Familia Nueva

I moved into my new home on Sunday with my new family and I really enjoy their company and conversation. Admittedly, Senora seemed as though the arrangement we had was sketchy and I shouldn´t tell my teachers or other students in the school of our arrangement, but after our conversation this morning at breakfast, she seemed comfortable with her new house guest.

Apparently last week, she had gone to Celas to ask for more students in her home. Celas had said possibly in the next few weeks. Rumor has it the school will be extremely full the week of July 12. Corinne is continuing her studies while this week I have stopped. I have found it has its advantages and disadvantages as I really enjoy the vacation time and solitude, but I just returned from ¨morning announcemnts¨ at the school to see what activities they had in store and I missed the student/teacher learning environment.

I have a much smaller room in the new house and Senora does not fix food that is typically traditional. Something I missed this morning was huevos and frijoles negras. Ah well, I had toast and jam with papaya...just as good.

I was worried that with this new arrangement I was going to have miss lunch with the family because EDLAC needs me at 1-1:30 in the afternoon. Senora usually serves at 1:30 for her family who return for lunch from work, but she agreed to cook lunch for me at 12:45 (very early for Guatemalans) so I wouldn´t have to spend extra money in other places. Also, I feel admittedly strange eating the food that we prepare for the kids, considering I have enough money to buy myself something to eat and they do not. I would rather continue this arrangement and find my own means and keep the resources for the students and the staff who work there day and night.

Ben left on Sunday and I was very sad to see him go! I enjoyed our chats and experiences here in Guatemala and I was glad he came to visit Corinne and study. Him and Corinne went to the hot springs on Saturday and stayed in one of their bungalows for the night! I think Corinne and I will do the same for her birthday before I leave Guatemala on the 23rd. So...by myself, while on a transcontinental phone call to T...I ran into friends from the school at which point I took them to La Luna for some tea and chocolate pura. So good! There we met another friend from the school and chatted for a few hours. I left early to eat dinner with my family one last time. They made me my favorite indigenious food: platanos y frijoles negras y tomalitos. I went out just as I had come in! I got a phone call from David, a guy Corinne and I met who works for Habitat here in Xela for the summer, asking if we wanted to come make dinner with him and some friends at his hostel. Because I was solo, I was definitely down to meet new people and eat some good food. David made cilantro rice and mango salsa and Megan (someone staying at the hostel) made green chicken curry. Everything was AMAZING (i didn´t try the chicken, but I heard it was good) and we had chocolate pura with Kahluha (sp?) for dessert. David walked me back to Tecun where I met up with other students. I usually try and meet up with people who live close by so I can have others to walk with. This was one of the benefits of my move as now I live literally 1 block away from her on the same avenida.

On Sunday, I got up early to find that every 1st weekend of the month (similar to the art walk in Phoenix), the locals have a handicraft fest in the parque selling their goods and handicrafts. I wasn´t in the market and didn´t buy, but took long looks at what they had. I went to the monstrosity of a Catholic church that is in the parque for Sunday morning mass. I wanted to try it, but found it to be somewhat emotional for me. I sat in the back, as I noticed that when I was walking in the aisle way I was attracting a lot of attention and therefore decided the back of the church would be best. I stayed through till the reading of the gospel and really enjoyed the experience. Not sure I will return to the same one, but I want to find one to try.

I am forgetting my time on Friday! On Friday we had our weekly ¨graduation¨ that the school puts on for the students. There were a lot of us graduating this week from the school. Before the celebration the school offered a cooking class on typical Guatemalan food for us to try. The food we cooked was served at the graduation and was awesome. I loved making the tomalitos, which are small tomales that do not contain a filling and are steamed in corn leaves that grow on the stalks. It has become tradition to drink a lot at these celebrations and this evening was no different. I found myself drinking quite a bit of whiskey (of all things). When my name was called, they insist you give a speech at which point I said maybe 3 sentences. I was not a fan of the speaking Spanish deal in front of others. After the graduation a very large group of us went to Baja Luna, which is La Luna, but underground (seriously cave-like), where they serve wine and cheese. You can get a liter of wine for 50Q at which point 9 of us shared 3. It was awesome! Ryan and Courtney (students) live near me and they walked me home...safely.

Sunday morning, after church, went to Bavaria for a not-so-great breakfast, but has a GREAT conversation with my Mom and Dad. I was happy to talk with them. Wendy (another student) came into Bavaria and we shared breakfast together. On Saturday, before Ben and Corinne´s departure, we had all gone to the cemetary here in Xela, which was amazing. Right now I can´t figure out how to download my pictures onto the blog from the new computer site I¨m using, therefore, stay tuned, but these graves were incredible. As such, I took Wendy there as well on Sunday...the most time, admittedly, that I have spent in a graveyard. The way in which these people take care of their dead was incredible, if they can afford it of course. Ben said it reminded him of New Orleans. I don´t have any experience with the area, but apparently it´s very similar. I had Indian food with David, Adei (girl from his hostel) and Corinne at the Indian place...it was so good! Corinne and I went home and crashed.

This morning I had a great conversation with my host family about retirement practices in Xela. Apparently it´s very bad, which I¨ve come to notice among the workers here. It was great to practice the conversation as much as I could with Senora and the others. She will always correct me when I´m wrong and help me with my vocabulario. A brief description of my new family: 5 persons/Cleo and Cesar are the parents/Lijia, Alexis and Cesar II are the kids. They have 2 birds and a turtle and their dog of 2 years just recently ran away (so sad!). Lijia is an accountant, Alexis works at a bank and Cesar II is a computer engineer...I think. Cesar I is currently in the process of retiring but has been filing paperwork for Social Security for 2 years now...they are still waiting. Cleo works around the house!

That´s it for now as I must get back to bumming around the city. Today is my first day at Escuela de la Calle helping the kids and employees out. I´ll blog about my experiences later!