Garifuna Day, Part 2

Before you read this post, scroll down and read Part 1 of the Garifuna adventure. Its a much less entertaining viewpoint of our Thanksgiving weekend excursion but its also a better one to start with.

Okay, now that you have read Part 1, remember that hike we went on? The one that started with an hour and a half walk on the beach and ended in a beautifully tranquil forest filled with lakes? Well after that "too-good-to-be-true" adventure, we started to walk back in the same direction we had started. Something I neglected to mention earlier was that we had spent the entire day walking with a 15-year-old boy named Herman (I resisted the urge to call him "Hermie," Danielle) who lived in the house next to our hotel with his family who maintained the place. He was a nice, shy boy who helped us out a lot of didn't complain about hanging out with a bunch of chicas all day.

Herman had one quality, however, that I was not the biggest fan of. He was so sweet and innocent that I believed everything he said in his mid-puberty, Spanish-speaking voice. That's why, when he told us that this random water coming from a pipe on the side of the trail was "well water" and was "safe to drink," I totally believed him. Big mistake. HUGE mistake. Promise me right now that if you ever find yourself in a Central American country, walking through the forest, and a 15-year-old boy named Herman tells you its "safe" to drink water that is not already in a sealed plastic water bottle, you will say no. Promise me! I don't care how dehydrated you are from walking for 4 hours or how clean and delicious the water looks... Don't. Do. It.

It only took about 5 more hours for that "safe, clean, well water" to go through my system and rock my world. We were walking around the Garifuna festival and I suddenly felt the urge to vomit. I used my gringa charm (or maybe it was my nauseous looking face and the gripping of my stomach) to use a bathroom at a restaurant. I puked up my dinner, was unable to flush the toilet, and then sneakily left the place without being seen. A few minutes later, I still wasn't feeling any better so Aubrey bought me a Guatemalan antacid. After drinking the nasty stuff, there was still no sign of recovery. So we walked to a soccer field nearby and sprawled out on the ground while we waited for our water taxi (wth?) to come pick us up. I'm not sure how long we waited there but all the sudden I felt the immediate need to use the bathroom again, this time for another kind of relief. That's when I realized I had eaten something, or drank something, that was slowly eating away my insides. I don't remember a whole lot of what happened next, just me aimlessly following Claudia and Aubrey as they begged shop owners to let me use their bathroom. I fainted at some point and the next thing I knew I was in a really disgusting bathroom in a creepily dark hotel lobby. I won't provide too many more details from that spot but basically I spent the next 12 hours at my hotel room unwillingly letting my body do whatever it needed to to get that water out of me. As I sat on the bathroom floor, watching little bugs crawl around and staring at that toilet with total hatred, all I could think about was where I was last Thanksgiving and how great it would be if, at that moment, I could be transported back to that place.

The experience probably would not have been so traumatizing if it weren't for the fact that we were oh so far away from being home. Aubrey started to get sick in the morning as well so we had to wait until we could both go at least 30 minutes without having to use the bathroom, as that was the time it took to get through the shortest leg of our trip. We left at about 11:00am, didn't catch a boat until 12:15 and purchased our bus ticket at 12:43 when the bus left at 12:45. We were about to drop our bags in the storage under the bus when I took a glance at the our vehicle; no bathroom. I tried to tell Aubrey the news lightly but her face completely dropped with hopelessness. Our bodies stepped it up a notch, however, as we both somehow managed to ride the entire 7 hour trip only having to make one bathroom stop. After that we were still another cab ride away from being home and looking back on our state of consciousness we probably could have made a better decision than getting into an unmarked, white taxi (we have been recommended by everyone in Guate to never take white taxis) but at that very moment we couldn't have cared less. We got home, dropped off our things, and headed to the hospital, which is fortunately just across the street from our house.

After a few hours of attempting to provide a stool sample, watching people in actual emergencies being wheeled into the ER, trying to decipher the real-life soap opera drama that was happening in the room next door to us, accidentally offending the "doctor" who was wearing street clothes, looked like he had just been punched in the face, and didn't introduce himself, and getting the results of our blood test, Aubrey and I were overjoyed to find out that we did not have a parasite. By 11:00pm and Q.600 later we went home and made up for all the sleep we had lost the night before. We ended up filling our prescription of an antibiotic, just to be safe, and are well on our way to a full recovery. Frankly, I feel fantastic compared to how I did a few nights ago.

