Chicabracan Clinic...Otra Ronda

So a week ago yesterday...we thought we'd give a helpful hand to our dear friend Dr. Heidi once again at her rural clinic in Chicabracan. It actually worked out perfect since the power went out across the city of Quiché, so we really couldn't do anything at the office or at home either.

This time around the pastor friend of Heidi and Matt came out to the clinic to pray and preach to the "waiting room." He is a very nice guy and I'm sure he is touching the lives of these rural Guatemalans. Unfortunately he is getting married in June and will be moving to be with his wife in Honduras. We pray that God helps find an adequate replacement to help witness at their clinic.

During our morning at the clinic we seemed to be seeing patients with almost all the same symptoms. Many children and adults are suffering from dry skin, lips, mouth and allergies. Right now is the tail-end of the dry season so it is very dusty and the air is dry. We passed out lots of chapstick, moisturizer, and allergy medicine. And we recommended that everybody drink much more water and bathe with actual bath soap and not laundry or dish soap because those are very harsh on the skin. A few of the regular diabetes patients came for checkups and meds, but in general it was a low-key clinic.

It was nice for us to help out the Mayans, but also Heidi in particular. Since her and Matt have a 9 month old, it is much easier to conduct clinic if the little tyke stays at home with Daddy. It was a pleasure to assist with what we could.

Zach's Visit...Better Late than Never

During the month of February Zach Kaza paid us a visit here in Guatemala. Zach, who is currently living in Panama City, needed to renew his visa and thought he'd come up here and visit family in Guatemala. A little undecided at first, he was able to find a really cheap flight, so that sealed the deal. Unfortunately, Zach had all the photos of the trip, until recently, and so I have delayed in writing the blog. It's better late than never though, right?!

At the start of his trip, Zach came to stay with us in Quiché for a few days. He was able to visit our office and see me in action teaching my class. We also visited with our friends Matt and Heidi, ordering some delicious dos por uno Telepizza. One of the days Zach got a much needed haircut from Toby's friend and fellow firefighter, Tumba, who did a fine job as always for a small fee of Q12 ($1.25)! And of course, we took Zach to Blintz for yummy cheap crêpes.

When the weekend rolled around, I was able to head down to the lake with Zach, while Toby stayed back home for an extra day to teach. We hung out in Panajachel savoring the wonderful coffee and goodies at Crossroads Café and shopped for souvenirs. Zach in his usual fashion took over an hour trying on hats and figuring out which one he wanted, but finally was successful in the end! Later that evening we took a boat over San Pedro La Laguna to enjoy the restaurants and nightlife of this town, visiting Jarachik, Zoola, and Freedom (where people were performing fire dancing).

For the next two days Toby caught up with me and Zach in the lakeside community of Santa Cruz La Laguna. Here we stayed at La Iguana Perdida; and while I laid out in the sun, Toby and Zach shot a lot of pool in the community area. We also had 2 very nice big community dinners with all the other guests, although we weren't keen on taking part in the cross-dressing event one of the evenings. Since Santa Cruz La Laguna is quite small, we decided to return to San Pedro La Laguna for one more evening of entertainment and cheap eats.

The week Zach visited we didn't have any vacation time available so Zach had to entertain himself for the rest of his trip. We headed back across the lake to Panajachel and boarded a bus together. However, Toby and I would get off and part ways with Zach prior to his arrival to Antigua. Fortunately, Zach was able to visit with Matt once again, this time in Antigua, and also spend time with his friend Esly from Chimaltenango.

Overall it was a very rare, but nice, opportunity to share so much time with Zach. Toby and I are very happy he made the effort to come and visit us here in Guatemala. It was a pleasure to share our home with another person.

Back in the O.O.O.R.

Well, this last Wednesday Toby was back with Dr. Heidi in the operating room at the Good Samaritan Hospital in Chichicastenango, this time for what turned out to be a much more eventful surgery. This week they were doing a vaginal hysterectomy and repair for a 40 year old patient that had been suffering for awhile with inconsistent vaginal bleeding and bladder incontinence. The benefit for the patient of doing the surgery vaginally rather than abdominally is a much faster recovery time and a lot less pain.

