These are a bunch of kids from Stephen's neighborhood anxiously awaiting his arrival at a surprise housewarming party we had for him last weekend. Unfortunately...he wasn't very surprised. Apparently when you invite a bunch of kids to a surprise party, it doesn't stay a surprise for very long.

Here are some random thoughts and sights from the past week.

Last week at the produce market in Jalapa I found two rare finds: spinach and Brussels sprouts! Yum! I'd never seen either of them in Guate before. And as much as I love broccoli, cauliflower and cabbage, it's always nice to have a little more vegetable variety in my diet. Mom sent me some brussel sprout seeds, which I'm excited to give a try in my garden this year.

On Sunday I went to two parties: a quince anos in the morning, and a 50th wedding anniversary in the afternoon. Both parties were preceded by a mass, so I got a double dose of church. The first mass was in the cathedral in Jalapa, and was surprising in a number of ways. First, it started at 9am, sharp. Since when does anything start on time in Guatemala? (Apparently that's what the mom of the birthday girl was thinking too, because she went last minute to buy a dress for one of the damas and missed the first part of the service). The next surprise came during the New Testament reading, which was the story of Jesus's transfiguration. Instead of just reading it, they acted it out in the front of the sanctuary, and when they got to the part where Jesus is transfigured in front of his disciples, the man who was playing Jesus threw aside his blue robe to reveal blazing white pajamas, and they actually set off firecrackers! In the church! Only in Guatemala...

Both of the parties were pretty similar to, well, every other party that I've been to here in my village. Here's how it goes. You get to the house where the party is, find somewhere to sit and chat. If it's a big event, there will be balloons and streamers hanging up, and at least part of the floor will be covered with pine needles. Soon you'll be handed a square or rectangular Styrofoam plate holding three tortillas, rice, and some kind of meat in a red sauce. Then a Styrofoam cup holding super sweet coffee. Everybody eats in silence. Somebody brings out a couple of grain sacks to put the dishes in. If there's no dance, then people go home after a bit. If there is a dance, the guest of honor will dance the first dance, and then everybody else starts to dance too. However, there wasn't much dancing at either of the parties yesterday. A breaker blew at the first party after only a couple of songs, and then two drunk guys got in a fight serious enough to warrant pulling out their machetes. Luckily, I had already left by that time. The second party started late (for parties here), and I went home after dinner. Walking alone in the dark here is not recommended here, especially Sunday night when there are bolos (drunks) out.

One thing that I really find amusing about parties here is how much people like to videotape them. Although most people here don't have cameras, they always find somebody to come and record the party. What do they tape? Well, people eating silently. Then people dancing. Who watches these movies?

Here's a picture of Laurita, one of my favs from Pino Dulce, at her first communion last Thursday. Yup, that's right, I went to mass not once, not twice, but THREE times this week! I'm just about to turn Catholic.

¡Pintamos Un Mapa Mundial!

This week I've had the pleasure of working with a group of students from Michigan State University, who are here on an Alternative Spring Break trip. They all go to the same church, which organizes various mission trips every year. The first trip to Guatemala was organized by a volunteer in a site near me three years ago, and as volunteers have come and gone, organizing the trip got passed to me this year.

The finished product!

At first I wasn't sure what to do with them, but quickly settled on the idea of doing a world map project in one of the elementary schools that I work in. Rural schools in Guatemala are severely lacking in resources: there are no maps to be seen in the classrooms. And most Guatemalans can't even find Guatemala on a world map! So I thought this would be a great way to leave something lasting at the school that will help with the education of students for many years to come. It's in a prime location, right near a main road, so everybody in the community as well as passersby can easily see it. Also, the two teachers at the school (Julio and Hilda) have been very supportive of my work in the school, and I thought they would be easy to work with. And sure enough! Julio gave me the keys last week when I came to work with the kids, and assured me that he would have the school hooked up to electricity when I needed it.

Saturday Desiree (a volunteer who works nearby) came to help me paint the background. We scrubbed the wall with soapy water to get rid of the muddy soccer ball prints, then marked out a rectangle with masking tape. Unfortunately, the directions I was following were WAY off on the amount of paint we needed. We used up all of the white and half of the blue to paint that I had bought just to paint the ocean...and still left some parts a little bare.