And, that was Livingston for you. I know its not a place plagued with dirty water and bad decisions, but I'm having a little trouble looking past all that discomfort. Hopefully someday I'll make a pilgrimage back to that land, this time bringing an endless supply of Agua Pura Salvavidas, and enjoying myself much more. If anything, it was definitely a learning experience and one that made me much stronger emotionally and physically, HA!

I'm happy to report that I am a mere 4 days away from returning to the U.S. for the first time in almost 5 months. The anticipation is almost making me a little crazy though so it's in this week's best interest to go as fast as it possibly can. Friday is Aubrey's 24th birthday so that will be a great way to end a crazy week and to bid farewell to all our friends before our month long winter break-- man, I love being a teacher :)

See some of you very, very soon!

Garifuna Day, Part 1

So, I've decided to split up the Thanksgiving weekend into two blog posts because in my memory there are two distinctly different emotions I have associated with the four day weekend. I'll start with the grateful emotion, because good news is sometimes more fun to hear first :)

Aubrey and Claudia in Nature's Hot Tub

Aubrey, Claudia and I met at the bus station in Zona 1 at 6:28am on Thursday and the bus left at 6:30. It was actually really nice and comfortable ride with a bathroom in the back and at only Q.75 a ticket for a 6 hour trip, we weren't complaining. This was the first time we had traveled Northeast in Guate so we were able to see some pretty incredible landscapes along the way. When the bus trip ended, we were still another 45 minute boat ride from the actual city of Livingston. The boat ride was basically a whole bunch of people crammed into a vessel driving way to fast, a few dolphins jumping around in the water around us, and me trying my hardest to not wet my pants. We got to Livingston, urinated, and then took yet another boat ride to our hotel. After a quick meal we got on a plane and... no just joking... we got on another boat (are you catching on to the theme that Livingston is basically a water town? Like with water taxis and other awesome things?) and went to Aguas Caliente which was an area in Rio Dulce that had sulfur coming up from the rocks underneath the water. The sulfur made the water smell like hardboiled eggs and made the water incredible hot on the surface. It was recommended to us that we move the water around constantly because we could suddenly be sneak-attacked by water burning the crud out of our skin. In that same trip we went to a bat cave. It may not have been THE bat cave but it sure was creepy. Even though Aubrey continued to reassure me that bats do indeed have echo-location that would suggest that they would not run into me, it was close to impossible to not jump every time a blood sucking, flying animal flew past me. I do have a lot more respect for bats though as we totally invaded their space with flashlights and they still were nice enough to not kill us.

Acting all tough for the camera in the batcave

The next day we went on a walk on the beach for an hour and half until we reached this jungle-like structure called Siete Altares, which was a bunch of crater lakes stacked on top of one another. It was quite frankly one of the most beautiful things I had ever seen. Everything was green, including the water, and the only sounds we could hear were those of water falling and birds singing. It was definitely a relief from the busy sounds of fireworks, honking horns, dogs barking, and music playing we hear every night in the city. We were able to spend a good amount of time swimming in the lakes and just soaking it all in before we started our walk back to the hotel.

Dang, gina :)

When we got back to the hotel we made some crappy dinner and got ready to head back to Livingston for Garifuna Day. The Garifuna are the people in Central America who live on the Caribbean coast that descended from Caribbean and African countries. They speak their own language, have their own style of dancing, and apparently have their own day that we happen to be in Livingston for. It was basically a big party all day with people outside at all times eating food and spending time with one another. We were able to watch some traditional Garifuna bands play and everyone seemed to want to form a semi-circle around the band and then push one of their friends in the circle to do their own rendition of the booty shaking dance. It was pretty cool to see people from ages 6 to 86 rejoicing in their culture. We met up with Katie and two of her friends she had met the day before and though we all considered trying to learn the Garifuna dance, we decided our ginga selves would be better off spectating this time.

Traditional Garifuna music and dance

We headed back to Guatemala City on Saturday, not according to plan but rather according to necessity, and decided to write down all the awesome things about Livingston so our un-awesome experiences with the town didn't take over our memories entirely. I'll post pictures when I have a better internet connection and maybe they can do a better job of showing you the good side of Livingston than I just did :)

Wolf Man in the Park

I don't have too many things to update on since my last post, even though it was a week ago, but I am going to do my very best to explain a story that one of my students told me today.

