El Fin

My journey in Guatemala, like all good things, is coming to an end. Tomorrow at this time I will be flying over the continental United States. Closure has been difficult, goodbyes bittersweet, but all of them ultimately filled with the promise of continued communication.

Saturday I attended my final ASORGUA meeting, taking a brief jaunt over to la Universidad de Galileo to watch JB, a friend and ASORGUA officer, graduate with a masters degree. Back at ASORGUA, I exchanged hugs, best wishes and small gifts with my friends in the Deaf community. I was overwhelmed when they brought out 2 cakes and presented me with a plaque to bring back to the Guatemalan Deaf and Hard of Hearing Empowerment Project, to thank us all for our contributions to ASORGUA. It will be an honor to present it to the others at Graduation.

Sunday I had lunch with my friends from the Jewish Community, which was nice. I then spent the rest of the afternoon at my friend ML´s house, playing board games and watching a movie with his family. I learned they have a US landline number that gets routed to their house, so they now run a high risk of Hayley pestering them with an abundance of chatty domestic calls.

Yesterday was my last day at CECSA, which was actually fairly low-key. I worked in the office and did my best to swap email addresses and take a few photos without disturbing the students´school day. It was certainly very hard to leave.

After work I went to MWs house in Antigua where I stayed until this afternoon. We ate ceviche and guava cake and partook in some of the finest intellectual conversations I can remember having (which is saying a lot because I always find intellectual stimulation is at a peak when I am with MW and her friends).

And now I am back in the city. I am packed. I am sad. I am anxious. I am impatiently waiting to see my friends and family. I am overwhelmed. I am calm. And I am done.

Pacaya

May 1 is Labor Day in Guatemala, and I decided to take advantage of the time off of work to squeeze in some last minute tourism. Lunch in belly and camera in cargo-pocket, I rendezvoused (sp?) with a group of young backpackers from various countries to climb.

We had a guide for safety , but he spoke no English and did not really provide any tourguide information. He was more of a shepherd, mandating us to hurry up. When he did speak, I served as the translator for 2 brits, 2 aussies, 2 americans and an Israeli. At the bottom of the mountain, a plethora of little boys swarmed the tourists selling walking sticks and asking for change, candy and writing utensils. I traded a pen and a half bottle of gatorade in exchange for idle chat and the chance to pet a horse named Canelo.

The hike up was brutal, 3 km straight up. The weather was extremely overcast and it rained for most of the hike, but that actually added to the foreign-planet ambiance. The ends were well worth the means. The rainclouds cleared for 15 minutes which allowed for some photo opportunities, and we spent some time climbing over volcanic rock and hardened ash (and it was hot! there was lava just a few feet below). We were able to come within a few yards of actively flowing lava. Another group of tourists brought hot dogs to roast. Have to admit, it was a great idea.

We descended the mountain in the dark and met our tourism van at the bottom. By the time we got back to Antigua, I had befriended the 2 Americans and the Israeli, and ended up going out for a drink with them and staying in a spare bed at their hostel.

This morning I had breakfast with some other backpackers, from Costa Rica and California respectively, who were great conversationalists. The whole thing makes me want to load up my frame pack and keep romping around the world. But not just yet.

Pasajeros

My daily ride back to zona 11 after work was a little more interesting than usual. A familiar legless boy on a skateoard came on to sing his Mayan chant and roll down the aisle soliciting change in his baseball cap. I have yet to figure out how he gets on and off the bus. I tried to retrieve some change from my pocket, but an impressively large woman in a floral dress sat down next to me a sandwiched me against the window. A candy vendor and a sticker vendor came on to peddle their goods, and one of them stepped over the legless skateboarder entirely causing no harm or foul. As we passed the Eye and Ear Campus, a woman got on with a seeing eye dog, the first service animal I have seen in this country. The strangest part of the whole ride was that the driver came to a complete stop at every juncture!

Chiquimulas y Esquipulas

ASORGUA excursion weekend! Saturday morning, over 40 Deaf Association members and their families boarded a prociegos painted bus and headed to the arid, eastern part of the country. We arrived mid-day at a public pool and hotel complex in Chiquimulas, and were bombarded by the heat. I stayed with H and M, their kids, and P in a basic bungalo. We went for a quick swim, downed sandwiches and grape soda for lunch, then reboarded the bus for an afternoon trip to Esquipulas.

Esquipulas is famous throughout Central America for its magnificent Basilica containing a black sculpture of Jesus Christ on the cross. We entered the cathedral and were permitted to come very close to the black Christ. The presence of dozens of Central Americans humbled in the presence of the statue in silence was very powerful. Retreating from the cathedral, it is customary to walk backwards as not to turn one´s back to the Christ. In the gardens surrounding the Catherdral, I chatted with ASORGUA members and built up my Guatemalan Sign vocabulary a little more.

As the sun set, we headed back to Chiquimulas, where we went for a night swim, cooked a huge chicken and bean dinner, then fell asleep, full and happy. Sunday, we again went swimming (the heat really did warrant 3 swims), lunched, and boarded the bus back to the city. We stopped along the way for the best coconut ice cream I have ever tasted. I had such a wonderful time with some of the greatest, warmest folks I have had the privilege to meet.

Zona 3

OT, a friend of an audiologist I know, invited me to her home in Zone 3, next to the infamous basurero (garbage dump that people scavenge for viable scrap). She wanted to chat and charge me with brining back some cards and parcels for our mutual friend. I was hoping that it wouldnt be as marginal and unsafe as the zone is rumoured to be. Unfortunately for OT and her family, their asentamiento lived up to its reputation.

Although I had been in plenty of neighborhoods like it on home visits with Pro Ciegos, it was the first time I heard residents complain about the crime and trouble. OT is a hardworking masters student at the public university, and her traditional Mayan family makes a living by selling tamales and other goods. They are all very religious, upright citizens. They want desperately to move further away from the dump but cannot yet afford it.

I met the whole family, and they were overwhelmingly warm and generous. Safely inside their house, I took a few family photos, which I will send to our audiologist friend and to OT who uses email on occasion. I decided to head home well before dusk. OT and her cousin loaded me up with green mangoes from their patio and walked me to the municipal bus, which luckily runs right past their neighborhood.

bendiciones nunca vienen solas

I was asked to come to CECSA on Friday for a special staff refreshment time, which I assumed was for National Secretary´s Day (we have a fabulous secretary). When I arrived, however, I found FR, the director, the psychologist and the speech pathologist gathered around a desk full of chuchitos and punch, holding a Thank You card with my name on it. I was so overwhelmed at this sweet gesture. As we ate the refreshments, the director thanked me for my hard work these past months, and noted that having international staff is a very positive thing for the students insofar as it broadens their horizons.

The psychologist, whom I have befriended as a fellow curious mind, gifted me a small boat made of seeds and the shell of a melon. My cup was overflowing. As I walked up the street toward my bus afterward, a Mayan woman commented on how lovely my little boat was. Before I knew it she was handling it--and asking if she could keep it. I smiled and said it was a gift from a friend, but she wouldn´t give it back. It got a little awkward, I was being friendly but secretly hoping I wouldnt have to wrestle it from her mango-saturated grip. Eventually I wriggled it loose--que suerte!

I stopped into a great used book nook on 8a Calle, and while browsing, the proprietor asked me if I was Swedish! Luck strikes again! and as if that werent enough, he gave me a discount on my age-worn Latin American classics.

On the bus, I gave my seat to an older woman with a basket, but she insisted that I could perch on the corner of the seat as a welcome third party. ¨I´m not yet so fat that I cant move over a little, eh?¨ she cackled. I wanted to hug her, but I was carrying books and reclaimed melon boat.

Ciudad Quetzal

Today I completed my final home visit for this internship. It was, of course, bittersweet. Agaist the backdrop of a cardboard wall We interviewed a mother who, bless her heart, didn´t know her own age, and made a living from making tortillas with her mother. Her husband is working in the United States as a meat packer for the second time; He was deported last year but has returned.

On the way out of the house, three small girls approached us. They were classic beauties of the campo, shoeless, dirt-smudged, but with all the beauty that any child under 8 possesses, eminating from their sparkling eyes. The tallest one spoke ¨Are you the person that comes to give us shots?¨ No, we came here to help that family, I said. Incredulous, she laughed and asked the Pro Ciegos driver, ¨Are they the ones that come to give shots?¨ There aren´t many visitors in Ciudad Quetzal.

Las desgracias nunca vienen solas

Today I interviewed a kind hearted mother of four. She had lost her leg to diabetes, her husband was blind and her son was deaf. Her son in law abandoned her daughter and their newborn baby. Her other daughter works in a factory to support all eight members of the household.
I chose to ignore the cockroach on the wall and focus on her responses. I had to focus, because all of her top front teeth were missing and she was hard to understand. Her husband was missing all of his bottom front teeth, and spent much of the interview swatting at flies in the kitchen with a dirty rag. Her grandson was asleep on the kitchn floor.
Is the United States like this? She asked me.
I told her many things were different.
A little more cofortable? She offered.
She knows. They have cable TV.

No recibí el memo

Yesterday, mid-morning, Pro Ciegos decided to have an inservice today beginning at 845am for all of the staff of the Deaf schools in Guatemala City. They told the staff to show up to Santa Lucia, the school for the blind, with sneakers, and sent the students home with notes for their parents saying ¨no school tomorrow¨. And so it was set.

This morning, I set out early for Santa Lucia, as it is located in Zone 10. The people on my second bus suddenly developed a mob mentality (I still do not know why) and I was pushed out of the back door of the bus with dozens of other people. I was able to get on a third bus, but found that I was running late. In order to arrive on time, I decided to run from the Avenida de la Reforma to Santa Lucia.

When I arrived, panting, I greeted the janitor, Don A., who was standing outside the door of the school. In his precious, monotonous low-talking voice he said, ¨the location was changed, the program is at Fray Pedro¨. Fray Pedro is the other school for the deaf in zone 11 (NOT next to zone 10 as a logical person might assume, but rather on the other side of the city. ironically, where I live.)

