2 Month Special Feature

Dear faithful readers

I must apologize for the lapse in the regularly scheduled blogging. There is no excuse; I’ll just chalk it up to an unfortunate series of events.

First, here is the promised recap of the trip to Guatemala (unfortunately now more than 2 months ago).

I’ll preface this by saying that a week was not enough. I saw a lot but it felt like I was constantly moving, like I could never really sit down and relax and get to know the country. First stop was Antigua – quite the interesting place. It has interesting colonial style architecture and impressive ruins left over from past earthquakes but does not feel quite like “authentic Guatemala” due to the international vibe. It seemed that over half of the people encountered in the street were foreigners. Antigua served as a base to visit Volcan Pacaya, my first opportunity to see a volcano up close and personal (aka not on TV). Once we reached a certain point it seemed like Pacaya was devoid of life like Mars, except the rock is black and vents near the active zone were contributing steam to the morning mist. Our guide lead us far closer to the lava flows than you would ever be allowed to in the US, and some of my compatriots stuck their walking sticks in the lava to catch them on fire if they could manage to withstand the heat of being so close. It’s quite the otherworldly experience watching glowing red lava pass through the cracks beneath your feet. I found it hard to reconcile the slow progress of the lava with the destructive potential of the volcano, but it was easy to feel a profound respect for the ancient force of nature. From there we moved on to Lago Atitlan where we got a chance to see Maximon, the god of vice (sort of a blend of Catholic and indigenous Guatemalan traditions), for a price of course, and the wooden statue was very happy to accept gifts of guaro (cheap alcohol) and cigarettes according to the two guys sitting behind. From there it was over a 12 hour trip to the Mayan ruins of Tikal; not the most pleasant experience, but the ruins made the trip worthwhile. I am always fascinated with what ancient civilizations managed to accomplish without modern machines. I’m sure that the 60m pyramids are not all that impressive compared to those in Egypt, but it was amazing to be in the middle of the jungle, sitting almost at the top of one with my legs dangling off the side, and pondering what life was like there a thousand years ago when it was constructed. I couldn’t help but wonder if our civilization won’t someday fade back into the wilderness after we exhaust the Earth’s ability to sustain us.

Catching up

Back in November I had the opportunity to help transport some cows from one pasture to another on horseback. To be honest, I didn’t really help out much at all but it was amazing to get caught up in the excitement of it all and I didn’t even mind too much when the horse would suddenly take off at a gallop, nearly jolting me from the saddle. Actually the gallop was a lot less hard on the rear end than the next slower pace (canter maybe?).

Election Day this year was kind of sad; there was none of the excitement from the primary elections a year ago, and very little campaigning from what I could see. It seemed like most people in this community were resigned to the current situation. I would guess that less than one third of the community voted, despite last minute petitions of representatives from the mayoral candidates. The new president just took office so we will have to see how things turn out.

My eldest host brother is building his own house and I have been lending a hand here and there. Making adobes, while easier on the pocket, is a lot off work. Step 1: gather a significant amount of dirt and wet it to the right consistency. Step 2: dump in pine needles (to prevent the adobe from cracking as it dries) and mix them into the mud with your feet by stomping around as if you were crushing grapes for wine with your feet. Step 3 is the tedious job of hauling the mix to the mold and spending hours hunched over filling the mold, cautiously removing it, and starting over. I jumped in on steps 4 and 5, squaring the adobes off with a machete where they had slumped, and stacking the dried adobes to make room for more. The latter was quite a task and I was sore for days. It was pretty much just like the deadlifting I used to do way back in high school. I probably stacked around a hundred adobes a day (around 500 in total and thankfully they didn’t all dry the same week) and each one probably weighs around 50 pounds (although I might be off a little since it has been a while since I have been in a weight room). The foundation is nothing more (and nothing less) than a trench dug and filled level with rocks plastered together with mud. The walls are up now and only the doors, windows and roof (made of wood) are lacking. Watching the walls go up was interesting; the construction was just like working with bricks except instead of bricks it was significantly larger adobes and the “mud” was really mud. I can’t help but think how a house made basically of dirt (except for the cement lintels) would never last back home. A picture is worth a thousand words so for those of you who have facebook, check out the progress and I’ll try to get the new photos up soon. For those of you who do not, I again apologize.

Before I went home over Christmas and New Years I went through a rough week where I was substantially under the weather (I’ll spare you the details). During this time I developed the theory (obviously just based on personal experience and far from proven) that noise pollution is a concept that does not exist in this culture. I had already observed that many Honduras seem to think that louder is always better, but when I was just really trying to rest and my host sisters turned on the radio full blast it dawned on me. Add to that the fact that the week before my (previous – just kidding, we still get along) man’s best friend went into heat and it didn’t seem to really bother my fellow inhabitants of the house while I, however, passed several sleepless nights. I had never known just how lucky I was to have never experienced this before. It was as if the house was converted to a dog hotel and all of the neighborhood dogs (and some drifters) decided to stop and spend the night, and, after some heavy drinking, they all decided they were going to fight over the same girl.

Christmas and New Years were good but I again had to remind myself that home had not changed, I have changed. It was not anything I could specifically pin down but home just wasn’t the same. Probably the “reverse culture shock” that we as volunteers are warned about. As much as I was looking forward to snow, and it was beautiful, I’ve become more Honduran than I had thought and couldn’t bring myself to go out into it very often. In my defense, temperatures were below freezing just about the entire 2 weeks I was home (side note: it is cool to explain low temperatures to Hondurans because they usually have never felt them and because below freezing is “bajo cero grados” below 0 in Celsius which just sounds more impressive). I wound up taking most of the “snow pictures” I had promised my Honduran friends from the windows of the house – I know, how lame am I.

I felt somewhat vindicated when my mom came back with me to visit for a for a few days. I had been given some criticism by friends and family in the US for feeling cold when the temperature hit 60 (Fahrenheit) here in the community. However, this time I had to loan my sweatshirt to my mom. The truth is that when the wind howls and the temperature drops (even if the drop is only around 20 degrees) if you aren’t physically active the cold penetrates your very being because the houses are far from sealed and insulated. The wind comes in under the roof, through the shuttered windows, and even right through the door without even knocking.

Work update:

The water project: same old thing unfortunately

The electricity project: Funding came through for the first half of the project and the 2 communities closer to the highway know have public lighting. The only thing lacking is the house connections which the patronato (council assembled from the 2 town councils) does not want to allow the families to connect until the project is completed so that they do not stop supporting the project for the other 2 communities. Some people in my community are really angry that funds only came through for 2 communities when they have pulled a lot of the weight in getting the project to come through, but others are more understanding and see that electricity is now a few steps closer and that it is not likely that a project once started won’t be finished. When, however, is another thing altogether. Who knows, maybe I’ll be able to switch on the lights before I leave in September? Or maybe not.

And of courses classes will be starting again this month so things are looking up.

That’s all folks.