• Student A: Mees Ana, yesterday me and Student B goed to the park and, and, and there was a... a... a... como se dice hombre de lobo??? 
• Class: Wolf man!
• Student A: Va! Si! There was a wolf man at the park.
• Me: A Wolf man? Uh... okay. Is that the whole story?
• Student A: No! The man wolf, he come up to Student B and he say things about her sister.
• Me: Whose sister?
• Student A: The sister of Student B
• Me: Oh, he was saying things about HIS sister. Was the wolf man saying mean things?
• Student A: Yes, he say bad things of the sister of Student B so Student B say, "You can't say things this way of my sister!!!!" and HE PUNCH HIM!
• Me: WHAT?! Wait, you're telling me that a man, who looks like a wolf, was at the park yesterday, saying unkind things to Student B about Student B's sister and then Student B punched him???
• Student A: YES!
• Me: Was this "wolf man" an adult?
• Student A: Yes, he was big!
• Me: And what did he do after Student B punched him?
• Student A: He go like this [makes angry face], "GRRRRRR!"
• Me: [bewildered, amazed, and not sure what to say next] Student B, did you really punch a wolf man in the park because he said mean things about your sister?
• Student B: [smiles] Yes.
• Me: Are you guys sure this really happened? [no longer trying to hold in laughter]
• Student A & B: Yes, Miss Hannah!!!

I'm still pretty confused.

This past weekend Aubrey and our friend Claudia and I went to see Harry Potter y las Reliquias de la Muerte. It was quite possibly the best Harry Potter movie yet. I was super tense the entire time and left the movie thinking there was going to be snow on the ground and dementors waiting for me outside the mall. Tom is going to the movie tomorrow with his whole 5th grade class-- awesome. Aubrey and I really wanted to join but we are going to a baby shower for Katrin, our neighbor and director of extra curricular activities at Inter-- equally awesome.

After the movie, Camille, Katie, Makenzie and I went to Antigua to meet up with Jaron, our friend from the Peace Corps that we met while hiking Volcan Tajumulco. She seems to really be adjusting to her site well and is overall loving her experience as a volunteer. We met a few of her PC friends there as well and one of them was a vegetarian from Wenatchee, Washington and attended the University of Washington. Small world! Another had finished his PC service in April but remained in Guatemala to build schools out of... wait for it... garbage. No joke. He somehow figured out how to use hundreds of thousands of tons of trash to create strong enough structures to teach little Guatemalan children in. Talk about inspiring! That's one aspect of living abroad that I don't know how I will ever be able to give up. I've met some of the most interesting, compassionate, knowledge-seeking people, which I am confident exist elsewhere in the world, but there's something about aimless wanderers that intrigue me to no end. On Sunday morning we went to Salvador's (the seventy-year-old Antigua grandfather who danced salsa with us a few weeks back; remember him?) crepe restaurant and then headed back home for an afternoon of napping, relaxing, and getting ready for our three-day school week.

Tomorrow is our last day for the school week and then we only have one full week left until an entire month vacation. It's unreal how fast this is all going. I'm trying not to blink for fear the next time I open my eyes this whole life down here will be over with. In order to take advantage of every vacation time we have, Aubrey, Claudia and I are going to Livingston, Guatemala for the four-day weekend. Livingston is located on the Caribbean Sea just east of Belice. Apparently it's like a little Jamaica and looks nothing like the rest of Guatemala. Should be a good time.

I hope you all have a fantastic Thanksgiving and if you're having a hard time finding something to be thankful for, here are some inspiring words from one of my third graders...


"This Thanksgiving, I am thankful for my lovely family and my kind friends. They are always there for me thats why I chose them. I am thankful for my friends because they always play with me, they always make me laph, and they always care for me. But with my family, is different. They love me with all thair harts, I know it because they always tell it to me. My dad is so sweet because he tells me that it doesn't matter if he is in the sky. He is always in my hart. Thank you for being so good listeners!"

