Llovedera = pouring rain

Ahhhhhhhh. Another week or so has gone by! I feel like I don’t even measure weeks by weekends anymore, since we never really have spare time. I only know it’s been another week by our weekly visits to the Peace Corps headquarters. Since the last post, several VERY exciting things have happened:

· We visited Guatemala City, the capitol! And I got a super amazing new sweater there! It says “Super Shine” and has a rainbow, and when I wear it, nothing can go wrong! I also got to eat an amazing salad (I know that sounds random, but you wouldn’t believe how hard it is to come across uncooked veggies) and I bought ugly new closed-toe shoes. What a find!

· On said trip to Guatemala City, we rode on a school bus from NORTH GEORGIA!! Holy shit! I wanted a picture SO BAD of the North Georgia sign right next to the name of the bus, which was something like “Cabriacenalita” but since we were sitting 3 to a seat on both sides, it just wasn’t possible. Que triste.

· We went out to visit a current Agriculture volunteer in Patzun. He showed us around some of the gardens he helped implement, and described some of the ways he facilitated seed distribution among his community. In his time there, he also worked with some of the ladies from his community and neighboring ones to start a mushroom-growing operation. Since many of the women in Guatemala work in and around their homes all day, there is a little bit of down time that could be used for income generation. And thus, a project was born. They bring in a lot of money; they grow quickly; they almost always produce well. Boom. It was amazing to see, and to talk to the ladies who started this program. I have to say, though, after the visit I got extremely intimidated. This guy has really done a lot with his community, and has obviously gotten a lot of trust and respect from these people. I guess I see why they really push for us to understand the importance of integration.

· It was the weekend of feria in our town, and we went out and celebrated as a group. We had a lot of fun, especially on Saturday, when we broke a few rules, ate a little street food, and rode some pretty dangerous Guatemalan fair rides. They have this one Ferris wheel that goes about 80mph forwards and backwards. Needless to say, I didn’t get on.

· We finally got our official technical trainer for Food Security. His name is Dale. He’s from Texas. I joked a lot about how I wasn’t going to like him before he got here, but he seems like just the person our program needs. He’s a pretty chill guy, and really seems to know a lot about agriculture, and told us on the first day that he’s laid back, but at some point we’re going to hate him. Perfect! I’m actually looking forward to having someone push me and he’s been a great motivator and resource so far. He reminds me a little bit of my dad, because he’s down to joke around and enjoy work, as long as the work is actually getting done.

· We get to an actual city alone this weekend!!!! Will the fact that it’s Sunday morning stop me from treating it like a Friday night? No way. I want an icy cold beer and a medium rare steak (or Indian food. Or cake. Or Mexican. Or a hamburger.) Anyway, we’re all pretty excited and are looking forward to planning.

· I did NOT have to go to my family’s church’s all-night vigil! Huzzah! They didn’t even really put up a fight when I said I would rather not go to church from 8pm-5am. It was touch and go there for a second, but it basically made my weekend when I dodged that bullet.

· Saturday = college football gameday. Boom. Although I don’t really want to think about how much I’ll miss one of my favorite parts of college (the all-day boozing/socializing, not the actual football game) I’m excited Tech is starting a new season. I’ll be dreaming of 100 degree weather, sundresses, Natty Lite, and cornhole while I’m giving a tour of my town in the rain. Alas. Give ‘em hell, Tech!

Anyway, I’m still enjoying Guate, despite having bummed my way through a cold and way too much rain. That must be good, right? We’re also hopefully going to be planting soon in our new gardens and we’ll be starting our series of “charlas” or “talks” as well.

Embelequero = "rubber-neck"; person who likes to see what is happening

So here's the link to where I'm putting up my pictures. So far I have only ones from the feria parade this past weekend. I also have some amazingly hilarious videos (at least to me they're funny) but I'm having a little trouble uploading them.

http://picasaweb.google.com/esanford3

Also, thank you all for your support and comments! It's really great to hear back from everybody and I'm slowly but surely responding. I love hearing from you all, miss yall tons.

Canche = blonde or light haired person

Pictures of the Parade!
(more to come when I get my Picassa up and running)
Traditional "Traje" de Guatemala
Traditional Men's Colthing

"Don't forget our Sumpangan Traditions"

Check out these kids beards. Too cute.

