La Ciudad, Monterrico y THANKSGIVING!

I’ve had a great weekend! Thursday, we headed over to Paul and Bev’s house for a little birthday party/get together in honor of Thanksgiving. We ate cake and played some games. It was a good day. Friday, we went to the city in the afternoon. Some students wanted to watch the new Twilight movie, so those of us who wanted to go rode a bus to the city. I went to the post office with Jen and picked up her package then headed to the market for a bit and walked around while waiting for another student to buy her bridesmaid dresses. Then, we went back to the mall and hung out for a bit until the movie was over. On our way home we stopped by Pollo Campero and had some dinner. We made it home around 9 and had time to shower and go to bed by 10 in preparation for our beach day on Saturday!

Saturday, I woke up relatively early to get all of my stuff together for the beach and made sure everything was charged and ready to go. We met at 8:30 and were off to Monterrico. After a little over two hours in the bus, we arrived at our ‘hotel’ where we changed, ordered our lunch and then hit up the beach. I left time to lay my towel out and set my camera down before taking off my flip flops and making a break for the water. Sand is hot when the sun shines on it, but black sand is even hotter. I think the bottoms of my feet burned! We played in the waves for awhile…or rather, the waves played with us. Then we walked along the beach to dry off a bit before lunch. After lunch, you guessed it, we hit up the water again. After a few hours of being tossed and turned by the waves, I called it a day and showered off so I could lay out and dry off a bit before we headed back to Antigua. I don’t think I’ve ever felt so close to death before in my life. The Pacific Ocean is a beast and quite a fantastic adventure!! LOVED IT.
[Black Sand!] Today, we had our Thanksgiving celebration and meal at Paul and Bev’s. It was delicious! This week, I’m not really sure what’s in store, but I’m sure it will be great. I hope to get to interact with my host family some more as I have been the past few days. It’s fun to just sit and talk with them. I’m going to miss nights like last night: being told I look like a tomato and talking about what I want to do with my life. These days are flying by and I don’t wanna miss a single moment!

La Ciudad, Canopy Tour and Earth Lodge!

Friday, I had the opportunity to go with a few of my roommates, Aleia and Jenna, to Guatemala City to visit Chad and Marlana Smith. We spent the day visiting AMG, shopping at Wal-Mart, eating at Taco Bell-where there were French fries, not nachos, and shopping at a Mega Pacas-giant thrift store…better than Goodwill! Then we went back to the Smith’s house for a bit before they brought us back to Antigua. It was an amazing day! It was fun to get out of Antigua and see some familiar faces and have a relaxing day of shopping, friends, and fun! It’s probably a good thing there aren’t Mega Pacas in Antigua…or else I’d have too much apparel and no room in my suitcases! Hopefully, we’ll get to go back again on Friday when we go to the city!
[It’s been a long time since I’ve had Taco Bell, but here was my amazing meal!- They need to get all the new desserts in the states!]

Saturday was another amazing day! We went on a zip line canopy tour :) It was pretty fantastic! There were seven different lines which got successively longer. It was so much fun!!

[My wristband! - They wouldn't let us keep them :( ]
[A group of us before the longest one!-Jen, Jenna, me, Cassie] Yesterday, we went to Earth Lodge and had our Sunday meal there where we just got to sit around soaking up some sun and getting burnt while waiting for our burgers, guacamole and chips, and smoothies to be prepared. It was a beautiful place for a meal outside of Antigua with a great view! It was a bit of a drive and a little hike, but definitely worth it! My favorite part may have been the ride back to Antigua standing in the back of pick up truck riding down the mountain.

[Sign...]

[Chairs to relax in...with an amazing view!]

[Volcano!!]

Meseros?!

What a week!

