Sunday strolls and church

The view from our drink spot at Loma de Tzununá of Volcan San Pedro and Lake Atitlan

      Samuel recommended a great hike along the lake. So early Sunday, we boated to the town of Santa Cruz and started hiking the 3 or so hours back to San Marcos. An older gringo told us to watch out for robberies which put us a little on edge, but at that point we were already set on going. The trail was easy to follow though we did end up getting lost in a cemetery trying to find a drink stop. 

     The views were fabulous though slightly hazy because of yesterday's eruption of Volcán de Fuego about 40 miles away. We also stumbled upon a group of male folk dancers, of all ages, performing in the gym in San Marcos while the local women and kids watched and played.  

       Upon returning, Mark finally was able to wear his one collared shirt and we went to church with Alejandra (her second time today). I haven't been in many evangelical churches but I imagine the singing, scripture readings, sermons and praying are pretty universal. However, the differences probably included when the roof started leaking on the drums from the heavy rain, Pastor Lorenzo mixing in Tzu'thuhil in his sermon and the adorable kids belting out Spanish hymnals. Two hours later, Midori, Mark and I visited our friend JC from last week's JC'S BBQ and swapped jokes over enchiladas.

This adorable lil guy was singing at the top of his lungs.

Sunrise hike to Indian's Nose (La Nariz de Indio)

     At 4 AM, we met Samuel, our trusty guide from last weekend at the iglesia (church) to catch the chicken bus to Santa Clara.  Chicken buses are old US school buses that serve as the public bus system throughout Guatemala.  Most are outfitted in crazy new colors, lights and often are filled to the brim with people.  We hiked to the gorgeous outlook over the lake and awaited the sunrise.  It was beautiful to see the colors reflecting across the lake and the Volcan Fuego puffing in the distance.  I even saw red lava when it was still dark (side note- this evening we learned it erupted more today and Antigua is under emergency warnings!).  So even though we didn't hike a volcano for the 4th weekend in a row, we still saw some volcano action!

Our 4 AM chicken bus!

Volcan Fuego puffing on the right

Looking back towards the Pacific Ocean in the distance

   Afterwards, Samuel walked us through the Santa Clara Saturday market where I found some cute kids to photograph.

      Then we walked about 2 1/2 hours through dusty cornfields and lush coffee and avocado trees all the way down to San Juan and finally to San Pedro.  This was the bonus of booking again with Samuel because most trips just hop back on the bus but we enjoyed the views during the hike down and his expertise to navigate the farming trails.  And he helped us buy a new clock for Alejandra at the market and even carried it back for us!

Second week of Spanish classes!

    Our second week of classes is muy bien! Afternoons are a little more difficult for me since lunch is the biggest meal of the day so I get sleepy in class. Still, I have all sorts of verbos básicos and verbos irregulares floating around my head and I am learning a lot. It's amazing what I can understand after just a week and a half (though not everything of course!) But speaking it is always muy difícil. Yo debo practicar más!

     We are enjoying our homestay at Alejandra and Pedro's home as I wrote about previously.  In the mornings this week, we worked out at the local gym a few times, ran to the coffee plantation, trip planned for Chile and did homework.  On Tuesday, we boated over to Santiago for shopping and to scope out another language school.  However, it actually is closed which led to our decision to just stay in San Pedro another week.  The big city of Xela was another option but it required a few hours of travel and presumably much louder and colder.  Plus we haven't explored all there is to do around the lake, I love the small town feel of San Pedro and continuity is probably best for me during my last week of classes. 

         The school hosted salsa classes on Wednesday night which was fun. The other students are great. We met a guy from Fort Collins and a girl currently in a MPH program so we are in similar company.  We also learned about Mayan numbers on Thursday night.

Mark y Rocky bailan

     We returned to Santiago on Friday morning because that was the big market day.  We bought a few gifts but mainly squeezed our way through the local market, taking in the colors, sounds and smells of market day in small town Guatemala.

The many colors of the market

Rip-off shoes and sardines right next to each other

More fruit!

I love how nonchalant breastfeeding is in other countries!

Marco y el gallo

One form of transportation.  We'll have a whole post on the tuc-tucs we've seen!

Midori, Mark and I on the bumpy boat ride back

    On Friday afternoon, mi maestra y yo visited a local poor family that the school supports.  We brought food and the madre de la casa Cecilia showed me the two rooms where 7 people live.  One daughter's education is supported through the school.  Cecilia also tried to speak in Spanish for me but really can only speak Tz'utujil which is a guttural language so it sounds so cool.  She did let me take a photo with her and yes, I look like a giant.

We also treated Mark's maestro and his family to dinner as a thank you. I enjoyed playing with Jeffrey since you don't need to speak the same language to play hide and go seek!

Family life

    This week we are staying at Alejandra and Pedro's house. They live further up the hill in town so unfortunately it is louder (like fireworks blasting from the church at 5 am and dogs barking endlessly at 1 am loud) but Alejandra is so kind, especially with my newbie Spanish and cooks the best meals! She is 46 years old and has a 26 and 20 year old who study in Xela. Her mother was 15 when she had her and had 7 kids, the last who was born at the same time as Alejandra's first. 