All the important men in the town

So I’ve officially been in my training site for a week. I’ve lasted 2 trips to the market, 2 Saturday-night tamale dinners, 2 visits to church, and 4 weekend nights in bed by 9. I think at this point I should write a little more about my daily life here in Guatemala during training, and what I’ve been up to the past week. The newness of everything is finally starting to wear off here, and I’ve made it around town the last 4 days now without getting lost. I’m sure my family is a little disappointed I’m getting more comfortable with the city, since they love hearing stories of the dumb stuff I do, but I’ve found other ways to embarrass myself or be awkward.
My family, by the way, is amazing. It’s been overwhelming how accepting and supportive I’ve been the past week, and how much they try to help me succeed here in Guatemala. Communication hasn’t been a problem for us at all, since my Spanish is improving “poco a poco” and they take the time to explain words to me or even act out what they mean. Whenever I have a grammar, pronunciation, or even cultural question, any one of them will work to make me understand. We’ve gotten to the point in our communication abilities where we can joke with each other, and laughing for hours after dinner around the table is a common occurrence. Like when I told them about how a little boy threw rocks at me in the street when I was lost. Or how I mistakenly told a store owner I needed to buy “ham “to wash my clothes with instead of “soap” (cut me some slack, “jamon” sounds a lot like “jabon”). Or that I tried to eat something raw that is only meant to be eaten raw by animals. I’m so cool.
My padre is hilarious and calls me Rambo, because I seem to be breaking or tripping over something, or am just big in general every day. My hermano, Gerson, is very quite, but since he’s studying to be an engineer, I’ve spent the last four years preparing to interact with someone like him. He currently hasn’t been going to classes during the day because his school is closed down because some students are trying to take over it. The article about it is here in Spanish(I can’t figure out how the get the English version), and it’s pretty amazing to read about. The students are fighting for what they call “human rights”, since the government is trying to make the public school become private. This would make it basically impossible for nearly all the current attendees to attend, since private schools here are ridiculously expensive. I’ve also heard from several people that the public schools turn out better prepared students because they actually have to work to not get kicked out, and can’t just pay to stay in. I told them it was basically the exact same in the U.S. (just kidding, you private school babies!) Anyway, Gerson is planning on getting his Masters and probably Doctorate, and I’m making a big push to turn him into a Yellow Jacket. My hermana, Leslie is a medical student and studies a lot too. She’s adorable and hilarious, and doesn’t mind going out with me in public even though I awkwardly get attention called to me almost every time we go somewhere. She also has this funny affectation she does when she’s making a joke or being sarcastic that I have to learn to adopt. Joking here is entirely different, and if you can’t do the Guatemalan snort after you make a funny, no one knows you’re joking. I learned this the hard way. My madre is probably the person I spend the most time with, and the person that works with me on my transition here the most. She’s tireless and constantly calm and collected, and will listen to me prattle on in broken Spanish for hours. She makes all the meals at the house, does almost all the household chores, and travels 2 hours both ways, three days a week to work in her family store in Comalapa. She’s the first one up in the morning making breakfast and packing lunches, and the last one to bed, after all the dishes and laundry are cleaned by hand. And despite all this work, after a long day, she still wants to hear every detail of my day and make sure I’m caught up with my homework. She truly is the backbone of the family, and an amazing supporter, and is always content. Since I’m an old lady here (I would put the average age to marry at 19) she seems to consider me her peer, and we’ve talked about everything from family problems to how to be attractive and conservative (although since she always wears the traditional “traje” it’s not too hard for her to be conservative).
A lot of people have asked about what I’ve been eating here, and I have to report back that I’ve been eating massive amounts of “delicious”. Seriously. I was made to eat this type of food every day! My new favorite veggie is güisquil, and is amazing. I’m sending some home asap. A local dish here that is probably one of my new top favorite foods is pepian (this isn’t the best recipe, since it doesn’t have güisquil), and is basically like a Mexican “mole” without the chocolate. It’s amazing, and my madre says she’ll teach me how to cook it the next time I have a free day. There’s also a lot of beans and tortillas, of course, but more surprisingly for me is that there’s a lot of veggies or other things dipped in egg and fried. I like the whole green beans done that way the best.