¨The...what? When did they change the location? They notified everyone else?¨ Apparently, they had. The only other person who didn´t get the memo was Don E, the other janitor, and he hadnt arrived yet because he has low vision and it takes him a long time to commute with his cane. The Director of CECSA had called and left word with the guard of Santa Lucia to instruct us to take a cab for which she would reiburse us.

I decided to call FR to inform her of the situation. ¨Oh hi,¨ she said when she answered the phone, ¨the location was changed, I was going to call you but I ran out of minutes on my cell phone¨ (bear in mind she was standing in a SEA of Pro Ciegos staffers with active cell phones.) ¨When did they inform everyone of the change of location?¨ I asked. ¨around 8, 8:15 this morning¨ she replied.

Am I the only one who finds it absolutely astonishing that over 100 Pro Ciegos staff members on a phone chain can instantaneously re-route without any confusion? And who changes a location 45 minutes before it starts? Don E. finally arrived and the janitors and I set out in search of a taxi. Every time a white vehicle passed, Don E. yelled ¨That white one! Is it a taxi???¨ The first six times, it was not, in fact, a taxi, but the seventh time was the charm.

We arrived at Fray Pedro to see that the activities had not even started. Just our luck? Perhaps. The opening ice breaker was human bingo, in which each person must obtain the signature of a person with a characteristic on the bingo card (i.e. tallest member of the group). People immediately rushed over to me and thrust their cards in my face,requesting my john hancock next to ¨Whitest Skin¨. Awk.ward.

After a relay race and a rousing variation on the Human Knot, we engaged in 2 hours--2 HOURS--of latin dancing. After 120 minutes of non-stop hip girating, fist pumping and salsa steps, we were all ready to drop (not just me! I was pleased to learn that not all Latina women are skilled in the art of reggeton arobics).

The afternoon session involved disscussion and creative activities involving the mission statement and vision statement of the Comite Pro Ciegos. I have to say, I had a blast. A sweaty blast. And it was a great opportunity to bond with the rest of the CECSA staff, as I only have 2 weeks left (dont get me started [sob] that´s another post altogether).

The kicker was when I was waiting at the bus stop and noticed a boy in a Fray Pedro uniform with hearing aids. I started to sign to him, but got no response other than a sheepish grin. ¨Man he´s shy¨ I thought. But cute. Fifteen minutes later I realized that Fray Pedro is an Oral Deaf school and the boy doesnt know sign language. Good one, Hayley.

El Infierno

Monday night there was another mini earthquake, though I feel that ´tremor´is a more appropriate term. A grade 1 seizmic rumble, lasting 40 seconds. I was reading in bed, and actually, I didn´t even get up or even feel alarmed. Something is definitely wrong with me, because the rest of the house was pretty freaked out. Nothing even fell over, but I imagine that living in a country where earthquakes have a reputation of death and destruction will instill fear in people.

This morning we visited a mother of a student for a socioeconomic interview, and the tremor was the first thing that came up. The mother made a casual remark about the possibilty of divine intervetion in the quake. FR jumped at the opportunity to second that motion, then lauched into a 20 minute prosthelitizing session using the soon-approaching apocalypse as a spring-board. This was the longest evangelical session she has ever indulged with a client, and although I was worried both about ethics and time constraints, the client seemed receptive.

Here are some of the things I learned:
1. The quake was a sign that Jesus is returning soon, so people need to accept him as the one an only son of god.

2. There is most certainly a hell (and when the client suggested that we cant really know what lies beyond, FR corrected her in saying that) the New Testament speaks of hell and damnation, and the bible is the DIRECT word of God. Since man can neither add nor remove a single word from this immaculate work, we know for a fact that there is a hell.

3. The ´nucleus´ of hell is reserved for the worst sinners, and is divided into sections, varying by sin.
3a. ´Fornicators´in which giant snake-like creatures crawl into sinners´sexual orifices, engulf and destroy their internal organs, then emerge from their mouths.
3b. There is also a section for insolent people who deny God and listen to rock music. They are forced to stand or move about forever and nails come up through the ground and stab their feet.

4. The people in hell are forced to wear labels seared into their chests, similar to the concept of a scarlet letter. The labels indicate which sin has brought damnation upon them, and are made of an ´aluminum-like material that doesnt melt or burn´

5. Here on earth, there is really no such thing as a Friend, just companions, and co-workers. People who say they are you friends but offer you temptations like beer are not your friends. People who do not always follow through on their word are not your friends. The important thing to know, however, is that Jesus Christ is a true friend, the one true friend of all people.

Needless to say the session ran very over time, and the Pro Ciegos driver returned to the projects to retrieve us. A loyal but ornery man, he was not pleased when we finally got back in the vehicle. The overtime was worth it to FR and me, but for very different reasons.

una mas

Another banner day in the slums of Guatemala City. Today we visited a mother who frequently visits us on account of an ongoing issue with her daughter. We had to meet her at the bakery where she works because the barranco (canyon) community where she lives is so steep and labrynth like that we would have never found it on our own. After talking to us for over an house in the bakery (there really is no way to get a word in edgewise without interrupting her, really), we descended into the barranco. At least this one had stairs. On our way we passed a dog and a boy. FR asked the boy if the dog bites, and he replied ¨Sí¨. Stupendous. But no one was bitten. The one-room house was made entirely of lamina (tin sheets) and produced a very unpleasant odor. The surrounding area was littered with very unique trash and other scraps. A cat ate a dead moth out of a bicycle rim, and the señora mentioned (laughing)that she sometimes killed cats for the crime of being black or black-spotted. The interview took over an hour and a half because of the tangential nature of the Señora´s responses. She then left us to climb out of the barranco and find the bus station on our own. All in a day´s work.

Los Olores

Today, admittedly, stunk. I had to drop off some papers for the Eye and Ear Hospital social worker before work. Upon arrival I was assaulted by the smell of mopped-up vomit and found myself in the company of over 100 people of all ages (it was 6am) who had seemingly been waiting since before dawn. Publis health services here are a nightmare, and everyone was upset or impatient. The one staff member working was being bombarded with grievances and pleas from impoverished parents. Even in my Pro Ciegos uniform, I was the last person he was interested in pleasing. I finally caught sight of a co-worker I knew and begged him to let me by so I could give her the papers. Running back to the chicken bus, I boarded and got off the bus on time and hurried past the dog poo in Zone 1 to the doors of CECSA.

There were 4 visits planned for today, mostly in zone 18 (a ¨red zone¨in terms of safety) so we got to go in a Pro Ciegos vehicle with a driver instead of on the chicken buses. I sat in the back of a Pro Ciegos Jeep from the Vietnam area and breathed in gas fumes all the way to Zone 18. The first visit was without incident, I conducted the interview and we left shortly.

The second, however, was no party. The house was in a dangerous barrio, and the mother we came to see was not there. We started the interview in the dark of the one room house with the student´s sister, between an unmade bed (shared by all 5 family members) and a pile of fly-infested dirty dishes. Everyone´s clothing was in a large crumpled pile on the floor. There was no running water in the house. The stench was all but unbearable.

We got lost on the way to the third house, but were lucky enough to be stuck behind a bus which emitted a simply unreasonable amount of fumes. It was way too hot to close the windows. Walking up the barranco to the house, we witnessed the mother hitting one child while holding a baby. Inside the house, 5 children under the age of 10 swarmed around us, and the mother did the interview while breastfeeding and yelling at her ¨shiftless¨adolescent son. The young boys jumped on the family bed and whipped each other with a belt (wonder where they learned that).

By the time we got to the fourth home visit we were stranded in the campo with no cellphone signal. The Pro Ciegos driver was ready to kill us, and FR and I both had to pee like race horses. We finally found the fourth house and used their outhouse, which teeters over a 15 foot drop lower into the barranco (and yes, that is where the children play). FR sped through the questions and we got out of there, stat.

We arrived back at CECSA with just enough time to eat lunch and punch out.

trabajo, trabajo, presentaciones

This last week at work was particularly challenging but I survived. People seemed to be in a pervasive bad mood, and work was dryer than usual. Nonetheless, I finished off the week with a fabulous friday at the Colegio Americano de Guatemala. MWs friend EZ is the director here at the American school and invited me to give presentations about sign language and deaf culture. Its a bit wierd because I am a hearing woman, but I figure that some exposure is better than none. I presented to an auditorium full of kindergarteners, then a large group of third graders, then 3 high school classes in an individual classroom setting. In between sessions I had the opportunity to chat with the school staff, and enjoyed it very much. Each presentation was different on account of the ages of the students, but each one brought the reinvention and modification of curiosity. I was very impressed! Part of me just wants to join the faculty here, but dont worry, Ill come home first. :)

La cabaña a lado del lago

The end of Semana Santa meant a change of scenery and, impossibly enough, an increase in happiness. MW, her brother, her son, B and I went to a cabin on Lake Atitlan to visit friends of MWs. There were 2 families with 3 young children between them. Now I have met a lot of kids in my life, but these little critters were top knotch. We all became children ourselves, racing, coloring, dancing, making faces, and relishing in the delightful antics of a precocious lad named Pepino (Cucumber) and his baby sister and cousin. After a wonderful meal, the adults played this addictive, rambunctious card game called ¨Pit¨ which destroyed our voices from all of the shouting. The view from the cabin was magestic, especially in the early morning. After a traditional Guatemalan breakfast, we went into Panahachel to people watch (and there were tons of people to watch). My heart nearly broke when I departed in a shuttle for the City. Holy cow, what a Holy Week.

Gallaudet en Guate II

This world is pequeñito! Walking back from Frida´s I caught a glimpse of a Gallaudet sweatshirt, inhabited by a Japanese undergrad and accompanied by 2 other internationalundergraduates. The mysterious Gally travelers that I missed the weekend before! I flagged them down and introduced myself, and before I knew it we were signing away. It was so wierd, we may as well have been sitting in the MarketPlace on campus, but instead we were chatting in the central park of Antigua, Guatemala, with Semana Santa festivities all around us. They shared with me their disconcerting brush with danger in Guatemala City and their exciting stories from Tikal and Flores. I told them about my internship and the Deaf community here in Guate. It was late, so we took a group picture and went our separate ways, only to meet up again at graduation in May.

