Pictures Coming Soon

I should preface this entry with letting you know that this is Aaron writing this, and I haven’t been keeping up with what Marla has already told you all, so there may some things that are repeated.
Since the departure of Felix and Laura we’ve all been settling into a rhythm of life here in Uspantan that is starting to feel comfortable. Our mornings consist of rolling out of bed at around 7am putting on a pot of coffee and sitting down with a book (there has been a lot of good reading on this trip). At eight we meet Don Avolino, the building manager, for water purification and our Spanish/ English tutoring sessions.
Don Avolino has agreed to teach us Spanish in return for us teaching him English, which has been a very fruitful exchange for everyone. Each day for about two hours while purifying the four tinacos (tanks) we trade words through hand signals and looking them up in the dictionary. Our Spanish vocabulary grows as Don Avolino’s English grows, he asked us if we would like him to teach us Quiche as well, but we said we think we can only handle one language at a time, not to mention when he starts to speak Quiche all understanding goes out the window.
After we are through purifying all the water with Don Avolino, our day consists of yoga, hiking, playing soccer/Frisbee with the kids at the field, cards, cooking, going to the Mercado, more reading, researching coffee farms, hanging out with new friends, and planning our next moves.
We’ve had the privilege of meeting some very interesting and helpful people in the past week. The first is Don Bagote aka Glen, he’s doing his Doctoral research on Latin American politics, and is currently traveling around through Guatemala, conducting interviews with as many people as are willing to sit down with him. He’s been a great help to us in informing us of the past and present political situations in Guatemala, and having traveled extensively through Guatemala, he’s also been helpful in telling us interesting places we may want to visit.
The other person that has been a true Godsend is Laura, a Peace Corp. Volunteer, she is currently working with the city of Uspantan trying to build some sort of tourist revenue for the city. Seeing that Guatemala is such a beautiful country she is trying to market the city to outdoor adventurers, which just so happens to be something that all of us are very much into, so we’ve all offered ourselves up as guinea pigs for anything that she is working on. She has also been a huge help in pointing us in the direction of several coffee co-ops and farms, and seeing that she works in tourism she knows the chicken bus system backwards and forward, which is a huge help.
The water purification system at the hospital is currently put on hold until we get the platform built that the tinacos will sit on to gravity feed the kitchen. The platform should be complete by August 10th, it is being made from steal so that it will last, but it also is taking longer than we anticipated. The maintenance/engineer guy at the hospital, Marcio, is one of the most intelligent guys that I’ve met and has been studying the water purifier manual for the past two weeks, and I am confident that he will have little problem with running the system.
So that’s pretty much it, life is good right now and I feel good about where we are. Each day brings a new challenge and adventure that stretches us a little, allowing us to grow and learn.
PS I hope that not too much of this post is a repeat, but I felt it necessary to write at least one while in Guatemala.