Anwayyyyyyyy, more about what I’ve actually been doing, I guess. I get up every morning about 6-6:30 and get ready for class, which starts at 8, but changes locations almost every day and I have to walk/take a bus to get there. I eat a full breakfast of about 3 tortillas and whatever eggs/beans/veggie thing there is. Then most days I have 4-6 hours of Spanish/culture class, where we go over grammar or go around the city visiting sites and learning new vocabulary. I also have started my 2 hours of technical training every day, and will soon be outside getting into some small-scale farming. Although I get extreeeeeeemely tired of Spanish classes (I swear I’ve gone to more class in the past week than I did all of my senior year at Tech) it’s not too bad, and I’m really enjoying my technical classes. It’s a good group of people, and there’s a lot to learn. So after class I hang out with my family, have some down time, eat dinner, and am in bed by 9 usually. It’s a simple, albeit boring, life but I am enjoying my time here immensely. Every day has some really enjoyable aspects and knowing that I’ll be prepared for my future site is a great motivator.
The goals for the Food Security Volunteers is to have at least 5 family gardens and 1 school garden in each of the communities we work in, and we’ll probably be working in 3 communities. We also will start nutrition classes and proper chicken care of at least 1 backyard chicken coop. I know this sounds small-scale, but in a community of 200, where most the people are related, if we can affect 5 families and a school we’ll have started a big change in a town. I have to admit, I’ve gotten a little overwhelmed at some of the stuff we’ve been learning recently. It’s not my specific agricultural project that has me worried, but how to implement them in the communities where there are so many other problems. Because I’m a a Food Security Volunteer, I’ll most likely be sent out to a very rural area where hygiene or sanitation isn’t a top priority, and where the “trash problem” (basically they throw it down the hill when it rains) is taking over the land. How can one start building a garden if it’s in a community where the pigs are free-roaming and literally pooping the garbage they eat right next to a garden? I don’t want to worry about it too much, since I don’t know my site or conditions yet, but if sanitation is a problem where I go, there will be a lot of work to do before I can implement my gardens. I guess for Peace Corps Volunteers across the world this is a potential problem in every community. I mean, hey, it is a developing country.
So this weekend was a special and exciting one here in Sumpango. Not only was it the beginning of feria, complete with huge parade and carnival food, but it was also the birthday of one of the other Trainees here, Kristen. On Saturday, after our 8am clothes-washing class (holy crap, it’s going to take me forever to ruin/wash my clothes on laundry day) we threw a surprise birthday party for Kristen. We took up a collection, bought a cake, and snuck over to her house. I had asked her madre the day before if we could come over, and they were extremely accommodating, and even let us listen to gringo music. After that, we went to visit another friend and ended up laughing that day for hours. It’s nice to socialize with other people going through the same thing, and joke about knowing we’ll hit a breaking point and how we’ll react. Sunday was amazing as well, since I woke up at 6am to the neighbor playing Backstreet Boys, ate some amazing pancakes, and went to watch the parade. Parades in Guatemala are COMPLETELY different from ones in the U.S., mainly because about half the town and 100% of the kids are in it, and it takes roughly 2 hours to watch it pass. It was great though, because you can see what things are universal, like cute kids, angsty teens, and overbearing parents. I commented to my madre that there was the parade going by with an equally long parade of parents walking along the sidewalk watching their kids, and she said “just wait until it gets down to the center of the city and at least half of these kids lose their parents for a few hours”. We went to the downtown area after and hung around the mercado, and broke a big Peace Corps rule by eating street food. I haven’t gotten diarrhea from it, but if I do it was totally worth it. When I walk through the streets here, I feel like a giant. A giant blonde person, stomping through the streets. I usually get some looks or stares, and can almost always here whispers (and sometimes shouts) of “gringa” when I walk by. When a group of us is walking back from class, we make almost every 13 year old boy giggle. But the day of the feria I was walking along when 3 old ladies, who looked vaguely like the tree in Pocahontas, stopped me to pat me down and call me “canchita”. I have realized since being here how little we touch people in the states and how quickly I need to get used to it. After feria, we ate lunch and relaxed. Then was church. Ohhhhhhh, church. I’ve realized that I’m not just awkward at church, but actually intensely uncomfortable. I’ve explained this to my madre some, and I don’t think I’ll be going next week to the all night vigil. I came, I experienced culture, and out of respect for both them and me, I’m going to back off on going to church.
So today was the first day of classes at Tech. I got a little sad, and a lot happy that I wasn’t there. It’s amazing where you find yourself in a year’s time. Good luck to everybody still in school, and hurray for a new pledge class of AXOs.

