Feliz Noviembre!!

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Feliz Noviembre! The months keep passing along for I have been in Guatemala now for a little over 6 months! It is hard to believe yet as I think back to when I first arrived in April, I feel like almost a new person because I have completely changed my lifestyle in various aspects, my ways of thinking (literally since I find myself thinking in Spanish from time to time, hopefully someday in Kíche´, too), and to be back now in the Antigua area for this week has been a whirlwind of emotions and feelings. This area of Antigua is where I was living my first 3 months here in Guatemala.. with my most wonderful of a host family during our long, full packed days of training. It feels so strange to be back, but it has been such a blessing to stay and spend time with my host family again. Our nights are back to playing card games as well as a new addition.. rompe-cabezas (puzzles) of winnie the pooh and minnie mouse! I am going to teach them to make pizza tomorrow night as well as help my host sister with her English project of researching London on the internet and doing a little write-up! In turn she always helps me with my spanish and we have a very similar sense of humor and enjoy laughing and cracking jokes. It is nice to spend nights with people since usually they are spent alone in my house because everything shuts down in my village when the sun goes down around 6 or 6:30pm and I typically draw, practice yoga, knit then hit the sack (literally since I have been living in my sleeping bag the past few months) between 8-9pm everynight and awaking when the sun comes up around 6:30am. However I have no complaints for I have become quite fond of sleeping and awakening with the sun, it feels natural and I feel balanced for getting plenty of regular sleep as well as plenty of time for self-reflection, meditation and relaxation.

We are back here in Antigua for what is called Reconnect, to yes, reconnect wtih our other fellow volunteers, peace corps office staff, Spanish teachers and host families for those who chose to stay with them during this week. We have lunch with the Embassador tomorrow and get to ask him questions as well as be informed about current national policies in both the States and here in Guatemala and what that means for us and our work here. Today we had a presentation from a lady working here about natural birth control methods we can introduce to our villages since many methods of birth control and family planning are either unaccepted or not respected. It is a challenge we have to work with, but since many of these methods as well as other birth control methods commonly used in the States that we are familiar with are already being used and adminisitered in the health centers here, we are able to help educate womens groups and health promoters about the various options they have and why family planning is important, especially when many cannot afford an adequate amount or quality of food and clothes for all their children, nor to send them to school and pay for materials. We have been acquiring lots of materials about how to teach and educate about this, as well as receiving help from a local NGO about reproductive help. As for the remaining days of this week here in Antigua, we have spanish and mayan language classes then return back this weekend to our sites.

I actually have a new house waiting for me when I return.. they are finishing building the bathroom this week which I caught a glimpse of right before I left the other day, and to my surprise it is a beautiful tile bathroom and, wait for it.... complete with a shower! I had no idea I would be receiving this, and now I know why my ´´landlord´´ would not lower the price each month in which I am renting because all the work and elbow grease going into the bathroom. I still am unsure how the water situation will work out, but as of now it looks as if I will have a shower with running water which is rare in the village for only a small percentage can afford to have this. During the non-rainy season I recently learned that many of the wells that families rely on for their source of water dry up as do some of the smaller rivers thus forcing the mothers and daughters to walk about 30 minutes to a nearby community to gather water from the streams for drinking, washing their dishes and clothes, as well as bathing. Thus I feel extremely blessed and fortunate to have water, especially the work this family is going through to build a bathroom and connect a tube from their well so I can have water in the bathroom. There is a truck that drives by every wednesday selling firewood for my woodburning stove. I am excited to return to my village this sunday to a beautiful house which consists of 2 rooms conjoined with a half wall inbetween. One room in which I will finally buy a bed instead of sleeping on the floor, and the other room for cooking since it already has a plancha stove where I will be using firewood to cook my meals and my favorite part is has an accessible roof where I can stargaze! I live above 9,000 feet in a rural village with only a few lights which means the copious amount of stars in the night sky are brilliant and breathtaking to view from below.

My Halloween was one of the most magical experiences I think I have had.. I had the amazing opportunity to spend it in a town with a rich Mayan culture called Chichicastenango (Chi Chi) in the department of Quiche which is only a couple hours from my village. I went with my friend who is another volunteer here who knows and is friends with 3 Mayan Spritiual Guides that live in Chi Chi. We went and took part in a Mayan Ceremony where we hiked a little ways on the mountain, under the stars at night. Every part of it was beautiful, the sacredness of the fire with the various colored candles each representing something of the earth, cosmos, plants, day and night, as well as cacao beans which have a significant meaning for the Mayans since it used to be a currency for trade, as well as we used sugar, inscense, and tobacco for purification as we went through the 20 Nawales which also each have their own energy and significance. At specific times we moved around the fire in a circle to represent the circular motion of the earth and life in general how it is in a circle, always moving. It was beautiful to take part and watch these 3 brothers lead and guide, and what I love is that they do these ceremonies every 13 days, since 13 is a significant number for the Mayan culture as well since it is thought we have 13 energy systems. I also enjoyed ChiChi´s grand artesan market complete wtih music, food, and an overall lively spirit! I cannt wait to return someday in the future...

