Party in the USA

I didn't mention in my last post that the end of June I took a trip home to the States, returning to Guatemala oddly enough on Independence Day.  Below you'll find an overview of my time in both North Dakota and Chicago...

*NORTH DAKOTA*

One of my best friends from back home, Tanner, got married to the wonderful Amy and I got home just in time to go celebrate with old friends :)

The cake cutters.  Oh yeah, that cake had no idea what was coming.

The beautiful couple.

Me dancing with the lovely Lucy.

North Dakota at its finest!!!  I know we probably all love our home states and believe with foolish pride that we come from the best part of the US...so I won't go in to my long and prideful description of ND's wonders, but see for yourself some of the great open spaces, animals and good people.  Below is a view from inside Theodore Roosevelt National Park.

Buffalo!!!  We pulled in to a lookout point and from afar I totally thought it was a statue...really it had wondered in to the parking lot and was thoughtfully cutting the grass in front of the visitor's center.

Taking a walk around the farm on a gorgeous summer's day.

Me and some cousins at a family reunion...how I loved showing this picture to people in Guatemala- for once I'm not the tallest!

Being away makes it hard when you have friends back home raising kids (they grow so fast!) It was super fun to hang out with Jana and her cute kids (who knows where they got it from, hehe).  

This picture is from a talk I gave to kids about life in Guatemala.  I loved their questions: are there killer lions there? do you eat real food?  I wish I could take them with me to see it all!

Bismarck is home to the Superslide Amusement Park, which offers a variety of attractions, our favorites being mini golf and the slide featured in the background.  No visit home in the summer is complete without a race down!  I'm pretty sure I would have beat Kaela had it not been for my skirt...

Jana and I having fun exploring Fort Lincoln State Park.  I can't think of anyone else I'd rather spend a romantic sunset with...wait a minute.  Oh well, we had a good time exploring the cementery (the headstones give causes of death such as froze to death, drank himself to death, gunshot, or typhoid fever) and climbing around on the old military blockhouses.

Hanging out with the 'rents.

*CHICAGO*

My brother Matt and I biked to the lakefront for a sunny picnic...yay for summer!

The afternoon included a walk through the Lincoln Park Zoo and the Conservatory.

Bachelorette Party for Jess!  So great to reconnect with the old crew from IWU.

So Jess's wedding included many Indian traditions (since her husband is originally from there).  Here's her hand soon after she had the Henna artist work on them (up to her elbows!  3 1/2 hours)

Beautiful bride :)

Part of the wedding ceremony.  Her sister is to left, in a sari just like the rest of the bridesmaids. The officiant is seated to the left.  He would explain parts in English but mainly did the ceremony in Hindi.

Another part of the ceremony where colored dust was put on top of her head.

"I now pronounce you man and wife!"

Kellie!!  We met many years ago in a freshman Spanish class (we had an amazing corner, right kellie?  jajaja). 

Erika and I met in Miami when her study abroad group passed through and I came to visit friends of mine who were staff.  A year and a half later we randomly met up again but this time at a bonfire in rural Illinois (Jess's mom's house).  Such a small world!  Some of you may remember that both Jess and Erika came to visit me last August in Guatemala.

Sarah and Tiff made the drive up from IN to hang out and catch up.  Here's us enjoying the afternoon walking around Bucktown and the Ukrainian Village.

Danielle joined us soon after.  We were roommates all four years in college until she got a new one (her husband).  We have such good memories together and of course keep making new ones!

Great Cuban food for dinner.  I even got my favorite- vaca frita!  Tastes way better than it sounds, hehe.  I have such great friends....here the jungle is only missing Steph and Yue'e.

I also have great brothers!  I unfortunately didn't get a picture with Brad this time but here I am with Matt before taking off.

And that's all folks!  Now I'm back to daily torrents of rain, lots of black beans, tortillas, washing my clothes by hand (I think I washed every day at home in the washing machine just cause I loved how easy it was), world cup final fever, traveling in camionetas and learning new things around every corner.

The World I Know

Yet again there's been a lapse in my blogging activities...whoops.  Things (as always) have been pretty crazy with me, but life's good and I wouldn't have it any other way :)

Kudos to Mama Lupe for helping me with my birthday bash.  We toasted ingredients for my favorite dish, pepian de pollo.  Below you'll see dried chiles, tomatoes, miltomates, bread, onions, sesame seeds and pumpkin seeds. It turned out fantastic!  Oh I should mention that we started prep for this party on Fri May 28 (to have it on Sat), of course the two days that the tropical cyclone Agatha hit Guatemala hard.  