Encontronazo = a strong discussion with a person (literally: a bus crash)

So we moved! A group of 8 of us, all in the Agriculture department have moved to a smaller town about 30 minutes away from the Peace Corps headquarters to continue our language and technical training in a different setting. We looked over the calendar and for at least the next 2 months we have Spanish class almost every day (except Tuesdays and most Sundays) with our smaller groups, with some technical training in between. On Tuesdays all the smaller groups, spread over about 7 other towns, head back to the Peace Corps office so we can get further training in health and safety information. My new house is the bomb, and even has a three-pronged outlet so I can plug in my computer! I have new parents (Doña Cece y Don Julio), and a brother (Gerson, 18 years old) and sister (Leslie, 17 years old). The boy is studying to be an engineer! I can’t escape them. I really like talking to my host sister, Leslie, since she can explain things a lot better to me and is really funny. I’m pretty sure we’re going to be best friends.

So within my first few hours here, the family had already told me that they were Evangelical and that I would be going to church with them the next day for 3 hours. And they wanted to know if my whole family and me went to church as well. Needless to say, I embellished a little. I mean, I certainly come from a Christian background, and we are the type of family that prays before meals (on the rare occasions we all get to sit down together) but I could tell that I would need to be much more religious to suit my parents. Peace Corps doesn’t necessarily tell us to lie about our backgrounds, but they did stress that we need to claim that we have a God and encouraged us to put our families at ease about our poor souls. So I went to church with them the next day and wow. WOWWWWWWWW. So I had been confused about how almost an entire country supposedly doesn’t drink alcohol, but after one night at church, I completely understand. It was like a normal Saturday night! It started out with some amazingly loud music (though everyone in the audience was singing a different song) and then there was a lot of nonsensical crying and shouting (which was actually hilarious, because the entire church was quiet except for one lady just shouting) and then came the part where everyone fished around in there pockets for the tab (sorry, I meant the offering). I know this sounds a little mocking, but you sit through 3 hours of praise music and then get accosted by the preacher in front of everybody, and we’ll see how you describe it. It was a 3-hour long service, during which the pastor pointed me and the other gringa out and made us intensely uncomfortable. Then, my whole family and I came back to the house, climbed in the parent’s bed (yes, all 5 of us) and watched a movie about how God saves marriages. It’s called “Fireproof”, and is an American movie and I highly highly don’t recommend it. On the ‘up’ side, I mentioned to my madre that my exboyfriend was Catholic, and now she’s on a mission to get find me a good Evangelical boyfriend. All males within a 10-year age radius were introduced to me. Even the ones with children.

The first morning, my padre and I got into a fairly lengthy discussion about the Mayan history and a little bit of how it compares with Christianity. I can now tell you all, with complete confidence, that the world will NOT end in 2012!!! Hurray!!!! Apparently the Mayan calendar predicts the end of our “current world” (which is a material world, and many Americans equate to the entire world, according to my padre) but not the physical destruction of the land. What a relief! Obviously I’m paraphrasing (and I hope with at least semi-correct translation) that my padre says that the hype about the Mayan calendar predicting the end of the world is silly. The Mayan calendar predicts changes in increments all the time such as every 20 or 50 years, and that at the end of 2000 is just happens to be really big. This will be when the snake, which is our current representation of the world, grows wings and flies, and we ascend into a more spiritual world. I asked if this would happen overnight, and he says no, but I’m still pretty pumped to be in the land of Mayans when this all goes down. Hopefully I’ll make a Mayan friend or two just to be on the safe side. It’s interesting to see that although he’s pretty devoutly Christian, he still looks to the past for information and completely trusts the Mayan calendar, which he says is way more accurate than any other one. My parents are pretty great to talk to (when it’s not about religion) because they make a pretty huge effort to understand me and help me in any way possible, and let me ask questions about everything. Last night, I sat at the table after dinner with both of them and they helped me with my grammar homework, and then this morning my madre packed me my lunch and sent me off to school with my bookbag. I felt like a little kid, but I can’t complain about homework help and a homecooked lunch!

