Mi Primera Semana Aqui (My first week here)

Monday January 5th was the first day of classes at Celas Maya. Every morning I wake up at 6:45am and then eat breakfast at the table my myself at 7:00am. Then I get ready and walk to school which starts at 8:00am. Every student has their own personal tutor whom they work with from 8am to 1pm. I really like my tutor, her name is Monica, she is young...like 25 I think. This week we have been kind of going back to the basics of present tense irregular verbs, interrogatives, etc. We do exercises and we also have conversations. I love the one on one attention in Spanish! Classes end at one and then we are done for the day. Celas Maya (the school) offers many activities both in the afternoon and at night. Sometimes the activities are free like the salsa lessons on Wednesday and sometimes you have to pay, but the activities are pretty cheap. On Monday a bunch of us went on our first activity, a hike to La Muela, which is a peak slash mountain. The people at the school told us that it was just going to be una camina (a walk) or hike up the mountain, BUT no it was waaayyy harder!! We walked up several inclined paved streets first for about 2 hours, and then the terrain switched to forest type paths and then solid rocks and boulders! We basically went rock climbing for another 2 hours. However, despite the fact that my legs have been sore for a couple days and it was one of the hardest hikes of been on in awhile, the view was definitely worth it! We were VERY high up. I found the whole trip fun and amusing, especially because no one in our group knew that the hike was going to be that hard! The walk back felt like it took forever. We left school and walked to the mountain around 2:30pm and the leader said that we would return around 5:30pm but we didn´t get back until 7:00pm! When I finally arrived home I ate dinner, took a shower, did a little homework, and went to bed!



Tuesday I had class, which I will have everyday from 8am to 1pm, so that won´t change for awhile. When people want to meet up and do something, Celas Maya is where we always meet up. I don’t know if I mentioned this yet, but we get a ‘pausa’ or a break from 1030 to 1100 everyday. During this time people either check their email, chat with each other, eat the free bread snack provided OR they go and buy a coco banana from Anna’s host mom who sells chocolate frozen bananas, pineapple, and strawberries, they are so delicious! Today a bunch of us didn’t really feel like going on the activity which was a visit to a cemetery which I actually might go on later because it is supposed to be really beautiful and different from an American cemetery. About six of us took a micro bus to Hiper Pais which is the big commercial type mall in Xela because we all really wanted to buy cell phones so that we can keep in touch with the group and loved ones from home. The micro buses are funny but great. All you have to do is simply stand on the correct side of the road on a street near school and get in the one where the driver or little boy is yelling “HHHHIIIPPPERRR, HIIIPPPEERR!!!!” (pronounced e-ber in Spanish). The ride was really cheap too, it was about a 15 min ride to the mall and it only cost about 2 Q, so if you read my conversion above thats like…not even 50 cents!! I thought that Hiber Pais was pretty nice for a Guatemalan mall, I would probably compare it to a smaller mall in the U.S. Hence I probably won’t go there too much because I think I’ll like shopping on the streets and being more involved in the Guatemalan culture better. We bought our phones from a store called Tigo. Its basically the Verizon Wireless of Latin America. You see advertisements for Tigo everywhere, even in the poorest of towns. We each bought a phone for 200 Q and got 30 free minutes with it, pretty cheap if you ask me. However you don’t have a plan, you have to buy the minutes for the phone. After we all had our phones we sat around for awhile and just looked like a bunch of Americans exchanging numbers. The number exchange was made even better when we all decided to buy frozen yogurt, it was delicious! They take fresh frozen fruit and make it for you. Yum, I’ll go back to the mall just for the frozen yogurt!

Wednesday January 7th
I am getting to know Monica better now and I love it. I have found that we become closer everyday through our conversations. I have no problem telling her things I'm frustrated with or things about my host family or just simply telling her about my family, friends, and boyfriend back at home. I was super excited for the activity today! Jenna said that we should for sure go some time! The activites at Celas will be offered more than once during our time here since the average Celas Maya student spends about 2-3 weeks here. We decided to go today! A bunch of us signed up to visit Las Fuentes Georginas. They are natural hot springs! We took about a 20 min bus ride, but this time it was in a tour van that the school owns so we all just packed in. Kind of remided me of la Gua Gua van in the Dominican. The hot springs were beautiful and…SUPER HOT! There were about 4 medium-small sized pools. Each had a little bit of a different temperature ranging from very hot to warm. I'm pretty sure I went in all of them. Some people including myself got a little light headed after entering and exiting the pools a couple of times. They felt great though because the atmosphere of the mountains is cool. A couple people in our group didn’t bring their swimsuits….I felt bad for them however I believe that the leader had said that, when the activities were introduced on Monday (the activities are introduced every Monday), that it was a necessity (obviously because the pools are like giant hot tubs). I came home for dinner and then I also wanted to do the night activity which was free salsa lessons! A bunch of us met up at school and walked to one of the local discotecas, which are clubs with salsa dancing and a bar. The one we walked to is called La Parranda, its nice and modern and I learned the basic steps again and then learned some fun turns.

