Amigos, sorry it has been so long since I’ve posted a new blog, but it’s been a crazy week and weekend! I have lots to talk about so brace yourself for a long blog. I’ll separate it into sections to make it easier to follow.
Spanish- Week Seven
As you know, last week was my seventh week of Spanish (and my last week with a test)! It went really well! I worked on a lot of the perfect tenses (present perfect, past perfect, future perfect) and present progressive. I also learned lots of vocabulary during the week related to Día de los Muertos (Day of the Dead), which is today, November 1st. I will be going with a group from my Spanish school, La Unión to a town that makes HUGE kites for a few hours to get the full experience in a place filled with less tourists and more natives, unlike Antigua. My test wasn’t too bad. It only took an hour and a half and was seven pages long. Of course, that means seven pages of: writing stories, translating sentences, translating stories, vocabulary and conjugating in multiple tenses. Don’t worry, for those of you who have been waiting, I have a picture of me and my teacher!
*I will be posting all of the pictures from this weekend on a separate blog post since there will be so many and this post is already going to be massive.*
Weekend Away…
Panajachel
Friday at 12:30 we left Antigua and headed to Panajachel on Lake Atitlán. We arrived in Panajachel at our hotel around 4:30 and got new roommates for the night. We had a couple hours to shop around, walk to the lake and just hang out before dinner. It was gorgeous! The weather was beautiful all weekend. There were only a few rude vendors and lots of pushy people, so “just looking” wasn’t quite so fun, but we made it work! We had dinner at Solomon’s Porch and we had three options for meals: chicken crepes, vegetarian crepes, or cheeseburger. I went for the cheeseburger and it was delicious! Plus, it came with fries :) Always a bonus! After we ate, we were able to talk with a full time volunteer missionary in Panajachel who left his home to do full time mission work there. What they do sounds really neat and they were really great people. The rest of Friday night we spent in Pana and then went to bed to wake up early Saturday.
San Juan
Saturday morning we woke up early and met in the lobby/courtyard area to leave for three different breakfast locations at 7. We ate early and split up so we could be sure to make it to our boat ride across the lake to San Juan where we spent all day Saturday and Saturday night as well. We ate breakfast at a little place called Las Pitayas. I had scrambled eggs (with other stuff mixed in), pineapple, papaya and a fruit smoothie. It was delicious! Then at 8:15 we walked across the street to our hotel where we grabbed our bags, turned in our keys and walked down to the dock to meet our boat. We ended up all getting on one boat and enjoyed the beautiful 45 minute boat ride to San Juan. When we arrived in San Juan we walked up the steps to our hotel (the cutest hotel I’ve ever seen) and put all of our stuff in a storage room before walking to the coffee cooperative because our rooms were not ready for us yet. The coffee cooperative was really cool. We got a tour (in Spanish) of what they do and how it all works which lasted 2 hours and then we got to try some of the coffee. I don’t like coffee though, so I tried some and didn’t love it, but all my friends who tried it said it was delicious and worth buying. It was all organic which made it even cooler! We also got lunch there as some Mayans from the village prepared us a meal with chicken, veggies, rice, and tortillas. It was delicious! After we were done with lunch we headed over to Liema, which is a fabrics cooperative consisting of a group of Mayan women who hand weave all sorts of stuff. They have naturally dyed, eco-friendly handbags, purses, scarves, and tons more! We had the opportunity to make our own scarves and each student had their own private Mayan teacher. It was a really neat experience and we got to keep our scarves! (You’ll see a picture of me making mine and the final product with my teacher.) After we were finished with our scarves, we went back to our hotel and got new roommates and really fun rooms. We ate dinner at the hotel which was fabulous and then spent the night hanging out, talking, taking pictures with flashlights and trying to attract bats. Needless to say, it was a great day in San Juan!
Santiago Atitlán
Sunday morning we ate breakfast at 8 at the hotel (oatmeal, pancakes and fruit) and then departed at 10 for Santiago Atitlán. When we arrived there we walked to the church, but because church was in session, we couldn’t look inside. Instead we wandered through the market just for the experience and then headed to a restaurant for lunch, Restaurante el Pescador. I had a chicken sandwich, French fries, papaya, pineapple, melon and a Coca-Cola for just Q52. It was really good! Then we wandered through the side shops and did some browsing/bartering and I actually made a purchase there that I’m pretty proud of. [You’ll have to wait til I get home to see what it is.] Actually I had a few proud purchases that day, but the others were at night back in Panajachel! At 1:30 we met at the dock and took the boat back to Pana where we went back to our little hotel, Posada de los Volcanes, and got our room keys. Then we had until 6:30 to shop before dinner. We ate dinner at Sunset Café and it was amazing! I shared some super nachos with Aleia, and also had a beef burrito and fruit smoothie. (I definitely love the smoothies here!) Afterwards, Aleia and I headed down the street to try and find a little bakery we came across earlier with huge muffins for Q10. We bought them for breakfast Monday morning (as it was on our own). And believe me, they were HUGE! I ate part for breakfast and part for a snack after lunch. After we found the bakery, we were walking back to the hotel and found a little bookstore, so we went in and I bought a few postcards and made another really great purchase! We went back to our hotel to spend the night and then planned to leave at 8:30 Monday morning.
Antigua
Monday, I woke up at 7:45 to get ready and start reading my book for class. At 8:30, on the dot, we were all loaded into the bus and ready to head back to Antigua. I ate part of my muffin on the bus for breakfast and finished my book for class just before we arrived in Antigua. It worked out pretty well!
**See pictures for this post on the next blog: Fotografías**
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