Funny Things Said by Small People

This edition of hilarious comments said by my students was inspired by one of my smallest (and possibly the most adorable) students. Lately, a lot of my kids have been calling me Miss Hanita (Guatemalans add "ita" and "ito" to the end of peoples names as sort of an endearing nickname) which I really love but now some of them are calling me Mamita... like mom. No, sir! I tell them every single time that I am not their mothers and they just think its hilarious and do it anyway. Today, however, that small adorable child I mentioned earlier, told me that I was his sister. I thought that maybe he mistranslated so I corrected him by saying that I was actually his teacher. He counter-corrected me by saying that we were brother and sister in God's eyes. WOW! I am still not used to working in a private school in a country where 95% of the people are Catholic so this shocked me for a second, considering he said it in front of the whole class. The rest of the class didn't seem to mind, however and they actually all nodded in agreement. Well, at least now I know I have 22 little siblings in Guatemala :)

At Inter, there is an elementary school phenomenon going around called "The Cheese Touch." Students young and old will come up to unsuspecting students and teachers, tag them, say the words "Cheese Touch!", cross their fingers and run away. If you asked me for an explanation a few weeks ago I wouldn't be able to give you one but luckily Makenzie went ahead and investigated and found this... CHEESE TOUCH! Anyway, I am currently in a full-on war with Makenzie's students and the cheese touch. They sneak up on me at lunch, they send messengers to my side of the hallway during passing, they plot out who is going to tag me next, and some of them are even trying to convince my own students to plague me with the dreaded dairy product contact. Of course, I dish it out just as much and today I about scared the ring leader in Mak's class out of her pants. I felt bad for a split second and thought that maybe I should be the mature one in the situation and discontinue my contributions to this "game" but when Makenzie burst out laughing, I snapped back into reality and showed the girl my crossed finger (apparently, when you cross your fingers, you are immune to the cheese touching). I'm not sure if The Cheese Touch is popular in the U.S. but I have every intention of bringing it there in three weeks.

The young lad that I tutor after school is learning so much it makes my jaw hit the floor. Yesterday, we were reading "The Talent Show from the Black Lagoon" when a break in the page occurred to create suspense as to what act the main character was going to choose for the talent show. I closed the book and asked my student to guess what talent the main character would choose. He stared at me for a long time with a super confused look on his face. Usually when he doesn't know a word I say to him he runs to my computer and types it into Google Translator but on this day I was trying to make him use his contextual decoding skills to figure out what I was asking him. This is how the conversation progressed...

• Student: Gess?!
• Me: Yes, guess what the boy will do at the talent show. What do you think he will do?
• Student: GESS?! 
• Me: Yes, Student, guess!
• Student: [lifts up one side of rear end and makes a farting noise] GAS?!?!

Aaaaand of course, I lost it. Died laughing, couldn't even explain to the kid what I meant for a good minute. Luckily, he thought it was pretty funny too and in the end after looking up the word "guess" in Spanish he was indeed able to correctly make a prediction about the talent show. 

In other news, the Family Day on Saturday was seemingly successful. Though I have never seen anything like it in my whole life, it looked like most families were indeed enjoying themselves. I watched Leah go on mini rollercoasters for about 4 hours, ate some awesome Israeli food, helped talk the third graders out of being nervous for their Habitat Song performance, and ended up falling asleep at 9pm that evening. I'm not sure how much money was raised but hopefully it was enough to 1. at least break even and 2. get Inter some cool new resources. Probably neither, though :)

The ocean is a habitat, a very special habitat.
It's where the deepest waters at, its where the biggest mammals at!

Saturday morning Walter came to pick me up at 6:45am for our "10K" in the city. What's with the quotation marks you ask? Well, apparently most races in Guatemala are not actually the distance they advertise. I ran that "10K" in 43 minutes supposedly when I haven't been running consistently. That would suggest I ran all 6.2 miles in under 7 minute miles... HA! Walter thinks it was closer to an 8K which sounds much more accurate and explains much more about my time. It was super fun regardless of the distance and I am excited to be part of Walter's running group again once I have my own transportation. 

Estamos felices despues de la "10k," por supuesto :) 

After the run, the North American teachers threw our Thanksgiving feast and though we had to get a little creative when making our food with the resources we had, it was overall a perfect evening. The food was fantastic, there was plenty to go around, virtually no conflicts ensued, and the thirty people in attendance enjoyed themselves and were indeed very thankful. I can't really believe I only met these people 5 months ago because that Thanksgiving almost felt like the real deal. I don't think I'll be depressed on the real holiday now that we had that fix and I'll be in the U.S. a week later. 

My goal is to write at least 4 more blogs this month (setting my standards low on this one so if I go above and beyond I'll feel super accomplished). Hold me accountable! :)

Crazy Hair or Moustache Day

Well, its Friday and today we had a blast at school so I really couldn't be happier at this moment. I'm sitting on the couch, listening to Christmas music, and breathing in our gingerbread scented candle-- dang, life is good.

