Photo

aqui is the link to my photos on fb.
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2066510&id=44901945&l=84cee46fc0

Yo necesito comprar JaBON, no jaPON.

Allow me to explain the title. The other day I attempted to explain to Lola, my host mother, that I needed to buy soap to hand wash my clothes. Before expressing her surprise that I wanted to wash my own clothes rather than pay for a service, she began laughing hysertically at me. JaPon is an isla country of shortish Asian peoples, JaBon is soap. This sort of confusion is kind of a regular occurance for me. The other day in class I mixed up the words miente- meaning he, she, or it lies, with mierde- shit.

I had hoped to post pictures today, but the computer im working on cant deal with my camera. You will have to wait for the only 2 pictures I have of myself here thus far- one from a hike in los montanas con un maestro y los otras estudentes, and one of myself last weekend, on the worlds most sketch ferris wheel. Thats right, I rode a ferris wheel in a town square, high above the yearly mayan festival of Santiago. Santiago is the next town over on the lake, and the principle town of the Tzutujil Maya people. For the record, my family and our teachers speak Tzutujil when they want to make fun of us. The festival was neat- tons of shopping set up for tourists near the lake, and up the hill, traditional dancers and processionals out of the Catholic church in the town square. The church contained an interesting monument to Father Stanley Rother. Rother was a priest in the 70s in Santiago who fell in love with the Maya people. So much so, that during the guerria, o la violencia, the long and bloody civil war, Rother stood up for his people and was consequently black listed by the government. He returned to his native Oklahoma, but decided to go back to Santiago where he was murdered by the policia. His beloved people cut out his corazon and burried it in the church. Interesting, no?

In other news, my lessons continue to go well. I feel like im learning a ton, even if my speaking skills are catching up much more slowly. I continue to be amazed at the conplexity of conversations I end up having (or more accurately, stories that my mom and teacher tell that I contribute a little to). This morning Demis and I dicsussed the evils of prostitution and evangelism, at home yesterday it was c-sections and industrialized chicken, and a few days ago it was cocaine use and gangs. My words arent exact, but its kind of fun to try and describe what I mean, and to teach new english words and slang to my teacher. Its been confirmed for me that I absolutely love studying Spanish. Even if it can be very frustrating, the alegria of understanding my friends and having my day operate in a different language is great.

Im also meeting some really interesting expats. You may know that its kind of my dream to keep traveling when I have my PHd and to study expat identity and nationalism. There are some WEIRD people living here, and some good people too. Turns out its still easy for non-nationals to work in Guatemala because the country still has few rules in that repects. Anyway, in traditional areas like ours whatever rules the government makes are sort of ignored. Forexample, there are no fumar, no smoking signs everywhere, but no one really gives a shit if ou smoke inside. Anyway, the other day I met a woman who literally left the states 10 days after the initial bombing of Iraq. She owns several properties here, and is working on opening a guesthouse targeted at women who might be too nervous to travel here and experience the culture on their own. I also met a man who graduated from Foss HS in Tacoma- random!

Other quick thoughts (Im off to visit a coffee and craft co op)- I live with the cutest 9 year old in the world, and next door to the cutest baby- micxel. (I think thats how you spell it, but its like Mikchell). Lolita loves to tease and laugh at me. Micxel is literally runs in fear terrified every time I appear.

Im sick of corn now. Eating this much corn is like eating kenkey for every meal, if you comprehend Ghanaian cusine. Consequently, Im rarely hungry for my meals, but the food my host mom makes is really tastely. Last night she made coco from scratch (again, it contains a kind of corn meal, like everything else). Now shes beginning to remake things I like the most- I complimented the soup, and now I get tons of soup. Somehow I never seem to get sick from the food, while all of my companions are sick at least twice a week. Im sure its because they are scaring themselves into being sick with their fear of the water the food is cooked in :) Jk.

Thats all I got for now- Ill find a better computer for photos eventually...

Day 2 in San Pedro

SOmuch to say, and so little desire to be on the internet. Here are some pictures stolen off the net to help you visualize. The church is around the corner from my house.

After 3 busses, a boat, and a lot of rain I made it to San Pedro. It is a very beautiful place, and I have to say the weather almost makes it more appealing to me- it is about 72 degrees and either raining, or not raining. Its been raining extremely hard at night, and yesterday it was a total douwnpour when I walked to class (as in Skylar conpletely soaked, and feels stupid for only brining 2 pairs of socks and one pair of pants. Whatever...). Basically, its Tacoma in the spring plus 10 degrees, with thunder and lightning. Anyway, I was imediately dropped off at my school, La Flor del Maiz, where I very nice teacher named Jose told me hed take me to my family after the evenings activity, a lecture on la cosmovision maya (mayan worldview). What a way to start out! I understood about 70%, the same as the other students, so I was feeling pretty good until I did meet my family and participated in an extremely awkward dinner in which the father (Javier, also the owner of my school) asked only 2 or 3 questions and I pooly attemped to provide answers. I did understand that he thought I was coming in the morning and had been waiting for me all day (oops!)

