Thanksgiving Vacation Part II: Rio Dulce

After spending two nights in Livingston we took yet another boat ride to Rio Dulce (Sweet River). We actually didn’t stay in the town of Rio Dulce, but rather in a place called the Finca Tatin which was basically in the jungle off of the river Tatin (a smaller river that connects to Rio Dulce).

Our hotel

The rope swing on the dock of our hotel

Our rooms...straight up jungle



The day we got there we rented kayaks and paddled to the nearby hot springs. It was an extremely funny / painful experience. This was just a part of the cold river with scalding hot water coming out of the hole which we are all gathered around. The result was us all crouching in the shallow water frantically doggie paddling to try and mix the scalding hot water with the cold water. As my good friend Kelley said: "Most painful experience of my life - made worse by the expectation of something enjoyable."It was good for a good laugh.

The hot springs

The group mid-hike (yes I'm in a dress and flip flops)

Riverside Church

The next day we took a hike through the woods to the Tiger caves. This was awesome! The tour guide didn't exactly prepare us for what we were going to encounter (what else is new) so I did the hike in flip flops. After we got to the entrance to the cave we walked for about two minutes down into the cave where we came to a ledge and the only way to continue on was to jump down into the water below (which we could only see with a flashlight and was probably about 40 feet below (total guestimate by the way - it was dark)). 

Entrance to the cave

Conquering my fears. You can only see the cave because of the flash. The caves were pitch black except for the two flashlights that we had.

From this point we walked/crawled for probably about 15 minutes down deeper into the cave over the stream and wet rocks.We finally ended up in the bat cave with tons of bats flying overhead. Terrible if you have a phobia of either the dark or bats, but really cool otherwise. All in all a VERY unique and memorable experience.

Thanksgiving at the Beach in Livingston: My New Favorite Tradition

To celebrate Thanksgiving a group of 26 Peace Corps Volunteers and three brave friends who are not in the Peace Corps decided to go to Livingston and Rio Dulce. (Middle right in the map right under the B for Belize). We were there for 4 full days (Wednesday-Sunday). It was super far away from the Western Highlands where we all live, but it was totally worth it. We did the trip in two days. First we all took the PC shuttle to Antigua (about 4 hours from my house) where we spent the night, then at 5am the next morning we all boarded a shuttle that took us to Puerto Barrios (about 5.5 hours away). From there we hopped on a 30 minute boat ride to finally end up in Livingston. Livingston was a cute little touristy town, although it did feel authentic and not overly commercialized. The area is probably best known for their African-Guatemalan population. There actually weren’t as many black people as I had expected (having been to Africa I think that I had unrealistic expectations), but there certainly were many more black people than there are where we live (approximately none).

On Thanksgiving we had the perfect weather for a beach day. It was awesome. First we took a boat ride to Seven Alters where we walked up a beautiful rocky river bed and ended up at a waterfall where we all took turns jumping off. This was my first time jumping off a waterfall! 

 

After spending a couple hours there swimming and jumping we got back on the boat to head to Playa Blanca (the white beach). Here we spent the remainder of the afternoon swimming in the warm waters, hanging out, drinking coco locos (crazy coconuts – a whole coconut with rum mixed in with the coconut water), and playing beach volleyball (my team was undefeated thank you very much). It was so sunny and warm. The water was calm and shallow, perfect floating and relaxing. No offense family, but I wouldn’t mind if I spent every thanksgiving sunning myself on a beach on the Caribbean Sea. We had Thanksgiving dinner at our hostel, Casa De La Iguana (House of the Iguana). This hostel was made up of little bungalows. It was cute and I had my doubts, but they actually prepared a really good Turkey with stuffing, mashed potatoes, and cranberry sauce.  There wasn’t the usual quantity of food that is usually associated with Thanksgiving, but it was tasty.

Tapado soup

Tapado. Yum. This is a traditional dish from Livingston. It is a coconut milk broth with all imaginable kinds of seafood in it. Each soup had: a whole fried fish, snails, shrimp, the fish that live in Conch shells, and half a crab. ¡Que rico! I am positive that it was so rich that it couldn’t have been healthy, but I couldn’t have cared less. 

Livingston

Livingston

Livingston

Seven Alters

Our hostel

 

Beach Volleyball at Playa Blanca

Shucking Corn with My New Host Family

This week is our third and final girls camp! It is is San Andres Xecul, Totonicapan, and is about a 45 minute camioneta ride away from my house. When I got back to my house yesterday I found one of the rooms in the house filled with a mountain of corn that they had harvested that morning from their land. This corn was not for eating – it was left on the stalk until it was almost dry. They will use this for food for the pigs, to make tortillas and tamalitos, and to further dry for next year. So I spent an hour or so last night helping them to shuck the corn. This is apparently a woman’s job, so Minako, my host mom, three host sisters and I sat around the pile and got to work. This was a fairly complex process which I never really got the hang of. First there were two different bags into which we put the corn husks: the good ones for making tamales, and the bad/broken/dirty ones were to use as bedding for the pigs. There were also three different ways to prepare the corn: 1) take all of the husks off – these will eventually be ground up to make tortillas etc., 2) take all of the husks off and put into a separate pile – these were the bad corn cobs that were to be given to the pigs, and finally 3) take all but 2 corn husks off, pair that with another similar cob, and tie them together – these were then put out to dry for next year.

