Time is really flying by for us in Uspantan, the past week has been a whirlwind couple of days. Last wednesday, Laura offered to take us to La Chimel for the day to visit Dona Maria and a great little hike in the mountians with a great mirador (view) and an awesome rope swing. So 11 of us pile into a 8 passenger suv and go for an hour and half bumpy ride through the mountians.
The view was breathtaking and we all spent over an hour swing high into the treetops, with the boys and laura trying to outdo each others tricks. The most amazing part was lunch at Dona Maria´s house, where Laura asked her to tell her story of what happened to her, her family, and village during the civil conflict which just ended in 1994, and had lasted over 10 years and involved a scorch and burn operation that destroyed most of the villages in the mountains where most of the Mayans live. Her story was incredible story of struggle and hope for a new beginning. Her village was forced to live in the mountians for months on whatever they could find. While her and her father had been taken by the army into prison, so many bad things happened to her its hard to retail and give it any justice. It was very moving and made me want to learn a lot more about the history of Guatemala and it people during the civil conflict. The after noon will be one of my favorite memories of Uspantan.
We also found this flower called Flor de un dia (flower of one day) which only blooms one day!
Then just yesterday was michael´s birthday in which we surprised with a pinata and fireworks on the futbol field. It was a blast to see him blindfolded and swing at a little paper penguin. I think he enjoyed his Guatemalan birthday even though he says he doesn´t like a lot of attention and stuff.
Kane comes in three days and plan to start the travels around to all the coffee farms, and unfortunalty the hospital has been pushed back again but we will eventually get to start that. We are having some difficulties getting materials in town to build the platforms we need for the water tanks. There is plenty of time to finish though and none of our plans are set in stone.
Miss you all
much love marla and aaron
3 comments:
Hello everyone,
It was good to hear your voice on the phone aaron though we got disconnected. A couple of quick questions; did Kane arrive safe? and also can you take and post some pics of the farms and water purification installs?
Love you and looking forward to hearing your stories first hand,
Matthew & Brian
also,
that last quote is not from asa. we just used his name and password to be able to leave the comment. sorry - so low tech
you guys are loved and missed. Come back to us!
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