Over the next month at school, we are collecting toys from the students to donate to a school in the Lake Atitlan area that houses about 200 students who can barely afford to attend school. The effort was started by the one and only Katie Monson and so far it has been a huge success! As an incentive to get kids to bring gifts, they get to dress up on Friday as a coordinated "spirit day" if they bring something to donate. Today's theme? Crazy Hair and/or Moustache Day. Kids and teachers came to school with glitter, pipe cleaners, and way too much styling gel all over their hair. Students and teachers, both male and female, also came to school with moustaches drawn on their faces. To say the least, we looked like the most attractive school in Guatemala... maybe even in the whole world. Just sayin'.

"What tattoo do you want? I can draw a flag of
Spain or Guatemala."

Today also happened to be "Market Day" in third grade. When I was student teaching in Kansas, the fourth graders had a market day when learning about economics and it was one of the most hilarious activities we did the entire year. I suggested the idea to my team last week since we were learning about "making change" in math and we thought we would give it a whirl. It ended up being a total hit and the kids, and us third grade teachers, just about died of happiness. Each student had to provide a good or service, create an advertisement, and list a price for their clients. We printed out a crap ton of fake quetzales (the name Guatemalan currency, and also the name of the national bird) and gave every student Q. 25 to purchase goods and services from their peers. The kids sold their products throughout the entire third grade and we were even able to entice quite a few brave and hungry teachers to come checks out the market run by 8-year-olds.

Mr. Brown getting his hair did but a gaggle of giggling girls

Ladies and gentlemen, the brains behind the toy drive,
Miss Kite!

The best part of the whole experience was seeing just how incredibly creative my students are. In Kansas, I'd say about 75% of the class made some sort of dessert. Here, we had ideas from teaching foreign languages to telling jokes to doing make-up to temporary tattoos to Hebrew name tags to Harry Potter masks to bowling lessons. It was incredible! I had one student who advertised "Crazy Hair Dos" do my hair crazy for crazy hair day and another who advertised "Face Pain" (she forgot the "t" in paint-- hilarious) draw a moustache on my face. Smokin' hot. After almost an hour of buying and selling it was time for recess and the market day came to a close. Some kids had upwards of Q. 95 when they finished (I think they thought they got a prize for making money; nope!) and some spent every quetzal they had. In all, it was blast and though I had a stomach ache from all the candy I ate, the image of those kids beaming with pride as they sold their hard work and spent their earnings was priceless.

This kid couldn't figure out why no one would buy his cookies. I told him he may
have been lacking in enthusiasm, jajaja!

Miss Makenzie with her moustached student :)

After Market Day, the students had to give a brief presentation about their dream. We read a story in Language Arts about a girl who dreamed of becoming a professional basketball player but had to overcome many obstacles (mostly sexism) before she could get there. Most of my kids want to be professional futbol players, lots of them want to be teachers, a few of them want to be video game programmers, and many of them want to be whatever their parents are. One girl about made me cry again when she explained her dream of becoming a teacher. "I knew I wanted to be a teacher when I got to third grade and had the most awesome teacher ever, Miss Hannah. I hope I can be like her when I am a teacher!" WHOA! Either that kid was doing some seriously brown-nosing or she had some lame teachers in the past but regardless that comment sure required I do some intense tear-holding-back strategies like biting my lip, looking around the classroom, and laughing. Another girl said she "wants to be a professional diver because [her] teacher Miss Hannah inspired [her]." Holy cow, niños! Maybe they are all secretly trying to make me cry now that I already did it in front of them. They probably have a club at recess where they all practice saying endearing things so perfectly that it just makes me lose it. I'll keep an eye out for this club and report back with you.

Tomorrow we have "Family Day" at Inter from 12:30-7pm. I really don't know what to expect. There is a humongous tent on the field, probably close to 30 food vendors, posters and signs all over the school, an elementary talent show (we are doing the Habitat Song!!!), a raffle with prizes such as tickets for four to Miami, and a bunch of parents running around with their heads cut off trying to get things organized. We're all required to go but are only required to work for one hour-long shift. I'm going to babysit, Leah, my favorite little four-year-old neighbor for most of the day and hopefully play some games with my students for the rest of it. I'm sure I'll have a ton to blog about after tomorrow so hopefully I'll get back with you on Sunday. Oh! I'm running a 10K with Walter and Leslie on Sunday and then we are having a Thanksgiving feast with the North American teachers since we had to go to school on Canadian Thanksgiving and most people are going out-of-town for the American one. OH! Also, I'm Employee of the Month at school! I don't really know whose idea that was but there is a bulletin board in the main office with my picture on it. I guess employees of the month get rewarded with an additional personal day with pay at any time throughout the school year. Yes, please! I thought I would make my family proud by taking the picture below... its very fitting, eh? :)

Employee of the Month? ;)

From the highest peak in Central America

So I started this blog entry on Wednesday and its now Sunday. Not sure how that happened but here it goes!

