mi cumpleanos en guate

hola everyone!

as i celebrate my 23rd birthday here, i miss everyone a lot! i'm still having a great day but i miss my birthday spankings from my family (haha non-abusive), and all the phone calls from my aunts.

since updating you last life has been really great here. still hanging out a lot because the town is celebrating la feria still. i ended up going on the ferris wheel again, this time not as scary but still made mi estomago sink. the weather has been fantastic since sunday, now only getting rain in the afternoon, which is very common for the wet season. i have met all the gringos here now, two from canada, and three peace corps workers. last night at the feria not only was i there with jorgina, my host sister, but Dona Hilda (my host mother!) came!! she is absolutely adorable and it was more hilarious at the fair. she went in the bumper cars with kevin, and then she played foosball with kevin, franz and i. it was so surreal looking across the foosball table with 6'2" Franz and 2 feet shorter old, beautiful guatemalan woman. haha what a cool experience.

another highlight of the past two days was that yesterday we talked a lot with Charlie, who is a Peace Corps worker with AMMID, our NGO we are working with. We wanted to talk about our potential projects for the summer since we wanted to first find out what the people want. This week (starting at 5:30 am tomorrow) we are helping with the rain water catchment project in a nearby part of comi. basically, its a giant hollow cement ice cream cone in the ground and it will collect a lot of water in the wet season, to be used to water crops in the dry season (then guatemalans arent at risk of losing their crops and having to go to the coast to make little to no money). there is also a strong support for the clay pot water filters, and Lauren, another Peace Corps worker, is helping us with that. hopefully most of the containment work will finish this week, and then we can do the filter work. We also want to fix Dona Hilda's biodigester which has a popped bag because a drunk driver ran into her house. Hopefully, this wont cost much, but I think it might. Finally, AMMID got a lot of funding to continue the stoves that kevin worked on last summer. they are safer because all the smoke is sent outside the house so people aren't breathing in unhealthy fumes.

sorry, im typing fast but i dont want to be a ball hog with the computer. we are at the peace corps workers house now and she is making a carrot cake for us! we are going to hike to a waterfall today, then have a special lunch at home-Dona Hilda makes great chuchitos, and then hopefully we are having a birthday celebration with the gringos at Charlie's house later. should be a great day! thank you for reading!

mi amor,

lowra :)

mi estomago lleno, corazon contenta

hello to all! i have made it safely to comitancillo, guate which is where i will be for the duration of my trip, aside from a few weekend jaunts. this phrase is a common guatemalan phrase that my host mother, hilda, taught me. it means my stomach full, heart content. comitancillo is a great little town and it took a lot to get us here. we left guatemala city the day of the death at volcano pacaya (which we saw the night before, lava and all) and spent the night in xela. xela is a pretty big city about 3 hours from comi and it is very popular for people to come to xela to learn spanish. they have intensive spanish classes and they are all over guatemala. there are about 16 UD students in xela this summer and we ended up running into two of them! it was great to hang out with some flyers down here. we will be returning to xela the weekend of the 12th to watch the Copa Mundial (world cup) so that will be fun. many guatemalans cheer for brazil, not mexico.

leaving xela in the pouring rain (it started POURING friday morning and stopped early this morning-over 48 hours of heavy heavy rain) we took a chicken bus to San Marcos. i was sitting next to a really interesting guatemalan who now lives in LA but was visiting family in Antigua. we talked for almost the entire 1.5 hour trip. i love being able to practice my spanish so much. he was really wise and made parallels between dancing and believing in God. kinda cool.

then we took another chicken bus, about 2 hours, from San Marcos to Comitancillo. I bought my first guatemalan merienda (snack) at the bus stop and they were yummy strawberry pie cookies. so i enjoyed them for the second bus ride. when we arrived in Comi, still rain pouring, we still had about a mile hike UP a hill. this would have been an intense walk with each of us having two bags, i have the giant travel backpack. luckily, not only was one of their red scooter taxis available, but somehow by an act of God, we fit our three bodies and all of our bags in this taxi. this taxi is no bigger than a golf cart. we are still amazed we all fit. thank goodness or we would have been severely wet.

after the taxi ride up the hill and lots of laughing, we arrived at Doña Hildas casa (¡yay for Spanish keyboards!) she is our host mom and hosts all of the people coming to help AMMID. we have our own clubhouse which is a room of bunk beds near an outdoor bathroom and shower (yes, i have to pee in the dark at night, it is so scary but im challenging myself to either be brave or try and fall back to sleep when i have to pee). the clubhouse is amid Hidas farm and she has every crop. it smells strongly of cilantro, which i love. they also have pigs oinking near us, making for a great summer ambience.