The surgery went rather well, with Heidi and Toby actually removing the uterus in about an hour. To accomplish this Toby had to hold a variety of instruments to help Dr. Heidi see while she clamped and stitched the elements that attached the uterus to the body. Toby would often have to remove clamps and cut the stitches while Heidi tightened the stitch to stop the bleed of the cut area. Once close to the end of the removal of the uterus, Heidi was having a difficult time actually taking it out. It turned out that a large baseball sized fibroid mass was attached to the end of the uterus. Previous ultrasounds had only showed 1cm fibroids so obviously over the last year this particular mass had been growing. Once the uterus was removed all that remained was to stop the extra bleeding…herein was the problem.

Heidi worked for about one and a half hours to stop the bleeding but for some reason it couldn’t be controlled. Heidi had thoroughly stitched the walls of the vagina but feared the bleeding might be coming from the abdominal cavity. The difficult thing about this situation was the circumstances of the surgery. First, the woman was fairly overweight, making it more difficult to see what Heidi needed to do. Second, unlike in the U.S. Heidi was operating with no backup and no additional doctors that could potentially help her or give her advice to stop the bleeding or to achieve a better view into the vagina where they were working. Here Dr. Heidi is in Guatemala, every week operating with only her skills, and the Lord watching over.

After a short break and an important prayer, Heidi felt it necessary to open the woman’s abdomen to stop the bleeding. So…Heidi went outside to talk to the family while the anesthesiologist intubated the patient and began the process to put the woman to sleep (she had previously been awake, although highly sedated). Fortunately for Heidi she had explained the possibility of having to do an abdominal cut to her family and all 20 of so of the family members waiting at the hospital were very understanding and told her to take her time. Rescrubbing in, Heidi rejoined Toby in the OR to start the abdominal incision. They began the procedure with Heidi giving Toby a small token of thanks for his hard work (it is in reality VERY physically demanding to assist in this kind of surgery) by allowing him to make the cut on the patient’s abdomen and begin the surgery. Heidi even allowed Toby to do some cauterizing and additional cutting during this procedure. Once inside the lower abdomen, Heidi was somewhat relieved to see that she had made the right decision when she saw a significant amount of blood in the abdomen. Once inside it was very easy to see what was happening and Dr. Heidi was able to stop the bleeding very quickly. Although the patient will take a much longer time to recover the bleeding had to be stopped and Toby had the opportunity to see some VERY interesting things. Once the bleeding subsided, it didn’t take Heidi long to stitch up each of the individual layers of the abdomen and get the patient to her room to recover.

After five hours in the OR; both Toby and Heidi were exhausted, but happy to join spouses Brittany and Matt, along with Matt’s parents at the doctor’s house for pizza and relaxation. Looking back, this was probably one of the most unique experiences in Toby’s lifetime and he was so fortunate to have a doctor and friend such has Heidi to allow him to share in that experience. It seems that this surgery may have solidified Toby’s desire to go to medical school after he retires from a successful career in law…we’ll see :-)

Goodbye Atitlán & Crossroads Café

On Friday we took a little day trip to the lake for one last look at the beauty and splendor of the volcanoes and water, and to say goodbye to our friends, The Roberts, who own Crossroads Café in Panajachel. Needing to liquidate our space in Quiché, Brittany decided to bring a big bag of various clothing items down to give Adele and the girls. Hopefully they can get a good second life out of these things.

Previously, Toby had been promised the cheesecake recipe Adele uses, so we came to collect on that! But, we also wanted drink some delicious iced lattes while we snacked on homemade tiramisu and cinnamon rolls. :p Lungi was assisting Mike in the coffee shop that day since her and her sister, Kasha, had a week break from homeschool, but she took a little time out to learn Backgammon with Brittany. Then, after securing her first win against Brittany (getting 3 set of double sixes at the end), she proceeded to beat Toby as well. We spent a few hours at the café until they were closing for lunch and then gave our farewells to all the family members. Mike even gave a free t-shirt to Toby as a parting gift. The Roberts' company, hospitality, and wonderful café will be missed greatly. We plan to continue ordering their coffee when we're back in the United States.

After our caffeine fix we went in search of some traditional men's clothing used by the Mayans. Very few communities still wear the men's traje, while the women use it prevalently. Luckily we were able to find a very beautiful pair of embroidered shorts worn by men in Santa Catarina Polopó and two matching belts - not cheap mind you, but worth the quality and uniqueness. While we were in the area, we also decided to purchase a few coin purses, a long scarf-like textile, and two customized pens. We ate a delicious vegetarian lunch of tofu pita sandwich, tabbouleh, and burrito at Bombay Café before heading back on the bus to Quiché.

