That kid in Guate

Today we went to el Finca del Zapote. El Finca del Zapote is an old farm that is not so much about the farm but the landscape in it. There were oases like ponds scattered around a piece of land at least 10 acres big. The main pond was about 15 feet deep at the deepest and was surrounded by shade, beautiful, exotic plants. This was the swimming pond that had a rope swing and a diving board. The best part of the whole thing was the rope swing because it was set up so that you jumped of a 6.5 foot platform with the rope so you could get pretty high. Some people could do back flips off it. I managed to get half a back flip where I landed on my face, then ... read more

Around this time of year various churches will start making something called fombras. Fombras look like carpets because they display them on the floor but what they really are, are colored saw dust formed into patterns on a blanket of yellow saw dust. It is really amazing because if you think about how careful you have to be. For example, once you are 1/2 way done and you screw something up that you did 1/4 of the way through, you can’t fix it. The way they make it is by making a wooden frame and then filling it up, including the patterns, starting a one end and working to the other. The frames are too wide to simply reach across without putting weight on the sawdust and there fore screwing it up. So if you or ... read more

Today our ant and uncle come to visit us with our grandma. Most importantly they brought us out baby cousin who was born just a few weeks after we came here. She is the cutest baby on the planet. The whole time she was here she only cried for maybe 20 minuets and she was here for a week. Wile they were here we mostly just relaxed and talked. We did a lot of whispering instead of talking because the baby took maybe 3 or 4 naps a day so we always ad to be very quiet. The 2 places we did go were Lake Atitlan and Chichicastenango. At the lake we just laid out by the pool and enjoyed the sun. In chichi it was totally different. First of all every street is one way ... read more

For the past week we have been getting ready for school to start on the 14th. Our tutor has done all of the registration work and had to stand in line for a total of close to 6 hours. She had to do all this just to pay tuition and get our books and school supplies list. The first day when she went to the school she waited for over 2 hours in line to get us registered. The next day she waited maybe 1/2 hour to pay tuition and get our school supply lists. That same day we went to the market to buy the school supplies. We went to a very small little store and started reading off the list to the lady behind the counter. This was not an office max were you ... read more