In Antigua!

Hoe-leigh-kow! We made it to Antigua! What a bus ride. I wasn’t sick this time (yay) , but some other people were sick. We drove through a huge thunder storm. It was so cool since I haven’t seen lightning in a while. We also saw more mud slides. Man, those things are crazy. We saw someone’s house that had collapsed, and it was pretty sad. Also, when we were almost in Antigua, we went by this area where I think the road actually collapsed and dropped down a hundred feet or so with the mud. It was scary because the drop-off right next to us was huge and the road was extremely bumpy.

Anyway, when we got here, we got our family assignments. I found out that not only am I with Esther, but with 5 other people in the same house….. 3 of them boys. Uhhhh….what? I wasn’t too happy about that. I didn’t sign up to live with boys. Then I saw that the woman who we are living with had a little girl with her. I specifically put on the housing form that I didn’t want a family with little kids. I mean, yeah, they’re cute and whatever but I didn’t want any little ones bugging me to play while I studied. I was really angry on the crammed van ride to the house, and praying that there was more than one bathroom.

So we get to the house and….it’s freakin HUGE…like incredible. It’s just one woman and her daughter that live here. Each group has their own room (me and Esther, two other girls, and the 3 boys) with a bathroom connected! We also have a tv in each bedroom. I haven’t checked for cable yet. It’s seriously like a hotel here. I’m just sooooo shocked, and I feel extremely lucky. She even has a water purification machine thing in her kitchen, so the water is safe to drink here. Also, there’s internet! Can this get any better? Well, yeah, I guess if it were Wifi it would be better, but still! We’ll have to share it between all of us, but the hotel where we are having classes has Wifi, so no biggie. We all sat down and had tea and biscuits and talked to our mom, Ana Lucia. There are seriously no rules except don’t bring boys or girls home that don’t already live here. Oh, and guess what??? We have HOT WATER!!!! AHHHHH! I can’t believe it. I’m gonna pass out because I am so excited as I’m writing this.

Later, as Esther and I were organizing the room, two people came to our bedroom door and introduced themselves. They are this Asian couple from Boston that are living here too for about 3 more weeks. They look so young, but they can’t be as young as I thought because they have their masters degree and have been working for a while I think. They don’t really know Spanish, but they wanted to learn so they came down here for 4 weeks to go to the Spanish school that our host mom teaches in. Oh, and guess what their names are? Apple and Moses ….. Does that sound familiar?

Tomorrow we’re getting a tour of the city, so I’m excited for that! I just can’t believe all of this!

My head was in the clouds

No, really, my head was literally in the clouds. On our bus ride today, we got up to 11,000 ft. I think. Either that or 10,000. We drove through clouds and it was magical. This bus ride didn't get me sick, but don't worry, I was already feeling sick before I got on. By the end of the 2 1/2 hrs, I thought I was gonna die. When we were 4 blocks from our hotel, I almost got out to walk there (the professor told me to). But I figured that I would get there after the bus even though it wasn't moving at the time. I was soooo happy to be in our hotel room! But I'm really sick right now, like the kind of sick I didn't want to be while here or while travelling....the embarrassing sick. I just don't think the food here is agreeing with me. Most of it is really similar to what I normally eat, but maybe it's the way they prepare it? I don't know, but I probably shouldn't have eaten what I ate at lunch today. It was a "ham" and cheese sandwich, but I actually think that it was a Spam and cheese sandwich for real.

Anyway, the highway that we were on most of the time was pretty nice. The only bad thing is that there were some pretty serious mudslides covering two whole lanes. Oh, and something kind of off topic....I have a really hard time seeing the dogs here. They're like wild animals and I saw more dog road kill than I ever wanted to see. I think the saddest one was when we were driving through the clouds, 3 dogs ran across our two lanes to the other side of the highway where there was a car coming right at them (but it didn't hit them). I noticed that the dogs stopped in the middle of the road and when we went by, we saw that they were sniffing what was probably a buddy of theirs that looked like he was hit recently. Maybe he was still alive and they were trying to help him. :( Everybody on the bus sadly said, "Awwwwwwwwww." I wanted to cry. Dogs (and cats) are like humans to me as many of you know.