I have joined a couple organizations with other fellow peace corps volunteers within the last few weeks.. one group is a fundraising commite for our program (healthy homes) since we will be doing a lot of projects such as building stoves, floors, latrines, and water tanks in our second year. Peace Corps goals are to build sustainability within the communities in which we are working. We are not simply giving them these projects, but we are fundraising through local organizations, training health promoters and local construction workers on how to build and fund these projects as well as educate the health promoters about preventative health in order to try and create change in their current habits to reduce the illnesses and diseases we have been seeing among a rather large percentage of the people. Another side project a few volunteers and I are working on is making a sexual reproductive manual and workshop complete wtih materials and educational activies. This would mainly be geared toward giving to teenagers in the schools as well as teach the teachers so they can give them, too since they do not currently receive much if any education about sexual reproduction. Guatemala has been struggling with high teen pregnancy rates, transmission of sexual diseases and an overall lack of knowledge about hormones, menstruation, and what is actually going on in our bodies. My current goal is trying to develop a successful way to demonstrate through pictures and participatory activities of what hormones are, how they work and what they do. Each of us volunteers working on this in our group are determined to make this something we can bring to Peace Corps and implement in several of the programs, just like the HIV workshop manuals we have and give which was started by volunteers working in another Central American country a few years ago. The HIV workshop is very successful and overall is very participatory and thorough, thus we would like to do something similar for sexual reproduction.

Things in the past couple weeks have been a lot more relaxed since the schools here are on ´´summer vacation´´ thus I am no longer going to the schools to give preventative health talks on a weekly basis and we have had a break with our weekly earth-day activities and educational sessions with the students. Thus with more time in the mornings, I will instead be giving similar charlas about various topics of preventative health such as nutrition, chronic illnesses, dental health and basic hygiene in the waiting room of my health post. Also I will be starting to do house visits with Maria (health educator) to view the living conditions of more of the houses in my village to find potential beneficiaries of my future projects for stoves and water tanks. First it starts with preventative health education charlas and complete attendance by specific families before receiving a project, thus it is a long process and why we are here for 2 years! We (another volunteer living in my same municipial who came a year before me in my same program) and I have been giving capacitations and several various preventative health charlas to our health promoters who will also be involved in this process of educating the community and helping with the stove and water tank projects. We meet with them every other week with a different theme, and soon they will be giving their own charlas and taking part in the work I am currently doing at the health post, in the schools and other community groups, too!

We start our earthday camp next week with the students and will start building the benches around the soccer field which we are building out of the trash filled plastic bottles all the kids have filled over teh past few months! It is exciting that we are finally in the next stage of this project and to see it come along little by little since being attentive to details is important so we can be successful. It can be tedious to make sure all the bottles are completely filled and durable enough to be used as eco-ladrillos (in place of cement blocks) to build structures such as benches, trash cans, latrines, kitchens and houses. I am anxious to see how it goes over the next several weeks! Ah and yes my favorite part... the cooking classes are still a success! Most recently we made fresh vegetable tomato sauce to put over pasta to represent Italian food since we have been doing foods from around the world such as Chinese, Italian, Mexican, American, and other varities with new herbs and spices. I love being able to introduce new flavors, and my plan for January is to build gardens in used tires so the cooking groups can have fresh herbs and vegetables at their houses, especially because many cannot always afford to take the buses down the market to receive fresh produce regularly.

Well I think this is all for now! I have been working on a community diagnostic analysis of my village over the past week complete wtih interviews from various community members figuring out what the biggest needs are in my town and what the best way to go about trying to meet them are by working with various groups, NGOs and community leaders. It is a long, slow process that I will be working on over my two years here, but it is has been very interesting hearing from my village on a personal level the various problems, successes, and perspectives from the local community members. I hope to continue to learn more so I can work with them trying to improve the health and way of life for my village.. a big problem to tackle, yet little by little we see hope for the future!

I hope all is well with each and every one of you! Feel free to send me any thoughts, questions or comments for as always it is a pleasure to hear from you. Take care!

Peace and blessings, Alyssa

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