hola a todos!
this past week i was living in the altoplano learning all about what it is like to be a real live volunteer and i have to say i am extremely excited to get to work! it was a lot of work! my FBT group taught two seperate groups of teachers about experiencial learning (something that they DO NOT teach in guate) i taught a group of parents about family nutrition and then taught 50 second graders about brushing their teach. so it was a very busy week!
we were in a small town named Cabrican. It was incredibly cold but incredilby beautiful up there at 15,000 feet. from our hotel we could see the highest peak in all of central america, a volcano that is 22,000 feet. There are 35 different schools in the muni of cabrican and they are all about an hour to 2 hours from the town´s centro but the views were breath taking. but it was cold, it would be in the 30s at night and 40/50s during the day, definitely not what i thought central america could be! it is one of the possible sites, so two of us maybe going there in a month and a week! we were there until thursday when we came back down the mountain to salcajal. salcajal is another future site, but only one person will be replacing a volunteer there! it was a beautiful site as well, and a lot warmer! it still was really cold at night, but a lot more comfortable than the altoplano! we stopped by a glass co-op in a bordering town and got to see the men pull the glass out of the fire (all the glass is recycled) and it looked like melting carmel, it was sooo cool to see! we also went to another future site, i have forgotten the name, but it was equally beautiful!
i am so excited to become a volunteer and start my life in my site and start work! all of the places here are so beautiful and i feel very very lucky to be in a place that is so rich in culture and the people are so kind! we were going to find out our sites in three weeks, but because there are so many of us trainees and one of the departments had to be shut down, they are not ready to place us! so we are going to find out the day before we swear in! so in 5 weeks i will be able to tell you exactly where i am going to be! we get to look forward to field trips, meeting our site partner, and other experiencal learning things in the coming weeks! so look forward to more information! i miss you all very much! hasta la proxima ves!
Kata
Sunday, February 20, 2011
Thursday, February 10, 2011
Hola a todos!!!
this week is flying by! i can´t believe i am exactly halfway through my training experience and going strong! this past week has been very interesting! we had class in antigua which was a ton of fun because we got to go back to the bagel barn for class, where i enjoyed a delicious bagel and delicious coffee! afterward we went back to the market to learn how to bargain which is a lot harder than it seems! we have another free day this weekend (but it is a whole day!!!yaay!) and i plan on heading back and trying again because i am in desperate need of some new shirts! but after trying to bargain in the mercado, we went to a traditional comida place for lunch where i enjoyed chiles reyenos and plantains!
Saturday was the traditional mayan dance ceremony, which was incredibly interesting and different from anything i have seen in the usa. she started by explain how each direction has its own color and each direction represents a different part of nature! the whole thing last about three hours and she called all the mayan gods to come and give us blessings. it was very moving and i really enjoyed it!
Sunday was spent in the campo watching soccer and one of the girls in my language class had her birthday so we celebrated with a delicious lunch, cake, and a pinata. it was a lot of fun, because we followed the guatemalan tradition of slamming the guest of honors face in the cake and playing with the pinata. i throughly enjoyed myself.
On monday we had our language interviews and more technical training. i have gone up a level in my language skills to advanced beginner, which is exciting because it doesn´t feel like i have improved that much! the rest of the week has been a pretty normal week, a lot of technical training and practicum.
next week is Field based training or FBT, where we split into groups and go to sites throughout the country, i am going to Cabrican in the department quezaltenango, it is about 4 or 5 hours away in a car, but 7 or 8 in a bus! quezaltenango host the beautiful city of xela, which i am really excited to see because it is suppose to be very different from all the other colonial cities in guatemala!
i will be sure to make sure i write a lot next week because it is the first week we get to do charlas (classes of our own) so it should be very interesting!
i miss you alll so much and can´t wait to have a more reliable internet so i can spend more time talking with all of you!
hasta proxima semana!
this week is flying by! i can´t believe i am exactly halfway through my training experience and going strong! this past week has been very interesting! we had class in antigua which was a ton of fun because we got to go back to the bagel barn for class, where i enjoyed a delicious bagel and delicious coffee! afterward we went back to the market to learn how to bargain which is a lot harder than it seems! we have another free day this weekend (but it is a whole day!!!yaay!) and i plan on heading back and trying again because i am in desperate need of some new shirts! but after trying to bargain in the mercado, we went to a traditional comida place for lunch where i enjoyed chiles reyenos and plantains!