I had my last three days of Spanish Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday. My lessons ended well. We worked on subjunctive more and just talked about random things in Spanish to practice. It was a great last few days! Wednesday, we went to Parque Central with a few other students and their teachers to watch a race of sorts. A bunch of waiters lined up in Central Park and had their trays loaded with a few unopened beverages and the race began. It was a little crazy and quite strange, but oddly enough, it fun to watch! Before I left class Wednesday I gave my teacher a card (with a tip) and she gave me a purse that she made. We said goodbye, but only until Monday (today) when we planned to meet again.
[Waiters all lined up]
[Waiting for the action to begin...me, Ashley and Cassie]

[And they’re off!] [First place finsher at the finish line!] Thursday I was very productive and got a lot of work done! I did homework for Monday, did a P90X Kenpo workout, read my Bible and checked my email all before 11! It was weird to wake up just a few minutes before breakfast, but felt good to ‘sleep in’ a bit. I think I might be able to get used to having mornings free to do whatever I need to!

Volcán Pacaya

Amigos! I hope everything is well with you all! This past week was great! I had my last FULL week of Spanish and I have three more days this week until I’m done. It’s a bitter-sweet moment…I’m going to miss Spanish and learning more of it, but I will enjoy having some free time in the mornings. This week in class was much more conversational although we did work on subjunctive! Thursday, my teacher and I had a little celebration with Cortney, another SAU student and her teacher at her teacher’s home. Her teacher, María Elsa, is actually a home stay mother as well of a few SAU students. We went over to her house and had a little “last week of Spanish” party. We made chocolate covered strawberries, chocolate covered bananas, popcorn with a little left over chocolate on some of it and also had ice cream with sparkling strawberry juice. It was fun! We played a little bananagrams and talked in Spanish. It was a blast! Friday, Delia and I worked on subjunctive some more and then played scrabble in Spanish with a few random students from La Unión.

Saturday, we had a little adventure on our own as some of us (apart from the University) decided to go through a travel agency and climb a volcano…Volcano Pacaya. This is the volcano that erupted a year and a half ago, in May 2010. It was an exciting experience to say the least! The climb up took about an hour and a half and then we were able to explore a little on our own for an hour towards the top. We weren’t allowed to go to the very top and see the crater, but we got pretty close! We saw lots and LOTS of volcanic rocks and got to go in some steam holes and such, so it was worth it. When we got to the top, a girl who hiked up with us, but was from a different group fell and she broke or cut her leg really deep, cut her head and hurt her hand, so we took a different way down the volcano. A more direct route, but it also happened to be a bit scarier and much steeper! I was stepping in volcanic rocks up to my mid-calf every step down the volcano at what was probably a 60 degree decline. It was crazy, but after I got the hang of it, it was kind of fun and not scary! All of the guys took turns carrying the injured girl down the volcano until we got to the ambulance. From there, we walked down the windy road to our bus at the bottom of the volcano. Then, we hopped in the bus and headed back to Antigua and we got home around 1:40 and ate lunch a little before 2.
[During the climb up the volcano..we could see other volcanoes in the distance, the ones that surround Antigua. This picture doesn't show them all as the others are off to the left]

[Me on the volcano!][the volcano...part of it anyway][The decline one our way down the volcano...this picture doesn't quite do it justice.]
Once we all had taken showers and cleaned the ash and dust off of ourselves, Aleia and I went to the market to do a little shopping and bartering before coming home a little bit before dinner. It was a great day! I’m definitely sore today, but I expected to be.

Today, we went to church and then out to lunch with the whole SAU gang. I’m excited to see what the remaining weeks have in store for me here! A little over a month left and there’s so much more I want to do. Hopefully, having mornings off starting Monday will allow me to have enough time to accomplish all of the things I want to do!