Anyway, it’s the week of “feria” here, which is their big celebration for their patron saint and also somehow includes Mayan princess celebrations too. I don’t quite understand the “mezcla” of cultures here yet, but the parades are beautiful and the markets are huge and a lot of fun.

Also, there’s this really creepy laughing that I keep hearing from somewhere. I’m not joking at all. I’m about 80% sure it’s one of the many birds my family has, but I really need to investigate before some killer Guatemalan clown comes in and chops me up. I’ll keep you all posted, and maybe try to get a recording. I’ll also hopefully be posting up pictures soon, but these past 6 days have included so much information that I’m just now slowing down and getting into a routine, and will be able to post more concise stuff. For now, HERE is a link to a lot of different videos that past and current volunteers have made, so that you can see what the country looks like and what people are doing here now.

Dichosote/a = a very lucky or happy person

I’m going to preface this post by saying that my dates won’t necessarily be matching up with the exact events that I’m describing. I’m trying to keep up with writing down stuff fairly regularly though, even if I won’t be able to immediately have internet access.

Anywayyyyyyyyyyyy, so today was the day we arrived in Guatemala. I spent my last night in the States visiting with my sorority sister, Anna, so I got exactly one hour of sleep before I had to be up for the 2:30 wakeup call. Awesome. Needless to say, the plane rides to Miami and then Guatemala were a blur. We finally arrived in Guate around 1-2, and when I looked out the window as we were landing I saw something I had never seen before. I come from a fairly mountainous place (shoutout to the north GA) but as we flew over Guatemala I was actually amazed at how rolling the landscape was. I’m used to a range, where there are mountains, and bases of mountains, and that’s it. This was like seeing a continuous wave of land with houses hanging on for the ride. It was beautiful and green and surprisingly not rainy! The Peace Corps compound is about 7,000ft. above sea level!

I have to admit, when I finally landed in Guatemala after 7 months of applications, forms, and waiting, I was surprised by some of the feelings I had. I was obviously overwhelmingly excited and actually had a “purposeful” feel, but what scared me a little bit was the other intense emotion that came at me. Selfishness. I felt extremely selfish to be sitting in my plane, off to do noble deeds and pat myself on the back for 2 years about how I was “helping the world”, all the while leaving my loved ones behind. Now I’m not trying to think anybody’s world will collapse at my departure, and I’m sure none of them want me to be worried about them back home, but how could someone make the decision to just check out of life without truly consulting the people they love? I know the Peace Corps won’t be a walk in the park, and most people actually think it sounds like complete hell, but isn’t it nice to be able to escape the daily hardships of life for 2 years and come back with these types of experiences under our belts? All the while, my family and friends are back home dealing with tough situations and sadness, and where am I? Feeling like I won’t be able to support the people closest to me makes me very sad, and feel like a selfish jerk. I guess what I wish I had told a lot of them was not just to read my blog and send me care packages, and wait for my phone calls, but to also always always keep me updated on what they are doing. I think about my family every day, and it breaks my heart to feel like I’ve abandoned them. And this is only the first day!!! I didn’t mean for this post to take such a negative turn so quickly, but I’m sure we all have different anxieties that will fade over time, so that’s just my little bit of negativity.

Fortunately, after being in Guatemala for almost 12 hours now, I can safely report that there are no negative feelings about the actual country, job or Peace Corps in general to report. The people here, both staff and natives, are exceptionally kind and accommodating. I even surprised myself by how sure I feel of my role here. After the plane landed, we were taken from the airport to the Peace Corps Guatemala compound, where we met our Training Officer, Country Director, Medical Officers and other staff. The next few days, like the 1 day we had in DC, will be filled with technical and logistical information, and general overviews of the Peace Corps’ role in Guatemala. We also will be tested on our Spanish skills, where I hopefully won’t be embarrassing the foreign language department at Tech, and given shots. Seriously. Shots. On the first full day. I can’t WAIT for them to watch me bawl like a baby at a syringe, and question if I’m actually old enough to be there.

