Guatemala 2007: Wooddale

So after my junior and senior years in high school I went to Guatemala and El Salvador with my church, Wooddale. It was an experience that really changed me and part of why I then decided to study Spanish in college.

This year, I was able to translate for the same trip that I had gone on a few years earlier. It was great for me to be able to see the growth in my Spanish in this way. During the trip I translated for North American doctor. It was great to be able to use all the medical Spanish that I had learned during the semester. Also, I loved the students who I was able to get know. It really affirmed that I would like to work with high schoolers someday.

I could write several entries about the trip, but mainly I would just like to say that I love Campur. Campur is a town that I went to in high school and was able to return to this year. It's in the mountains in northern Guatemala and it is a very impoverished area. It's always a blessing to be able to work with the people of Campur.

After working with the Wooddale group I left for the States. I could have stayed longer but it was necessary to go home and make some money. The pictures are of me and one of the girls from Campur and of a some students from the medical team and me helping translate.

Guatemala 2007: Two Weeks on My Own

So after the program with Bethel University ended, I stayed in Guatemala for a month. The first two weeks I just did whatever and the second two weeks I worked with a trip that my church does each year. During the two weeks on my own I was able to go to class one day at la Universidad Rafael Landivar, go to a wedding shower, go to an in-house Bible study, work in the clinic, and get to know the Diaz's (the family that I stayed with) a lot better. Unfortunately, by this time in the trip my camera had broken and so I don't have any pictures of this time. :-(

Guatemala 2007: Magdalena and Ministry Sites

Our last three weeks as a group we lived in Magdalena again and worked at our Ministry Sites. It was a good time to get really involved with the sites and get to know the families well. Also, for me working in the clinic, it was a good opportunity to practice what I had learned in my Medical Spanish class. At the end of the three weeks, the families helped us bring our bags to the bus. It was amazing to see how much of the community turned out to say good bye to us and how many of them were crying. Living in Magdalena was very different than Antigua. The photo is of the church that we went to and worked with.

Guatemala 2007: Pacaya

Another excursion that we did as a group was climbing the volcano Pacaya. On the way up there were people with horses offering rides (for a price of course). I enjoyed their jokes about having the most environmentally friendly taxis in the world and petted their horses whenever we took a break. Seeing the volcanic rock and lava was incredible. Feel the heat from the volcano while feeling the cold from the high altitude breeze was a contrast that I can't find words for. I hope to go back at night next year because then the lava is more visible.

Guatemala 2007: Semana Santa and the Beach

Also during Semana Santa I went to the beach for the weekend with a family that I know. It was great to be able to get away from the tourism of Antigua, the crowdedness of the procesiones, and the English of the group and go to the beach. At the beach I was able to relax, have fun, get to know some people better, and speak a lot of Spanish. One picture is of people playing in the pool. The other is of a sunset that I almost missed taking a picture of. We were walking back from the beach and I turned to listen to someone and suddenly realized that it was a great moment to take a picture.

Guatemala 2007: Semana Santa and Procesiones

Semana Santa means Holy Week and is the week before Easter and of Good Friday. While in Antigua I was able to see many processions (procesiones). My favorite was the procecion infantil or kids' procession. Also, on Thursday night I was able to walk around and see all the alfombras that people were making. Alfombra means rug. People make these beautiful "rugs" out of died sawdust on plants/flowers. At dawn of Good Friday, the alfombras were marched over by the processions. It made me think about the work of Jesus in a different way.

Guatemala 2007: Tikal and Flores

One of our excursions was to the island town of Flores and the nearby Mayan ruins of Tikal. Visiting Tikal was my first time visiting anything that old. The city was at its peak from 200-850 AD. Climbing to the top of the temples gave a spectacular view of the rest of temples peaking out from above the forest. I chose this picture of one of the temples because it shows the stairs/ladder that we climbed very well.

The town of Flores is on an island and that is where we stayed. It was beautiful to be able to take a walk around town and around an island at the same time. It is a town that I would love to get to know better someday. The sunset picture I took when walking around the island and I saw some boys playing on a dock.

Guatemala 2007: Second Session of Language School

So for my second session of language school I had the class Medical Spanish for Health Professionals II. The work included a lot of vocabulary, reading articles in both English and Spanish in relation to health and health in Guatemala and Latin America, visiting hospitals, and doing a final group project of a public presentation.

Two other students were taking the same class and so the three of us had to do a presentation together. Since we were all females, our teachers were all females, and the doctor that we worked with for our ministry site was also female, we decided to take advantage of that and do a presentation on women's health in relation to pregnancy. Towards the end of class we went to the clinic in Magdalena and presented the information twice and gave out prenatal vitamins to the women who came. The one picture is of us students at school with our visual aids and the other picture is of a student and me with my teacher.

Guatemala 2007: Pacific Coast Excursion

Going to the beach was a great weekend break. Seeing the black sand, playing in the waves, relaxing in the pools, eating the amazing food of an all-inclusive hotel--everything was thoroughly a sabbath for me. But perhaps someday I should try to see a different ocean since I've been to the Pacific from Oregon, northern and southern California, three different points in Guatemala, and two or three different points in Ecuador. :-)

Guatemala 2007: Second Session of Ministry Sites

So after our first 4 weeks of language school, we had another two weeks of ministry sites. So while still living in Antigua, we went to our sites-- which for many of us implied a lot of public transportation. Many people refer to the public buses in Guatemala as "chicken buses". It's always an adventure on the chicken buses as adults fit 3 to a seat with kids on top and as the bus drivers race each other on the highway.

Guatemala 2007: Living in Antigua

Living in Antigua was a truly unique experience. It was good in that it was a safe and beautiful town. It is a tourist town-- so there's always people from various countries in Antigua. That was both good and bad. It meant meeting people from Korea, Japan, Denmark, Italy, and of course Canada and the US on a regular basis. But it also made it easy to be able to use English. Overall, I loved it. I had a very kind host family and house mates. The pictures are of the view during my walk to school and of my house. Beautiful, huh?