Ahh, hot chocolate made of protein powder and partially boiled rain water

Comalapa, night under the stars, picnic with david, talking with demetrio, soccer compliments, toe, living sitch, playing pots and pans and disney songs

So after being trapped in beautiful san pedro for a week and re-planning the rest of my life I finally made it to comalapa.

Being in the highlands and still rainy season it was freezing and the conditions could definitely be considered rustic... I lived in litterally a shed and I could see through my walls, our dry compost toilet and solar shower were outside and the site we worked on was a half hour walk up a mountain of mud. And I loved it!

In the mornings we would all either make a collective breakfast or pack our lunch then we worked all day digging ditches, hauling gravel, sifting sand, or decorating with mud and cow shit. We made lunch together, went to town played soccer, lived a full life. Again for dinner we would all cook together then play music into the night. Meaning we would get out pots and pans for drums, play the banjo and sing disney songs. These are not things I would normally do or relish in, coming from the states I would much rather drive than walk anywhere and probably cook for myself maybe three times a year. But once I was thrown into this totally opposite life style I was hooked; its like the feeling of being fully alive. and I started to love walking for hours everyday not to be healthy but because thats what I needed to do to get where I needed to be, I fully owned everything I accomplished in comalapa, because I wasn't relying on anything but my own body or mind. Gas and machinery didn't take care of transportation, I did. McDonalds didn't make my food, I did. And although I bought the ingredients I bought them from the person that grew it, raised, killed it, whatever.

It all felt like being baptized in a waterfall, I couldn't have planned it and I don't think I can replicate it, but I want to figure out how to use it, not forget it. We joked this should be sold as a retreat, to become one with your body and your world, because honestly I can not imagine finding this feeling at a yoga retreat eating all the right foods, I think its because this is the way we were meant to live.

Living the homeless life in xela

Homelessness: the closest thing to true community I have ever seen

In xela we stayed at the cheapest hotel that all the traveling artisans stay at, however I'm pretty sure we would consider traveling artisans hobos, they don't have homes and they perform or sell homemade things in the street. They cook together and sleep in the dorms sharing knowledge and stories teaching each other skills. Because my roommate is friends with a band that falls in this category we spent most of our time in xela with artisans. Very cool.

Street art and community cooking: the dish that looks like a pizza is a spanish tortilla with beets zuchini onion and egg and the dish that looks like key lime pie is quacamole, all for around 5$ total. it fed 8 of us with leftovers for the whole day

I have internet!

And for some reason areomexico says you need to arrive 3 freakin hours early so after a ten min check in I have time too, this is definitely worth leaving at 4am...

So here's some pictures of san pedro, my friend lisa, my sweet kitten, and derumbas!

Weinie bar

Dear casting for spiderman, superman, anyone needing a super strong and fearless man, a real man's man;

Perfect candidates found: Guatemalan bus driving team.

We woke up at 5:30 after going to bed around 2:00 to make the first chicken bus to xela for the ultimate fair: carnival rides that have been sold or trashed because they no longer meet american safety standards, and any other regulations have been completely disregarded because here "risk" has a totally different meaning. I officially don't think you can call yourself a real addrenalin junkie until you have bungie jumped from a platform made of corn stalks and completed with discontinued american materials, with no directions or rules of operation.

I however have abandoned all intentions of being an addrenalin junkie since hiking 8 miles off a mountain with a broken back so I have no room to talk but seeing such an extremely different culture of non-fear did jolt me. Even though fun places like the fair highlight our differences we were all the most shocked by places of non fun but necessity such as the chicken bus.

At the end of a long but good weekend we made our way at around 5 to the bus terminal not sure if the last bus left at 5 or 6 or if they even ran that late on sunday, thankfully I still don't really know spanish because when we asked where the buses going to the capital were(we knew we were too late for a direct bus to san pedro) they said nowhere, gone, there were no buses left...while I was blissfully unaware they remembered there was one last bus that was running late so we followed at a run and made the bus, but the driver was running late and gets paid by trip rather than hour so we began rally-ing it to the capital. After several stops one of them including doughnut venders getting on and back off while the bus was moving it started to rain hard and get dark all at about the same time we made it to the major mountain highway. Here I started to notice the guy that wasn't driving would disappear after each stop out the back door and reappear in the front door much later.you could even hear him crawling around on top of the bus strapping on oversized cargo.every turn you can feel the outside wheels lift a little, we are taking turns at like 60mph. I'm afraid the bus is going to roll yet this guy is literally carrying heavy cargo on top of a tin roof then walking to the other end and swinging in the front door, hundreds of times a day, everyday.