Sorry for updating when nothing's really happening! Btw....we have a 9-hour bus ride on Saturday! :)

Chi Chi's

Let's see....how can I describe the trip over here to Chichicastenango? Insane?...yeah, that. I'm so car-sick right now. The roads are crazy and this land is so mountainous that you're constantly going up and down 1,000s of feet on the mountains. The drivers are insane. Apparently you can just pay to get your license here, so most drivers suck at driving. They were constantly passing us on curves. Not really smart when there's a thousand foot drop right next to you. And these were public buses too, not just cars. We had to go though a couple of small towns, and we couldn't make this one left turn. The bus driver was going back and forth and back and forth and we just couldn't make it. We created a huge traffic jam for about 30 minutes....seriously. I was trying to imagine if that happened in LA. People would be shooting each other. But nobody got upset here. Nobody's in a hurry, and it must be normal for buses to get stuck trying to make a turn there. People got out of their cars, came out of their shops to help direct the bus. Anyway, we ended up having to go the wrong way on a one-way street in order to make it through the town. That was quite an adventure. We ended up making it to our hotel alive thankfully. I was so tense that whole ride. I think I'm going to take a nap and try to chill out. The thing is, we'll have to do this all over again tomorrow when we leave!

Post #2

I posted two today that I had written on my computer before I got the internet. Read below for the first one.

Today was a great day to get to know some people. There are 44 of us this year, compared to 33 last year. Many students are first-year students, so I've been trying to learn names and get to know them a little. There are actually a few people who look so much like other people I know. This one guy, Miguel looks so much like Chad Craig...just more Mexican. It's crazy! And there's one girl, Jessica who looks just like Nikki Francek. Another girl looks like Amanda Buschlen.

This morning we took the boat out on the lake to go to a small town, San Juan, Laguna. The ride was about 30 minutes long, and the view was incredible. The lake is literally surrounded by volcanoes. San Juan was very cute. We went to this weaving place, and this pretty little 16 yr. old girl explained to us the process of weaving. It's a crazy art. It takes so much patience. The people were so nice. It wasn't like in Mexico where the people bug you to try to get you to buy their stuff, and nobody asked for money. When you'd walk down the street, everybody said hi to you. Also, in all of these little pueblos around the lake, the women have their own unique clothing. It's very pretty.

We also went to an elementary school, and many of us brought stuff for the kids: candy, pencils, bracelets, etc. Someone probably should have thought of a more organized way to do it because the kids were attacking us. I had some candy in my purse, and once I gave a piece to one kid, a huge herd of them flocked to me saying, "Just one, please." Then when some started reaching into my purse, I had to say that there was nothing left (although I had plenty left). They were pushing into each other and into me with their hands out, and I didn't have enough for everybody. It was kind of like having a piece of bread in your hands with pigeons all around you....scary.

We got back on the boat and went to another larger town called Santiago, Atitlan. It was very different there, and much like Mexico with the vendors. They would actually follow you around with their stuff trying to get you to buy it. I didn't like this place so much....maybe it was because it was pouring rain the entire time there (the weather was fine before that) or maybe it was because there were older teenagers walking around carrying machetes. Anyway, we ate there and watched part of the Spain soccer game. By the time everyone got back on the boat, we were all soaking wet. My shoes and socks and the bottom of my jeans were soaked. I hope they all dry before we leave tomorrow. We'll be headed to Chichicastenango tomorrow, which is famous for it's market apparently. Well, 'tis all. Must get back to reading!

Arrival

This is what I wrote on 6/28 on my computer when I didn't have the internet:

Well, I made it to Guatemala safely! On the flight from Atlanta to Guatemala City, I was sitting next to two men who were on separate mission trips, so I talked to them a little. As the plane was going down to land (we were a few hundred feet off the ground maybe), we felt it suddenly go up. That was the steepest I've gone up in a plane, and we ended up thousands of feet above the ground again. Everybody was wondering what happened because it was so sudden. It turned out that something just needed to be cleared off the runway so we had to circle like 5 times through the rainclouds.