Semana Santa II

And what an all-nighter it was. After a rousing game of cards, MW, her son, his friend B and I went down town to watch people making alfombras. Some of the designs were pretty spectacular. Most of the tourists had retired for the evening, and the streets were filled with locals, huddled with coffee, selling pupusas and other fried delights. B and I went to take photos of the alfombras while MW and her son went to sit and talk, but all 4 of us ended up at the same restaurant by accident!

At 3am, we stood in front of La Merced, a prominent church, and watched dozens of Roman soldiers on horses read the proclamation condemning Jesus and ride off into the night. It was like the Renaissance fair, but more Guatemalan and MUCH more serious (these guys mean business with the reenactment). We headed back to the house for 2.5 hours of sleep before rising again to start on our alfombra.

The alfombra team was a motley gang of gringoes from all over the States, all with some connection to MW or her housemate. With stencils and planks, dyed sawdust and water, the group constructed an impressive alfombra. Which was promptly run over by pious marchers bearing the weight of a float. bearing the weight of Jesus. bearing the weight of all of our mortal sins. Needless to say it was thoroughly destroyed, but well worth it anyway.

We napped through the afternoon then returned to town to have dinner at Cafe Frida, a hip mexican restaurant/bar honoring Frida Kahlo. Taquila ran like water and a good time was had by all.

Semana Santa 1

Let me just start by saying that I have been having the time of my life for nearly 3 solid days. I am in Antigua, or rather, just outside of Antigua with MW, her housemates, and a fluctuating 7/9 other house guests. We have been strolling through Antigua (which is PACKED with tourists from all over the world) viewing processions and alfombras for Semana Santa. An "alfombra" or carpet is an elaborate, mandala-like creation on the streets made of flowers plants and or sawdust. I helped dye the sawdust for the alfombra that we will be helping SH, MWs housemate, create early tomorrow morning.

The processions involve hundreds of men and boys wielding floats bearing gruesome and ornate depictions of the stations of the cross. Each float is enormous, illustrating the steps leading up to the crucifiction. They are preceded by incense and followed by small marching bands. Thousands line the streets to watch them pass by, their paths carpeted by so many ornate alfombras. The streets are a perpetual circus of people and a delight for the senses.

In addition to the processions over the alfombras, each church has an impressive display of the floats before they are cycled though the city. We visited La Iglesia de San Francisco and La Escuela de Cristo. The latter had a light show, a man narrating with a kereoke machine, and a massive display with Jesus and Angels suspended from the church ceiling and Adam and Eve on the pulpit, dressed in leopard skin caveman garments. Awesome doesn't even begin to describe the novelty of this scene.

As if this weren't enough, I could not be in better company. Our band of gringoes spans 23-66 in age and hails from all over the US. The merriment virtually never ceases. Tonight is supposed to be an all-nighter in the streets of Antigua before we start the alfombra at 6am, so I'm off to take a nap!

San Andres Itzapa

Tuesday brought the privilege of seeing another shrine of Maximon. I went with MW and her brother to San Andres Itzapa to see a particularly well known shrine. When we got to the gate of the temple, there were 3 small bonfires on altars. Several Mayans and one kooky British lady were praying in front of them. Several other Mayans were seated on nearby benches smoking 2 to 3 cigars simultaneously. A guatemalan with perfect English kept offering to tell us about Mashimon (and he and his friend ended up extorting a rather large tip out of easygoing MW).

Inside the temple, there were 6 ling tables where people were lighting birthday sized candles and sicking them to the table top with melted wax. One by one, people ascended the platform where the Maximon was held, and a shaman blessed them by tapping their head and arms with what looked like palm fronds. Closer inspection revealed that this Maximon was covered in plastic wrap, and further observation revealed the reason for this precaution. A woman ascended and, after praying, started dousing the Maximon alternately with perfume and liquor. More liquor than perfume. Maximon in all of his manifestations in known to drink and smoke heavily.

The inside of the temple was adorned with bricks engraved with messages of gratitude to Maximon from all of the people he has helped. It was very neat to read them all. On the way back to the car, we passed through the local market which was impressive but smelly, and just before reaching the car, a sex worker flashed MW's brother, although MW and I didn't see anything. San Andres is certainly an interesting and unusual place.

Gallaudet en Guate

Last week the Gallaudet population in Guatemala quintupled its size. N and J, a couple from Colorado Springs, came to Guatemala City to complete the adoption of their new son. Additionally, there were rumors of 3 Gallaudet undergrads roaming the city, but we were ultimately unable to get in touch with them. I got to spend a fair amount of time with N and J and their adorable hard of hearing son who is 13 months old. We used the Mariott Hotel as our base, since we could exactly play phone tag. The Mariott is like the adoption capital of the city, there are 2 floors designated for adopting families and even a "baby lounge", a communal area for parents to chat. Every other person is toting a newly adopted baby or toddler.

On Saturday, N and I went to the ASORGUA building to chat with some of the members. I was positively amazed by how seamlessly and fluently N communicated with the Deaf Guatemalans. They knew a bit of ASL and she learned GSL vocabulary like she was being paid $50 a sign. Everyone seemed to enjoy themsleves. On Monday, C, JB, and V from the ASORGUA board met up with us for dinner at Guatemala's most famous fried chicken franchise, Pollo Campero. Campero puts KFC to shame and is more of a sitdown restaurant. I'm not big on fast food but I will say that Campero is delicious. Full and happy, we snapped a few photos to docuement the international Deaf connection.

3 Dog Día

The first home visit I did today was in Zone 7, and the path from the bus to the housing project was lined with stray dogs, fighting each other ferociously. FR actually picked up a concrete rock to throw in case they bothered us. They didn´t.

The second home visit was in a zona roja of zone 18, known for drugs and crime. The path from the bus to the house was marked with a dead dog (or a nearly dead dog, I wasn´t getting close enough to check, particularly because it was covered with lesions from an unidentifiable disease)

The situations of the families we met were very sad and difficult to process. On the bus ride back to my home, I got off in front of the high end shopping mall in zone 11, and walked around for a while to people watch. I´m not sure if seeing other unimpoverished people eased or compounded my guilt and frustration. On a lamp post there was a flyer for a lost dog, a well-groomed maltese that had gone missing from a nearby home. The award for finding the pet was Q2000, more than either of the families I interviewed earned in a month.

Chichi

On the way back to Guatemala City, we stopped in Chichicastenango, which is famous for its church and its artisan market. The market was a cross between Calcutta, Carnival in Rio, a Rainbow, and the third circle of hell.

We had to wait for a Catholic procession (pre-Easter parade) to pass before entering the market. This meant squishing up against the wall of Mayan observers, trying to take pictures and hoping we didn´t get struck by shrapnel from the firecrackers, set off willy-nilly by the shrine carriers in the procession. We then entered a labrynith of hundreds of booths selling traditional Mayan crafts. Everyone was 4 feet tall or less and shouting, except for the occasional tourist swimming upstream. We noted more than a few Mayan woman pushing past with baskets holding live turkeys strapped to their back. Lower to the ground, one could see metal barrels filled with baby turkeys, drunk persons who have chosen to sit or nap in the way of oncoming traffic, and even shorter Mayan women, who are by nature lower to the ground.

The three of us worked as a team to purchase the crafted goods on our shortlist. My father gaged the appropriate price, then I tried to barter in Spanish. They drive a hard bargain, and I´m a bleeding heart, so I would say it only went moderately well. There were points when we knew we could have gotten the price lower, but I balked, because I honestly couldn´t handle the idea of paying hard-working, dirt-poor artisans any less than the cheap prices they were offering. Weaving in hand, it was amazing that we got out of there alive.

The true gem of Chichicastenango is not the bi-weekly market, but the Catholic church at the city´s center. It is here that the first written document of the Popol Vuh was found. Popol Vuh, which means ¨Book of the Council¨ Quiché, is the main text of the Mayans, containing their creation story, an epic about hero twins, and other stories about the gods. Inside the cathedral, designed with classic Spanish architecture, groups of Mayans were holding their own religious ceremonies around small alters with incense and candles, demonstrating the aforementioned unique fusion of religion and culture.

Chichi was perhaps the most bizarre educational experience I´ve had as of yet.

Maximón

Maximon is described aptly by Professor W. Ikipedia:

¨a saint worshipped in various forms by Maya people of several towns in the highlands of Western Guatemala. The origins of his cult are not very well understood by outsiders to the different Mayan religions, but Maximón is believed to be a form of the pre-Colombian Maya god Mam, blended with influences from Catholicism...Where Maximón is venerated, he is represented by an effigy which resides in a different house each year, being moved in a procession during Holy Week. During the rest of the year, devotees visit Maximón in his chosen residence, where his shrine is usually attended by two people from the representing Cofradia who keep the shrine in order and pass offerings from visitors to the effigy. Worshippers offer money, spirits and cigars or cigarettes to gain his favour in exchange for good health, good crops, and marriage counseling, amongst other favours. The effigy invariably has a lit cigarette or cigar in its mouth, and in some places, it will have a hole in its mouth to allow the attendants to give it alcohol to drink.¨

Praying to Maximon is considered by Evangelicals to be the ugliest form of ungodliness, but the Mayan who embrace him hold fast to an eccentric and fascinating set of beliefs. The most impressive part is the way that they´ve incorporated him into Catholism, blending the 2 religions (there is often Jesus iconography on or around the shrine to Maximón). Despite our tourguide´s wealth of knowledge, we coudln´t quite wrap our heads around the fusion of faiths, which seemed contradictory. Nonetheless, it is a classic example of the adaptability of the Mayan people, who have molded themselves to the impositions of Catholic conquistadors while retaining components of their own spiritual life.