Hilda has three kids that I have met so far. Jorgina, 10, is an absolute riot. She is so goofy but talkative and fun. I love her relationship with Kevin, who spent last summer with her. Irbin, 15, is really nice, too. Much less talkative than Jorgina but very nice and considerate. I also met Armando who I think is 20, and we havent really talked. But, what a great family to have in my life this summer. Hilda cooks meals for us when we don’t want to eat in the village, and she is a great mom figure for this summer (Non, I miss you!).

During the rain yesterday, we walked into town (back down the giant hill) and met Lauren, who is doing healthcare work for the Peace Corp in Comitancillo. She is a great girl, very nice and seems to really love her volunteer job. She wants to help us with our water filter project, so I think this week we are going to go with her to meet potters to see who can help us make the pots. We also met Charlie who is the Peace Corp worker for AMMID. He is very nice, too, and he is also a Buckeye. GO BUCKS!

AMMID doesn’t open until Thursday, haha, so we will probably be slow to get things rolling with our work, but its ok because this gives us time to get to know the community and the people. Also, we are currently in a 3 day festival for Mary, so the town is hyped about that. There was supposed to be a desfile (parade) for the start of the festival yesterday, but that has been postponed till tomorrow. Kinda a fun way to start our time in Comi, though.

We just went to Sunday Misa (mass) this morning and that was a hoot. It wasn’t in the normal room, which is much bigger, so we were crammed into a smaller room, all standing. It overflowed into the outside where the market was going on. They had all these candles lit for Mary, which made things even hotter than the normal body heat of people standing next to each other. This had an effect on all the babies, I felt so bad for them, and many cried throughout mass. Luckily, mass is in Spanish and not Mam their Mayan language. Also, we gringos were so obviously gringo by our height alone. We, even I, towered over EVERYONE. I was taller than the tallest man at mass. And, it’s a hoot how people stare at us. Comi people are known for staring blatantly at gringos, so I just smile, say HOLA and then they giggle. Haha I love it.

My Mam phrase of the day (trying to learn a new one each day): Wah hey ka pey…This means I WANT COFFEE!!!

In the internet café and Hey Soul Sister is playing. Sigh, a bit of home. Don’t know how often I will get to Internet, but there are Internet cafes in the town. Sorry this was long but I hope you enjoyed it. Please leave me comments and let me know how you are doing, or send me an email!

As they say goodbye in Mam, koon hey (but you have to be really throaty with the pronunciation, haha, Mam is a very throaty language)

Koon hey,

Lowra Betty…Ñ¡¿ ooo I love Spanish keyboards

here are the pictures, hopefully

i also included one of Franz teaching Oscar

hoy es el miercoles

hola todos,

i have a bit more time to write to you now. the kids, ten of them, are all studying right now because they are home schooled. two of them have tests today, which their mother Cynthia administers, and currently Kevin is distracting Stephen by having him help him read a Spanish childrens book to improve his spanish. Kevin and Franz have done a great job communicating in Spanish. they made it sound like they knew nothing at all but the kids and family are understanding them well.

all the family wants us to at least stay till Saturday, when they are having a birthday celebration for their littlest, Felipe, but we need to get to Comi. they are having a pinata and it sounds like a blast. i would love to spend the whole summer with them because they are incredible, so full of energy and love, and so much fun. today, we are going to Antigua around lunch time. i have been there before, it is the city where mile 0 is and its very touristy, but pretty and historic. we are also going to try and find cell phones so i might be able to call home.

after lunch yesterday, Cynthia found out that Franz knew how to play the violin, so she asked him to teach Leroy how to play. we had fun listening, franz was really good, and leroy was getting better. i also gave them the games that i brough them, including coloring books, frisbees, velcro ball throw, play doh, those pills that grow into foam creatures in water, bubbles and cards. everyone had fun trying out these new toys.