Thursday-Friday
I didn't really do much on Thursday. It was nice just to vedge and spend a little time on the internet. If I failed to mention before I do not have internet in my house. At times it is unfair because some students do have internet in their house and it would be a lot easier, oh well it has both its benefits and its downfalls. That is why I haven' posted my blog until now. I have been slowly updating it and after a while I just decided that I wanted the first week to be posted before I sent everyone a mass email with my blog address on it.
Friday night was our first night out! Since I mentioned that we are not the only people studying at Celas Maya there is a graduation party at the school for the other students here every week! The party started at 7:00ish, but if you wanted to attend you had to bring something ie food or drink. Me, Angela, Shannon B, and Jenna walked down to La Dispensa which is a local grocery/convinient store to buy something. Jenna and Angela ended up making jello cake (a Jenna favorite), and Shannon and I bought citrus juice and soda for punch. Everyone else arrived later with their contribution to the fiesta. It was the most random buffet ever! There was spaghetti, cake, punch, pizza, home-made guacamole and salsa, chips, cookies and more! All of the things I listed were brought by people in my group :) After the graduation party died down/was over we all hung out for a little bit at the school, and then we all went to dance at another discoteca! This time we went to La Rumba which was a popular disoteca amoung last years travelers. It was very fun, loud salsa music and some techno, free popcorn, some drinks, friends, and Guatemalans equal a good time! The streets here are dangerous at night, especially on the weekends. I would never walk home alone, so we walk home in groups, usually a bunch of girls with one guy does the trick.

Saturday
It felt awesome to sleep in today. I wasn't really sure how it was going to work with our host families serving three meals a day. I thought Sonia would wake me up for breakfast but thankfully she let me do my own thing, and I just ate when I got up. Today I went shopping! Me, Jenna, Shannon B, Angela, and Mike A all met up at school and walked about 10-15 minutes to a store called La Democracia. It is an outdoor market with TONS of stores, and you can pretty much buy ANYTHING there like....underwear and socks, to DVDs and music, to Guatemalan souveneirs todos. I bought a cute Guatemalan looking purse, a coin purse, and a head band, but I will definitely be going back because there is no way I could visit/see all of the store in one day. I was tired after our shopping extravaganza so I didn't know if I wanted to go out salsa again. I met up with some people around 8:00pm to go to a place called the Blue Angel which is a movie cafe. What's a movie cafe you say? Its a small place that sells food (as in meals) and drinks and every night it plays 2 different movies in the movie rooms which have a regular sized TV and a bunch of seating. It cost 10 Q to view a movie, but they do have free wifi and cheap food there! After the Blue Angel we went to El Pasarje which is a nicer restaurant in an enclosed area. A couple of us ordered some awesome dessert, I had helado chocolate(icecream).

Sunday
I slept in again today, and used the internet again in the afternoon. I cried for the first time today. I think I was just frustrated talking about the streets of Guatemala but really all is going awesome here! On Thursday, I told Monica (my teacher) that I liked her nails, they are long...and real! I asked her if she had polish and if I could borrow some. Since she is so so nice she brought a small bag to share. Sunday me, Jenna, and Shannon B got together and at Jenna's house and painted our nails. It was cool seeing another house. Jenna's house looks like a Shanty from the outside but on the inside it was nice! Her house has two floors! I had to rush home to be there by 5:30 so I could go to church with Sonia. Something excited happened at church! Like at home there are prayers of the faithful...ya know when the person says, "For the poor." and then the congregation says "Lord hear or prayer." Except here they pass out slips of paper to random people to go up and read into a mircophone and Sonia and I both got one! I was SOO nervous, but Sonia gave me the easier one and it was only like a sentence long. I asked her a few pronunciation questions and when it was time I went up and read the prayer to the church! At least I didn't have to face the church....the people that get the slips face the alter instead of the church to read them.