Lot of hail, lot of tomatoes and lot of happiness (yea..running out of creative juice)

Sitting here in my dining room, freezing! Wearing a rain jacket, two sweaters, two shirts under that and my fuzzy slippers. Probably could upgrade the quality of my socks to wool instead of cotton but to lazy to get up. Oh! And wearing a snow hat too! I currently have a cold and a temp of almost 38C’ which I don’t know what that is in F but all I know is that means I have a temp. This is my third cold of the year. I have been sick for probably 3 ½ of the 4 ½ months this year. Grr!!! Well it’s my own fault usually for not wearing sufficient clothing when the freak hail storm attacks during the middle of the day. Yea, we have had hail 3 times this week. Guatemala surprises me everyday. Getting ready to cook some dinner. Looks like eggs are on the menu, as usual, and maybe soup because just don’t have much of an appetite. Oh! Just remembered I have mac and cheese. MMMMM… I saw on the menu for lunch tomorrow is beef chow mein with garlic bread. Hmmm…maybe I should save some mac and cheese for lunch tomorrow. Work is going good. I am having some big cultural difference lately but as always relying on God to get me threw, which I know he will. Guys hitting on women when they are married, massive amount of drinking (and driving), the lack of consideration of people sometimes, a variety of things. Again, all the things I thought would be hard here aren’t where as all the things that are hard I never anticipated. Kinda how life goes right?

# of times I slipped climbing down a mountain at work-1
# of slugs found crawling in my kitchen-1
# of meats featured for lunch on Friday-4 (I was excited because they also featured mashed potatoes so I didn’t have to partake too much in the meat fest)
# of goals scored on my team last Thurs when I was goalie-1 (I’m getting better!)
# of quesadillas I have made using the cheese my parents brought down from my mom- 5
# of KNOWN leaks in my house- 5****
# of home made Mac and cheese meals-1
# of brownies made this week-2
# of brownies made that worked-1
# of egg shells dropped into my brownies that went MIA-1
# of $ for a box of tomatoes (50lbs) - $16.60
# of days till I come to the states to visit- 83days (+/-)
# of days I have been in Guatemala- 245 (+/-)

**** So as I was writing this very part, its raining out, and the rain sounded louder than normal (with it already being VERY loud thanks to the metal roof). And I walked into my kitchen and its raining in my house! So I put the blog on hold, cleared out all my shelves which were basically like they were outside getting rained on, grabbed a broom and started sweeping the 4inches of water in my kitchen into the bathroom into the shower. I did that for about 30min, stopped to take a picture of course, placed some buckets to catch the waterfall in the kitchen, ran out of buckets, gave up, called my grandma to chat while waiting for the rain to stop and proceeded to try to dry off the food that got soaked. We will see what survives. So I would like to change the number of known leaks in my house to about 15 now. Gotta call the owner tomorrow and tell her to come put a new roof on the kitchen. (next day) So I got up, climbed on a chair and started to clean one of the drains that was filled with leaves and mud. The drain above the kitchen I covered with a rusty piece of sheet metal hoping less rain and hail will collect there but we will see. If that doesn’t work I will need to make some cement and fill in the holes. The whole time the boys were laughing at me because I said a lot of EWWWW when cleaning out the mud. (this is me trying to beat the water and push it all into the bathroom..i didn´t win)

Most Creative Moment- So I got a bag of nuts in the shell and I found out that my metal juice squeezer thingy can also double a nut crusher! Wehew!

Funniest Meeting Moment- We were in a meeting in a community the other day and one of my coworkers was talking him and I was watching. He said his comment, then looked down and started flexing his arm mussels and then stopped and said another comment and went back to flexing. I got a good kick out of it and he caught me laughing which was better.