Not quite as shocking, but everyone you meet here lives life so differently, I talked to a girl earlier today that said she wanted to sail the world so she literally showed up at a dock everyday asking people with boats if she could sail and after a week someone said yes and she grabbed her stuff and left that day. it makes you realize life is at our finger tips, we just have take it. So much is possible that we think is impossible,i was amazed for me it was a stretch to ride a chicken bus, yet for so many others the bar is so much higher.it made me wonder how many things we could do if we just believed them to be possible, or needed them to be possible, an artisan told me that for two years he used a drill bit and a deconstructed lighter as a mechanical drill because he needed to feed his family, and that was his work, he did what he had to do.every artisan I meet i am amazed, the ingenuity is amazing, like nothing I have ever seen, and I think its because of a culture with a mixture of nessesity and non fear. people seem to know they have to take charge of their lives and can't or won't let fear or anything else stop them. maybe im wrong and I just haven't seen the culture in depth and I'm sure I will change my mind again but for now I'm amazed I wonder what could happen if these people had access to the resources we do, if they would turn into us or if they would freakin make things happen?

I kissed a drunk girl

One of the many best parts of the night:

Girl in bathroom stall "i can't get out" boyfriend outside,"the lock is inside, you locked it" me in another stall to girl"you can turn the light on its just a switch by the door, girl "i can't get out"boyfriend is knocking on outside of door"its right here look where I'm knocking".eventually she escapes her self-induced prison and sees me washing my hands and says"your cute, can I have a kiss?" Me,"sure"we kiss on the cheek, and me and her boyfriend both wonder was that such a good idea she did just lock herself in a bathroom who knows what germs she could have picked up...

I'm doing just fine now

Aprender the other side of ingenuity.

Every time my school has a conference or movie showing we learn new super depressing facts about the civil war, which is actually amazing because everwhere else no one will talk about it at all, its like they don't want to scare you away with the past, but its their past and I think travelors should know the people not just the places they visit.

The movie we watched was written produced and acted entirely by indigenous Guatemalans and it started with a man running for days to tell the closest village that everyone he knew had been slaughtered and his entire town burnt to the ground and that they were next and the town had to decide what to do, with little hope of survival. They have connections with the rebels but know they will still be drastically outnumbered, they tell the rebels and even though they were told not to act they come, but the leader is being drawn as a bit jaded, and hungry to make a point.eventually the people are faced with the choice to stay and fight or run to the hills and leave behind everyone that is not able along with everything they have ever known.they choose to stay but one msn who had already lost his wife and daughter to the war wants to leave but by this time the rebel leader won't let him and threatens him at gunpoint.when the other rebels hear one rebel confronts him and the leader calls them cowards that need to be forced to do the right thing.here was the most impactful thing I have heard in a while: the other rebel responds by asking what do you want them to do where were they meant to learn courage, they are a conquered people they survived by running one group after another has taken their liberty, their homes, their families, what do you expect of them, when that is all they know. How can you force them to be the casualties, even for a good cause, you are atoll forcing them to be your weapon. I was shell shocked and thought how can we ask why would these people elect a man that knowingly killed thousands of his own people to president? How can I expect these people to think like me,i have no idea what history has taught them or formed in them, and not ancient history but current history; middle aged adults were young adults during the last war, they have lived through genocide.

The film finishes with the questioning rebel letting the questioning villager leave and him immediately being captured and tortured by the army, and with the rebels realizing he would give away their cover and deciding to try and hide all the villages in a nearby cave, but when the army arrived they found and killed absolutely everyone, and only a couple of the rebels survived to tell the story.
Not only was I really impacted by the statement, and tragic true story but the really impressive telling of humanity.there was no one right side like I want there to be. the rebels obviously were better than the army, but they were still run by people that are suseptable to both good and evil and change in the face of really tough circumstances, like we all do. Its much less drastic but relevant to people today,i wrote earlier how amazed I was by these people, their ingenuity, and since then I have tried to see another side to the story. There is no right side, we are all human. My teacher keeps retooling me stories of herlife as I tell hermine and each time a think how can I possibly try to excision the greed in america our what not she reasons with a story exactly like mine or tells me of the drastic problems with alcoholism here, or I go hang out with freddy who taught me how he mcgivered a lighter into a drill, and he walks away for a min to go do a line. Even though I have always known it I have wanted to believe their is one right way, one good people, somewhere where they have it figured out, but I think we just have to work everyday to be the people we want to be.