Lago de Atitlán and all the communities that surround it have been such a welcome break to our life in Quiché. Anyone who has been here can attest to the peaceful majesty of the blue lake and the three towering volcanoes that surround it. We have come down here more times than we count since it is only about 2 hours bus ride from where we live and never ceases to amaze us. This haven will certainly be missed! Goodbye for now Atitlán!

Primera Comunión

This past Sunday we were invited to attend the First Communion (a special Catholic occasion) of two children in Antigua. While studying in Antigua last year, we lived with a host family: Rony, Tere, Almicar, María Teresa, and Andrés. We have continued to visit with them on many occasions throughout our time in Guatemala, including Semana Santa in 2007 and 2008. Having grown close with all the family members, we were invited to share in the celebration of la Primera Comunión of Almicar and María Teresa. (Andrés is still too young and has to wait for two more years.)

The day began with a special mass in the Cathedral in Antigua at 8:00am. Having previously attended only a few masses in Guatemala, we were delightfully impressed with the service and the priest. At the beginning of the service all the children receiving their first communion walk into the church and gather together. And before taking communion each of their parents brought special offerings that the priest blessed. These ranged from fruit platters to bread to fancy wine glasses. The priest also spoke very sweetly and directly to the children about this special occasion. They already took 6 moths of courses in preparation, but his main message was basically that when you have Jesus Christ in your heart it is always a party. Siempre es una fiesta con Jesucristo. We loved that!


After the mass we took advantage of some photo opps with the family all dressed up. Then, we were off to have breakfast at Café Condesa with the family and a few friends. This was a nice time to talk with other people staying with the host family and to catch up with Rony, Tere, and the kids.


In the afternoon, we were invited to a lunch and reception at a very pretty garden location. Tere and others had worked all night before making lunch for around 50 people, even making something special for us vegetarians. We certainly enjoyed the salad, bread, rice, and a special mushroom sauce mixture. They also made about 30 gallons of horchata (an almond/ milk drink), storing the extra it in a 50 gallon garbage can!


After lunch a very cool clown provided entertainment to even more invited guests. We were kind of raising our eyebrows in question when he showed up, but we were very impressed by his non-creepiness and ability to involve all the crowd. He performed for at least an hour, involving parents and kids in the activities. Toby was even enlisted to participate in one of the games! Unfortunately, when we wanted to transition from clown to piñatas a rainstorm dumped on all of us for 30 minutes. This rushed the candy grabbing and encouraged the cake cutting so people could sit in the covered areas eating.

Eventually we had to leave the celebrations when they continued into the evening. But, we are very grateful to have been invited to this special occasion. We hope the children continue to be strong and committed in their faith into the future, and maybe we'll even be back in two years for Andres' shining moment. ;o)