After a short info session, our language teachers then took us to meet our host families for the next three days, and boy did we have fun. We arrived at Doña Eva’s house and were shown our bedrooms and started small talk with the family, which consists of 7 kids (and various neighbors’ kids that seem to roll through too, as if they lived there.) And then came the lull in conversation. I blame the lack of sleep and Spanish-speaking deprivation for the past year, but I could not seem to keep a conversation going tonight! It’s also funny to see how differently Doña Eva and I reacted to the “awkward” silences. I feel like we’re so trained in the US, with our constant music, TV, and filler words, to keep a room noisy and get uncomfortable with the idea of simply sitting around a table together. This doesn’t bother Doña Eva at all! She didn’t blink or giggle, or do any of the other awkward things I was doing, because with all the free time they have here, it’s much more common to simply be around people. And there really isn’t a word for “awkward” in Spanish. Life would be so much easier if I never had to worry about being described as awkward.

Oh, and speaking of awkward, I’m about to give you all a beautiful mental image: first morning in Guate, me standing in a shower completely naked except for my sandals, lookin down at the bucket of luke warm water and smaller bowl. That’s right, it’s time for my first “guacalazo” or bucket bath. After about 2 full minutes of me scratching my head in confusion (and in the buff), I realize there’s a small window with a flimsy lace covering in the bathroom wall, which is the perfect height for my madre to lean over and ask me how I like my eggs. I would feel awkward about her possibly seeing all my special parts, but since the rest of the family is starting to get up, I just hurriedly dumped water over my head and got the hell out of there. I have to admit, though, it saves an embarrassing amount of water to use a bucket, even with long hair.

So that’s all. The group I came here with consists of “Municipal Development” and “Sustainable Agriculture” people (that’s me), and all seem to be fairly awesome people. It’s been great getting to know the other trainees over the past 36 hours, and nothing will bring you closer with a person in such a short time than watching them try to sleep, mouth open and drooling, in a plane seat. Awesome.

Also, just to rep the dirty South, this is the culture I'm leaving behind for Guatemala (watch out for the racy lyricssssssss)

T-7 days

So it's officially one week until I leave. Boom. A week sounds like forever, but when I start thinking about all the stuff I have to do AND all the stuff I want to do, time is definitely running out. I have almost everything figured out except for still getting dental stuff done (RIP wisdom teeth) and packing. Packing is turning into a bigger issue than I had planned. I keep separating my clothes into ones that are practical to take, and ones that I want to take. The "want to" pile is steadily growing, while not much progress is being made practically. The part that really blows my mind is how I'm going to take roughly 8 pairs of shoes with me. I know I won't be wearing heels much in Guatemala probably, but I can't resist being prepared. The other, definitely more exciting, thing I get to do before I leave is celebrate my big sister's birthday. It will be a joyous fete with much merrymaking and revelry.

Anyway, I suppose I should preface this blog with why I'm actually indulging in arguably one of the most pretentious things to come out of the internet. First of all, I have recently started reading the blogs of current and returned volunteers from Guatemala, and I absolutely love it. It gets me pumped, it gives me insight into what challenges I will face, and they're usually full of beautiful pictures. I know it sounds creepy, and it might be weird to meet people whose lives I've already read about, but it doesn't deter me at all. Thanks, all you PC bloggers. Secondly, it just makes sense, in terms of the most efficient way to distribute information. Instead of writing everybody the same email, or remembering what stories I've told to what people, BOOM, it's in the blog. Lastly, I'm not usually much for self-reflection, but since I'm getting older I may as well try to grow up a little bit too, and I hear journaling is good for that. Anyhow, when writing this blog I'm going to try not to think or use the backspace button too much, and just write down my experiences and hopefully my perspective on some of it. Maybe I'll realize I kinda suck. Hopefully not, but at the very least I'll have a saved record of my time in the Peace Corps. Just a heads up to anyone reading that hasn't ever gotten a long email from me, I write like I think, and usually go off on a lot of tangents. Bear with me.

So that's all. Next time I post I'll have way more interesting things to write about.