El Lago Atitlan

We hit the road early for a 3 hour drive to Lake Atitlan, lauded by Adlous Huxley among others as the most magnificent lake on earth. They weren´t kidding. Forgive my use of mindless cliché, but it really was more beautiful than I ever imagined. As card-carrying tourists, we have dozens of photos to prove it, but they won´t do the lake much justice. The Hotel Atitlan, too, was overflowing with history and character. Our room contained 3 twin-sized cots, all in a row, with intricately carved wooden bedposts. The gardens of this Inn were also gorgeous (they really know how to do it right here in Guate, considering the plethora of indigenous wild flowers).

We met our excellent tour guide mid-morning and boarded a small motorboat to begin our hop around the lake. Gliding (and sometimes bumping) through the water was so lovely and humbling it was easy to lose all sense of time. The first town we stopped at was San Juan La Laguna, populated by traditional Mayans who have successfully formed artisan co-ops. The streets of the town were squaky clean, (which is REMARKABLE in this country) and the women´s attire was almost as impressive as the steep hills (My father and I came to the concensus that in order to traverse Guatemala, one needs to channel one´s inner mountain goat). We saw the last remaining artisan cooperative that produces and uses only natural dyes for the threat they weave in their tapestries. Derived from boiled leaves, bark and berries, the colors are smooth and indelible, though not as vibrant as the synthetic dyes that most Mayans now utilize.

After visiting a homeopathic garden and a shrine to Maximon, a Mayan diety of sorts with the most intriguing eccentricities (Please refer to Mashimon post), we he headed across the lake to Santiago for lunch. Santiago had another statue of Maximon, over which a chosen group of men were keeping vigil. This one was wearing no fewer than 12 Western-style silk neckties. When we entered the hut to see him, a boy child farted and everyone became hsyterical. We put a few Quetzales in the dish in front of the shrine and made our way out. Santiago is also the site of a beautiful Catholic cathedral, which incorporates Mayan religion in small, iconic ways.

In the evening we went to Panahachel for dinner. ¨Pana¨, as it is dubbed by Guatemalans, is the party capital of the lake, and is famous for its bars, clubs, and debauchery. Needless to say, we 3 nerds had had enough of it by the time we´d finished dinner. Instead of taking a taxi back to our hotel, we opted for a took-took, which is the love child of a rickshaw and vespa. The driver spent about 10 minutes zig-zagging the lagging mo-ped up the steep hill, dragging the weight of 3 food-filled gringoes. We all got a good night´s sleep to prepare for Sunday in Chichicastenango.

Mis Papas

Last Friday was the start of another fantastic adventure, one that included my favorite parents! I was thrilled to see them rolling their suitcases out of the Guatemala City arrivals terminal. We headed immediately to Antigua, where we met my supervisor MW. They took a guided tour of the historic churches while I met with MW, and we reconvened in the evening at their hotel, La Posada de Don Rodrigo (supposedly the oldest Inn in Central America). The rooms were old and lovely, but were upstaged by the stunning inner courtyard, which yielded a postcard-like view of the Agua volcano. We ate perhaps the tastiest dinner I´ve had since I arrived at La Fonda de la Calle Real, and hit the sack to rest up for our weekend at Lake Atitlan.

Las aventuras

B and Hayley made the most of our second day in the park. Walking down from Temple IV after sunrise, we past through the vacant Gran Plaza to find a flock of giant irridescent pheasants foraging the courtyard. We stopped back at the hotel for a traditional Guatemalan breakfast then headed back into the park. Luckily, B knows how to read maps and brought her Guatemala travel guide along. We spent the entire morning hitting all of the monuments we hadn´t yet seen, the most impressive of which was Temple V.

Although Temple V is very close to the rest of the ruins, it was sparsely populated by visitors. We soon learned that the reason for this was that ascending this temple involved a precarious climb up wooden ladder stairs at about an 80 degree angle. B´s intrepid spirit wasconvincing enough to give the climb a try. I´ll admit, it was scary going up, and, well, paralyzingly terrifying coming down, but worth it all the same. The view from the top was far and away the greatest view in the park. We have pictures of the view--and the ladder--to verify our tale.

The only shuttle back to Flores left the hotel at 2pm with B and me on board. We observed that giant hogs roam freely in the small towns and along the roads connecting them. We witnessed one special pig shimmy under a chicken wire fence. Once in Flores, we had a few hour before the flight, which we spent in town on the isle of Flores. To call Flores picturesque would be an understatement, and it was as quaint and tranquil as a watercolor. We drank licuados on a dock and strolled around a bit before heading back to the airport.

Coming back to Guatemala City was a little disappointing after the amazing weekend we had had, but we made the best of it. Sunday morning, we went to the Parque Central in Zona 1. We visited the national cathedral, snaked through the Mayan market on the central square and ate freshly made churros (and not the baseball park/six flags crap sticks, delicious authentic churros). I was so sad to see B leave but grateful for our amazing travel experience.

El amanecer caro

For a reasonable fee, guests can enter the park at 4:30am to watch the sunrise from the top of Temple IV. B and I wanted to seize this opportunity, so we sought an ATM to get cash to shmear the guards the next morning. We soon learned however, that there is no ATM to speak of in a 60 mile radius. The hotel can be expensed to a credit card, but the national park functions on cash only.

Desparately, we probed every pocket, secret hiding place, decoy wallet and backpack compartment between us to yield exactly the correct amount needed to enter the park and pay for an escort to the temple at dawn. This sum was comprised of dollars and Quetzales, including 25 centavo pieces. We also contemplated which of our belongings we would be willing to hawk if we found ourselves a few Quetzales short. When we hiked out to the gate of the park and presented our motely collection of currency, the man gave us the ¨you dirty backpackers need to learn some responsibility¨look and gave us back the 2 quetzales worth of small coins.

We rode in the cab of a pickup to the base of the temple with several other tourists, and were promtly abandoned by the guards. Finding seats atop the temple, we waited for dawn. The next 50 minutes brought about 60 other people who had the same idea. Giant tours of Americans and Chilenos, one led by an obnoxious guide who kept speaking politely in Spanish then morphing into a demeaning Cheech Marin in English. He ordered us all to be silent for the 30 minutes preceeding the sunrise.

The jungle was covered in a beautiful gray fog and revealed itself slowly as the sun ascended somewhere. The view was even more breathtaking than it had been the day before. The best part, however, was the sound of all of the animals waking up and greeting the day. The calls of howler monkeys abounded and parrots and toucans joined in a fabulous chorus. One guard had told us that the monkeys howl because they are just so happy to wake up, which isn´t true but I´d love to believe it. The morning sounds were the kind of thing that make me feel like nothing I could imagine could be more beautiful than the natural world that already exists.

TIKAL

The shuttle driver was waiting outside of our Antigua inn at 3:55am. Slinging our backbacks into the van, we set off for the airport where we boarded a plane to Flores. Arriving at the Tikal Inn a little after 9, we were sunscreened, bugsprayed, water-toting and ready for our tour of the ruins by 10. Our guide was very competent and spoke excellent English, but I had my typical anthroplogical freak out while listening to the disparaging way he spoke about the Mayan people. Most ancient Mayans, like contemporary Mayans, were uneducated and believed things happened on account of dieties rather than science. The guide, however, mounted his soapbox every five minutes to expound upon how silly, ignorant and dim-witted they were to have done so.

Nonetheless, the tour of the ruins was magical. I took dozens of pictures, but none of them does the archaeological site any justice. On the first afternoon, we climbed Temple IV and saw the Gran Plaza and the twin pyramids. Spider monkeys in the canopy above and giant Cieba trees and Spanish cedars provided an ideal backdrop for our adventure. We exited the park at 2pm and decided to rest for the afternoon before re-entering the park the next day. The heat is extraordinary in Peten, Guatemala, so we spent several hours in the hotel pool.

Amigas

This week in Guatemala was blessed by a visit from a good friend from home. B came down Tuesday afternoon, and I was simply delighted to see her. She has limited Spanish skills, so it was quite a hullabaloo introducing her to my host, E, who is a real character. Every ten minutes E used a token English word, and screamed with delight directly after uttering each one (which I of course also rewarded with a high five) We spent the evening in Zona Viva, a posh area of Zone 10 with good restaurants. The following morning, at 5:55am, we hopped a bus up the road to the Hotel Tikal Futura, where the driver let us off on the median and sped away. B met a shuttle to Antigua, where she remained until I met up with her Thursday afternoon. It would have been difficult passing the days at work in anticipation of meeting up with B, but I was very busy. In addition to the bi-monthly parent workshop, the monthly board meeting with all of the helping professionals at CECSA was held Thursday. Guess who took minutes? Let´s hope that FR finds my notes acceptable, everyone was talking like the man in the old micro machines toy comercials. Thursday afternoon FR went to the eye and ear campus and left me to hold down the fort for the first time, which was a nerve racking but good experience. Then at 3:01, it was off to Antigua to begin my mini vacation with B!

Día del Cariño

Valentine´s Day is big here. Thursday´s work day was like an 8-hour hug, it was fantastic. There was an assembly for all of the students and staff in which everyone was assigned one other person to whom to give a gift. The staff also had a secret friend exchange all week which culminated in a staff meeting where we discussed quotes/psalms about friendship, exchanged small gifts and ate a giant strawberry shortcake. The students even got to leave an hour early.
In the afternoon, FR and I went to the eye and ear campus for an in-service on professional excellence. All of the Prociegos social workers were there. The speaker ended his presentation with a Spanish-dubbed American motivational video called ¨Even Eagles Need a Push:How to Keep Flying in These Changing Times¨ Then, of course, more cake.
This afternoon, at the ASORGUA meeting, there was a belated celebration of Valentine´s Day which included plateful´s of typical Guatemalan cuisine and (surprise!) cake. When I arrived home tonight, I opened the refrigerator seeking my tomato juice, and blocking it was (surprise!) a strawberries and cream...cake.