Dr. Piering...kind of

More playing doctor was in store for Toby last week while he went from the small clinic in rural Chicabracan to help out our friend Heidi in the operating room in nearby Chichi. Every Wednesday more or less, Heidi travels the half hour to the Good Samaritan Hospital in Chichicastenango to operate on a variety of patients. She usually schedules one to two surgeries per week, hoping that her patients don’t cancel on her. Heidi is an American OB/GYN and therefore more than qualified to operate on the variety of cases that are encompassed by her specialty, however, living in Guatemala has presented her with a very unique situation. Seeing as there are almost no well-trained doctors in the area where we live, especially those that will donate their time and facilities, Heidi can often be found operating on a variety of cases that in the United States would normally be handled by a doctor of a different specialty. Heidi’s presence in Quiché has allowed her to help numerous people that would otherwise have no where to turn. As living in Guatemala has provided Heidi with the unique opportunity to operate on a variety of cases and patients, it also allowed Toby the opportunity to scrub in and assist Heidi in a surgery last week, an idea unheard of in the United States. In fact many of Toby’s friends that have been in medical school for a few years have merely observed surgeries thus far. Heidi, not turning away a potential assistant and always eager to teach and help others learn, graciously invited Toby to help her take a biopsy of a large mass that had developed on what remained of a patient’s leg that was amputated last December. Toby, intrigued by medicine and eager to take advantage of this unique opportunity was very excited to help out. Once at the hospital Toby and Heidi changed into scrubs (apparently very comfortable according to Toby who has to try and talk Heidi into letting him buy a pair off her) and Heidi brushed up on her upper leg anatomy (not a bad idea). Once the patient was in the operating room and sedated, Heidi and Toby scrubbed in (just like you see on TV, more or less) with Heidi explaining exactly how to scrub, rinse and dry every bit of the hands, fingers, and upper arms while not contaminating the already cleaned areas. Heidi did point out the irony though of rinsing with the water from the sink that was at one time in the past undrinkable. Welcome to Guatemala. Once their arms were sterile (in theory), Heidi again played teacher, verbally guiding Toby as he dressed into the sterile surgical gown and gloves with the help of the scrub nurse. Once finished, it was important for Toby to never drop his hands below the level of the patient and the table, areas that were considered not sterile. Toby and Heidi then prepared to operate. The purpose of this surgery was to open the mass to take a biopsy that could be sent away for diagnosis to determine if it was cancerous or benign. With the mass isolated by sterile cloth, the working surface was actually quite small. Heidi examined the mass for the best area to begin her incision then proceeded to cut into the patient. With only a small amount of skin and fat to pass, the mass was soon visible.
Unfortunately, to everyone’s dismay, the mass was quite clearly cancerous from the beginning. Cancerous tumors actually drawn in their own blood supply by signaling the body to produce small vessels that supply it with the food it needs to survive and grow. The presence of many vessels was a pretty strong indicator of cancer from the beginning. Taking a small piece of the tumor, the task then was to stop the bleed that came as a result of the biopsy. Cancer, with its heavy blood supply, bleeds significantly for the size of the cut, and the small piece taken out required about 30 minutes to stop all of the bleeding. Heidi went to work with an electric cauterizing scalpel to seal off the small bleeding capillaries. While Heidi was working on this, Toby was suctioning the blood from the wound and the smoke from the cauterizing scalpel. He is also holding the wound open with the forks in the picture above. Once that was accomplished, she sealed up the incision with stitches actually in the subcutaneous layer of the skin which left no exposed stitches and only a small wound. Unfortunately for Toby’s first surgery and such a unique and amazing experience, the patient sees to have an aggressive form of bone cancer and will not likely have much longer to live, leaving behind four kids. Heidi has already enlisted Toby’s help for two more surgeries this Wednesday, a much longer vaginal hysterectomy (3-4 hours in surgery) and a breast biopsy. After this relatively short surgery, Toby has a large mount of respect for surgeons that must stand up for such lengthy stretches of time without breaks, not to mention the knowledge and skill it takes to operate on a person. This experience has sparked Toby’s interest in medicine, yet lucky for us he has already been accepted to law school and will not be changing his plans.

Chicabracan Clinic

After months of talking about accompanying our friends Dr. Heidi and Matt Bell to one of the many medical clinics they host through their mission Agape in Action, we were finally able to travel with Heidi to the nearby village of Chicabracan to help her do her thing. One might not think that there would be much to do to help Heidi, being that we aren't doctors, yet she put us to work right quick. Our presence also meant that Matt could stay home with their 9 month old baby boy Isaac instead of coming along to help Heidi. Things were a tad less chaotic for Heidi and also turned out to be a blessing in disguise as Isaac had a severe case of vomiting while we were off at clinic. Had he been there, it definitely would have been a worse situation. The clinic was a good chance for us to see all the crazy stories that Matt and Heidi tell us, firsthand. It was about a half hour from Quiché so we left around 7:30, riding in style in the newer Toyota truck their organization had just purchased.