Our professor was waiting for us (there was another student on my flight) outside the airport, and we were shuttled over to the hotel quickly. It was a super nice hotel called Barcelo. It used to be a Mariott. Now, we're in a hotel right on Lake Atitlan. The drive over here was something else! It's been raining pretty hard all day, so the roads are pretty bad. There are miniature mud slides everywhere. Also, we always seemed to be driving on the edge of a 5,000 ft. drop-off. It's so mountainous here, but pretty (even in the rain). I don't mind this cool weather, but it would be nice if it stopped raining so that the clouds wouldn't be in the way of the pretty views. I hear it rains almost every day here, but usually in the afternoon.

Tomorrow we'll be taking a boat on the lake to some villages called San Juan and Santiago Atitlan. We'll be on foot most of the time so we should expect to get dirty from all the mud!

In other news....I'm dying to know what's happening on the Bachelorette right now! I don't feel like paying for the Internet yet, so I can't watch it. I've already read the spoilers, so I know what's going to happen, but I still want to watch it. My roommate, Esther just told me that she met Allie (the bachelorette) a few weeks ago when she was in San Francisco. Apparently they have a mutual friend of a friend of a friend or something, and they all went to some bar together. Allie even lent Esther her jacket because she was cold. How cool is that? I think it's totally rad!

Alright, it's off to dinner then reading time! Yay!

Nerves

I have been very on-edge these past few days. As the time comes closer to leave, I can hardly concentrate on anything. I just realized that I should have started reading for my classes like a month ago. I don't know how I'm going to do well in my classes when we have to read a novel and a half each week written in ancient Spanish.

I was stupid again last night and searched about safety in Guatemala, and I am now absolutely terrified to go. It's more real now that I know that I will actually be there in 5 days. I thought to make myself feel better, I'd go to the US Dept. of State's website on Spain. If there were just as many violent things listed there as on Guatemala's page, I wouldn't feel so scared because I didn't really feel unsafe in Spain. But, there was actually nothing listed. Pick-pocketing is the most common crime in Spain where as armed robbery and rape are quite common in Guatemala to foreigners. Oh, and it's on the rise in Antigua too, which is where I'll be staying for 4 weeks. Awesome. I think I'm most scared for when we're traveling on the tour bus because I keep reading about 5-7 armed men hijacking tour buses, taking them to remote locations and robbing everybody and raping women. This happens on the main roads, which is what I'm assuming we will be taking. I just don't want to go. I hate leaving Jordan, and I just have a really bad feeling about this trip.

Why does there have to be so much violence in this world? I don't understand it. I also don't understand why our program is taking us to such a violent country. I feel like we're going to Afghanistan. They should have just stuck with Costa Rica, which is where we were originally going to go. In two years, we're supposed to go to Mexico. If so, I'm skipping that year. Mexico has a big piece of my heart, but it has become so screwed up recently, and I have no desire to go there right now. I never thought I would say that.

Anyway, if you think of it, please pray for our group's safety (we have about 40 people). I just don't want anything bad to happen to anyb0dy.

Going to Guatemala

So it's summer #2 with my grad program at Sacramento State, and we're going to Guatemala. We'll be staying in Antigua for 4 weeks, and traveling all over the rest of the country for 10 days. I'll be leaving on June 26th and arriving on my birthday. Here are some pictures of what's been happening in Guatemala recently:



There have also been some massive mud slides. So yeah, hopefully that excitement dies down before I get there.

I have been getting more and more excited to go as I keep talking to people who know somebody that's been there and loved it. As many of you know, I've been a little nervous to venture into this country. I've learned not to go to the US State Department's website because they make it sound like you have a 10% chance of surviving and a 100% chance that everything you bring there will be stolen. Take a peek at the website and you'll see what I'm talking about: http://travel.state.gov/travel/cis_pa_tw/cis/cis_1129.html

Anyway, I'm not sure how often I will update because I'll be taking three classes instead of two (like I took in Spain). I'll be rooming with the same roommate I had in Spain: Esther from Brazil, so I'm happy about that. I'm just very excited to be able to use my Spanish every time I speak for 5 1/2 weeks. My skills can only improve from that. I love being forced to speak Spanish because many times that's the only way I'll do it, and that's the best way to get better.

So, leave me comments as you read. I love hearing from you all! Have a great summer!