On Tuesday, we went to school like normal, ate lunch like usual, and then went with our school to Cerra de la Cruz, a hill in Eastern Antigua decorated with a giant cross, probably 30+ feet tall, looking out over the entire city. Looking over the city, we were able to pick out all of our favorite churches, and the Santa Cataina Arch, as well as the various ruins we've passed around the city. Walking up the hill, you go through woods up stairs. The stairs are guarded by policemen around many corners, as the walk is notorious for running to robbers. Our host family told us there were 333 stairs, (tres, tres, tres) but we only counted 330.
Going back down we talked a bit with a friendly couple from England, who, they told us, had cycled around Europe and down the West Coast of America. Cool, we said. We live on the West Coast. They asked where, and we told them near Port Townsend, in Washington. Oh, they told us, we cycled around Port Townsend.
!!!
For those of you in Port Townsend, near, or who has visited there, they remembered the Whidbey ferry, the co-op, Fort Worden, and the hill by the Safeway. We met another woman from Salt Spring Island in British Columbia who said causually- oh, Port Townsend. Neat.
It's a small world.
I haven't really told you about our host families house, besides the roof, have I? Well, if you're getting envious right now, it's true that it's amazing here, but imagine no hot water. Yes, we are spoiled with hot water every day back home, but I didn't really think twice about it. Here, we have hot water occasionally, but for the most part we're lucky to get a slightly warm one. You can't touch the back of the shower head without getting shocked, my dad found that out the hard way, and part of the shower had usually falls off three or four times... wait, why am I telling you about the shower? I guess it's because it's one of the differences in just everyday life.
In the house there are no windows. Aieee. No windows! Or few windows. In the center of the house is a small courtyard, I guess you could call it, extending from the ground floor to the roof. The roof opening was partially covered by a slate of metal roofing. How would you feel if your roof fell off? That hardly counts as a roof, but one day at lunch there was a grating sound from above, and our host family all sat up, tensed, and grimaced. We stared cluelessly, as in the court yard room the piece of roof came crashing down. the family frowned at it, but kept eating. It was interesting to me to try imagine how we'd react at home.
As you know by now, I jump from subject to occurrance abruptly, but before that happens and we're still discussing roofs, the other day I looked up onto a roof and standing there watching us was a sweet looking dog, yes, on the roof. Some roofs here are flat, but this one was your average slant and distance from the ground. It's just another minor but obvious and amusing difference.
On Wednesday night I made a 19-month-old-friend at a dinner party. This 19-month-old-friend is VERY smart smart, and VERY busy, and during one of the few moments I was sitting down, I had one of my first conversations by myself with a woman who speaks only Spanish. I think I did okay until she asked me how old I was. Yes, I know, one of the most simple questions, and yet somehow I manged to reply that I was forty, not fourteen. Yes, Spanish is still improving.
On Thursday my mom and I went with the school to an organic macadamia farm. My dad chose to study instead. The macadamia farm was interesting enough, but the fun part was the bus.
Let me define 'bus.' A bus where I live is a rectangle made from metal with wheels, fuzzy seats, obeying the speed rules, with advertisements posted on the walls. Blue and white painted and 'Jefferson Transit' labels.
A Guatemalan public bus is an old American school bus, painted vibrantly. they're called Chicken Buses. My interpretation of the name would be having the passengers squished in, like poor chickens. These are old school buses, remember, and we were three to a seat, which was fine, but from what we've heard that was EMPTY. Driving from the airport we passed over a dozen, with passengers all hanging out the doors. Either they don't have turning blinkers, or they don't work because the buses have Guatemalan guys all haging out of the door- bicyclist and s ignals do for blinkers just fine.
Then there's Antigua... remember I told yo uthere was cobble stone? Well potholes and speedbumps don't seem to bother the drivers much, because you'll be watching the scenery, listening to the music they play, and BOOM! Passengers fly into the air.
Chicken buses are fun to describe. Being cheap for the puclic, lots of people want to ride them, thus they have few scheduled stops. They just stop when people flag them down. If the bus isn't stopping where you want to get off, it's no problem- you just open the back exit (clearly labeled 'EMERGENCY' on the school buses) and hang onto the back ladder. When the bus slows down, you simply jump off. Problem solved. I myself did not try this, but witnessed it several tiems as we're bouncing along and, being seated in the last row, the door would open and passengers would just disappear. We did get to disembark out of the back, but it was at a bigger stop, so we actually got off a stationary bus.
We rode one again today, to and from a Mayan pueblo, and the bus was 3-6 people to a seat (counting littler kids) and several of us were standing.
The Mayan pueblo was neat- they staged an example of a Mayan wedding using students from our school (No, I didn't get married) and showed the making of the weavings and talked about the customs and designs in there clothing and such.
We went home with another weaving.
And we got to make tortillas, which, we found out quickly, is not one of my fortes. It looked weird, my tortilla. But hey- it tasted great, and my mom was good at it.
Picture time!