last night we went to Erick´s Evangelical church (not only is the Estrada father a doctor but he is a pastor). and we basically had 1.5 hours of praise and singing. it was really neat. we got in large circles and said prayer intentions for all the church ministries, we sang A LOT, and we (kevin, franz and i) were also introduced as guests. we each had to say our name over the microphone, haha.

this morning we woke up and had breakfast consisting of mashed beans, corn tortilla, hot dogs with a sauce of tomatoes, sweet peppers and onions, fried plantains, and of course cafe. Felipe was a hoot this morning. he came into the kitchen, jumped on Franz, and commented on his ¨barbacoa¨ and ¨pelito¨ (short haired beard). he then touched his hole face and laughed about his adams apple. then he observed that kevin had longer hair than Franz, haha. Then, the UD boys, Juan Carlos, Felipe and I all played two card games, memoria and this fun matching addition game. i will have to teach people when i come back. its no euchre, but i still enjoy it.

the pics above include my Favorite Juan Carlos...so freakin adorable. and the other is of me, Oscar, Isaiah, Diego and Sandra. These pics were taken while Franz and Leroy were playing the violin. Felipe had a lot of fun with my camera.

well, i am peacing out, but thank you for reading my blog, i hope its entertaining for you!

platanos fritos,
lowraaa

ya llegue!

i made it, im with the estradas and i will update more luego because right now i have a naranja in one hand so its hard to type...but we have had a yummy lunch where i ate spaghetti noodles with a spoon, we played frisbee, cards, bubbles...and juan carlos is as adorable as i remember...the 5 kids i havent met are a joy. they are so sweet to me and they fit right in with the family...ALSO!!! i have gotten to speak spanish alllll afternoon, and im not half bad! love u all!!! besos y abrazos, loWra (i love how spanish speakers say mi nombre)

adios USA!

So, I leave in two days. TWO DAYS. yay! I am so very excited, really not nervous, but sad to say goodbye to people for a long time. BUT, when you read my blog and leave comments, it will be as if we are having a never-ending convo!

I am really proud of myself because I accomplished a lot so my life won't be as hectic when I return from Guatemala. I have mostly everything picked out that I am moving with me to Wisconsin, and I have gotten all of my furniture so I can sit down in my new apartment.

Now, I just need to pack and say my goodbyes! I saw a lot of people Friday night (and some awesome people in Vegas a few days earlier) and it was so wonderful, and just reminded me how every time my friends and I reunite it will be wonderful and feel as if our conversation really never ended.

I got an email from the Estradas (I love confirmation), the family who is picking the three of us from the airport on Tuesday, so hopefully we will connect with them in Guatemala City and I can see all of my Guatemalan children, like Juan Carlos and Stephen and Leroy! Maybe I will even be able to see the medical clinic that my grandpa and uncle helped to set up and build down there. Seeing this family will be a great way for me to re-introduce myself to Guatemala before we head west to Comitancillo for our ETHOS projects! They speak English and Spanish so I will be able to transition to speaking Spanish.

What I am looking forward to most after I step off the plane: SPEAKING ESPANOL. It hit me the other day how much I LOVE speaking Spanish. And how much I thrive on communicating in another language. Entonces, voy a hablar tan mucho como posible.

Well, off to lay by the pool on this beautiful day in Cincinnati. Hopefully next time you hear from me, I will be in Guatemala. Have a great summer everyone, I love you all so much!

Me encanta el sol,
Lowra :)

QUINCE

dias hasta Guatemala. That's right, I leave in 15 days! That's two weeks from tomorrrow. That's 3 times 5 days. I'm very very excited but still hasn't hit me that I am going to Guatemala for that long. It might be because I'm trying to organize all of my college stuff, decide what I'm moving to Wisconsin (where my full-time August start job is), get things together for my apartment lease (yes, I officially have a Wisco address!) and get ready for a two day trip to Vegas-all before May 25th. Haha, at least all of this is good though!

I am writing this post because I was inspired by my friend Meggie to write more often. She is headed to Central America this week and for a longer period of time. I am so proud of her, and we have promised each other we will travel together once she is back in the USA. Thank you for your inspiration, Megs!

One thing I have to do is pack gifts for the Estrada family (people I visited during my first trip to Guatemala in 2007) as well as gifts for the children and families in Comitancillo. Any ideas???

Hasta pronto,
Lowra :)