Rolling again.
So the stone that is Melissa is off again. Right now I’m in Guatemala, studying the culture and doing some service / missions work. Hence the lack of posts lately. Internet access is sporadic at best. Here are some excerpts from emails to my parents The keyboards here stick so I apologize for any punctuation./spelling mistakes in advance.
We are staying in Antigua. It is called “Guatemala frozen in time.” Population: 40,000 (compared with Guatemala City with 2 millionn) It is so beautiful here! Imagine Vermont with the vegetation of Florida and the architecture of Southern California or Mexico. All of the houses are painted shades of sky blue, peach, burgundy, or goldenrod. The roofs are spanish-style terra cotta tile or corrugated metal. The floors are beautifully painted tile. The streets are cobblestone.
There are three volcanoes near us: Agua (means water), Fuego (means fire) and another one with a long unspellable name that I don’t know what it means. Only Fuego is active; it errupted this morning and, since it is a clear day, we could see the smoke comng from its cone.
I have seen so many beautifull flowers. I am keeping a list to show Mom and Grandma when I get back. I am taking way too many pictures! But it is digital so I can erase them and won’t miss anything important later in the trip.
The people here are beautiful. All of the little school children wear uniforms like in England with blazers or sweatrers and pleated skirts. It is so funny to see them, walking to school, or in many cases, see a dad in his work clothes driving a yamaha motorcycle with the littlest one in front of him, and two others on behind!
This morning for breakfast we had tipica (traditional mayan) food: scranmbled eggs, slsa, blackbeans, and fried plantains with Mango juice. Today we are going to work in an elementary school in the village ofo Santa Maria de Jesus, a poor village with mostly indigenous peoples. There are a few people here, John and Marlene, who know so much about development!!! I am very ezxcited to pick their brains and learn as much as I can.
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I am exhausted right now. We have spent the past two days in Santa Maria de Jesus (grammatically and theologically that name makes no sense to me) and it is very different from Antigua. It is so poor. They are all Catholic, so sleeping with someone before you are married is ok but cntraception is not. Population: 1700. Mean children per family: 12. Range: 8. Number of families using contraceptives (pills or injections): 111. So you can see that they have to do something about their inadequate sanitation system, (A purification tank was begun but never competed so they have two pipes that run out away from the city and dump the sewage– one into a stream and one into the ground– and only about 40% of the houses have running water to their home) soon. The population is just exploding. Rate of growth is inversely related to the change in the infant mortality rate– and the UN has seen to it that the infant mortality rate is declining. Totally unsustainable.
The little girls wear these adorable “typicio” skirts and blouses. They are dirty and smelly with runny noses and feet and hands that have been God knows where and as soon as they see you they coming running and throw their arms around your waist and ask if you will try the low-fat healthy carrot cake they have learned to make that day at the comidor– feeding center. And you hug them and say “Si, si, muchos gracias! Esta Rico!” and love them to death and teach them to play “Miss Mary Mack” and “Down by the Banks of the Hanky Panky where the Bullfrogs Jump from Bank to Banky” and let them beat you at Four Square.
These are the kids in the commercials who literally have nothing to eat. In a family with fourteen kids, three boys, and enough food to feed two of them, girls are lowest on the priority list. 20% of the children in the SMdJ are illiterate (the high literacy rate is attributed to missionaries); 70% of that 20% are girls. Hardly any girls graduate from Jr. High.
We worked today on a farm that belongs to a man in the church we are working with. We cleared land of brush and weeds and grass and trees. This is very difficult to do at 6,500 feet because the air is so thin that you get tired quickly. I have blisters on my hand. We met all kinds of poisonous bugs and even a baby cobra. Jacob, our pastor, Troy’s, ten year old son who came on the trip with us, hacked it’s head off with a machete. I saw an avocado tree growing naturally and learned to make salsa and guacomole. We’ll try to make it when I come back.
The waether here is fabulous. It is 70-80 degrees all the time. It is clear early most mornings but gets hazy later in the day. It is the rainy season so each afternoon there are heavy showers and the occassional thunderstorm. Moresoo in SMdJ than in Antigua because SMdJ is higher.
Today I had the most wonderful Mocha I have ever tasted at a place called Fernandos. I also had hot chocolate at a place called Cafe Condesa; it had cardomom in it. We’ll try to make it when I get back.
Sunday I may get a chance to climb a volcano! We’ll see how my lungs hold out. You get tired quickly up here and its four miles up and four miles back.
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Public transportation is an adventure here. In Antigua, it consists of “Took-took”s– little red vehicles with three wheels that zip in and out of traffic at a pace that puts some of the rides at Kings Island to shame. Out of Antigua, it consists of “Chicken Buses.” Good American school buses achieve Nirvana when they die; bad ones are reincarnated as chicken buses in Guatemala. There is no such thing as personal space in one of these buses. They are painted in brightly variegated patterns. People sit three to a seat in every seat, not including children up to the age of eight or so which are held on or cling onto laps. People stand in the aisles, as well. They cram in like sardines. There is probably about 100 people on the bus– that is no exaggeration. They never turn anyone away. A couple of times they have had to keep the front door open because it wouldn’t close, and a couple of other times there have been people hanging onto the ladder on the back of the bus. The New York subway is nothing to it. And then, as if that weren’t enough, instead of taking money as people get on or off the bus there is a little Guatemalan man who squeezes past / climbs over the people in the aisle to collect their fare. I’m telling you, if this much personal contact was conducted in any other setting except smuggling people somewhere it would probably constitute molestation. Not to mention that you are hurtling around corners going up and down the Guatemalan mountainsides.
Last night I was horribly ill. Not traveler’s sickness from drinking the water, thankfully; it was my sinuses all messed up from the pollution and the elevation’s thin air. I emptied my stomach a couple of times. I don’t ever think I’ll eat cilantro again.
June 18th, 2005 at 11:52 am