Last weekend, Katie, Makenzie and I went with our friend Aaron from Colegio Americano and his wife Ali who works at the US Embassy to travel across Guatemala in order to hike the highest peak in Central American, Volcan Tamujulco. We started the 6 hour drive with little idea of how the weekend would go but with lots of excitement about trying something completely new. We stopped in a town called Xela for lunch and had THE most delicious Indian food I have ever tasted. Katie and I discussed how much Indian food fits our lifestyle with plenty of vegetarian options, lots of spices, and the lack of necessity to eat with silverware.

Anyway, we made it to a town called Tejutla where Aaron and Ali's friend in the Peace Corps, Matt, was living. We played Settlers of Catan, ate yucky pizza, and talked the night away until it was time for us to retire to the only hotel in the entire town which was also the highest building in the entire town. It was Q. 100 for the night for Mak, Kate and I to stay in a room with tiger bed spreads and a super cool view. The next morning we made breakfast of french toast and fruit at Matt and his wife Meli's house with Jaron, another totally sweet Peace Corps volunteer from Arizona, packed our things and headed for the volcano.

Listos!

The hike itself was surprisingly not that difficult. Considering it was my first hike since the time I thought I was going to die from being hit by a ridiculous rock, I was quite pleased with myself for not losing the ability to hike and the love of hiking. The most difficult part of the entire climb was the sheer fact that the air was literally thinning with each step as we summited around 14,000 ft. Luckily, it was one of the most beautiful hikes I have ever done with landscapes of rolling foothills, refreshing vegetation as far as the eye could see, volcanoes surrounding the volcano we were already on, and big huge turds randomly placed throughout the trail. Seriously, some of the biggest poo I have ever seen was on the highest peak in Central America. Where did it come from? I know some of you obnoxious readers are guessing it was me but my best guess is either the horses that some lame-o's rode to get to the top... or it was Makenzie. Who knows.

We set up camp at a little site just below the summit, made some bread, beans, cheese and tomato sandwiches, and went to bed at 7:30. Ha! Kate, Mak and I shared my tiny, two-person tent which meant we were very warm all night but also very uncomfortable. I was actually pretty relieved to get the 4:00am wake-up call to start the hike to the summit. We put on our headlamps and started climbing single-file to our final destination (dun, dun, DUN!).

I wish I were talented enough at writing to truly explain to you all what we saw when we reached the top but I haven't really been able to put it in words. I could tell you it was a jaw-dropping, incredibly humbling, intensely inspiring site; but really none of those comments would do it justice. All I can really fairly assess is how it made me feel to be standing on something that felt bigger than life itself, something that has been part of Guatemala for thousands of years. I felt completely convicted that where life is taking me is meaningful, if not to anyone else, to me. Breathing in that freezing cold air may have been messing with my brain cells a bit but it sure made me appreciate it all. Guatemala has taught me more in the last four months than I could have ever expected and even though there is so much about life that I cannot control or anticipate, I still couldn't help but smile at all the beauty, both physical and emotional, that I've been fortunate enough to find myself surrounded by. I'm pretty sure that some days I cannot even really comprehend just how beautiful life is but on this day, while standing on top of the world, I think I got it.

Behind me is the Guatemalan volcano chain. To the right is the Pacific Ocean. In front is Mexico. To the left is the Western Highlands of Guatemala. Below me is 13,845 feet of awesomeness.

The trek back down the volcano was stranger than fiction because one moment we were freezing cold and not sure if we would ever regain the feeling in our feet and the next minute we needed to stop to shed off several layers of clothing because we were sweating so profusely. We made it down and after some celebratory high-fives, heart-felt goodbyes, and a quick meal to refuel, we started the long, traffic-filled drive home. That night, my Guatemalan bed never felt so good, the altitude in the city felt like nothing at all, and one of my life goals was crossed off the list.

