July 22, 2013

It is hard to believe that I am already to the final day of my trip. I enjoyed all of my trip, but being here at the school with Amber, living in the community of La Esperanza, and getting to know the volunteers has exceeded my expectations.

Today was Lukas' birthday. Someone thought it would be fun to wake Lukas up in the morning with fireworks. We all got up at 5:45 for the experience. They were the kind that make a lot of smoke and loud pops like gunfire. Natonia was the one who wanted to light them. Fireworks scare me, so Laura and I stayed far away by the stairs. The first one scared Natonia when it started going off and she kind of threw it. It burned her hands a little but not badly. The second one would not light. It was kind of windy and so Natonia took the firework inside the door of the kitchen to light it. Laura and I thought she was crazy and wanted her to abandon the task, but she was determined. She went in the kitchen and got olive oil to put on the fuse. It still was difficult to light but finally can't and went off with the characteristic POP, POP, POP, POP, POP that sounds like gunfire. Lukas still did. It appear so we started singing happy birthday. He finally came out, sleepy, confused, and slightly annoyed. Happy birthday! Some people had made cake the night before with bananas, oats, a little bit of Belgium chocolate, and the usual cake ingredients. It was decorated with red, white, and blue star sprinkles. We showed it to him and got a cup of coffee before heading down to the English office to work on curriculum for a while. We used the big dry erase board from the prepa classroom and Amber drew a grid on it with a column for each subject and rows for each month. We then placed the post-it notes in a sensible progression. We worked until 8:30 or so and then went down to the bakery to get fresh bread. By the time we arrived, though, they did not have any French bread (which we needed for dinner) or muffins or sweet bread. We bought polvocitos or something like that. They were crumbly tostada-like cookies with a dollop of jam baked on them. We then went to the sad lady across the street and bought 3 pounds of tomatoes for the soup and to the man to buy 2 pounds of onions. We went upstairs and got ready. Then we went back to the English office to do a bit more work and then reviewed our plans for the day.

We read The Little Red Hen in preschool. We had all the kids together again. They were very talkative. It is difficult to control twenty preschoolers when you are not their teacher. The funniest part of preschool today was when Amber told them that it was my last day. She said, "Let's all wave goodbye to Seno Carolyn" and proceeded to wave enthusiastically at me while all of the kids looked on. She said, "Or just Seno Amber will wave to her." It was really funny. We had a few minutes before lunch so we just waited downstairs and talked about our plans for the rest of the day. Then we picked up the lunch and went upstairs. Unfortunately the lunch was soupy black beans and rice with shredded carrots, radishes, and lettuce salad with lime juice on it, and tamarind juice. This was unfortunate because we had already planned to make three bean chili for dinner and the beans were already soaking upstairs. We dished up our food and went to prepa. It was a pretty good day with the kiddos. They read The Little Red Hen also and decorated the bodies of their animals. We waited until the last minute to get a picture with them, so we got a crazy one with the kids ready to go with their backpacks on. I talked to Jazmin and she wrote down my name to add me on Facebook. We then went to the English office to start working on brainstorming sample activities. Soon, we went down to buy bread. The line was long, so Amber decided to go upstairs and turn on the beans. I wasn't feeling great. I almost felt a little feverish and my stomach was a bit queasy. I felt better within a few hours, so that was good. I really didn't want to be sick on the plane. I told the lady that I wanted 9Q of French bread. She looked at me with a concerned expression on her face and asked me if I realized that that would be 27 pieces. I told her we were cooking dinner for all the volunteers on the roof. I also bought galletas (cookies) for Katie and two chocolate soy ice creams for Amber and me. I went back inside through the security doors. They have a camera outside, so if the UPAVIM office is open, all you have to do is stand in front of it and the secretary will see you and let you in. Amber had to go help with sign-ups for community English classes, so I stayed and washed the onions and tomatoes and chopped all 3 pounds of tomatoes. Amber came back and started on the onions. Rachel had cleaned the green beans during her lunch break, so they were ready. We needed tomato sauce (all we had was tomato paste) and cilantro. Laura wanted one tomato, as well I offered to go buy the items. I went to the man first and asked for tomato sauce. they tried to give me tomato paste and did not understand what I was wanting. Finally a teenager who was working there handed me Ranchero sauce. It was not quite what I wanted , but I thought it might be wrong (too runny) in the right direction since we also had tomato paste. i bought two instead of the requested three in case it was not what they wanted. I went to the sad vegetable lady across the street and asked if she had cilantro. She said she did and pulled it out from under a pile of veggies. It was brown and wilted and covered with gnats. She looked at it and said no, no then asked me if I still wanted the cilantro with a sheepish look on her face. I said no thanks and walked up the road to the two vegetable stands and bought cilantro from the two ladies who work at the first stand. It wasn't the greatest cilantro either, but it was much better than the sad lady's. I let myself in the preschool door and ran into Natonia who was leaving to spend the night close to the airport since her flight was first thing on the morning.

I went back up and helped a bit more with dinner. Amber said we were going to go to the English office, but since she was on the computer, I decided to go ahead and take my shower. When I finished, I went downstairs to meet her and work for a bit. Then we went back up for dinner. The white beans were not as cooked as the black and red ones, but the chili had good flavor. I like cooking for the roof dwellers because they are not picky and like vegetarian dishes. We all sat around the kitchen and ate together and talked afterward. We had Lukas' cake that people had been nibbling on all day and he blew out twos used tea light candles since he was turning twenty. I wrote down people's names so I could find them on Facebook. Some of us decided to play games. Sanne is so adorable. She is quite the social coordinator. She made out a "fun week" schedule. Sadly, I was only able to participate in Lukas' birthday celebration. We played Psychiatrist with first Sanne and then Barb (who was in bed) as the psychiatrist. It was hysterical. Amber and Darlene were hilarious and I was told that I did a good impression of Sanne. Afterward, they wanted to play more games, but it was already 8:30 and I still needed to pack. Amber brought out her list of standards she wanted to brainstorm and then we discussed them as I packed. We were going to give each other massages, but I took too long packing and Amber was too sleepy. Katie came in and we three talked for a while as Amber was drifting in and out of sleep. She went to bed for real and we turned off the Christmas lights that give our room such a homey feel. Katie and I continued using the Internet which had unexpectedly started working in our room again. I decided I did not need to write the whole blog post right then since I would have so much time on the plane the next day. I did check email and add a few people as friends on Facebook. I think I turned off my iPad around 12:30. I couldn't fall asleep very quickly because I was thinking about all the things I wanted to make sure I did in the morning. I did not sleep in my earplugs because I wanted to wake up at 5 when Amber got up to exercise. I was freezing and kept waking up all night. I am not ready to leave Guatemala!