Yesterday in the morning I had breakfast with Javiers wife, Lola. She is very sweet and much easier to talk to. She taught me how to make tortillas, which I suck at, no matter how many times she told me my 2 that didnt fall apart in my hands were muy bien. Lola does not work outside their home, except to weave skirts and belts, really typical for a Mayan woman. She mostly cleans and takes care of their daughter Lolita, age 9. Lolita is very cute, and seems quite micheveous. We sit at the breakfast table and she giggles endlessly at me. After that we cleaned, and I attempted to take a walk around San Pedro, but it was raining too much (This will be a common theme, I meant to do X, but it was raining...) My first class was in the afternoon with my teacher Demis. The other students (Currently 3 brits and a woman from Seattle-Denver) say hes the best, though based on their assesments of the other teachers, hes the most patient and thus the best. He is extremely patient. We laugh alot constructing simple sentenses like- I dont like rats, people who eat them are strange.- Apparently someone tricked him into eating one once... My classes are 4 hours long, but they hardly seem like it. We spent the entire time reviewing basic concepts, which was really helpful. Its apparently really common for people to come with lots of working knowledge of the language, but no understanding of grammar, like myself. Two of the brits left this morning so last night we went to a gringo bar for desert and drinks Apparently, I like cubo libres. It was very relaxing to talk in English for 2 hours, lemme tell ya. We covered normal travel topics, for example- what do people really think of Obama, and what happens if a homeless person with no insurance needs to see a doctor. I had forgot about the inevetable part of traveling that is being a US ambasador. I also forgot how much more people from Europe travel. Another question -why dont many americans have passports- is also very common. The two students who left this morning are on a 18 month adventure up and down s. and c. america, through india and through new zealand! It was refreshing to be around poeple who also feel that most extra funds should go towards travel.

Today I switched to morning classes and had more review time with Demis. We take breaks after about 2.5 hours and then the tables are turned- we students tease our teachers about their usage of English, and talk about slang expressions. Today I learned several ways to say womanizer and slut. Ah, life education. This afternoon our extra activity will be a Salsa lesson, yay!

What else is important¿ Food. So far Ive had mostly steak, black beans, and tortillas. So. many. corn. tortillas. And coffee, even Lolita drinks coffee! This morning Lola surprised me with a huge breakfast of chocolate pancakes, watermellon, and pineapple with yogurt and syrup! Breakfast here is a normal size, lunch is supposed to be a big meal, and dinner is very small. As my fellow student Jono put it, dinner is f-ing paltry! Lunch is a mormal sized meal in the US, and dinner is very, very small. But its enough, and only slightly akward that Lola and Javier give themselves portions half as large as mine...

This weekend is a popular one for fiestas in mayan towns, so I think I will go to the next village over, Santiago, for their festival. I would also like to climb one of the two volcanoes on either side of San Pedro- its astonishing how deep the lake is and how imediately close the mountians are. However, that would necessitate 5 dry hours, which might just be a miracle.

Thats all I can think of for now. Hasta luego!

And now it's a Guatemala blog...

Buenos Dias!

I woke up before breakfast is availible so I guess I'll put up my thoughts on Guatemela City before I move on.

My guide book is pretty frank in noting that Guatemala City (or just Guatemala, or Guate, for short) is unattractive, very dangeous, not charming, and aside from a few museums, devoid of things to see. Well, perhaps I'm just not you typical "rough guide" traveler. I certainly didn't see everything yesteday. I didn't even make it up to the "old city" where the older government buildings and chuches are. I stuck to zones 9 and 10, which are supposed to be fairly safe (I didn't have even bus fare to venture out, and didn't want to pay for a cab). Zone 10, where my hostel is (Xamanex, www.mayaworld.net) is called the Zona Viva, and is full of all the night clubs, shopping malls, and nice food places that I didn't bother with. Zone 9 is just a little seedyer, and more had the feeling of business people just going about their business. While I wondered around for several hours yesterday and didn't see much in the way of "sighseeing" things, I think I got a feel for the place, which was more impotant to me. It's gritty, but not dity, if that makes sense. It's actually the cleanest city trash wise I've been outside of Europe and USA/ Canada, although I ended the day with some dirt in my eyes and exaust in all of my pores. So much car exhaust! Certainly more advanced than Belize, and years ahead of Accra (I could have had a Frosty, Big Mac, Whopper, Subway, or Quiznoes if I'd' wanted, if you call that more advanced...). I totally get why most people skip it. In a stunningly beautiful country, this would be the bottom of most lists. However, I like cities, and I like places that are rougher around the edges. My favoite parts of yesterday were mundane seeming things- I bought some sort of street food for dinner, walked up and down ave. la Refoma and looked at decaying concrete monuments to independence, costa rica (why?), the first CA nobel in literature (one of my favorites) and an interesting speach by Simon Bolivar (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sim%C3%B3n_Bol%C3%ADvar) that no one payed attention to after their unveiling. Finially, I sat underneath the Torre de Reformador duing the evening rush hour (see photo). All in all, I think I like the place, and would like to spend one more day here to see the rest of the things I would enjoy, but I'm off to San Pedro today. Maybe I'll be back, but probnably not, since there are so many more peaceful, beautiful places to see.

My hostel is great- super friendly women greeted me, and we had most of a conversation in Spanish (as with the tourist office woman, and the taxi driver, and the cell phone vender, and the dinner guy- I'd say most conversations have been 60/40 Spanish/English) I'd read it was maybe a crazy party spot, but thankfully it was pretty chill on a Monday (we watched HBO in Spanish with subtitles and read our books or tooled around on netbooks, which it seems every taveler but myself brought).

Ok, time to get off the computer. Later!