When we arrived around 8:00am, the line was already pretty long so we didn't waste time setting up the supplies. The clinic is located in a small teacher storage room at the village’s school. Heidi has everything down to a science with all her equipment packed perfectly in four giant plastic toughboxes. In addition to those things we also brought a portable ultrasound machine and a laptop for keeping records. After getting all of our stuff set up, Heidi saw a patient out of order, something she rarely does, to hopefully acquire a key to the small room where they hold their clinic. It seems the man was the head of the Comité or leadership group of the town and had the ability to get them a key so they could have access to the clinic room in case someone else wasn’t there to let them in. After that, Heidi spoke to the group of patients waiting and explained to them the system of numbers that they could purchase to be seen by the doctor, one number per patient. Often the patients will try to buy one number and have Heidi treat both them and usually a child. Sure enough, one woman tried to do just this during our clinic, but Heidi wouldn’t back down and made her cough up the two quetzals (30 cents) which she had conveniently ready in the pocket of her apron. Overall the clinic was fairly routine by Heidi’s standards, with numerous patients complaining of abdominal pain (heartburn) and many with very high blood sugar. Heidi has mastered a speech explaining the two types of sugar, sugar and “white foods” (aka carbs) such as corn, rice, potato, tortillas, and bread, so that the Mayan patients can understand the concept. It was clear that like in the U.S. many of the ailments could have easily been treated with a better diet. With such a high number of patients with high blood sugar, Heidi, an excellent teacher, quickly taught Toby how to measure blood sugar and blood pressures and put him to work for the rest of the day. While Toby was pricking fingers for blood sugar, Brittany was manning the computer and quickly learned not only the records system, but also many medical abbreviations and terms.

Perhaps one of the most interesting aspects of the clinic was all the pregnant women and using the ultrasound to determine an approximate birth date for the children. It seems that as more people in the town hear about the clinics, the more people are beginning to trust Heidi, coming to see her and let her examine the condition and health of their unborn children. Seeing that she is an OB/GYN, that is a very good thing. Heidi also believes that having the portable ultrasound is a big draw to the residents of this village that likely didn’t know such a machine existed. Of the 35 patients we saw on Monday, about half were regulars while the other half new patients. We had the opportunity to tell three women that they were pregnant, one of whom was having her 5^th child and another that for some reason didn’t look very happy at all to hear the news. We handed out plenty of vitamins, Tylenol for pain, Tums for heartburn, pre-natal vitamins for the pregnant mothers, a few toothbrushes and a few other random medications. The highlight cases of the day were one woman that had no control over her motor movements on her right side, explaining to us that while she was making tortillas she simply couldn’t make the necessary motion; and a little girl that had worms that tickled her when they came out of her culo, which Brittany had to explain to Heidi was a crude word for anus. Overall the experience was awesome and we are hoping to go back with Heidi in two weeks right before we leave Guatemala.

It is very important to mention that all of these clinics are possible due to the sacrifice that Heidi and her husband Matt have made to be down here. Rather than taking a much higher paying job, they are essentially donating their time to help the people of Guatemala and spread the love and word of Jesus Christ. It also would not be possible without help from their sponsoring organization Agape in Action, that not only pays for her to be here, but provide her with the medications and supplies she needs to help some of the poorest people in Guatemala. Please visit their website to read about their organization and should you feel inclined to donate, do so.

No Electricity

This weekend past weekend Toby and I took a little trip down to Atitlán so we could get out of Quiché for a bit and eat some good grub. Unfortunately, when we arrived home we were without electricity, and it appeared to have been out a while since our freezer had totally defrosted and melted everywhere. Periodically we are without electricity for a few hours so we weren't too worried, we just threw on our headlamps and made out like we were camping.

On Monday we still didn't have power back by the evening so we asked our friends Matt and Heidi if we could come over and take some showers (ours is an electrical shower head). Upon returning home we talked to our landlady Fabiola about the electrical issue. They were unsure what the problem was and planned to investigate on Tuesday. The most frustrating thing about this is that only OUR house was without power. Supposedly it all went out in our neighborhood on Saturday and the electric company people went around to fix things but nobody was home at our house nor Fabiola's mom's house that we are attached to, so we weren't serviced.

All day Tuesday went by with no electricity. Toby and I were having to get creative for cooking since none of our food could be refrigerated. Luckily, we have a gas stove so we were able to at least use that to make some dinner. It was a good excuse for us to go to bed early!

Wednesday we solicited the help of Matt and Heidi again for the use of their shower and washing machine. Thanks guys! Of course they graciously invited us over and invited us to stay for lunch. Little did we know we would be preparing that lunch, however! Really, it was the least we could do since we kept mooching off of them. Thankfully that evening we arrived home to find there was power!!! But, we now don't have working cable... Ahhh Guatemala!