Favorite Moment of the Week- So on Thursday I went to a community to go to a meeting that no one showed up for, except one person. Then we went to look at a garden where they are growing tree seedlings. It started to rain, quickly took some pictures and then hopped on the moto before it got to bad. Well, we got about 100mtrs down the road before it was hailing. So we hopped off, ducked under a porch and waited. I was starving (it was 5pm) and so I pulled out my cheese and crackers my mom sent me awhile back. Well, the worst thing that could ever happen did, I dropped the little red stick in the river under my feet and it floated off into the unknown. NNOOO!!!! Must eat cheese and crackers! So I pulled out my switch blade knife that I was given for a gift from my marketing trainer and I proceeded to use this knife that could be used for slaughtering an animal, to eat my cheese and crackers. But then the hail started coming in side ways so we put our helmets on because it hurt! So my crackers got wet L Still ate them anyways. Then we went into a dark store because we were being attacked by hail the size of small marbles and it hurt like crazy! So waited there for about 20minf or it to pass with some other community people. Then we went outside and the ground was covered in hail. We wanted to have some fun with the camera while we waited for the rest of the storm to pass. So first it was Wilver and he would toss the hail and we tried to take a pic. Then it was my turn and I got an older indigenous lady to do it with me. I haven’t laughed that hard in a long time. They were such wimps to putting the hail in their hands which was funny speaking we took the picture maybe 10times because we couldn’t get the timing right of when to throw it vs. when Wilver will take the picture. A group of people were watching us laughing as well and I love it when the indigenous people laugh because some of them look so serious that they haven’t laughed in years. So we did that for a bit, then it was time to try and leave. That was definitely something that will go down as one of my favorite memories. Then we drove off, and the land was GORGEOUS! The rivers were HUGE, the ground was steaming, the hail was placed in strategically beautiful spots and the road to leave was terrifyingly slippery (don’t worry dad, all is well). So we made it out, made it back to Tejutla, which looked like it might have gotten a bit of a sprinkle and we walked in looking like we had been in a hurricane. Had the pictures to prove it! (Can ya find the gringa in the group shot?)

You Know Its Hailing Hard When- You can’t hear the speakers for your music on full blast and they are 12inches from your ears.

Guatemalan Proverb- Thy who burnith thy trash while installing-ith thy smoke detectors shall have problems-ith.

Hmm..the bad side of this situation- Bummer is I opened the box of matches on the wrong side and they all fell out. Good side… the matches somehow magically stick to my bathrobe J

Rain, rain, comes almost every day- So we are getting to the point where rain comes basically everyday in the late afternoon or evening. Luckily my pila has a small roof over it outside so I can do my dishes while it’s raining. Somewhat relaxing actually. There is a TON of lightening and thunder here which is fun because in LA for whatever reason those two things don’t really happen. So we are set to have rain almost everyday till the late fall. Loving it now, ask me again in a month.

“This I declare of the Lord, He alone is my refuge, my place of safety, He is my God, and I am trusting Him.”
Psalm 9:11

Just want to take a hot shower! So the showers here are electrical. Which means when there is no power, can’t take a shower. So my shower head finally burned out for whatever reason. So I invested a lot of money into a good shower head, $30, had a friend install and it turned it on, whew! Hot shower! New problem! The shower head for whatever reason turns off after about 3min. Grrrrr…. So I have to take a 3min shower, turn it off, wait there for about 2min, turn it back on, another 2-3min shower, it goes off again, wait two more min. And so on. My goal is to able to take a hot shower for longer than 3min in my house here in Guatemala. My parents taught me to aim high.

Flour Tortillas- One of the other volunteers and I made flour tortillas using a recipe from this book created by volunteers in Guatemala using ingredients we probably have here. So we had a taco night and we were VERY excited. I now understand why Guatemalans eat corn tortillas because there are very easy to make compared to the floured version. So our tortillas were good, we couldn’t make them very thin so it was kinda like a pita flour tortilla.

Comitancillo Feria Parade- So I went to the neighboring site (2hrs away) and it was their feria this week so we watched the parade. It was really interesting because each parade is themed but can’t figure out the theme for this one. This all being acted out and what not by kids from the schools. So the first set of kids were portraying the controversy of immigration in the US. They had made floats and what not that represented the barriers getting to the US, a few of them being a giant wall, people walking with dogs and guns and the government. It was actually kinda sad watching this. Then came the world figures. We had everyone from Che, Osama Bin Laden, Martin Luther King and George Bush Jr. walk by. So for this being the poorest municipality in Guatemala, they did a great job building the costumes and floats with the limited resources they have.