La Moto a Canalitos

¡Santo Cielos! FR and I showed up at the city rendezvous point to meet the father of one of the students, who was to accompany us back to his home. We thought this meant another bus out to Canalitos, but he actually came on his motorcycle. His oldest son came on a motorbike, too, and they instructed us to hop on back. No no no no no no no no. I don´t even like skateboards. I don´t even go down stairs without holding the banister. This just won´t do.

But do it did. We really had no choice, FR was set to do the home visit, there were no buses around headed that way and the men had already used time and gas to come pick us up. I frantically considered the appropriateness of squeezing my driver like a koala on a eucalyptus tree. Deeming it inappropriate, I just put a death grip onto either sides of his American cheerleading windbreaker.

If I said that my eyes were open for the first few minutes of the ride I´d be lying. When I did open them, I saw a beautiful landscape of green gorges, surprisingly just outside the city. This scenescape was soon marred, however, by the presence of an unreasonably large number of turkey vultures. They´re huuuuuge. And I can´t just appreciate them as a species of bird--where there are vultures there is carion. What were they there to scavenge? Maybe they were waiting for me to fly off the back of the moto and break a leg so they could harass me then eat me.

We finally arrived at the residence and were greeted by the sound of ravenous, wild dogs. This was like the Guatemalan version of the Princess Bride without the quicksand. The father went in to chain up the 2 dogs. When FR asked if they always barked that way, he said ¨pues, solamente cuando quieren carnita¨ (well, only when they want meat). At least there was a nice looking rooster to foil the ravenous-wild-chained-up dogs (although, call me Danny Tanner, but what is a rooster doing IN the house?)

FR conducted the first part of the socioeconomic assessment interview and I did the latter part. This family, too, lived in virutal squalor. We both did our best to ignore the stench from the dogs. As always, the family was very friendly and generous, offering us cups of Atol (sp?) which is a drink made with water, sugar, and an oatmealish substance. At the conclusion of the interview, they offered us a ride back to the city, but FR asserted that it would be best for us to take the Canalitos bus. The father insisted that that would take an hour more of our time, but we were fine with that. Never again with the motos.

Primero Dios

Like all of the poorest municipalities dotting our warming globe, Guatemala is a city of God. The population is split primarily between Catholics and Evangelicals. Because FR is a devout Evangelica, I have had the unique opportunity to learn about the faith. In fact, it finds its way into every aspect of practice.
Using religious doctrines in social work in the US is generally a no-no, and preaching can be classified as a no-no-no. This is not the case, however, in Guatemala. Religious words have seemed to provide comfort and solace to all of our clients, Catholic and Evangelical alike. Everyone´s policy is God first, particularly where and when medicine, education, food, support, and security are not available.
FR´s office has 2 solid walls of psalms, printed in bold face and mounted on pink construction paper matte. Solid walls. While doing paper work, we listen to Evangelical soft rock or sermons on the Evangelical radio station. FR fasts during the work day to show her commitment to Jehova and to spiritual improvement. During our lunch break, we read ¨la palabra¨, an Evangelical newspaper.
I can´t say that the fierce Evangelical presence is always comfortable, but I´m on the ¨When in Rome¨ plan, so I try to embrace it as a cultural experience. I told FR I was Jewish when she asked, and she was curious to know what that meant since she had never met a Jew. I think it´s disappointing to her that I´m not Evangelical, but she respects and accepts me anyway. I tried to emphasize what all religions have in common (faith, community, tradition, love). She agreed, but she doesn´t seem to understand that we Jews KNOW about Jesus, but don´t understand that he died for our sins. I´m going to leave that one be.
The weirdest thing was when the friendly Evangelical janitor came in to talk about misguided people from other religions. I kept my nose in the filing cabinet while he went on and on about the Jews and the Mormons, not in a mean way but in a genuinely confused way. It´s really interesting--they´re not ANTI anyone, they just really, really don´t get why the rest of us just don´t get it. FR was a good liaison repeating my explanation of Judaism, and I just kept quiet with the files, hoping the Janitor would forget I spoke Spanish.

La Pasqua

Today it was I who conducted the socio-economic data interview. FR and I traveled to Canalitos in a bus adorned with patriotic...US...stickers. We walked with the student´s mother to their ïnformal¨home, the word here denoting a ¨formal¨ lack of a sturdy roof and walls. The interview was of intern quality, but I´m sure I´ll fine tune it for next time. FR was very supportive.
While there was no light to see what I was writing, I was offered a glass of coca cola and had the pleasure of observing the most beautiful roosters I had ever seen. I´m not being sarcastic; these birds are surely the muses of all kitsch and crockery fit for Midwestern collectors. Black and white with blood-red crests, slender yellow legs and pristine voices. I wonder if they know what it´s like to be a human where they live.

Zona 21

An hour and a half on a bus united FR and myself with M, a mayan woman with 4 children, no job, no education, and no teeth on the top of her mouth. Dressed in traditional attire, she led us down a steep slope to her home, baby in tow. M´s heart glowed through the intricate weaving of her blouse. She was hospitable and informative, though she needed some help from her second oldest son to provide the details we needed. Their household had 6 people who share 2 rooms, tin walls and roof and dirt floors.
There is a heartbreaking negative correlation between people´s poverty and their generosity here. While this mother was certainly the poorest we had seen, she refused to let us leave without giving each of us a mango, 2 oranges, a Bosco snack cake and a can of coca cola. Climbing the path back up to the road, I was too overwhelmed to speak.

Villa Canales

The next home visit was 2 hours away by bus, a distance traveled twice a day by the student and her mother. The rendezvous was a shell station in the bustling center of the town of Villa Canales. The walk to the house necessitated the avoidance of a lot of stray dogs and chickens who looked like they came out of hell.

The student (who attends afternoon school) greeted us at the door with a smile. She is a very sweet girl. She shares a single room, bathroom and small yard with her sister and mother, who know some sign language. The domicile was cement and tin, but had a refrigerator, a TV and a portable electric stove. The mother has no education and no steady work, but sells things when she can and hopes to get a job at a factory. She is Evangelical and depends heavily on faith, and receives support from her stepmother and some friends she did not want to name.

This mother spends 44 Quetzales and countless hours each week accompanying her daughter to school. FR and I rode back to the city with the girl, saving her mother just a little bit of fare.

Zona 12

I accompanied FR, the social worker at CECSA on three home visits this week. The purpose was to collect information for a socio-economic report which determines, on a sliding scale, if the students´families have to pay for them to attend school.

We rode 3 different buses in order to arrive in Zone 12, the last of which was free since no one coming from there can afford fare. The mother of the student met us at the bus stop and walked us to the home she and her daughter shared. It was a single room, within a cement-walled house, without water and with minimal electricity. They cannot leave the house after dark. There were 2 dirty dogs roaming in and out and the smell was off-putting. FR was distracted by a noise from above which she said was ¨air¨but was probably rats.

The mother worked as a domestic in a different zone had no family, no education, and no knowledge of sign language with which to communicate with her daughter. Despite her unimaginable poverty, she gave each of us a piece of candy and thanked us for coming. Walking back to the bus stop with the mother, FR was praying out loud.

Los Buses

Now that I commute to a different zone for my internship, I have gained a lot of experience with the City buses. Most of them are old American school buses, painted red, gutted and sometimes fitted with school-stadium chairs bolted to the floor of the vehicle. A muchacho hangs out the door shouting the destination of the bus, which is also pasted on the front window next to so many decals. The decals include the name of the vessel, usaully a woman´s names like Margarita or Esmaralda, and plenty of reminders that the driver is a man of god (¨jesus es rey¨, ¨Dios Bendiga¨or my favorite one ¨May Hadger Power is Jesus¨...say it out loud and think about it)

How does one complete a successful ride on these camionetas? Here´s one for Frommers:
1. Have a quetzal coin ready and waiting in your pocket. You will have to fling it at the driver between the time when he takes his foot of the brake he never really pressed and slams it on the gas.

2. Flag the bus before you can even see the sign indicating which one it is. If you wait, it will be too late for the driver to stop, and if it´s not your bus, just shoo it away.

3. When the muchacho leaps off, you leap on, grabbing the handlebar with your left hand and swinging the quetzal into the driver´s palm with your right. God help you if you need change for a 5.

4. During commuter hours, don´t look for a seat(there wont be any). If you find one in the middle of the bus, resist the temptation--if the bus fills up, no one will let you off, even if you push. During off-hours, sit the hell down, these guys will drive in the lane of oncoming traffic if they feel like it.

5. When the driver approaches where you want to get off, whistle, or if you´re like me and you can´t whistle, just move toward the door and say ¨aqui. If he doesn´t stop, you may or may not want to try again...he probably heard you he just doesn´t feel like making an extra stop. Don´t worry, he´ll stop soon and you can backtrack.

6. Dont talk. Don´t read. Don´t get distracted. You´ll be fine.

¿Ud de EUA?

Ah, life as a cultural imperialist. I try never to advertise that Im from the United States, but in the Deaf world its a bit different. The faculty have blown my cover and the kids are really jazzed about it. I always catch kids jabbing other kids at the hall, pointing at me, and signing ´¿see her? shes from the US. Uh huh, the US.´ They are full of awesome questions and comments that Im happy to field. Here are the top 10 in no particular order--

1. Do you know Mel Gibson? He came here to Guatemala.
2. Did you fly here?
3. Your eyes are celeste!
4. Do you know Dennis Rodman?
5. How do Americans get to be so tall?
6. What language do they speak in the US?
7. How many kids do you have?
8. Youre not deaf, but you know sign language?
9. How can your teachers be deaf too?
10. What is your sign for watermelon?

The only thing better than the questions is the answer that one teacher gave. She explained that Americans are tall because our food has nutrients. Also, we marry people from Europe who are tall. She explained that if the students met a tall blond woman like from TV, married her and had babies, the babies would grow to be tall too.

P.S. Just when I want to put US pop culture on the backburner, I meet 2 students named kevin arnold and monica celes.