Reflections on a Language

I was thinking this morning about the differences between Spanish and English and the strengths and weaknesses of the two. Spanish is very easy to understand in that they have different words for everything. For example, it is a different word for to shoot a basket (basketball) than to shoot a gun. Also, Spanish would never use read and read for past and present tense like we do in English. I bet you thought I made a typo there until you finished the sentence. Am I right? anyway, English is also a lot easier in some ways as it doesn't use feminine and masculine words or a different verb form for every subject, I, You, We, They, She, You all (plural you). What brought on this thought was thinking of possessive verbs and adjectives. English has Spanish beat by far in this category. For example: To say "at our friend's house" in Spanish would be "en la casa de nuestros amigos". It is really much longer and a pain in the butt. It really made me wonder who invented the "apostrophe s" and can I shake their hand. This one's for you Apostrophe S Man (in the beer commercial voice)!

The Earth Shaketh

We were unsure if it made international news or not, but we thought we would tell everyone we are safe and sound after a 6.1 earthquake last night off the coast of Guatemala. We were having dinner with our friends Matt and Heidi last night when Brittany felt the quake around 9pm. Sure enough, we all felt it once she mentioned it, as it lasted for about 40 seconds. We were actually quite far away frome the epicenter and imagine that had we been in Antigua it would have felt a lot stronger. This is about the 5th quake we have felt since living here and really wasn't nearly as strong as the big one we felt at work about a year ago.

Teaching Memories

Last week Toby and I completed our last English classes here at Enlace Quiché. Our final grades and exams are all finished, so we thought it was appropriate to reflect on our time spent teaching English to the Guatemalan people.


Prior to coming to Guatemala Toby and I didn't have experience teaching English as a foreign language. We had previous experience teaching lifeguards, swimming, and 1st graders (Brittany) and Search and Rescue courses (Toby), but this was new territory for us. At times this was a very frustrating process due to our brand new English program and lack of established organization and standards. Many times we started courses without the class texts or teacher's manuals because our coordinators weren't on the ball yet or simply forgot. We also had a shortage of English resources to use in our classes since those items can't be found in Quiché. One of our tasks while volunteering with Ajb'atz' Enlace Quiché was to organize and solidify the English program throughout the past year.


Our involvement in this program included teaching a variety of classes from fundamentals to level 4 for adults and levels 1 and 2 for children. Teaching each separate class involved extensive class preparation with lesson planning and creating materials and exams, grading homework and exams, and providing additional help and make-up exams for students outside of class time. The were no initial grading standards, so we created an evaluation standard for the English classes and wrote a syllabus for classroom standards. We also administered English placement tests (over 20) so that students could skip levels to save time and money. In order to amplify our supply of materials we coordinated the donation and purchase of English language materials including books, magazines, videos, and other resources (thanks to LeAnn Piering for some of these!). Fortunately we were also able to attend three different English teacher training workshops/conferences (March, July, and November 2007) where we learned strategies for evaluating, pronunciation, games, classroom management, and more.


Teaching English has been a challenging but very rewarding experience for us both since we learned a lot and saw such great improvement in our students throughout the last year. Some of our greatest memories teaching English include co-teaching an intensive vacation class for 5 weeks that included about 15 high school bilingual secretaries (Toby loved the attention) and 1 older male teacher, and my class giving me a surprise birthday celebration where they locked the door during our break and only let me in when the candles were lit! We are also very grateful to have met some neat English instructors and experts along the way like Cris Elder, Dr. Bailey, Dr. Oprandy and Jessica (and Joel) Schumacher.


In conjunction with this English Program, we have also created a Volunteer Program at Enlace Quiché, with hopes that these English speaking volunteers can keep our classes rolling. We hope that our partnerships and stable program will maintain these courses for many years into the future. We'd also love for our past students to continue studying as well since they've put so much effort out already. If you'd like to make a donation to provide a scholarship for the under privileged Mayans and public school teachers please click here. Anything can help continue to make this a successful learning experience!

Brittany's Goodbye Party

On Tuesday night this week, my English Level 2 class took Toby and I out to dinner for a goodbye party. I have been teaching some of these students for a year now and I've seen them progress from knowing nothing to writing paragraphs. All of them passed this class, so I really hope that they continue to study in the future. Maybe one day one of them will visit us in the United States! From left to right above is Juan, Fermina, me, Mike, Claudia, and Pedro.