This week in school was a short, fun one with plenty of new experiences to add to my teaching repertoire. We had parent-teacher conferences from 1-4pm on Wednesday and then a few more throughout the rest of the week. Naturally, I was pretty nervous to meet with the parents for fear they would admit their lack of confidence in me in teaching their children everything (I think) they need to know to be productive members of society. Fortunately, this wasn't the case at all. I got a lot of reassuring compliments and had parents supporting my ideas as to how to help their students reach their goals and even had a parent tell me that their daughter "googled" me, found out I dove in college and now wants me to teach her how to dive. By 4pm that afternoon, I felt like the happiest teacher on earth. I always say that my students come first but I won't lie, it was very encouraging to learn that their parents have faith in me too.

This Friday was Miss Nancy, the third grade Spanish teacher's, graduation from her Master's degree program. She invited Ashley, Leslie, Walter, Lissbeth (technology teacher), Vero (first grade Spanish teacher), and myself to her grad party which was nothing like the backyard BBG with a Costco cake you'd picture in the United States. This party had attendees wearing floor length gowns, a dance floor with a DJ, a fully-stocked buffet, a Mariachi band, and the happiest Nancy I have ever seen. We toasted to Nancy's success, ate awesome Guatemalan food, and danced until one in the morning. I loved to see that Guatemalan's truly know how to celebrate their hard work and good fortune and appreciate the ones who helped them get where they are. Ashley and I laughed about how the party was nothing like we had expected but it was 192,456,234 times better.

Getting our Macarena on at Nancy's grad party

Mario's band!

On Saturday we took an evening trip to Antigua to watch our salsa instructor and fellow Inter teacher, Mario, sing at a Cuban club called Sabor Cubano. We had been meaning to get down there to support Mario for weeks now and were so thankful we finally did it. Mario is in a band with his super adorable wife and they are just as talented at singing as they are at dancing. I got to practice my dancing skills with a super sweet 70-year-old man named Salvador and an incredibly uncoordinated 15-year-old boy named Jesus (HAY-SEUSS, not the real Jesus though I bet the real Jesus was a MUCH better dancer than this kid). We laughed about how Salvador has now become our new Antigua grandfather and Jesus probably thought I was his age and was really hoping Mario and his band would play some Boyz to Men so we could slow dance Jr. High style. We stayed at a hostel for Q. 60 which included breakfast (that's about $8 USD) and then headed home this morning. We bummed around for the rest of the day with a ultimate frisbee break thrown in somewhere in there and now I'm here, finally finishing this darned entry. Hopefully it has caught you up and you're becoming increasingly more convinced that Guatemala is where's its at and you should totally come visit asap (HINT, HINT!)

Sharing my dance partners with Makenzie and Aubrey

Buenas noches! 

I'm not Santa Claus, I'm Mrs. Claus!

Monday was the three month anniversary of our arrival in Guate and the first time I cried in front of my students. Please do not fret; they were tears of happiness for sure. Let me explain. Some of my students last week randomly decided that they wanted to pick up garbage during recess. No one told them to do it, no one bribed them, they were not bullied to do so, they just straight up wanted to help the earth. They had so much fun that they started an "Earth Team" in our class and asked for volunteers to help them in their efforts the next day. The entire class, all 22 of them, volunteered to help out. I ran around school asking for people to donate any grocery bags they had so these 8-year-olds could clean up the school when they could be playing intense games of futbol or that weird rope game thing I told you about earlier. After that day, I have had kiddos pick up trash every single day during recess. I asked all parents to donate plastic bags and we keep them in the corner of the class so students can grab them and pick up trash whenever they feel like it. If you're wondering if this was enough to make me cry I'll have you know I have gotten A LOT tougher in Guate and it wasn't this awesomeness that made me cry, it was the conversations we had following that totally did me over.

Earth Team! (don't smile TOO big, guys)

Since all 22 of my students were picking up trash at recess, they started to make a scene. Other third graders started joining in and almost everyday now, I see kids from other classes headed down the hall back from recess with a giant bag of trash. On Monday, Colin mentioned some students in the morning message for picking up garbage at recess on their own accord. Not one of the students mentioned was in my class. When I read the message to myself before the kids got to school, my heart totally sank. It was their idea, I had told Colin about it, and now not one of them was getting recognized for being such amazing citizens. I contemplated not reading the message to my students, or just skipping that part, but decided it might be a good lesson in being humble and doing the right thing... just because its right.