Saturday was the traditional mayan dance ceremony, which was incredibly interesting and different from anything i have seen in the usa. she started by explain how each direction has its own color and each direction represents a different part of nature! the whole thing last about three hours and she called all the mayan gods to come and give us blessings. it was very moving and i really enjoyed it!
Sunday was spent in the campo watching soccer and one of the girls in my language class had her birthday so we celebrated with a delicious lunch, cake, and a pinata. it was a lot of fun, because we followed the guatemalan tradition of slamming the guest of honors face in the cake and playing with the pinata. i throughly enjoyed myself.
On monday we had our language interviews and more technical training. i have gone up a level in my language skills to advanced beginner, which is exciting because it doesn´t feel like i have improved that much! the rest of the week has been a pretty normal week, a lot of technical training and practicum.
next week is Field based training or FBT, where we split into groups and go to sites throughout the country, i am going to Cabrican in the department quezaltenango, it is about 4 or 5 hours away in a car, but 7 or 8 in a bus! quezaltenango host the beautiful city of xela, which i am really excited to see because it is suppose to be very different from all the other colonial cities in guatemala!
i will be sure to make sure i write a lot next week because it is the first week we get to do charlas (classes of our own) so it should be very interesting!
i miss you alll so much and can´t wait to have a more reliable internet so i can spend more time talking with all of you!
hasta proxima semana!
Wednesday, February 2, 2011
Hola everyone!
sorry for the long pauses between blog post, last week i picked up a bacterial infection from some food and was not able to get on the internet at the office and this week the internet at the office wasn´t working so i wasn´t able to get on and catch everyone up!
these have been a couple of crazy weeks, last saturday for our spanish class we got to go to antigua for the first time, antigua is so beautiful, but very touristy and a lot more expernsive than the rest of guatemala! we explored hidden court yards, the market, the jade factory (one of the best in the world) and then had brunch at the bagel barn (if anyone comes to visit we are probably going to have to hit this place up.....it has every kind of bagel imaginable!) all and all it was a very enjoyable spanish class followed by a nice relaxing afternoon back in San Lorenzo.
Then on monday we went to Guatemala city to learn how to use the correct taxis, locate the hospital that we will go to if we ever have a serious medical problem, and see the embassy. I thought that as far as latin american capital cities go, it was very clean, but very american as well. we ate at a mall foodcourt that had almost exactly the same resturants that there would be in an american mall. our spanish teacher loved it, we were less than impressed, but still gorged ourselves with panani´s, ice cream, chuchuros and hot chocolate. the mall had a movie theater, belks, victoria secret and many other americanish things in it! we are only allowed to be in guate if we are leaving/entering the country or going to the places listed above, so i don´t think i will get to utilize the malls and i definitely wouldn´t be able to afford it on my pc salary! haha
the rest of the week past pretty normally, spanish classes and training. But this past saturday we had our inter-community exchange with some of the eco-tourism trainees. They came to San Lorenzo first and then we went to Santa Catarrina. Santa Catarrina is very beautiful and has a lot of coffee farms around it so it is very green. Afterward we had our first free afternoon so we headed back to antigua for a afternoon of hamburgers and more exploring.
But this weekend was very different from the last weekends in SL becuase the fierra came to town. this is a big parade/fair that is set up in the plazuela. it starts at the bottom of our town with people in the town dressed up as oversized stuffed animals and they do this shuffle dance for about 30 minutes before proceeding to a neighbors house, having snakcs, and starting their dance again. they normally start around 3 or 4 in the afternoon and arrive in the plazuela around 9. it is so loco! definitley one of the more bazarre things i have seen!!! then the town sets up a dance area and the entire town comes to dance to a band(on saturday night) and a dj (sunday night) until 12 or 1 am! it might not sound very crazy, but considering that normally bed time is 8:30-10 pm at the latest, this is definitely a chance for the people to cut loose. the next town party isn´t until august so it is always fun! it definitely made the weekend go by quicker!