Going back down we talked a bit with a friendly couple from England, who, they told us, had cycled around Europe and down the West Coast of America. Cool, we said. We live on the West Coast. They asked where, and we told them near Port Townsend, in Washington. Oh, they told us, we cycled around Port Townsend.
!!!
For those of you in Port Townsend, near, or who has visited there, they remembered the Whidbey ferry, the co-op, Fort Worden, and the hill by the Safeway. We met another woman from Salt Spring Island in British Columbia who said causually- oh, Port Townsend. Neat.
It's a small world.
I haven't really told you about our host families house, besides the roof, have I? Well, if you're getting envious right now, it's true that it's amazing here, but imagine no hot water. Yes, we are spoiled with hot water every day back home, but I didn't really think twice about it. Here, we have hot water occasionally, but for the most part we're lucky to get a slightly warm one. You can't touch the back of the shower head without getting shocked, my dad found that out the hard way, and part of the shower had usually falls off three or four times... wait, why am I telling you about the shower? I guess it's because it's one of the differences in just everyday life.
In the house there are no windows. Aieee. No windows! Or few windows. In the center of the house is a small courtyard, I guess you could call it, extending from the ground floor to the roof. The roof opening was partially covered by a slate of metal roofing. How would you feel if your roof fell off? That hardly counts as a roof, but one day at lunch there was a grating sound from above, and our host family all sat up, tensed, and grimaced. We stared cluelessly, as in the court yard room the piece of roof came crashing down. the family frowned at it, but kept eating. It was interesting to me to try imagine how we'd react at home.
As you know by now, I jump from subject to occurrance abruptly, but before that happens and we're still discussing roofs, the other day I looked up onto a roof and standing there watching us was a sweet looking dog, yes, on the roof. Some roofs here are flat, but this one was your average slant and distance from the ground. It's just another minor but obvious and amusing difference.
On Wednesday night I made a 19-month-old-friend at a dinner party. This 19-month-old-friend is VERY smart smart, and VERY busy, and during one of the few moments I was sitting down, I had one of my first conversations by myself with a woman who speaks only Spanish. I think I did okay until she asked me how old I was. Yes, I know, one of the most simple questions, and yet somehow I manged to reply that I was forty, not fourteen. Yes, Spanish is still improving.
On Thursday my mom and I went with the school to an organic macadamia farm. My dad chose to study instead. The macadamia farm was interesting enough, but the fun part was the bus.
Let me define 'bus.' A bus where I live is a rectangle made from metal with wheels, fuzzy seats, obeying the speed rules, with advertisements posted on the walls. Blue and white painted and 'Jefferson Transit' labels.
A Guatemalan public bus is an old American school bus, painted vibrantly. they're called Chicken Buses. My interpretation of the name would be having the passengers squished in, like poor chickens. These are old school buses, remember, and we were three to a seat, which was fine, but from what we've heard that was EMPTY. Driving from the airport we passed over a dozen, with passengers all hanging out the doors. Either they don't have turning blinkers, or they don't work because the buses have Guatemalan guys all haging out of the door- bicyclist and s ignals do for blinkers just fine.
Then there's Antigua... remember I told yo uthere was cobble stone? Well potholes and speedbumps don't seem to bother the drivers much, because you'll be watching the scenery, listening to the music they play, and BOOM! Passengers fly into the air.
Chicken buses are fun to describe. Being cheap for the puclic, lots of people want to ride them, thus they have few scheduled stops. They just stop when people flag them down. If the bus isn't stopping where you want to get off, it's no problem- you just open the back exit (clearly labeled 'EMERGENCY' on the school buses) and hang onto the back ladder. When the bus slows down, you simply jump off. Problem solved. I myself did not try this, but witnessed it several tiems as we're bouncing along and, being seated in the last row, the door would open and passengers would just disappear. We did get to disembark out of the back, but it was at a bigger stop, so we actually got off a stationary bus.
We rode one again today, to and from a Mayan pueblo, and the bus was 3-6 people to a seat (counting littler kids) and several of us were standing.
The Mayan pueblo was neat- they staged an example of a Mayan wedding using students from our school (No, I didn't get married) and showed the making of the weavings and talked about the customs and designs in there clothing and such.
We went home with another weaving.
And we got to make tortillas, which, we found out quickly, is not one of my fortes. It looked weird, my tortilla. But hey- it tasted great, and my mom was good at it.
Picture time!
 |
| Cerra de la Cruz |
 |
| Cerra de la Cruz... Volcano Agua in the background |
 |
| Chicken buses |
 |
| Textiles! Whee! |
 |
| More textiles... |
 |
| And more textiles! |
 |
| Tortilla making |
Wow! Sounds pretty awesome, I love your description of the chicken buses! They look great, too. Of course, that's me with my intense fondness towards bright colors-anyway! That's a great shot of a mountain/volcano in the background of the cross picture, by the way! Anyhow, good luck with all your endeavors!
ReplyDelete-Luna