Tikal

Sunday morning was an early one as I woke up at 3:45 a.m. and got ready to head to Tikal. At 4:30 our group met in front of the church (our normal meeting spot for excursions) and headed to Guatemala City to catch our plane. We boarded our flight at 6 a.m. and flew out at 6:30. After we landed, we took another bus to Tikal before arriving at a little inn where we prepared for our 3 ½ hour hike.
[Our plane…much bigger than the ones we take in Alaska, but small enough to be enjoyable, though not quite as adventurous] We drenched ourselves in an aroma of bug spray and then headed out to see the temples and ruins. They were amazing! Our guide spoke in English and allowed us time to stop, look around, take pictures of wildlife, climb a temple every once in a while, and explore the ruins of the main center. We saw lots of amazing things including, little animals that looked like raccoons, but had longer noses, spider monkeys and howler monkeys! I tried to take pictures of some, but they didn’t all turn out.
[Little critters right on the side of the trail] [Spider monkey in the tree…look in the middle of the picture] Our treks up the temples were really cool. The tallest temple, Temple IV, had a massive amount of wooden stairs that took you up to the actual temple where you could climb about 10 more to get to the top. It was hot and tiring, but the view was worth it! It was really cool to just sit up there and see the tops of trees and other temples off in the distance and picture how life was back when those temples were in use. We climbed another temple too, but I forgot to bring my camera up it, so hopefully I’ll be able to snag some pictures from other people on that one.
[On top of Temple IV. You can see other temple peaks in the back ground.] At the end of the tour we got to the main center and had 40 minutes to wander around and explore on our own. It was so much fun! We wandered through tunnels not knowing where they’d lead and up steps that were over a foot tall each until we could see the entire landscape from the top. It was gorgeous! I really enjoyed the time with my friends, just climbing, exploring and having tons of fun together.
[The main center] [The temple that Tikal is most known for (and is on lots of postcards)…we couldn’t climb it though as it was recently struck by lightening and considered unsafe] After we finished exploring, we met up at 1 and headed back to the inn to eat lunch. We made it back and got our food a little before 2. I had steak- which was way better than I expected- rice, mixed veggies, beats (that I shared) and tortillas. It was a good meal! Then we loaded on the bus and headed back to the airport, waited at the airport for a little over an hour for our plane, then hopped on the plane to the City and then got on another bus back home to Antigua. We made it home before 8 last night then, showered and were in bed at 9. It was a long day, but good!

Día de los Muertos

Today La Union took us to a celebration in a different vilalge for Dia de los Muertos. It was an awesome experience! I got to learn more about the culture, see enormous kites (attempt) to fly and try new food. Another successful day!

I just want to post a few pictures of the kites and festivities from today...I'm all blogged out for today! Sorry folks, but I'm sure you have pleanty to read now...For more pictures...see my facebook (I'll try and post pictures tonight or tomorrow)!

[Masses of people]

[Me trying typical food...really good, but really sweet!]

[Some giant kites...]

Feliz Halloween

Happy Halloween, amigos! I trust you all had a fun and safe day (yesterday). Monday we got back from our weekend at Lake Atitlan. We ate lunch with our host mom and then headed to class. At 4:30 I left for home to start getting ready and getting my costume put together! Aleia and I decided to go as Greek Goddesses. It was the easiest and most affordable costume idea we had. Our host mom gave us a huge white sheet to split (as it was already cut halfway), I borrowed some jewelfry and a belt from my roommate, Jennifer, and then we made crown type things with some greenery and flowers we found outside...We looked pretty good, if I don't say so myself. (You are entitled to your own opinion when you see the picture of us at the end of this post.) At 6:30 we went to the party at our Spanish school. There were tons of people there: students, teachers and host families. All of the host families brought different typical foods from Dia de los Muertos for us to sample. It was a blast and I enjoyed all of the foods (except one thing, but I still ate it)! There was a cosstume party and Aleia and I placed second, which was pretty awesome. We won ourselves 10 more hours of Spanish lessons, so 5 hours each! I still have two weeks of Spanish left, so it'll be fun to tag on a few more hours. Two other poeple from our group won first place as a news casting crew. They looked pretty great! They made their own camera out of a cardboard box and a microphone. There was even a little dancing at the party. After the part at the school, a few of us walked around town to meet up with some friends before calling it a night. It was a successful day!

[Me and Aleia...as Athena and Helen of Troy]