today we started our practicum, which just makes me more and more excited to get to site and start working! tomorrow it is back to spanish and training but friday we get to have class in antigua again and practice our bargaining skills at the market and the pacas (used clothing stores). Saturday we are going to see a traditional mayan ceremony and sunday is one of the girl´s bdays in my language group. its hard to believe how quickly the days pass here!
i miss everyone very much and hope everyone is surviving the winter! más venir!
sorry for the long pauses between blog post, last week i picked up a bacterial infection from some food and was not able to get on the internet at the office and this week the internet at the office wasn´t working so i wasn´t able to get on and catch everyone up!
these have been a couple of crazy weeks, last saturday for our spanish class we got to go to antigua for the first time, antigua is so beautiful, but very touristy and a lot more expernsive than the rest of guatemala! we explored hidden court yards, the market, the jade factory (one of the best in the world) and then had brunch at the bagel barn (if anyone comes to visit we are probably going to have to hit this place up.....it has every kind of bagel imaginable!) all and all it was a very enjoyable spanish class followed by a nice relaxing afternoon back in San Lorenzo.
Then on monday we went to Guatemala city to learn how to use the correct taxis, locate the hospital that we will go to if we ever have a serious medical problem, and see the embassy. I thought that as far as latin american capital cities go, it was very clean, but very american as well. we ate at a mall foodcourt that had almost exactly the same resturants that there would be in an american mall. our spanish teacher loved it, we were less than impressed, but still gorged ourselves with panani´s, ice cream, chuchuros and hot chocolate. the mall had a movie theater, belks, victoria secret and many other americanish things in it! we are only allowed to be in guate if we are leaving/entering the country or going to the places listed above, so i don´t think i will get to utilize the malls and i definitely wouldn´t be able to afford it on my pc salary! haha
the rest of the week past pretty normally, spanish classes and training. But this past saturday we had our inter-community exchange with some of the eco-tourism trainees. They came to San Lorenzo first and then we went to Santa Catarrina. Santa Catarrina is very beautiful and has a lot of coffee farms around it so it is very green. Afterward we had our first free afternoon so we headed back to antigua for a afternoon of hamburgers and more exploring.
But this weekend was very different from the last weekends in SL becuase the fierra came to town. this is a big parade/fair that is set up in the plazuela. it starts at the bottom of our town with people in the town dressed up as oversized stuffed animals and they do this shuffle dance for about 30 minutes before proceeding to a neighbors house, having snakcs, and starting their dance again. they normally start around 3 or 4 in the afternoon and arrive in the plazuela around 9. it is so loco! definitley one of the more bazarre things i have seen!!! then the town sets up a dance area and the entire town comes to dance to a band(on saturday night) and a dj (sunday night) until 12 or 1 am! it might not sound very crazy, but considering that normally bed time is 8:30-10 pm at the latest, this is definitely a chance for the people to cut loose. the next town party isn´t until august so it is always fun! it definitely made the weekend go by quicker!
today we started our practicum, which just makes me more and more excited to get to site and start working! tomorrow it is back to spanish and training but friday we get to have class in antigua again and practice our bargaining skills at the market and the pacas (used clothing stores). Saturday we are going to see a traditional mayan ceremony and sunday is one of the girl´s bdays in my language group. its hard to believe how quickly the days pass here!
i miss everyone very much and hope everyone is surviving the winter! más venir!
Tuesday, January 18, 2011
hola a todos!
This has been a fun and exciting week. the weather is definitely not hot like i had hoped, but when the sun is out it feels so nice. it rained a little on wednesday and has been cloudy ever since, which makes taking bucket baths very very cold! haha. But I have been busy taking spanish classes, going on field trips to where i will have my practicum (starting in 2 weeks), training at the office and in Parramos, the town that my pueblo is a suburbish like place to, and spending time with my host family and learning the ways of the guatemaltecas. One thing i have learned is that no matter who you pass (unless they look very sketchy or dangerous) you are to greet them with buenas dias, buenas tarde, or buenas noches according to the time of the day. Everyone in my pueblo greets each other. there are only 6 main families here, so pretty much you are always greeting a host relative of some sort.