CECSA

My new internship placement is a marked improvement, Im very fond of it already. CECSA is the educational center for deaf adolescents, also run by the Comite Prociegos y Sordos. The students are very eager to engage with me and the staff treat me like a peer, which feels great. I have lots more work on my plate, and Im enjoying it. I will be able to accompany the social worker, FR, on home visits because the Comite arranges for a driver if we have to go to unstable neighborhoods. The director, HO, is very kind and has scheduled for me a series of short classroom observations, which have served as a great opportunity to get to know the students. The GSL used at CECSA is even more similar to ASL, which has aided communication. I get to enjoy a daily coffee break with the school social worker and psychologist, meet with parents and joke around with the students.
The only tricky aspect of the new placement is the commute. I catch a bus at 615am on the highway loop in zone 11 which drops me and dozens of others at the entrance of Zone 1. Together we all trek a few blocks into the business district. When I leave the school at 3pm, I walk several more blocks in the other direction for an urban treat--a ride on the Transmetro. In service for about a year now, the Transmetro is a single commuter line largely resembling a Chicago El train, except for the fact that it is a bus. It has its own lane down the center of the main city road, and federal guards at each stop for safety. It is the only commuter line of its kind in Central America, and it costs the same as the painted, gutted school buses that serve as transportation in the rest of the city. All said, the folks at CECSA are definitely worth the commute.

el mundo pequeño

Here´s some lite fare to follow up my previous monster-sized post. A friend of mine from the Jewish community invited me to attend his sister´s wedding Saturday night, a huge event attended by upwards of 300 people. After a rousing hora, I found myself standing next to a woman that looked remarkably familiar. The odds of running into someone I know at a private event in Guatemala City are so slim that I figured this was just the result of my having left my glasses at home. When the woman returned my perplexed gaze, however, I confirmed that it was indeed ZU, my neighbor from the freshman dorms at Wesleyan! The bride was her cousin, and she was down for the week visiting family. What are the odds? We had the opportunity to talk and catch up, and of course take a here´s-proof-that-I-ran-into-someone-I-know-in-the-least-likely-of-places digital photo. One of the best rounds of Jewish Geography ever.

La mierda, el ventilador, y la resulta

Big changes afoot, and most likely for the best. Things at the total communication school have not been going well. Here is a synopsis of the issues:

1) To begin with, it must be made clear that ASORGUA and the COMITE are two entities that have precious little to do with one another. There is a very tangible tension between the two groups, and while it is a Gallaudet interest to collaborate with both, it is a conflict of interest to attempt to integrate them. I shall still be attending ASORGUA meetings on the weekend and hopefully doing needs assessment with them out of my own interest.

2) LP, the director of social work at the COMITE, authorized my internship but did not consult with ID or the school director before doing so. I was functioning under the assumption that he had discussed the role of an intern at the school with them, ony to find out that this is not the case. They have both been kind, but have also made it clear that there is not a structural niche for a student social worker 32 hours a week at the Centro de Comunicacion Total. I empathize with the fact that they were put in an uncomfortable position, but the situation has not been handled very well. Passive agression has ensued and I´ve been made to feel unwelcome on a number of fronts.

3) ID proposed a number of alternatives, which included working at the other Comite schools. She has asserted that there is no place for an intern at the school (I can´t tell you how great it would have been to have gotten this information just a bit earlier). As far as home visits are concerned, policy dictates that I cannot do them alone and ID has expressed concern about me accompanying her. Many of the neighborhoods she visits are astonishingly impoverished and people will not take kindly to a young outsider who looks like me entering their homes. In addition to the safety risks for myself, Imelda says I would be putting her at risk.

4) The kicker is the Guatemalan bureaucracy, about which I´ve gotten to learn a great deal. Note that I am not being sarcastic--it really has been valuable, however frustrating. Ultimately, the only person who has the authority to make any decisions is LP, who is terribly difficult to contact. Before even contacting the other nearby schools, we must go through him, and he was out of the office until this afternoon.

THANKFULLY, I have a phenominal supervisor MW who came in from Antigua today to advocate for and with me at the Comite office. We had an excellent meeting with LP and the new scoop is as follows:

A straight shoot up the PERIFERICO highway loop from Total Communication School is the Comite´s central office in Zone 1. We talked with LP and he was very kind and understanding. His recomendation was that I transfer to SECSA the educational-vocational program for Deaf adolescents. SECSA is located 2 short blocks from the Comite central office. We all walked over there and talked to HO, the director of the program. HO was so warm and welcoming, and has stated that there is room on her team for a masters student. She of course will be discussing things with the SECSA social worker tomorrow, to make sure she is comfortable with it. HO really made an excellent impression on MW and me, and seems more philosophically amenable to the idea of a partnership with Gallaudet.

Monday through Thursday and some Fridays, I will take one highway loop bus to the vicinity and walk 4 blocks to SECSA, which seems to be fairly safe. I will work with the SECSA ¨team¨which includes HO, the social worker, the psychologist and the instructors. The hours are 7am-3pm, which is more than enough to fulfill requirements. On Fridays, the students have vocational ¨practicas¨. This means that a group of teens and 1 teacher go to various businesses and the students work on a particular vocational skill like cooking or cutting hair. I can accompany ¨practica¨days when needed and I will also continue to attend ASORGUA meetings most weekends.

LP says that initially most of the swk practice will be team-based, but that there will likely be opportunity later in the internship to do one on one work with students. If everything is alright with the SECSA social worker, I will begin Weds morning. (Tomorrow I shall go to Total Communication School and inform them of the transfer).

It has come to light that the disconnect between Gallaudet and the Comite is much larger than any of us thought. This of course comes with the territory of pioneering a new internship. Please cross your fingers for me if you´re not using them to communicate. :)

Dificultades

What I thought was just a slow start to my internship has actually proven to be a significant dilemma. It´s not a good time to disclose many details just yet, but as a result of bureaucratic miscommunications, I currently lack formal responsibilities, a role, and a stake in the school environment. I am still fulfilling hours until the snag gets resolved, but much of the work is clerical in nature. While it is not a personal issue, the school resents having been given an intern. Now is a fantastic time to find this out.

Tomorrow morning I will have the opportunity to work with some parents briefly, but structural changes to the practicum cannot be made until Monday at the earliest. It is upsetting to have lost purposefullness, but I understand that this sometimes comes with the territory of pioneer internships. The good thing is that things will definitely get resolved, as I have several potential options for lateral shifts. As a wise graduate assistant told me when I was having problems with internship planning last semester, I have the best kind of problem--one with a solution. In the mean time, I´ll just cross my fingers that the appropriate authorities make appropriate decisions to get this practicum back on track.

La Sordera

Today I had a conversation with the school social worker about common causes of hearing loss in this country. She had a lot to say about it, and I was happy to serve as a captive audience (because sometimes I get the feeling that she finds having an intern awkward and even burdensome...but that´s probably my paranoia talking).

The picture she painted was not very uplifting. She cited rubella and other infections as the most common medical causes, along with antibiotics given to treat bronchitis and (get this) ear infections. Complementary to medical problems were social problems. Most Guatemalans live in poverty, and at least half of the students at the school live in what is considered extreme poverty. They have no means to obtain medical care, and live in squalor.

Other families may have economic access to medical care but their faith instructs them to seek help only through faith, not through medicine. Most Guatemalans are Catholic or Evangelical, though there are a growing number of Jehovah´s Witnesses. And on the other side of the spectrum from faith, there is ignorance. ID explained disparagingly that most parents have no health education or parenting skills education, and often do not notice signs of hearing loss or diseases that lead to hearing loss in their children.

Perhaps ID has been exposed to this sadness too long, for she is really quite critical of parental behaviors. She noted their consumer mentality when it came to money management and finds some parents take her constant clothing and school supply donations for granted.

This discussion stood in stark contrast to IDs wonderfully warm conduct and positive regard for parents who have come to the school to see her. She is a truly gifted social worker and people-person with a lot of wisdom. I suppose every social worker gets jaded by experience eventually; the key is to try not to let it affect our work.

La Adopcion

CA and I planned to get together once more before she returned to the US, and chose the Camino Real as our rendezvous. As I sat on the couch in the lobby to wait for her (the very same couch on which the President of Aruba sat for his interview), I noted a strangely mixed group of people on the couches across from me. A man was translating for an old mayan woman who was articulating information about baby care and specifications. A teary-eyed couple with wisconsin accents listend intently. It was the finalization of an international adoption.

Minutes later, the mayan woman placed a baby girl in the American woman´s arms, and turned away. Her neice stood to comfort her as she cried silently. The air was thick and emotional. I couldn´t believe that I was this close to such a critical moment in both families´lives. I was obviously missing a lot of details, but was nonetheless overwhelmed by a contradictory mix of thoughts and feelings.

I am a strong proponent of building families through adoption, and international adoptions are very common. Guatemala, however, has been red flagged recently for problems and corruption with adoption, which tainted my observation of the scene. While everything seemed legally and socially legitimate, I couldn´t stop thinking about what the transaction meant to the Mayan family choosing not to parent the child.

The child´s change of family did not make me uncomfortable but the setting did. The couple adopting the child were guests at the finest hotel in the city, and did not speak Spanish. They were educated White people, who will likely make great parents, but how did the older woman feel relinquishing caretaking responsibilities for this baby in an environment that catered to wealthy foreigners? She will always remember the child as a mayan person, but will the child´s life reflect her heritage? On the other hand, would her quality of life have been sufficient had she remained with an aged relative without the means to care for her?

My anthropology, social work and personal wires all got crossed that afternoon. I want to restate that I´m not being critical of any party involved, but I feel unsettled nonetheless. I´ll chew on it for a little bit longer, with no intention of reaching a verdict.

Trabajo Social

The school social worker, ID, has returned at last. She is a genial, upbeat middle aged woman who exerts a positive influence on the school environment. We rearranged her office to make room for 2 of us, and greeted and met with a slow trickle of parents with enrollment concerns. The major challenge is that the concept of a social work intern is not the same in Guate as it is in the US.