Sunday evening the Michigan State crew arrived, about six hours late and with no luggage! (Luckily
they were able to get their luggage the next day with no trouble). After dinner in Parque Pino Dulce, I took them to the school, just a five minute walk away, to trace the map. With my laptop and a projector that I borrowed from another teacher, I thought we were all set to go. (Getting the projector the day before had been a small ordeal, requiring me to chase after not one but two buses!) But the electricity wasn't on when we got to the school. I ran over to the house of the neighbor who was supposed to hook us up for the night, to find the house dark. I hated to wake anybody up, but it was only 8pm, so I yelled "Buenas noches" a couple of times and soon had don Abel up and connecting the school to his electricity. Phew! In about an hour we had the whole map traced!

Monday morning it was up early to start painting. After getting the students started with yellow and red paint, I headed to town to buy more paint. By the end of the day all of the countries were painted in, plus a white border! Amazing!

Tuesday was more of the same, but even more fun because it was Carnival, or Fat Tuesday. Guatemalan children like to celebrate by cracking eggshells filled with confetti over each others' heads, and the kids at the school were eager to share this custom with us:) We got the kids involved by tracing and painting in their hands in a border across the top of the map. It required a bit of maneuvering to get the kids up that high, but it turned out great! We also numbered the countries 1-186, added the name of the school, the year, a Michigan State symbol, and the Peace Corps symbol...and voila! Mission accomplished! As for the accuracy of the map...there may have been a few Pacific islands omitted, but hey, we did the best we could with out limited resources:) The maps that we were using to label the countries weren't all that great (too small and a bit blurry), which made it a bit hard to label everything. I think that in the end it turned out pretty awesome! What do you think? A big shout out to the MSU students who made this world map a reality! Mil gracias!











Ariel and I trying to label the countries...

Birthday Week!

My second birthday in Guatemala didn't start out with a bang like last year. But honestly, I wasn't too sad that I wasn't woken up at 4:00am with firecrackers in my front yard like last year. It was a Monday just about like any other day. In the morning I prepared materials for my meetings this week and helped a group of women who make jam to sell, and in the afternoon I taught at the middle school and later attended a meeting with the village's health committee. When I came home, my host mom had prepared a special birthday dinner: chicken with a delicious red sauce (tomatoes, miltomates, red peppers, sesame seeds and pumpkin seeds are the secret ingredients) and rice with veggies. I knew she wouldn't have time to make a cake that day, so I took the liberty of making my own cake. Mango cake is definitely one of my new favorites! Probably my favorite part of the day was my host dad singing the Guatemalan version of Happy Birthday to me "Ya queremos pastel...." (We want cake!).

Tuesday morning I got up early with my host mom to go pick peas with her and her brother, sister, brother in law and nieces and nephews. It was an absolutely gorgeous day, though the pea plants were soaked from a rare summer rain the day before. Being my graceful self, I promptly slipped and fell on the slick ground and was soon soaked all the way through my jeans. We picked from 6:30am until 5:30pm with an hour or so break for lunch. Phew! It's funny, I've always loved to pick fruits and veggies: cherries, blackberries, strawberries, sweetcorn, you name it. The one thing I've always hated picking is peas. But somehow I enjoyed myself! It might have something to do with the fact that the peas are staked, so you can actually walk instead of crawl through the pea patch to pick...(just saying Dad!)

The other part of my birthday celebration didn't happen until Friday. I've been helping out the aforementioned group of women that makes jam since I moved here. They went to a workshop to learn how to make and can jam about a year and a half ago, and now there are eight of them who get together once a month or so to make jam and sell it. They're some of my favorite women here in my aldea- always laughing and joking . When I saw them on Monday they said that they had forgotten about my birthday, but that they wanted to make it up to me with a lunch sometime that week. What a nice end to the week!


This coming week promises to be a busy one. A group of college students are coming for an alternative spring break trip, and will be working with me to paint a world map on one of the schools that I work in. Wish us luck!