Best christmas ever

Guatemala has a holiday called "day of the kids" for it we taught random kids how to slack line, parents play this wierd game where they compete to feed their grown children a bottle the fastest while the children are dressed in as many layers as possible, barney music plays on the tv all day long, children get cerviche and whatever else they want for meals, and the kids don't have to do any work all day. Pretty rad

No leche in la noche

So I got sick for the first time after having my first smoothie in a gringo bar but more interesting was my host grandfathers explanation of why it made me sick:

Supposedly milk is not the problem.milk is fine if you drink it warm in the mornings but during the winter, which it is here, at night, you can't have cold milk? Still not sure why but apparently this is a well know fact. Kind of cool,

Suggested Listening, sorry you have to copy and paste the link for now

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vDf5eUkLUnU
i am putting my videos on facebook, i just cant post them here

Going out with a bang... or not

"What exactly is a post tropical cyclone"

So on what I thought was going to be my last day in san pedro i tried to shove as much possible experiences in as I could.

On my last day of class my teacher asked me if I would go with her to a catholic brotherhood fiesta thing because her other friend she would ask was too peppy and as I speak little spanish I am generally a good  bet to be pretty freakin quite when surrounded by solely spanish and ancient myan speakers.

We walked to her house to grab me some bottled water because she knew I would get sick if I drank coffee made of regular water and then headed up another hill to the party.once we got close the path was covered with fresh pine needles to stop the dirt and dust from picking up and giving it a nice clean smell and fancy look.we were greeted by some of the brothers and sat at one of like five picnic tables and immediately served soup and tamalitos by other brothers and we sat and ate in relative silence while every 15 min or so they signaled everyone to plug their ears and set off a bomba which is exactly like a firework without any of the fire yet all and more of the bomb like noise and according to my host mom "only a couple of them are real bombs like in iraq" apparently she had no reservations in joking about bombs in a relatively unsafe country wroth a fairly ignorant gringa:) . Also apparently only the catholics in Guatemala set off bombas as the christians have something against them, luckily for me I lived across the street from the main catholic church in town and got to celebrate with bombas nearly every night.

After we finished eating I got a bag to take my leftover chicken to my favorite little shoe shine boys and we left.and that was it people filtering in and out for 25 min at a time and eating and leaving, sort of strange but cool at the same time.

For my second party of the day I went to the isreali house for yam kapur.there are about as many israelis in san pedro as Guatemalans and I figured I should experience their biggest holiday while I had the opportunity. On my way I passed my local buddy freddy no kruger who gave me crap for going cause he wasnt a huge fan of the israelis because they consistently won't even talk or acknowledge the locals and although they will spend a shit ton on food and hostels they will never buy from the locals only other isrealis.so as I left freddy tells me I can't fall for an isreali at this party I have to stick with the myans,i told him I would try.

At least in san pedro it wasn't that hard. I sat with some people that did a great job of explaining to me how the sky opens up every year at this time and the world is judged so if you have wronged someone in the past year you need to have already asked for forgiveness because if the person doesn't forgive you it doesn't count that you asked. I ate some delicious isreali food and amazing fresh isreali bread. After the feast we went over to a tent being built by quatemalans because they were not allowed to work on that day. the tent was segregated by a sheet into men a woman and the sermon performed in hebrew. It was very interesting but unlike the locals who are incredibly welcoming and friendly, I stood around alone for probably half an hour before anyone said anything or even acknowledged I was there, also unlike most guatemaltechos everyone spoke perfect english.

My final fiesta of the day was my first quinceanera, which I had helped make over 2,000 tamales for the night before. Except for the loop of 4 quinceanera songs this was almost exactly the same as my first quatemalan fiesta of the day. No pine needles because it was at a really nice house with grass, and with the additional blessing of the birthday girl, nearly 1,000 people passed through and quickly and relatively quietly ate then left.

I moved out of my homestay the next morning and the hurricane hit, mudslides closing off every route out of town. So started my departure from san pedro.

Offspring: the official sound of guatemalan independence day!

