundry in a community laundry area |
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| School and church in a remote village (not the same one where we visited the school or potential housing project) |
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| Starting point of the hike in Santa Maria de Jesus |
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| View from Volcan Agua (the different colored hats show what group you are in) |
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| A family observing the participants of the hike in Santa Maria de Jesus |
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| President of the high school class we visited welcoming us to the school (every class has a president and vice-president) |
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| Playing games with the high school class |
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| Kitchen of the family we may build a new home for |
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| Bedroom for the family |
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| Bathroom (keep in mind they have no running water right now...) |