To celebrate, my class organized a special dinner at Café Martita. Knowing that we are vegetarians, they specifically ordered a special meal for us to eat. We feasted on bread, salad, spinach lasagna, naranjada con soda, and dessert. It was a very special time to talk and laugh with all of my students in a relaxed environment. And of course, all of them were happy when I passed out their exams and grades, and they learned they had passed the class.


As if the dinner wasn't enough...my students also collaborated and got a gift for me. It's a handmade textile and then hand embroidered with the geometric animal designs. In the Mayan culture these animals represent some of the nahuales. A nahual is an animal companion that is spiritually linked to all persons throughout their lives. It could be a horse, lizard, rooster, etc., however, your nahual is determined by the day you are born. I'll have to look into my personal nahual and see if its on the tapestry. A very big thank you to my students for giving me such a beautiful gift and for giving Toby and I such a nice despedida.

Quiché Cemetery

Although it seems somewhat morbid, we had heard for a long time that the Quiché cemetery was a very beautiful place. So on Monday, we decided to check things out for ourselves and see what it was like.

Cemeteries are very interesting here because they are quite different than the ones at home. They are almost like little towns or something, because instead of having underground placement with a tombstone or plaque, they actually have huge crypts to house the corpses. Generally these structures are very large so they can hold all the family members and sometimes have an enclosed altar space to place flowers, photos, etc.

The crypt houses are also very brightly colored with a variety of pastel shades making this a very beautiful and pleasant space, unlike the dark and dreary images we often associate with death in the United States. The Quiché cemetery has a very joyful and pleasant setting helped by the lack of garbage and noise. Definitely gets two thumbs up!

Holy Week 2008

As you already know, two weeks ago we were off celebrating the national holiday week of Semana Santa. It was a welcome break from work and provided us the opportunity to enjoy the summer weather here in Guatemala. Here's a little recap of what we did during the week.

For the first part of the week we relaxed a bit at our house and took advantage of lying out in the sun on our rooftop terrace. On Monday we had dinner with our friends Dr. Heidi and Matt, and their volunteer Dr. Charlie. Although Matt doesn't like games too much, we were able to invite Charlie and Heidi into the wonderful world of Pounce. As expected, it was a hit with them!

It also happened that we were able to meet up with Matt, Heidi, and Charlie once again during the week, but in Antigua. Charlie was only volunteering for a month and wanted to get down to Antigua to experience the festivities. So, we all met up on Wednesday of Holy Week after Toby and I checked in with our host family and got Toby registered for carrying in the procession. Between Wednesday night and Thursday afternoon our activities entailed eating at Café Flor for dinner, hanging out at their hotel, eating breakfast at Fernando's Kaffee, and helping Charlie shop in the artisan market for a gift for his fiancée.

On Thursday evening we were invited to eat tamales with our old host family from when Toby studied Spanish in Antigua. We got to fill up on delicious vegetarian tamales, and homemade banana bread while visiting with other Spanish students and the family. One couple in particular was really great to chat with that evening. We met Patty and Doug from Alberta, Canada, a retired couple traveling and studying in Central America. During the next few days we had the pleasure of telling stories and sharing wisdom about places in Central America as we built an alfombra and ate dinner at Kafka with them.

Since carpet making at PROBIGUA (the Spanish school) was set to begin around 10 pm Thursday and go through the night, Toby and I decided to take a little nap. We slept from around 9pm-midnight before heading over to the school and diving into the creative process. This year the alfombra was mainly made with colored saw dust and not flowers, so this was a much more time consuming process. We had a very committed team of about 10 that consisted of the Canadian couple, a couple Norwegian guys, a German, some PROBIGUA staff, and us. Diligently, we smoothed, patted, and filled stencils with sawdust and then cleaned up our mistakes. What started off as a bit questionable and disorderly soon became a very beautiful piece of artwork in the street. It was all complete and ready by around 4:45am, just in time for us to watch the La Merced procession.

Before walking around to view all the carpets, Toby and I stopped into the YWAM coffee shop Higher Grounds (which had been open all night long) to get a few latte pick-me-ups. Then, we proceeded to walk along the procession route, but just ahead of it, so we could see all of the beautiful carpets that had been constructed. Some of our favorites included one block long alfombra on Alameda Santa Lucía, a butterfly made of flower petals, and the family team alfombra that marked 50 years making carpets in 2007. Halfway through our touring and before the sun fully rose we stopped into Bagel Barn to get a quick breakfast and rest our bodies. Afterwards, we meandered around a bit more to look at carpets before settling back by ours to watch the procession pass over our hard earned work. Unfortunately, while we were waiting for the anda two different dogs went running through our carpet making footprints and messing up the sawdust pattern details.