I am goldie locks and I found my just right!

Man so cool! I came to guatemala with no idea I was landing on election day or that independence day was two days later.additionally I chose to come to san pedro because it was the cheepest for language school, the classes were in a garden overlooking a huge lake and I saw a recommendation online, but I had no idea it would be such an amazing and perfect culture in my eyes.

I have fallen in love with the banana pancake trail and those who travel it, travelors are in constant community and I am considered high matnience so its like finding potential best friends everywhere.everyone lives in the moment, they live the life they want to live every moment and they don't let anything stop them.with that said I think I also took this trip with the hope of being more than just a travelor,i planned everything in the hope of building relationships with the people of the places I visit and learning about their lives and what real solutions would look like.its like god dropped san pedro in my lap and said "here, this is the life you want"

San pedro is like the perfect mix of both worlds.for example today was independence day.last night I stood on the balcony outside my room as hundreds of people ran down my street and around the center of the city over and over carrying poles with tin cans on fire attached to the top singing some sort of independence day anthem.after they finished they had a presentation in the town square/basketball court and ran around the town like ten more times.i saw this because I was walking home from hanging with travelors and literally ran into it needing no planning or arranging.at breakfast my family told me there was a parade and a music competition today so in the morning I asked my teacher if we could go to the parade and we did with only a few other gringos, all of whom were students and watched this amazing parade of kids wearing anything from jesus costumes to dresses made from dorito bags, marching bands with capes, and little boys with painted on mustashes.the dad in my family takes pictures of tourists when he travels because they are so uncommon in local centers. After school me and my roommates went to the basketball court for the competition and stood outside in the rain for 4 hours barely being able to see with literally the entire town and maybe 4 other gringos. One of my favorite bands played offspring "the kids aren't all right" and I think it is so much better as marching music, they also set off legit fireworks that exploded in they sky above as the marched and played around it. the whole court filled with smoke as the kept matching and you could see the reflection of the fireworks on the wet ground as they played,so cool!Later that night we went to hang out with some of my favorite travelors and I asked them what they had done for the holiday; they had mostly slept, hung at the hostel and eventually walked around town.i was like awesome, you see the cool statue in the park of st pedro? They were like no, where is that? And I realized how lucky and happy I was that I was able to be in the middle of so much local culture while also feeling so welcome with the traveling culture.i told them they had to see the rest of town and I would take them If they wanted, but they weren't sure about walking the hill;)

The worms and what they make

And one last Tur-duck-en

The hill!

My house is at the top and everything else is at the bottom, Good thing my bag only weighs 50lbs

Free range Tur-duck-en

Studying with a kindergartner

For the worms

Today we visited an organic coffee farm/processing plant, honey farm, composting facility and natural dye association.i was obviously super interested and learned so much about how to make fertilizer and I think it could definitely be possible for kids on a dump so that's super exciting and I learned so much about the difficulties of exporting fully produced coffee which was so interesting, its all about little farmers being connected,because otherwise you need a big plant to process enough coffee in the final stages of roasting and grinding to make enough to export.but I know much more now and when I talked to my spanish teacher about it she said an association across the lake introduced mushroom production and its super easy for busy woman that take care of the house as well, no training necessary, and an excellent export so I am looking into visiting them and learning about that, as it could be a great resource!

I got to ride in the back of a caged pick-up truck to the association, it was like the scene in the titanic where they go to front of the boat and spread their arms, so exhilarating, and exciting, and like the taxi of guat, sounds good to me.

San Pedro = Love

In central america central time seems to  mean any time you want.

