HI! So we’ve been away again, but it wasn’t really our fault. You see, the plan was to go to our In-Service Training and then my friend Devin was going to arrive the day we finished and we’d start our whirlwind tour of Guatemala with him. He bought his ticket to arrive on said date, then Peace Corp moved training up a week, boo. So we went to Antigua for a week, came home for 5 days, and went to Antigua again to pick up D-ho. About 3 months after arriving to our new home here in the mountains, in the midst of one beautiful, rainy hike through lush greenery and waterfalls, Fletch and I were talking and we came to agree that there was one person on earth we knew needed to come see us here, because he’d probably appreciate the place as much as we do. That person was Devin Hogan. Shortly thereafter we set about convincing him he needed to be here. We didn’t really have to twist his arm… Devin and I met sophomore year of college in one of the most transformative classes (sortof joking, but mostly not) of our Knox career, London Arts Alive, which means we hung out in London together for like 3 weeks during winter break. Our friendship started on a traveling adventure and thus it continues…

Friday morning Fletch and I set out on our marathon bus ride straight from our front door to Antigua, arriving in just under 12 hours. Devin’s flight was dirt cheap, which meant it left Chicago at 3:00 am and got to Guatemala at 6:30am. He was doing us the huge of favor of brining two pelican cases of computer equipment for the computer center project, thus we went all out and rented a taxi to and from the airport rather than taking a cheap shuttle. We had no idea if the airlines would slap Dev with ugly baggage fees that would prevent him from getting the cases here. Nor did we know if immigration would let the pelican cases through once they got here. But the taxi pulled up to the arrivals exit and Devin was standing, all chill in his MIB sunglasses, with a bulging backpack and two pelican cases, right at the taxi lane. Impeccable timing plus VICTORY. The baggage fees were only $50, but immigration was a little trickier. The officer that first checked the cases out had a bad case of Self-Importance. He hassled Devin about the boxes for a while, asking what he was doing bringing so much computer equipment into the country, what the value of it all was (not much; it’s all used). The customs official declared that the boxes, since they came with no official Peace Corps documentation to back up his skinny backpacker story of helping out a to-be computer center in the highlands of Huehuetenango, had to be left at the airport until someone could come pay taxes on them. And this is where Devin kicked butt. He does actually speak spanish, but he was kind of rusty for not having practiced in a while, and he’d been at O’Hare and on planes since 1am, so he breaks out some flimsy spanish skills, looking totally square (obviously he’d not put on the sunglasses yet) and starts telling the officer, “It’s just, well, my church donated this equipment for a project here in Guatemala, and, I mean, we’re supposed to leave for the mountains this morning and the villagers are all waiting for these boxes they are know are coming…” Exit custom officer, enter next in command. Devin was told he could take the cases out of the airport, but was getting a special stamp in his passport. If he’s found trying to enter the country again in the next twelve months with more computer equipment and no documentation he will have to pay taxes. But on this day he got off scott free with our start up boxes. YAY DEVIN!

I think he was generally a lucky charm his first day here. We a took him, very loopy and all, to breakfast at our favorite place before meeting up with our “shuttle” to Lake Atitlan. We showed up early, about 20 minutes before said shuttle was supposed to leave, and less than five minutes after arriving a little car pulled up to the travel agency and asked the woman if he had any passengers. She pointed to us. We got a private car to take us, in amazing comfort, to Atitlan (2 1/2 hours from Antigua) on pretty back roads not used by big camionetas–for less than we paid for a taxi to the airport and back (a 30 minute trip)!