At this point we were pretty exhausted from 3 hours of sleep so we went back to the house to have another nap from around 10am-noon. When we awoke we were completely disoriented and confused as to what day it was and the time since we were keeping such and odd schedule. Nevertheless, we continued on our marathon Good Friday by eating lunch at an Indian restaurant and hiking back up to the San Felipe church and Jocotenango in search of Toby’s procession turn badge. Along the way we admired quite a few more carpets made for Toby’s procession (starting at 3pm), then got ready for his turn. They base the groups on height, and since Toby is quite tall compared to most Guatemalan me, he was in turno 6.

For the majority of the rest of the day we tried to sit down and rest because we had done SO much walking all around the city. In the evening we did enjoy watching the Escuela de Cristo procession pass around the central park and the cathedral. Usually the crowds of people are enormous and involve a candle vigil as the floats pass by.

Afterwards we really needed some caffeine and energy to keep going through the night. Toby still had one more turn to carry, and our prediction was that it would occur around midnight on the far side of town from where we were staying. We managed to find the procession route around 11 or 11:30, but during all the walking my flip flops gave out and the strap totally broke. Being on the other side of town, I opted to use masking tape to secure the sandal to my foot so that I could continue walking around. (Luckily, I happened to have tape in my purse since we had been hanging “volunteers needed” posters around the city.) We were so far away from the house and our legs were aching, so I didn’t want to make an extra lap to get a new pair of shoes.

After mending my sandals, Toby joined the fila, the line of float carriers that walk on the sides of the road ahead of the procession. At around 12:30 or so he finally had his turn to carry; it turned out to be a tricky one. The anda that he carries needs 100 men to keep it afloat, bearing around 80-100lbs each man. The small colonial streets barely can accommodate the size of the floats, often involving some maneuvering to turn corners. And, that’s exactly what Toby’s group had to do. Upon turning the block the anda couldn’t make it through and was bumping up against the buildings. Toby said that they even hit the eaves of the roof at one point and everyone felt the vibrations. In order to make it through the men had to lower the structure onto their forearms (standing parallel instead of perpendicular to the float) and then further onto their hands and shuffle around the corner. Then, at once, all 100 men hoist the structure back onto their shoulders. I must say that as a bystander, it is very nerve racking to see the men move it around in this way, wondering if they may drop it. But alas, this did not happen and we were able to finally retire around 1ish in the morning after running on so little steam.

We did stay in Antigua until Sunday afternoon to enjoy the restaurants and beauty of the city. However, a lot of the festivities had died down and the streets were much clearer since all the Guatemalans had fled to the beach. Even though we attended the celebrations in 2007, it was just as enjoyable this year for different reasons than the last. Antigua, Guatemala during Semana Santa is a MUST SEE.

Skin Dog

Well, the title is pretty self-explanatory. We have been wanting to get a blog up about our little neighborhood mascot for some time now and just the other day as we were walking home from work with the camera, he decided to pose for us. Skin Dog roams around a few specific blocks in our colonia or neighborhood and can be often seen basking in the sun, eating scraps of food, and looking all around skinful. He is a dog with a gentle demeanor and without a lot of fur. Here's to you Skin Dog!

Time for a Fiesta

This past weekend, ourselves and many of our coworkers took a little time to relax and unwind while celebrating the birthday of one volunteer Katie, and the upcoming departure of another, Sonja. We weren't really celebrating her "departure"... but you know what I mean. The party was a tranquil affair with many of the men standing around the grill cooking steak and the women talking in the casita (little house) or around the tables. Isn't it funny how that happens here in Guatemala too? Together we cooked up some steak, had some delicious potato salad and snacked on some hummus that we personally made that turned out out to be quite the hit. Our hosts made the party even better with some semi-warm Gallo beer and a bottle of Martinelli's Sparkling Cider. The cider alone was a treat as we haven't tasted any in over a year. DELICIOUS! After plenty of eating we brought out a big cake for what is at least the Guatemalan tradition of smashing the birthday boy or girl's face into a cake. The time spent with everyone was a blast and we are really trying to enjoy our last few weeks here in Guatemala.