Everyone is glad to have me, but doesn´t have a clear idea of what I do. While they are eager to teach me things, I am trying hard to make it clear that I can also be a practitioner, assisting with work and shouldering responsibility. I´m sure this will come with time. In the mean time, my learning contract was a foreign object to ID. She smiled and reviewed my proposed goals and objectives, but I could tell by the uncomfortable nuance in her smile that it may take a few days to get roles sorted out.

On top of the intern role confusion, ID keeps suggesting that I only stay a month, then go to work at the deaf preschool on the other end of the eye-ear compound, and later to the oral deaf school on the other side of the city and the remote one in Quetzaltenango, Guatemala. She is very wise to acklowledge the importance of a well-rounded perspective, but it really is humorous how different our concepts are. I would like the opportunity to visit all of these places, but my first perogative is to iron out my current situation! Either way I´m learning tons and fullfilling direct practice hours, but I am concerned about my efficacy in serving the children and families. Oh, to be young, American and a guinea pig.

Karma Mala

I can´t believe it. Just days after I posted a complaint about the funky garage dog, she vanished. Yonela never came back, and J is sure she was stolen, or worse--met her fate on the peripheral highway ring. I can´t help but feel this is my fault. Her poor puppies! Luckily we´ve been teaching them to drink milk from a bowl, and I think they´ll be ok. That´ll show me to speak ill of another living creature.

Centro Hebreo

Tuesday afternoon, after a string of exchanged emails with the director, I visited the Centro Hebreo, which is the heart of the Jewish community in Guatemala (yes, there is a Jewish Community). I was very curious to see what they had to offer. Security was tight--there is no published address, one must get it personally from the director. The cast iron wall has no sign, and one must submit a photocopy of one´s passport at the door.
The Centro Hebreo, like many places I´ve been in this city, is a geode: Dull and camouflaged on the outside, beautiful and brilliant on the inside. The synagogue is breathtaking, with stainted glass, and a white roof shaped like an inverted lilly. It conjured the aesthetics of the Bahai house of worship in India (though about 1/50 the size). Behind the synagogue is a 3 story school/community center, complete with a social hall, an indoor preschool playground, administrative offices, a conference room, and even a tiny kosher grocery story in their underground parking lot.
I was received with a typically guatemalan abundance of warmth, but with argentinian accents to boot! A significant portion of the community is in Guate via Argentina. They look like me, but smoke fashionable cigarettes and are dressed to kill. It was very unusual, but a delightful experience. I was given a tour of the whole facility, and am very impressed with what I saw. I even accepted an invitation to attend Shabbat services this weekend.

P.S. On an unrelated note, I learned how to make tamales from scratch.

Los Regalos

Over 40 people crowdedinto this week´s ASORGUA meeting. Many had donated gifts (wrapped and sitting under the ASORGUA christmas tree for about a month and a half) and today they opened the gifts and presented them to the Association. Among the gifts were tupperware, towels, knives, and even a toaster! I also had the privilege of presenting the results of the GDHHEP fundraiser to the group. After the meeting I showed the Board my pictures from the event, which were still in my digital camera. To express their thanks, the board gifted me and CA ASORGUA T-shirts. :)

Camino Real

The rest of our stay in Antigua was nice. We ate dinner at a restaurant, during which there was yet another power outage (4th in 9 days). They had to close the iron doors immediately to keep out thieves. This one only lasted 15 minutes or so. We then paid a short visit to N, a colleague who has hosted Gallaudet Faculty in the past. He was incredibly friendly and knew a member of ASORGUA from a GSL class. In the morning we stopped by a children´s charity and the Hermano Pedro center for persons with disabilities before heading back to Guatemala City.
CA suggested we visit the Camino Real, which is a super fancy hotel on the Avenida de la Reforma, as something of a sightseeing venture (it looked like a palace inside, in contrast to the city outside its walls). There were metal detectors at the entrance and myriad important looking people. The new President, Colom, will be inaugurated Monday, and had invited leaders from many countries to attend, many of whom were staying at the hotel. This was a strategicdecision; not only will it make the event auspicious, but the presence of international leaders and members of the press may help keep disgruntled Guatemalan citizens on their best behavior. Perhaps now they won´t riot or protest so asnot to seem unsightly or embarrassing (asif politics were a WASPish dinner party.)
The climax of this story is that while CA and I were sitting on couches in the lobby, the press interviewed the president of Aruba and the Dutch Ambassador on the couch right in front of us! Wow!

Faire du Nerd

Last night I reuinted with CA and my supervisor in Antigua. CA and I are staying 2 nights in a lovely 12 room hostel/inn run by a family she´s known for a while. We had a wonderful dinner of tortilla soup with my supervisor and her housemates, just after my supervisor returned from her Democrats in Guatemala meeting (yes, you read right. There are a lot of expats here, and they´re rooting for the good guys. :)..)
CA´s dear friend, Latin American Studies Professor B from a college in Maryland, is here with a group of students. What a fantastic opportunity for me--I got to sit in on a lecture about conquistadors and history in Antigua. I guess not everyone gets as excited about optional lectures as I do. While it would have been advisable to be a respectful, passive listener, I started to squirm in my seat like a second grader with a full bladder when Professor B asked the group about Cortez. She generously granted me permission to participate, so as always, I came off as an obnoxious, overzealous nerd. And I have the notes to prove it.
Next came the tourism. I marked the occasion by busting out my shorts. That´s right, shorts. pantalones cortos. Iced the cake with a camera and sunscreen. CA and I accompanied the group on a tour of the Tercera Catedral, which was destroyed by both a flood and an earthquake but is still lovely. We also saw the original University of San Carlos, which is now a museum, the Iglesia de San Francisco and el convento de Capuchinas (¿spelling?...as if I´ve been diligent with spelling in this blog. hah.) The group is very American, which is a bit of a change. In any case, hoorah for learning.

Los Padres

Thursday was registration day for the new semester at the school. The social worker has still not returned from holiday, so I was a "floater", helping out the teachers. In Guatemala schools do not get the kind of State funding and support that US schools do, so the families themselves are in charge of providing all art and classroom suppies, in addition to their own notebooks and school supplies. The children are all very adorable (not shocking, I mean, they are children) and sign a fair amount. I was impressed to see that a lot of the parents signed basic things too. About half of the children came for registration with just their mothers, but the other half came with brothers and sisters (many of them babies in Mayan cloth clings) and some dads! I only noted two parents who asked their children to use spoken Spanish to greet the teachers.
Things have gotten a bit befuddled with my schedule; now the social worker is not returning until WEDS, so I have 2 idle days next week. It´s a good thing that I will be able to make up the internship hours with a Gallaudet trained Audiologist working in Guatemala City. I will be following up with patients and their families about use and efficacy of their assistive devices (primarily hearing aids because Cochlear Implants are very rare here).
The faculty are very friendly, I hope to get to know them all better. 1 of the 2 Deaf teachers has a deaf family and her siblings are deaf and married to deaf people in the US! Everyone takes a short break around 10 for a snack, which entails going to the parking lot of the Robles hospital for a hot dog or something else from a vender. Get this--New York and Chicago may pride themselves on the distinctive condiments adorning their hotdogs, but here in Guate, they put Guacamole, Mayo, ketchup and Onions on them, served on bread or in a tortilla. If you want pop with it, they open the glass bottle, pour it into a little plastic bag, and stick a straw in it, so they can recycle the bottles. Mmmm!

Los Animales

I love animals, heck, I am an animal, but I have to say that the dog in the garage, Yonela, is no longer my friend. I stepped outside for a few minutes for better cell phone reception and came back to find my garbage bag ripped open and the contents strewn all over the floor. She even ate a full egg from my food shelf, lapping the contents out of the half-shell, but managed to dribble some of it across the floor tiles. She is incidentally a cross-eyed, bow legged chihuahua mix with teats so heavy from her nursing puppies that they drag on the ground. Ay, caramba. Oh, and as an added treat, the parrots have learned to mimic the tantrum screams of my hostess´s granddaughter. Hilarity ensues.

Centro de Comunicacion Total

I rode the city bus alone for the first time yesterday, but it was really just a kilometer on the highway loop around the city. 3 minutes and I was at the gate of the school. When I knocked on the giant green cast iron doors, a man who looked suspiciously like the Mayan cousing of the whiskered doorman of the Emerald City let me in. After meeting with K, the very professional VERY young director of the school (27? 28?). All of the staff except 3 or 4 are under 30 it seems. Only 2 mail teachers out of a 20 person staff.
I attended an inservice (workshop) on nutrition with thet rest of the staff. It was facilitated by this animated, guapo homeopath-nutritionalist. I now know how and when to maximize water consumption and the ideal posture for pooping. Also, smoothie lovers beware: fruit from the ground and fruit from trees should NOT be mixed. The presentation had a lot of great info for kids and families, though I´d be lying if I said he didn´t try to sell us chinese herb packets at the end.
After discussing a few more things with K, I got the grand tour of what seems like a campus for Aural-optic deficiency. The school is connected not only to a multi-faceted Comite resource center, but also to the Robles eye and ear hospital. My teacher friend, V, (also a former ASORGUA president), was my guide. I also ate lunch with him and learned a bit more GSL. I came home mid-afternoon and enjoyed having some time to myself (which is ironic, because I´ve had too much of it in recent days.)
This morning we had staff workshops on self-esteem and classroom discipline. I was glad to be able to participate, and actually ended up teaching some attention-getting techniques from my days working at Deaf camps. Tomorrow the parents will come with their children to tour the school and meet the teachers. V said we are getting 50 new students, which is a ton! Monday I will meet with ID, the school social worker, and will be doing a lot of work with her off-campus.
Today ended with a reunion with CA, my mentor-guardian-angel-Gally Alumna who helped make the internship possible. It was greate catching up with her, and tomorrow afternoon I will be joining her and my supervisor in Antigua. Can´t wait!