Hiked a Mountain for what?!- So the other day at work we were making our rounds and checking on the tomato growers greenhouses. The work guy I was with told me to take off my motorcycle gear because this was going to be a bit of a walk. A bit?!?! So we walked down a mountain which is always tough for me because I seem to constantly slip. Then got to the bottom, time to go up the other mountain. So we walked up this mini mountain thing and that got me huffing and puffing and in the end it took about 40min. I said on the way up “Watch, he won’t be there” Yea! Guess who wasn’t home! Ahhhhh!!!!

Day Light Savings Time- For the 2nd time in Guatemala history they enacted day light savings time to help conserve electricity. Oh my gosh! I have never seen something so simple be SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO confusing. For starters, most of the communities don’t want to change the time because they are saying that “The president can’t change time. God created time and he can’t change it” So all the meetings this week, we got there at the right time but they all got there an hour late saying they were going by the “Actual time/Gods Time” and not the “Presidents Hour” People! Not that hard to change! So when we make meetings they ask us “So is this with the new hour or the old hour?” One person in my host family the next day was complaining “How can I go to sleep! Its my bedtime, but its light out! What am I suppose to do now! I am going to be tired tomorrow!” He was very grumpy. Even some of the buses run on the old time vs. the new time.

“Do you, take your cousin, to be your wife?” So killing some time before a meeting we were talking to one of the community members and he was saying basically everyone here is family at some point. Then he started saying “This guy, yea, his wife is his cousin, also the same with this guy, and these people are 2nd cousins. If you don’t marry someone from one side of your family, then it will be someone from the other side of your family” This is said to be a lot of the cause for the albino people here (seen about 10 since coming to Guatemala)

“Eh.just get a stick and hit him!” So the other day I was walking home from work and there is one bollo (drunk) in my town that I particularly avoid because he freaks me out. So I saw him coming and I ducked into a store and hid between the two doors and the store lady, who I say hi to everyday when I pass to go home was giving me a funny look. I said “There is this bollo that likes to bother me because I am a gringa and he is about to pass” So she told me when he passed and then we started talking. She told me to get a stick and just hit him. I found that so amusing speaking this harmless looking older lady is saying that. So we exchanged names and I went on my way. I love the little experiences like that in Guatemala. Kinda makes ya chuckle at the random moments thinking back to them.

Work Update-
Honey and Jarred Products- So I thought my two leaders were leaving the agency, nope. How do these things get so misunderstood. One day they are leaving, next day acting like we never had that talk. Anyways, I have a secret plan in the works for how I might be able to get rid of the peaches. If it works I will tell ya bout it in the next blog.
Tomatoes- So went and visited our tomatoes customers from last year to see if they are still interested and they are. Now I am just kinda having a logistical coordination nightmare. I have to figure out when the 20 or so greenhouses in the 7 different communities are producing tomatoes, when, what size, and expected quantity. Just writing about it makes me roll my eyes in frustration. I am quickly learning a lot about tomato growing. 1. Takes 3months for the plants to grow to produce. 2. Then they produce continuously for the next 4months with the quantity slowly going down over time. 3. There are 4 different sizes of tomatoes they grow. I am hoping the grow the first and second level but most are growing the second and third which isn’t so good. So next week I have to give them all quick talks about cleaning the tomatoes, packing them (some try to pack the tomatoes with the big on the outside and small on the inside, big no no). Then hopefully in a week we will be taking our first load to San Marcos.

My Walk- I am doing good in my Walk. I need to get back to reading the Bible which I have been saying for about 2months now. I work from 8am to about 6 or 7 and then get home from dinner at 8pm and usually in bed by 830 or 9pm. No excuse but its tough. So my prayer requests are that God continues to keep me healthy, happy and motivated here. Done a great

job thus far! (Grandma, this is my kitchen, when its not raining inside)