Spanish classes have been fun. I am learning so much here because i am practicing what i have learned almost immediately from walking out the door. We have classes at one of our houses for a week at a time. This past week it was at Joe's casa, this week it will be at my casa and I am not sure where it will be next week. There are 5 of us in all so we will all get to host at least once, maybe twice.
training has been really really interesting because we are covering everything from health to how the school systems work to how to be a successful volunteer at my site. From what my leaders have said, we will all be in semi-urban sites and going out the the more rural parts of guate. This of course has its pluses and minuses. A plus is that i will be able to find whatever i need at a somewhat reasonable price, but it will be harder to meet people and gain confidenzia. but i am excited none-the-less!
on sundays we go down to the campo to watch soccer games, then we normally come home, take our bucket baths (which i take everyday, they take once a week), eat a big lunch, take a nap, go to mass, and then go to another court to watch soccer until late into the night. Their weekends completely revolve around the towns' soccer teams, which is very interesting to me. i think i have watched a total of 16 hours of soccer this week! but I am having a lot of fun with my host family, i have really enjoyed getting to know the girls and the mom and am starting to move away from small talk about the weather to actually conversations. but they are talking extremely slow when we speak and are so patient with my seriously broken spanish. this feels like a really good fit. One of the sister's is going to highschool in a neighboring city, which is pretty unheard of in guatemala (most girls will drop out after middle school, because they need to find a husband or because they need to work) and she wants to go onto university, which is amazing! she is very driven which is such a great thing to see and her parents are very supportive of her, which is equally great to see as well.
well i better start reading this weeks packet! more to come!
This has been a fun and exciting week. the weather is definitely not hot like i had hoped, but when the sun is out it feels so nice. it rained a little on wednesday and has been cloudy ever since, which makes taking bucket baths very very cold! haha. But I have been busy taking spanish classes, going on field trips to where i will have my practicum (starting in 2 weeks), training at the office and in Parramos, the town that my pueblo is a suburbish like place to, and spending time with my host family and learning the ways of the guatemaltecas. One thing i have learned is that no matter who you pass (unless they look very sketchy or dangerous) you are to greet them with buenas dias, buenas tarde, or buenas noches according to the time of the day. Everyone in my pueblo greets each other. there are only 6 main families here, so pretty much you are always greeting a host relative of some sort.
Spanish classes have been fun. I am learning so much here because i am practicing what i have learned almost immediately from walking out the door. We have classes at one of our houses for a week at a time. This past week it was at Joe's casa, this week it will be at my casa and I am not sure where it will be next week. There are 5 of us in all so we will all get to host at least once, maybe twice.
training has been really really interesting because we are covering everything from health to how the school systems work to how to be a successful volunteer at my site. From what my leaders have said, we will all be in semi-urban sites and going out the the more rural parts of guate. This of course has its pluses and minuses. A plus is that i will be able to find whatever i need at a somewhat reasonable price, but it will be harder to meet people and gain confidenzia. but i am excited none-the-less!
on sundays we go down to the campo to watch soccer games, then we normally come home, take our bucket baths (which i take everyday, they take once a week), eat a big lunch, take a nap, go to mass, and then go to another court to watch soccer until late into the night. Their weekends completely revolve around the towns' soccer teams, which is very interesting to me. i think i have watched a total of 16 hours of soccer this week! but I am having a lot of fun with my host family, i have really enjoyed getting to know the girls and the mom and am starting to move away from small talk about the weather to actually conversations. but they are talking extremely slow when we speak and are so patient with my seriously broken spanish. this feels like a really good fit. One of the sister's is going to highschool in a neighboring city, which is pretty unheard of in guatemala (most girls will drop out after middle school, because they need to find a husband or because they need to work) and she wants to go onto university, which is amazing! she is very driven which is such a great thing to see and her parents are very supportive of her, which is equally great to see as well.
well i better start reading this weeks packet! more to come!
Tuesday, January 11, 2011
Hola mis amigas!!!
I am sorry for not being able to blog sooner, but I am just now getting enough time on a computer to actually write something worthwhile! The past couple of days have been a worldwind- between arriving in guatemala and meeting our temporary host families (I was only with the first family for three days) to having our language placements to starting language classes to finally moving in with the host family that we will be with for the three months of training, i have barely had time to catch my breath!