Here we are riding the boat to our hostel. Fletch and I were beat from the massive travel the day before and getting up early to meet Devin. Devin was beat from flying all morning long. The lake was just the anecdote of relaxation we needed. Being there is kind of like being in Hawaii, which is to say my brain just kind of shuts off. I can read and kayak and swim and do yoga, and my thoughts go no further than the next meal because the food is amazing. While there we ran into a lot of spring breakers from the US, and I thought, “Man, why didn’t I ever think of running away to central america for my spring break in college. That would have been so cool…” Then I tried to remember what I did do….One hiking trip to Cherokee National Forest with my dear Allison first year of college, next year in Hawaii getting to know my boyfriend’s family, next year in Morocco for ten days with same boyfriend, last year of college in Hawaii again as an early wedding present, climbing the volcano. I actually laughed out loud that I didn’t immediately remember that stuff. Apparently there wasn’t time to think about running away to Central America; I was too busy with other trips. Anyway, Atitlan gave all three of us time to rest, recuperate and catch up on all sorts of news. It was so relaxing, in fact, that we couldn’t bring ourselves to leave and had to stay one night longer than planned. Then we really had to go and meet up with the EWU student and all the computer monitors before we distributed the students to their PCV hosts.

Devin got to enjoy the 7 hour ride from Xela to our site. The poor guy is even taller than we are, so the microbus was nothing but loads of fun for his long-legged self. However, once he arrived in Temux he was treated quite well. Since the arrival of Elke the town has demonstrated nothing but enthusiasm for more gringo visitors. As Fletch has told with all his pictures, he got to experience everything that is our crazy life here, ha, right down to being in town where we are less known and having clusters of children suddenly form a huddled, panic-stricken line to pass us on the street. “Did you see that? Did you see the terror in their eyes?” I asked him. He could only chuckle. It’s sort of sad but funny that they’re so incredibly scared of us. He also got the opposite treatment in Temux as we went walking along the roads to happy children holloring enthusiastically, “GRINGOS! JAIME! EMILY! GRINGOS!” and waving madly from front porches and yards.

One of the coolest things that Fletch didn’t mention was how the town leaders showed up on multiple occassions to show Devin around. We ended up doing two days of long hikes. Nas showed us where he was born and grew up before he moved down to the village center. There were tours of some natural springs that Nas and Manuel wanted advice on how to protect and use (welcome to our job, Devin, we have to give information plugs like this all the time!), and of course lessons on the plant life, what this tree and that plant are called in Q’anjob’al. While the guys talked to us, Manuel’s little boys made flower chains for me until I had set, then they made flower bracelets for Devin and Fletch. Something about that was really endearing, a “Yeah, I’m in Peace Corps” moment. That day, we hiked until the sun set. They kept thinking of one more thing to show us, one of our last stops being a cave where, according to Nas, people descend to light candles and communicate with the supernatural. I have to laugh every time they say supernatural here, because they use the word extraterrestre, which in my mind sounds like they’re communicating with aliens. Nas said one of his sheep fell into the cave–it’s up on a little hill, the opening is a grass and rock hole in the earth–so he’s been down there at least once to retrieve a lost sheep. I always wish I could catch just how vertical the landscape here is for all of you to see. I think these pictures of our hike make a pretty good show of it.

This was Devin’s first sampling of how cool Nas Palas is, but I really wanted Dev to have the experience of eating dinner with the whole family. This was tricky, because I knew they wouldn’t want to invite us unless they had meat, and I didn’t know if they were going to be buying meat while Devin was here, so I suggested he buy them a chicken and they teach us how to kill it. Pretty funny. Reina gave me advice on where to go to get it, but sent Chalio and Alberto with us to help us find this random place up in the hills where a lady sells live chickens.

When we finally got there, the whole chicken selling family had to come out to see these three giant gringos that had come to buy a bird. It was pretty hilarious. Reina had already told me, “Make sure you get the biggest one you see to get the best for your money.” I spotted the biggest one, but as I was trying to figure out how to say it Q’anjob’al Chaleo hollered, “We want that one!” (same one I’d picked out, good eye good eye) so the guy picked up the biggest bird and tossed him in the bag the family had sent with us. “Now you have to carry it,” I told Chaleo, and he looked a little sad about that. I started laughing and slung the chicken over my shoulder, but that proved a very uncomfortable way to carry it. It kept bumping up against my back, and it’s beak and talons were sticking out of the bag. It was pretty funny. But the whole thing got funnier as Masha and Reina showed us how we had to kill it. The two had an argument over who  had to ring its neck. Apparently their sister-in-law who wasn’t home at the time usually does that part. In the end Reina had to do it. And here’s a funny picture of me with the girls. As Masha and Reina were plucking the chicken, the girls woke up from their naps in the other room, so I went to pick them both up to stop their squaking and show them where their moms were. They all thought it was pretty funny.

