Hola erstmal. Sprachschule ist kurz gesagt cool aber anstrengen. Muss noch viel lernen aber es ist schon eine kleine Verbesserung erkennbar. Xela wird von Tag zu Tag cooler. Hat viele Parks, kleine Restaurantes und Bars und vor allem gibts hier richtigen Kaffee....sonst hats bisher immer nur Instant-Bruehe gegeben. Schon komisch, im Land wo der Kaffee waechst trinkt man Instant-Coffee weil der meiste Kaffee nach Europa verkauft wird....bei den Fruechten ebenfalls, waehrend es hier gerade Probleme wegen einer schwachen Ernte und dadurch entstehnde Hungersnot gibt werden Obst und Gemuese exporti [View Full Entry]

---

---

Yes, it´s true! I finally figured out how to get to and from school from my family in two different ways, and then on Saturday morning I moved! The other place was OK, but I was hoping for a place near Zona Tres (3) where San Marcos is, and with kids. Well, I have found it, and its only about two blocks from the school. A young couple moved into this house (Helen and Olger) and they have a baby daughter of a few months called Eliza. Helen also has two sisters living close by (Maciel and Norma) with spouses, and [View Full Entry]

---

---

Holaaaaaa amigos :) YES! Now I admit it! I'm a bit crazy!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I know that some of u already know that but still...now it's official. For those who are still wondering why...keep reading... We decided to go to Quetzaltenango, or for short, "Xela" cause we met two funny australian guys in Mexico...they told us for Santa Maria volcano which is 3772m high and can be climbed year round! Its eruption in 1902 was one of the three largest eruptions of the 20th century! And why did we wanted to hike it? Cause it is possible to climb to the top of [View Full Entry]

---

---

Xela (sh-ela) is at around 2200m and gets very chilly at night. The big draw that brought us to Xela was to hike up the dormant volcano Santa Maria which stands at just over 3700m and peer down upon the active volcano Santiaguito (2500m) to watch its hourly eruptions. Eduardo was our man to lead this compelling adventure. Apparently he’s a famous character as he was proudly telling us of the personal mention he gets in the tours section of the Guatemalan Lonely Planet. It was a convenient 5am start as Eduardo and his wife Marta also ran the hostel that [View Full Entry]

---

---

Beep, beep. Beep, beep. I raise my hand from beneath the sheets and into the freezing cold air of our room. In a quick flash the silence returns, but the damage is done. We are awake. It´s 4.30am in Quetzaltenango (Xela to the locals), deep in the Guatemalan highlands - hence the cold conditions. Today we climb a volcano! We fumble about as we dress in a semi-state of sleep, made even more difficult by the dim bulb no brighter than candle light. We pull on the layers - vest, long sleeve top, jumper, t-shirt, hoody, combats, woolly hat, the obligatory [View Full Entry]

---

---

Quetzaltenango, 07-02-1990. A taxi got us to the foot hills of the Santa Maria Volcan. We had a quick look at The pueblecito called Almolonga which was inhabited by indigenous people, their women still wearing colorful indian clothing, their men the more tradional cowboy stuff with huge sombreros. The hike up to the Santa Maria Volcan top was great but tiresome and took us most of the day. Some local families beat us to it and were already waiting up there with water and food. They seemed to have gone up there to pray to one of their deities, we decided [View Full Entry]

---

---

now, i'm convinced that i'm not going to remember everything that happened in the past week, but i'm going to do my best here: so wrapped up my studies at the language school here in Xela which was great. There was a graduation ceremony and all the other students and teachers showed up. The students were in charge of bringing the food while the staff would bring the drinks. Well, since I don't know how to cook anything, and luckily another friend of mine doesn't either, we went in on a massive pizza together which was a huge hit. After that [View Full Entry]

---

---

so on friday i leave for Colomba where i will have probably limited internet access, so the next time i'll be able to post won't be until i'm in el salvador. It's crazy to think i'm 1/3 done with my semester abroad. My group and I took part in a Mayan Ceremony on tuesday which was fairly interesting. Later we found out what our Mayan symbols were. I'm not entirely sure what to make out of all of it. I was only able to understand bits and pieces but apparently my metal is silver, i have headaches daily and cramps once [View Full Entry]

---

---

well let's see, i believe the last time i posted i hadn't done the following: We all woke up at around 5:30 in the morning last saturday to hike up Chicobal, which is a volcano in Xela with a lake in the crater. the hike wasn't that bad. it started off being freezing (the mornings here are actually really cold), but once we were about half way up it started to warm up. There were some pretty great landscape shots. When we got to the lake there was an indigenous group singing along the shore, so we didn't want to venture [View Full Entry]

---

---

Okay, let’s see what has happened so far. We left Guatemala City at around 8:30 on Wednesday and got in to Xela around 1:30 or so. We had lunch here and had a little bit of class with our country coordinator. We went out to the markets and split into groups to buy food, clothes, school supplies, and medical supplies with 25 quetzales each. Apparently 25 quetzales is the average daily income for rural Guatemalans. I’m not sure what that translates into for dollars, but I think it’s really really not much. So I was in the group that was to [View Full Entry]

---

---