Well, the kids came to school and when it was time to read the morning message, I briefed the students beforehand that even if someone doesn't thank you for doing something, its still good to do it. I told them that when I was a kid I only helped out around the house if there was something in it for me. But now that I am older and more responsible, I help out because I know its a nice thing to do for my mom (and a few wiser kids yelled things like, "Yeah, Miss Hannah, you are too old for your mom to be making your bed!"--little do they know I am the one who makes my mom's bed... ZING!). Anyway, I didn't have to go too far with my little speech because my students all started chiming in about "doing what's right because your heart know's its right" and "setting a good example for others students at school" and all other things awesome. I felt the tears coming in when I saw how sincere they were about all this and how unaffected they were when they realized they didn't get credit for the initiative they had started. Then one of my students raised his hand and said, "Miss Hannah! Your face is red and your eyes are wet!" I just let it go. I asked if any of them had ever cried because they were so happy and they all recalled a time when they had. I just told them over and over again how proud I was of their character and how lucky I felt that I got to be their teacher. These little dudes are so incredible and I'm fairly certain they are teaching me more than I am teaching them most days :)

Okay, enough about crying. Last weekend Aubrey, Camille, Katie and Makenzie and I went to Lake Atitlan. You see that picture on the right side of this blog just below the map of Guate? The one with the sunset over a lake surrounded by volcanoes? Yeah, that's where we went. It was close to the most beautiful place I have ever been in my entire life. The lake was massive, the volcanoes were plentiful, the villages around the lake were endearing, and the views from every angle were breathtaking. We did a lot of shopping, walking, talking, and exploring and met some pretty awesome (and totally crazy) people along the way. We rented a boat for the day that took us from village to village so we could see more of the communities surrounding the lake. We stayed in one town called San Pedro for the night even though we were warned by our friends in the city that it was a town full of "crazy-hippie-druggies." Turns out, the warning was spot on but it made our stay so much more interesting (and hilarious).

This ain't Seaworld, this is a real as it gets!

After dinner we ran into some guy who was doing a "fire show" at this one bar across the street from our hostel. Of course we wanted to see some random dude juggling fire so we went. It was there that all the people who fit the stereotype of being from San Pedro were hanging out for the night. A few random people made their marks in our memory with their intense craziness but one guy forever changed Katie's life. This older gentleman in a winter coat had been trying to offer Makenzie and I cigarettes for about 10 minutes and when he finally got the picture that we a. didn't smoke and b. were ignoring him, he went up to Katie and said, "Estoy feliz! Y feliz navidad!" Katie was totally intrigued and struck up a conversation with him. Turns out, they guy was convinced that Katie was Santa Claus. Yes, the jolly man himself. Katie was quick to correct him that she was not Santa Claus but she was indeed Mrs. Claus. They talked about the elves working hard back up at the North Pole, and how busy Santa has been this time of year, and how he sent Katie out to make sure all the chimney's were clean and ready for him to slide on down. P.S. this whole conversation was in Spanish and this guy was eating up every word Katie said. It was probably the best laugh I have had in a long, long time. Katie says she will never forget that old, drugged, winter coat guy and hopes her husband gives him lots of presents this year.

Mrs. Claus and Santa's Little Helper

The rest of the trip was just as relaxing and wonderful and we had a little trouble getting ourselves motivated to go to school again on Monday. That is definitely the downfall of living in such an accessible, beautiful country. Everything is so interesting and exciting that one weekend away is such a tease. BUT this weekend, Katie, Makenzie and I are going with a teacher from the American School of Guatemala and his wife to hike the highest peak in all of Central American, Volcan Tajumulco. Its going to take the entire three day weekend (no school on Monday, November 1st because of Dia de los Muertos) but it is probably going to be the most exciting and challenging thing we've done since we got here. We are staying in a small town called San Marcos where Aaron's (the teacher from Americano) friend is serving in the Peace Corps and get to see how Guatemalan's live outside of the city. I really can't stop thinking about it, to be honest. And yes, family and friends, I will do my best to avoid falling rocks. Click here for more info :)

OH! You know what else I can't stop thinking about? The fact that I am coming home in 5 weeks! I'll be in various states in the U.S. from December 4th to January 1st and I'm really looking forward to this break and small dose of home. I know time will fly between now and then and that there will be plenty of awesome things going on here but still... :)