Making tortillas for every meal on the wood-fire stove in the kitchen

Fish (head and all) with Medori, our Japanese roommate

    Pedro is an enfermero (nurse) so has very interesting stories of working with the Cubans in the mountains, using nontraditional healing techniques (mostly because people can't afford what the doctors prescribe) and he is fond of the Cuban, Bolivian and Venezuelan political systems (socialist) because they strive to divide the country's wealth between all populations. He also discussed his distrust of the Guatemalan government which doesn't do enough to support the indigenous populations, in fact, they seem to support policies that repress them such as not encouraging them to learn Spanish so that they then can only speak their native rural villages language and not with the rest of Guatemala (and beyond). There are 20+ native languages and the people in San Pedro and 3 other towns along the lake speak Tz'utujil. That is why language schools are so popular here because Spanish is also their second language and thus they tend to speak slower and are more understanding of us newbies.

Pedro comes home for lunch but often works til late at night

     Pedro also discussed with us his thoughts on family planning efforts which he thinks are important for a woman's health. He says the Catholics want more and more babies but who will feed them?  Conversely, Mark's teacher talked about not agreeing with any efforts to reduce the size of Mayan families since they're probably a government conspiracy against the Mayans.  And people should be Mayan first and then whatever religion they are and then Guatemalan. He also thinks its paradox that people dislike the Spanish but they only teach their kids Spanish and not full Mayan. So basically, we have just as many diverse opinions in this relatively homogenous small town as you'd find in the US.

Volcán San Pedro adventures!

     After a 4:30 wake up, we were soon on our way to the base of the San Pedro Volcano with Samuel, our guide.  He handed us very necessary walking sticks and off we went by the light of our headlamps.  Though we could have hiked on our own, it was nice to have his guidance in the dark and to practice our Spanish.  Besides, a group of locals camping near the top had security guards with them so maybe it was safer. Up and up we went, accompanied by the music and fireworks drifting across the lake from an all-night fiesta in San Pablo.  We reached the top in about 2 ½ hours, climbing almost 5,000 feet to the top at 9,900 feet.
    We were immediately greeted with phenomenal views of Pacaya volcano smoking in the distance, the beautiful blue Lake Atitlan stretching before us and the quaint town of Santiago far below us.  We took photos, ate and took more photos before embarking upon the rough trip down.

   Back in town, we decided it was time to cool off and hopped a boat to San Marcos to cliff jump at a spot in the nature preserve called the ‘trampolin’.  It’s about a 25 foot drop. It took me a while to get the courage but the beautiful volcano views and the refreshing water was worth it.  San Marcos is a bit of a new age hippy town with lots of yoga retreats and alternative therapies.  At Del Lago, we ate ginormous but delicious veggie burritos with beet and carrot salad while some travelers played the guitar, others juggled and a women offered energy readings.
    Not really our thing but it’s interesting to see the seemingly peaceful co-existence of local Mayans, visiting Guatemalans from the bigger cities and hippy gringos from all over the world.  While they must welcome the influx of tourist dollars, they still seem to be able to hold on to their traditions and values, as evidenced by their traditional Mayan attire and religious customs.

 We returned in time to move to our new family’s home which is further in the town up the hill.  Petrona showed us our room and our key which we quickly broke when returning from getting ice cream.  As we were now locked out and the family was all at church, we decided to wait it out at the nearby JC’s BBQ.  The owner Juan was very nice and we learned that he had lived many years in the US, including Fort Morgan, CO.  That is where he strived to learn English and eventually went to college in Texas.  He returned to San Pedro full time a year ago to open his restaurant and live with his new wife.  We helped him add his restaurant to Tripadvisor and will help him ensure it’s on Google Maps because he was really nice and his place is a welcome respite from the over-priced offerings of ‘gringolandia’ (what locals call the tourist strip by the lake).   Eventually we got back in to the house and I let Mark joke that I had broke the key.  What a day!

Mark's Minutes: Day at the coffee cooperativa

     My Spanish instructor, Nicotu, suggested to take us to a coffee bean processing plant and the local market for a field trip.

Coffee beans are dried in the sun before processing

       On Saturday morning the three of us went on a little 20 minute walk to the local coffee processing plant owned by the Cooperativa, FEDEPMA, which stands for Federation of Mayan Coffee Planters. This cooperative is very special as it serves as a model to other operations in the area for its environmental sustainability and their own marketing efforts so that they can eliminate coffee selling middlemen who would cut into the cooperative’s profits. From there most of the beans are shipped raw to Germany and some coffee gets roasted immediately for the local market. In addition each coffee planter makes honey which is collected at the plant for resale. Last but not least, the third product is organic waste that is turned into organic fertilizer.

       Obviously, Suzy and I are not coffee experts (we don’t even drink coffee on a regular basis), but the field trip and paid tour was a great way to learn about Mayan coffee planters and to improve our Spanish. The photos and their captions may give you some idea of what goes into producing coffee. At the end of the tour we each had a fresh cup of the plant’s own coffee, which sent us coffee novices on “caffeine trip” for the rest of the day.

Coffee beans are separated by quality. In water, good beans sink and bad ones rise.  That's just one of three selection processes 

The beans are then shoveled to the next selection process

The cooperative's own small-scale roasting operation for the local market

Quality-testing

      From the Cooperativa we went to the local market to stock up on some food for our upcoming volcano hike on Sunday. We also bought a large Mayan style painting that we will send back rolled up to the US. I explained to our host family that it will be for gratos recuerdos (fond memories) when we are back home.

Siesta time in the park by the Catholic church

The park near the market

Proud owners of a giant painting