Corn, corn, and more corn

My new host mom

Hanging the corn to dry

Moving on up

This past month I moved to a new house. As it turns out my 12 year old host brother had been breaking into my room and stealing from me. It took me a while to figure it out, but he kept on getting bolder with his stealing eventually using a knife to pry open the mirrors on my locked dresser (I know this because he left my knife on the floor). Anyway all in all he stole my Ipod and over 500Q. When I moved out I got all of this back. Although I was out of my house and basically homeless for three weeks, it actually turned out to be a blessing in disguise. I now live with this really awesome HUGE host family. I have been there for a couple of weeks now and I still haven’t learned all of their names or figured out how they are all connected. From what I have heard my host parents have nine children (not all of them live with us), but some of those who do have children so the age range in the house is from 55-2. So far my favorite is Princess (yes that is her name – it’s not even Princesa). She is three years old and adorable. I don’t have a good picture of her yet but I’m working on it.

I also live with a female Jika volunteer (Japan’s version of the Peace Corps). Minako just turned 40 and she is super nice. I really like spending time with her. It is also nice not to be the only one who doesn’t fully speak Spanish or doesn’t know exactly what’s going on all of the time.

I have a nice little room with four big windows, two of which look out over the little river in my town which runs next to my house. I am also going to have a separate little kitchen. Right now it is just a room with a wood-burning stove in it. There are no outlets in the room so I am going to have to figure something out for my electric stove-top and toaster oven. I still share a bathroom with the family, but THERE IS ELECTRICITY/LIGHT IN THERE! Also THERE IS ALMOST ALWAYS HOT WATER FOR SHOWERS. Posh Corps (not actually but it is a huge step up)! Pictures of the house and room to come. 

Genesis / Crystal

Minako is on the left

SCHOOL VACATION in Guatemala

I graduated college and thought that I was done being on a school time schedule (at least for a few years), but I was wrong. Since I am a healthy schools volunteer I basically have the same schedule as the primary schools (except that I also work after school and during the breaks). None the less, school vacation in Guatemala runs from October 11 - January 15. The Guatemalan independence day is on September 15 and after that school is basically over what with all of the celebrations, exams, and general chillage.

So I started a new facebook album with pictures from this wonderful "time off" (although I think that I am actually busier than I was during the school year, but still, here is the link).

https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10200763614393147.1073741826.1246140026&type=1&l=3d44457040

Fiambre: The Guatemalan Version of Chopped Salad

                                                                           Photo credit: Kendra O'Connor

The typical dish for All Saints Day on November first in Guatemala is called Fiambre. Fiambre is a cold salad and can be made from over 50 ingredients. It is kind of like the Guatemalan version of a chopped salad. Families usually have their own versions of fiambre, but ingredients can include: meats including cold cuts, pickled vegetables, beets, pacaya flowers, cheeses, olives, eggs, corn, radishes, or many other ingredients.

Let's Go Fly a Kite at the Gigantic Kite Festival in Sumpango, Sacatepéquez

November 1 is Día De Todos Santos (All Saints Day) and is celebrated in Guatemala in cemeteries. In general, families visit cemeteries to liven up the tombstones (although they look more like colorful cement houses to me) of their relatives. This national holiday is also celebrated by flying kites. There is a noticeable increase in the selling and flying of kites around this time. I've heard the kites symbolize the spirits or souls of the deceased flying to heaven.

One of the most famous places to celebrate Día de Todos Santos is in the small town of Sumpango, department of Sacatepéquez, 25km north of Antigua. In a large soccer field there were probably about 25 different GIANT KITES. And by giant I mean giant! The smallest kites here on display were probably about 8feet tall and the tallest were multiple stories tall (most are more than 13m wide). The most amazing thing is that they are all made out of tissue paper! I cannot believe how intricate they were! The backs of the kites are long bamboo poles. Now not all of these kites are flyable. However they flew kites that were up to 7-8 feet tall. Pretty impressive. It was also highly amusing. They also flew the kites in this same area with all of the spectators so when the kites inevitably came crashing down it was fun to hear the shrieks of the crowd and see hords of people first moving one way to get out of the way and then the other. To quote the Lonely Planet Guatemala guidebook: "Part of the fun is watching the crowd flee when a giant kite takes a nose dive!" They were in no real danger, but it would probably hurt a little bit and I knew at least I didn't want to be the one to ruin a kite by sticking my head through it.  

It was like nothing that I had ever seen and I am so glad that I went! Just remember when looking at the pictures that they are made out of 100% tissue paper!

Kites for sale

Boy flying a kite on top of a tomb

Colorful graveyard

Huge crowd in front of all of the giant kites

This was in the smallest category of kites! These actually got flown

Proud Sumpango

Sumpango 2013!

Kaqchikel (Mayan subgroup) descendents

The backs of the kites - long bamboo poles.

The back of a kite and a kite face down on the ground waiting to be hoisted up

Pulling the kite up

Tzupam - Sumpango in Kaqchikel the Mayan dialect of this region

A close up. I can't believe that this is all tissue paper!

Kites flying in front of a volcano (I think they look like dementors)

When the last animal dies, when the last plant dries, man might understand that you can not eat money

One of the tallest

Walking the kite over

One of the 8-ft kites flying

By the end of the day the wind had gotten the better of a couple of the kites