El Comite

The phrase ¨go with the flow¨was created for days like these. I awoke at 7am to confront my rite of passage as a newbie in Central American: a bout of stomach illness. Fortunately this only lasted a few hours. I was supposed to meet up with M a little after 2, to go to the central office of the Comite, but she was coming on the city bus (which I did not know) and did not arrive until 330. You know me, a bit of a nervous nelly. I had already called a cab by the time she showed up so we took it together and arrived at 4 (serendipitous, because my meeting with the Director, LP, had been moved to 4 earlier that day after it took like 11 phone calls to get through.)
At the office we connected with President C, who had brought some forms from ASORGUA for LP to sign. I got to sit and discuss details with LP for a bit, he´s a very sweet man. Afterward, M left and I took the bus with President C to the ASORGUA building in Zone 10, which was an interesting experience. The buses are old American School buses painted red or blue, with handrailson the ceiling for standers. Always packed to the gils. People are very stoic, just sitting and not talking (unless they´re pushing through the crowd to get off). President C knows some ASL and can use some speech, so we got to talks about a lot of things. I got a more in depth tour of the ASORGUA office upon arrival and chatted it up at a snail´s pace in GSL-Spanish Pidgin.
As the only hearing person, M´s role of making calls for Deafies on their cell phones was thrust upon me. A man I´d never met put a cell phone in my hand and I had no idea what he wanted, but realized someone was on the line already. It was his daughter, calling to wish him a happy birthday, hoping there was a hearing person in the vicinity to interpret. Then Pres C gave me his phone to call M, who was to call a cab for the 5 of us going back to Zona 11.She then called Pres Cback, Pres C handed me the phone, M said a cab was on its way, and I signed it sloppily to the others. Whew! At least I got home having gained some experience with the logistical ways of this city.

La Casa de Las Tres Gracias

¨Hayley, veni, es tu mama¨said the Senora, holding the house telephone at 830 this morning. I answered the phone and realized that it was not my mom, but a different middle-aged white woman, my supervisor Mykell. She was calling to invite me up to Antigua for the day to lunch at the home she shares with 2 retired friends. I managed a ride to the airport where I met up with another member of their home, ¨La Casa de las tres Gracias¨. In about an hour, I found myself in the most beautiful place I´ve seen so far here, the world famous Antigua. The house was more like a small utopia, dripping with gardens, indigenous art and beautiful verandas. I had seen photos, but I was really astounded by this decadent, beautiful cooperative. The meal was 9 Americans, 1 Guatemalan and 1 Chileno, mostly former Peace Corps workers, and montones of vegan-friendly food.
These folks are really inspiring. They´ve done so much in their careers, and it is nice to see that people in their 50s and 60s can still be so idealistic, ambitious, and adventerous. They shared peace corps stories, and at one point, one of the ¨Gracias¨(women who own the house) read us a hippie children´s book from the southwest US. Needless to say I was in heaven. I look forward to working with my supervisor and spending more time with the Gracias.

Helado de Pescado

H and M took me to the Parque Central after the meeting to see the royal palace and cathedral. They are beautifully lit at night. You have to tip a man to park where we were parked, and the man got bumped three times and nearly run down when he tried to stop a passing car with a cheap, agressive driver. It scared the piss out of me but did not phase H & M at all.

H&M then surprised me by taking me to their favorite heladeria (ice cream shop) which is famous for it´s ecelectic flavors. Marylena´s Heladeria makes Burt Bott´s many flavored beans seem tame. Among the choices were fish, beans, corn, salt and varous fruit combinations. I had corn (elote, or cornmeal) ice cream and it was delicious. Next time I´m going for the fish.

ASORGUA

Saturday was my first meeting with ASORGUA. H&M were kind enough to pick me up and bring me to the headquarters, which is a small section of a building owned by the Comite (pro-deaf and blind committee). The facility is actually the Comite´s school for the blind, which borders a private hospital. M gave me a quick tour. There is a garden with myriad indigenous plants for the blind children to get acquainted with by smell and touch. This lovely sheltered workshop has differently textured tile pathways to orient the children.
But back to the ASORGUA building. It is very modest but very well taken care of by its dedicated members. There is a communal kitchen and a room with a computer. The common space is sufficiently large and, more importantly, sufficiently well-lit. There was an impressive nativity scene occupying about one fifth of the room--this was their first meeting of the new year.
To say that I had a warm welcome is a gross understatement. As if with long-lost relatives, our connections were immediate and infused with energy and care. Introductions did not need interpretations beause greetings and fingerspelling were already in my diminutive GSL lexicon. The best part was reuniting with JB, who is a good friend and colleague of the MSW program at Gallaudet.
For the formal meeting itself, the agenda was written on the dry-erase board and M voiced in Spanish for me. I was pleasantly surprised, however, at how much GSL is intelligible for those with knowledge of ASL. I was an item on the agenda, noted by the words "estudiante de chicago" and "Barbara" (the primary GU liaison who set up the Guatemala US connection, who is in frequent communication with JB). Pushing my GSL to the limit, I fumbled through an introductionthat was met with truly non-judgemental smiles. The meeting was led by president C, with other officers leading different sections of the agenda. The main topics of discussion were savings, membership dues, and upcoming Deaf Ed conference in Costa Rica and New Years wishes.
Most of the members are over 30. One is like 90, a founding member of ASORGUA, who rides the bus for over an hour to get to meetings. It was great to meet so many members of the Deaf community. After the business meeting, people stay around to chat for like an hour and a half. Again I was surprised at how possible communication was--some people knew the ASL alphabet and could voice a little in Spanish which helped a lot. After a round of Deaf hugs (the best!) I went back to H and M´s care balancing my overflowing cup.

El Temblor

First time for everything--even mini earthquakes. Is it horrible of me to say that it was cool? The seizmic tremor Friday night was very mild; nothing in the house fell or anything. Apparently they happen a few times a year. We´ve also had 2 more blackouts but they each lasted less than an hour. Just need a mild hurricane and then I´ll have a hattrick of extremely benign natural pseudo-disasters.

La Berge Guatemalteca

I met most of the boarders and am grateful to be in good company. They are all professionals in their late twenties, and very friendly, though I am a bit intimidated I have to admit. One is Spanish, one is Salvadoran, and the rest are Guatemalans. Engineers, journalists, students and a lawyer. Host sister J´is a law student as well and she is excellent company. La senora is a character in the best way--very strong and independent, a former teacher and a house remodeler--two days ago I assisted herin trying to install decorative little windows that she cut to size herself. I´m one lucky duck as far as my instant social network goes, but there is a weird dynamic between the boarders and senora&J, which is sticky to navigate because I´m the only boarder who live´s in senora&J´s section of the house. In any case, I hope to establish relationships with everyone.

La Ciudad

While my circumstances are stellar, the same cannot be said of the Guatemalan majority. Poverty is very visible in most places in the city. We drove past zone 3 which houses a garbage dumo neigborhood with homes made of tin sheets, concrete blocks, and trash. Theft is not uncommon, so one has to be careful. Even in very nice neighborhoods, exteriors of buildings are not much to look at. I am painfully aware of priviledge and poverty here already, and am fraught over my own American priviledge.
Things and people are more relaxed here, which is generally good, though I need to keep my fingers crossed about the lax scheduling making my internship hours sticky. I will be passing Saturday afternoon with ASORGUA and will go to the Total Communication School Monday.

La Oscuridad

It seems that I brought bad luck with me from the States--hours after I arrived, Guatemala experienced a comprehensive power-outage. The wind was strong, some generators got knocked about and bam--darkness fell over the whole city. Some people were speculating that it was sabotage. The new president, Colom, was elected by a very narrow margin and there are many people cranky about it. It is likely, however, that the power outage was your garden variety act of God. The challenge came when ´M´ and her husband ´H´ came to fetch me for dinner. La Senora invited them in for coffee but had only one candle by which we could see each other. H is Deaf, so lipreading and signing were severely limited. Thank goodness for mama stokar and her gift of a mini flashlight. It came in handy pronto.
By the time we reached H & M´s house, lights were partially restored. It took me a good 4 minutes to fall in love with the entire family, including their chihuahua ¨Bebe¨. They have 1 hearing daughter´C´, sweet as a pie, and aDeaf son ´J´. who was very communicative (via his interpreter mother; I don´t know much Guatemalan Sign Language, GSL, yet.) H is brilliant and is helpful in teaching me GSL. Many of their relatives live in different sections of their building and I got to meet a few. H, M, and I conversed for about 2 hours about Deaf education, philosophies, resources and policies. The two of them are real champions of Deaf advocacy, and I know I´ll learn a great deal from them.

Estoy Aqui

Today I am writing from Guatemala City. Yesterday, at a cruel hour before dawn, my fantastic parents drove me to the airport to ship out to my internsip. Boarding my final connection in Houston, it wasn´t 5 minutes before I was chatting with my seat neighbors. (And though most of you assume it was I who initiated since I have a talking problem, it was indeed my Guatemalan co-passengers). It was a good opportunity to warm up my Spanish-speaking abilities (which people have told me are fine, but I feel are insufficiently warm). By the time I got to the baggage claim I had 3 people´s contact info.

Having no trouble uniting with my host family, I put my bags in my host sister ¨J¨s car. They took me out for traditional Guatemalan cuisine--chicken strips at TGI Friday´s. While this is obviously not a Mayan specialty, there are 3 Fridays in Guate along with a slew of other imported fast food joints. There is even a call button in the center of the table to page the waitress. Marveling over the button, I was promtly laughed at by my host´s 4 year old niece.

My living situation is ideal. I have my own quarters in a large house in a nice neighborhood. 8 Boarders live upstairs and the Senora and her daughter J occupy the middle floor of the home. The home is complete with 2 parrots, 3 parakeets, a dog and her litter that live in the garage, and a seemingly endless flow of tortillas, juevos, y frijoles. My hosts have been extremely generous, shuttling me around from the bank to the embassy to the supermercado. It is difficult to get around the city safelt and efficiently without a car, but I will be working within spitting distance of the house. I met with my friend M from ASORGUA (Guatemalan Association of the Deaf) last night and dined with her and her family. The people here have, in one day, already proven themselves to be incredible.