My tab is my clock and it knows I'm in guatemala because it keeps changing my server or browser to spanish:( but after sleeping for 12 hours when I get up at 10am for breakfast I'm told my free breakfast is over because they are in their own time zone and it is really 11am, so I buy pasta for breakfast.ricardo did a great job and right on time my shuttle comes straight to the hostel and we drive 3.5 hours to san pedro.i ride next to the coolest person I have ever met and we arrive in the most beautiful town I have ever seen. Again my driver takes me right up to my destination and my host mother walks me to my new home. It is seriously nothing like I expected big and homey and she slowly explains everything to me in spanish,i think I understand like half of what she says but she is so patient and kind its like she is willing me to understand and I think its working. She has three daughters and no sons and with me she has three more temporary girls so her husband is the only guy but he is just like her patient and kind, they have the closest thing to an aura I have ever experienced, when you are here you just relax.the town is the same way all steep cobblestone roads overlooking a huge beautiful lake a 5 min walk away.one of the other temporary family members is here volunteering as a myan culture teacher, she speaks perfect spanish and english and acts happily as a home teacher, she is my kindered spirit lol.after an amazing dinner she walks us all around town to the"bars"that play movies and close at 11 and the churches that are constantly setting off fireworks, at night everyone, locals and gringos alike, just go outside and walk around town. I have more people bother me or make cat calls or anything in the states not once since I have been in san pedro have I heard anything uncomfortable, the most I have been made uncomfortable is today when like the oldest man in town who is like 90 years old, nearly blind and with only 4 teeth tricked me into kissing him on the lips. we were saying goodbye to him and he asked each of us to give him a kiss on the cheek which is normal but because he is almost blind he needs to hold your hands and then your face and he just turned mine towards his and kissed me, and did the same to my friendbut it was only playful and absolutely not perverse.i walked into the hostel and the owner recognized me from my less than 24 hours in antigua and said of course I could swim in the indoor pool anytime no problem I was a vip guest i could do anything I wanted at his hostel, everyone is friends with everyone. I love this place.

It begins

if you want to see more just look on facebook its seems to be super hard to upload to the blog but no problem to facebook.

Un gato negro-good thing I know animals, colors, and numbers

Somehow we make it to the airport just 5 mins late, so early my time, and we start looking for a guy holding a board with my name on it. ricardo (couch surfer) talks to the shuttle drivers while I stand around looking lost and for my board, ricardo finds my shuttle but knows way more than i do and that even if I get to antigua I might not make it to san pedro my final destination because most shuttles have shut down for elections so he and the shuttle driver decide my fate and call the school and ricardo my savoir was right no shuttles will go to san pedro today so I have to stay in antigua. ricardo offers to drive me to antigua and get me set up there and even though I'm still a little worried about relying on someone I barely know I'm more worried about going to antigua on my own unable to communicate.so back in ricardos car I go.we stop at this awesome restaurant over looking antigua that has amazing sculptures everywhere and its this crazy mix of super classic marble sculptures and uber modern and kind of weird sculptures (pictures are coming,i just need to figure out a way to upload them) the food is super fancy and delicious and on top of it ricardo won't let me pay for anything so its free.afterwards we go to antigua and look for hostels and we find one he was told is gringo city (un gato negro), and it is. I feel like l walked into a hooka bar in boulder, bob marley is playing and the hostel worker has dread locks.ricardo has him show me around, then calls my shuttle and arranges them to pick me up directly at the hostel.i say goodbye to ricardo my life line and sleep for the first time in two days.

10th anniversary of 9/11 and election day in Guatemala

Started the day being told I looked like all those girls you see in the movies that go on vacation and get lost and then killed, "oh ya a horror film" but ended being coned to kiss a waiter/hostel worker on the cheek so I could eat my soup in the internet room, better right...?

So I get through customs with half an hour till my shuttle leaves, but i am meeting a stranger/internet friend (couch surfing) to tour the city for what should have been 3 hours if my flight got in at 6:30 instead of 10:30.like a champ and thanks to my sis emailing him at 3am he is right outside wearing bright red like he promised and when security asks me where I'm going I point him out and they say "oh a friend"and for a moment I think, am I making a huge mistake? He is very nice and we put my stuff in his car and I get in and now I'm thinking"shit too late now".we have half an hour till I need to be on a shuttle and are now driving away from the airport where it will be. thank goodness he is organized and a genuinely great person, he takes me to a nice grocery store since we don't have time for anything more and refuses to let me pay for anything.we head back towards the airport after a quick tour of the city but did I forget to mention not only have I been flying all day in memory of the 10th anniversary of 9/11 but its election day in guatemala which is a bit different than the US...

Problem 1. Increased security meaning even more young boys packing ak47s than the usual shit ton more than I'm used to

Problem 2.traffic is stopped outside voting stations, which happen to be on route to the airport

Problem 3.to be continued...

Fun fact or two about election day in guatemala: parking is free on this day only, Rigoberta who I'm working with is running for president, alcohol is not sold or consumed for two days so everyone can have a clear head when voting, oh and shuttles don't run.

Leaving on a jet plane pics

in the car

at the airport