But so far this has been an extremely enjoyable experience. I am situated now in San Lorenzo, a small (very small) village located about 15 minutes from antigua and 1 hour from the capital. The family i am living with has two daughters and one son. One of the daughters wants to attend a uiversity one day and is very serious about her studies. we have made a deal that if she teaches me spanish, then i will teach her english. so far it has been a lot of her teaching me spanish and less of me teaching english, which is probably a good thing! I am here with 4 other healthy school volunteers that placed into a similar level of spanish as myself. I think that they are a little bit more advanced (most had studied abroad in spanish speaking countries) than I am but I think if i work hard enough i'll be able to catch up soon! my family is a huge help because they correct me wheneveer i mispronounce something or use the wrong tense. it is definitely hard though! I am hoping soon i will be thinking in nothing but spanish and writing in english will be what is difficult!
Guatemala is a beautiful mountainous country. right now my elevation is about 7,000 feet and it feels like spring in greensboro,nc would feel like: pretty warm during the day but freezing at night! the first couple of nights i had to wear two pairs of socks to keep my feet warm! and it is very dry, the altoplano is suppose to be completely unforgiving when it come to cold all year round, so i am really hoping i am not placed there because the bucket baths in anything lower than 60 degrees are absolutely miserable!
This week I am going to be diving into my spanish lessons, we will meet monday, wednesday, friday, and saturday for 6 hours a day. tuesdays and thursdays are what they in the office call "core training days" and technical training days. those days will mostly be covering safety and security techniques, health, and actual on the job training. The entire 54 person volunteer training group will get back together those days, so it will be nice to catch up with some of my friends I made during the initial orientation days!
so far there have been no major adventures to report, just the day to day life in guatemala. The people are extremely friendly and generous and have made it know that they want to help me in whatever way they can, which makes like much easier! i have my own room at my homestay and there is a flushing toliet and bathroom sink. the shower is a bucket bath which is definitely something that i am going to have to get used to! that is all i can think of now, hopefully i will be able to post again in about a weeks time with many more enriching stories but until then hasta luego!!!!
I am sorry for not being able to blog sooner, but I am just now getting enough time on a computer to actually write something worthwhile! The past couple of days have been a worldwind- between arriving in guatemala and meeting our temporary host families (I was only with the first family for three days) to having our language placements to starting language classes to finally moving in with the host family that we will be with for the three months of training, i have barely had time to catch my breath!
But so far this has been an extremely enjoyable experience. I am situated now in San Lorenzo, a small (very small) village located about 15 minutes from antigua and 1 hour from the capital. The family i am living with has two daughters and one son. One of the daughters wants to attend a uiversity one day and is very serious about her studies. we have made a deal that if she teaches me spanish, then i will teach her english. so far it has been a lot of her teaching me spanish and less of me teaching english, which is probably a good thing! I am here with 4 other healthy school volunteers that placed into a similar level of spanish as myself. I think that they are a little bit more advanced (most had studied abroad in spanish speaking countries) than I am but I think if i work hard enough i'll be able to catch up soon! my family is a huge help because they correct me wheneveer i mispronounce something or use the wrong tense. it is definitely hard though! I am hoping soon i will be thinking in nothing but spanish and writing in english will be what is difficult!
Guatemala is a beautiful mountainous country. right now my elevation is about 7,000 feet and it feels like spring in greensboro,nc would feel like: pretty warm during the day but freezing at night! the first couple of nights i had to wear two pairs of socks to keep my feet warm! and it is very dry, the altoplano is suppose to be completely unforgiving when it come to cold all year round, so i am really hoping i am not placed there because the bucket baths in anything lower than 60 degrees are absolutely miserable!
This week I am going to be diving into my spanish lessons, we will meet monday, wednesday, friday, and saturday for 6 hours a day. tuesdays and thursdays are what they in the office call "core training days" and technical training days. those days will mostly be covering safety and security techniques, health, and actual on the job training. The entire 54 person volunteer training group will get back together those days, so it will be nice to catch up with some of my friends I made during the initial orientation days!
so far there have been no major adventures to report, just the day to day life in guatemala. The people are extremely friendly and generous and have made it know that they want to help me in whatever way they can, which makes like much easier! i have my own room at my homestay and there is a flushing toliet and bathroom sink. the shower is a bucket bath which is definitely something that i am going to have to get used to! that is all i can think of now, hopefully i will be able to post again in about a weeks time with many more enriching stories but until then hasta luego!!!!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)