On Devin’s last day here Manuel took us on a hike to the mountains across the valley, to where he was raised. You have to descend to the river then hike UP. The paths were so well worn it felt like the roots and rocks formed functional narrow stairs. On the way there he pointed out where, during the conflict, a guerrilla from Todos Santos was hiding in the hills, and where he was consequently shot. For those of you who’ve read the earlier entries this story isn’t new, but coming from Manuel, who was about 12 at the time, it was told with much more revelry and pride in the moment than Nas’ confession of a few months ago. The disparity was a little disturbing, really, but it’s all a matter of perspective. And listening to the different perspectives is part of our learning process here, to understand this place and the people we’re living and working with.

Later in the afternoon they presented Devin to the community at a formal gathering. We try pretty hard to make people understand that the things we’re doing here are all supported by other people who care back in the US, our friends and family and other distant supporters, so we figured presenting him to the community would help emphasize this point once again. It was very interesting, as we were seated on the stage in front of the community, to look out at the room. The men and women, with very few exceptions, sit separately. All the women sit close to the front, but guard their mouths and faces. All the men sit in the back against the wall, and mill around the front organizing the program. No meeting here gets underway without the men writing up a formal agenda and speaking order first. They only ever write the agenda just before the meeting starts, as everyone is waiting around. So I’m sitting up on stage with Fletch on my left and Devin on my right, and we’re all talking about what’s going on. Suddenly it occurred to me that all the women in the room were watching us, and I wondered if it was strange for all these women to see this. I’m in the middle of these two men, interacting with them equally, but one is my husband and the other one I’ve introduced as my friend. In general, Guatemalans do not have opposite sex friends. In fact, it’s generally assumed that if a woman or man is speaking privately with a man/woman other than her husband/wife that the two are lovers. There’s really no middle ground. With such a system it’s no wonder the gender divide here is so strong. It’s just easier on everyone if the men run everything and do all business between themselves, but it also makes me a little sad. It’s going to take a lot to animar the women to participate more fully, but I guess we’ll take baby steps, just showing them it can be done. Or maybe they don’t think about that at all…maybe they just think I’m a morally lax gringa with some lovers on the side. Who knows? In the end, everyone was happy to meet Devin, and the leaders were incredibly happy to know the computers are one step closer to being in Temux. They thanked Devin and his parents profusely and all the town leaders took turns to talk about what the presence of a computer center in the village means for the community. “Now we can go from using our hoes in the milpa, clearing land during the day, to learning how to work on computers in the evenings,” said Don Simon, and when you think about the life these people, especially the eldest members of the community have had, that is a pretty huge leap for them. Devin was pretty touched by everything, much like Fletch and I were on our first visit to Temux. There was a town acta drawn up in the log books to record Devin’s visit to the village, and everyone present signed that they were in attendance and happy about the coming computer center. He’s officially part of the village historical record.

Early Monday morning Devin and Fletch took off, leaving me home alone for the first time since before I was in Peace Corp. But before he left Devin said, “I read your blog, but this stuff wasn’t on it.” He wanted more pictures of our village. So here’s some pictures I told him I’d post. But no matter how much we put on this blog, I think his statement is evidence to the fact that you all get a glimpse of our life only. If you want the real thing, come visit! Temux would love to have you.

This is the local cemetery, the campo santo, or holy field. In person it’s pretty cool because of the grave decorations the families put up on the first of November. This is Devin in front of our town. He really thinks people should know what it looks like up here. The last is pretty explanatory; we get to see lots of pretty sunsets around here. And just like that, the sun has set on Devin’s trip and this post.