First update from Guatemala

Dear world,

I made it to Guatemala! Today was my first full day and it's been very eventful so far. Jessie, the other girl who is interning for HSP with me, and I flew into Guatemala City yesterday afternoon and were picked up by a few people from the program who found us in the airport by writing our names on notebook paper. It made me feel cool. We took a van from Guatemala City to Queztaltenango (also called Xela), which was only a slightly terrifying 4 hour ride. There seem to be no lanes, road signs, traffic rules, or speed limits in this country, meaning the only goal while driving is to not die. We sped through the mountains at warp speeds and somehow managed to avoid careening over the cliffs, sometimes by about 4 inches or so. But they seemed to know what they were doing, the scenery was pretty, and I passed out for the majority of the trip. The mountain areas remind me a lot of Rio - there are tons of houses just built straight into the mountain sides, seemingly on top of one another. Oh, and while in Guatemala City I saw a man completely covered in green paint running around on the highway dodging traffic, and another guy sleeping facefirst (I assume sleeping?) across the middle of the sidewalk. Guatemala City seems like a great place.

We finally made it to Xela and to the AMA house, where Jessie and I are staying - the house has offices for the people who work for AMA (Asociacion de mujeres antiplanos) and rooms. It's a really cool building with open courtyards and a few bedrooms scattered around. The town is nice, the streets are really narrow, all the buidings are kind of connected, and theres a little "central park" down the road. I'll upload pictures if my internet will ever connect. For some reason Jessie's computer will connect to the internet but mine refuses. So I've been using hers to communicate with the outside world. The people staying in the house are me, Jessie, and a guy named Tony who is filming two documentaries here. One is for HSP to kind of show what the organization does and how it helps people, and one is about human rights violations in Guatemala. Ok we're going eat dinner, I'll write about what I've been doing today later!

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Part of trip: Highland Support Project Internship

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