More on that to follow.

I am blessed to have such wonderful people in my life here.  

Juanita's not in this picture but she was so great that she went out during the storm to pick the leaves from the corn stalks so we could wrap up tamalitos in them!

Picture with the family

So many of you might know what happened during Agatha, but if not click here.  The storm came just two days after one of our active volcanoes, Pacaya, erupted, and caused immense destruction throughout the country with flooding, mudslides and even a giant "sinkhole".  Luckily my community was spared from losing any people, but the park sustained significant infrastructure damage.  Here's what happened to the hydroelectric dam...  I have a post back in April that shows what it looked like before.

Our entrance was completely washed away and one of our concrete arches is now falling down because the land underneeth it was washed in to the river.

Here's the turbine and generator buried under mud.

We didn't have any power at the park for 5 days, so we all pitched in a hand to clean up.  I joined the men fixing the bridge and entrance.  Here Don Martin and I are exhausted from shoveling.

Luckily the roads got cleared a bit and I was able to head to San Antonio for a visit.  I love these kids!

Randomly hanging out with my co-worker's mom while making dinner.  

Each day brings surprises and new experiences.

Chico, Eddy and I took off on a Friday after work and class to hike up to a gigantic rock on the mountainside.  Here we're taking a shortcut through someone's corn field.

My first baby shower in Guatemala.  Exactly like the ones back home, except for the food (tostadas and tamales).  We even played the guess the size of the mom's tummy game with string and the race to burst balloons between two people (below)!

We had the pleasure of hosting a group of Canadian tourism students for two weeks in the park.  They were amazing volunteers and helped make signs, clean the trail, paint the office, plant trees, etc.

Fair in San Antonio Aguas Calientes.  Could not believe the men spent all day Saturday cutting huge pieces of plastic to make this decoration for their street.  The design is a depiction of St. Anthony.

My dear friend Patty gave me this bag for my birthday.  She tried to make it to the party, but like all of the volunteers I invited she also couldn't make it due to the storm, so we celebrated later.

Danika and Fatima all ready for their brother's birthday party.

So this was the craziest weekend ever...had a get together with the fam Friday night, took off Saturday morning for San Antonio to hang out with Patty and the old fam, left early Sun morning to get back in time for the baby shower, made cakes all afternoon and then spent the evening celebrating Johnny's 12th birthday.  

It was great :)

Corazón del Bosque: through the lens

A while back I took a bunch of pictures of the park for an upcoming publication from CONAP (the National Council of Protected Areas) and thought I’d share them with you all.  Also included are a couple photos a Canadian volunteer took and gave to us to use for publicity.  It’s not a big park nor does it have crazy attractions (like incredible views, volcanoes, ruins, adventure activities etc.) but I’ve grown to love its simplistic beauty :)

De todo un poco

Oops…I can’t believe how I let time get away from me this past month.  If I would have been a bit more pilas (on top of things) I would have written some great play by plays because there’s been quite a bit of interesting things in and around the bosque.  Since I strive not to be a long-winded person, I’ll give the quick summary…

Beach

Ok this has nothing to do with the craziness but I just wanted to share my excitement at the fact I was able to go to the ocean two times this past month!  The first was down to Hawaii (just past the famous Monterico) for a combination lifeguard training, despedida (goodbye party) for a fellow volunteer and fabulous dip in the ocean (although the current was unfortunately strong).  Accompanying me was the crazy duo of Jamie and Josh…talk about attention when you have three tall canches (blondes) walking around together!  The second time was a day trip with the park staff to Champerico.  The waves were strong here too so we just played a bit, ate some fish and spent the afternoon at a pool.  Even with 3 applications of sunscreen I came home the lovely shade of a tomato.

Wedding

Yep, another wedding.  This time it was Oralia’s brother who got married.  We went to his civil ceremony on a Tuesday and I got to see and take part in several of the traditional customs (bringing food for the family, gifts, the outfit the bride will wear on the other wedding day- green corte, white lacy blouse and veil, and not to the mention the important advice part where all the elders share their wisdom with the couple- I have to admit I was a little offended when they were telling the bride that she better put the right amount of sugar in the husband’s coffee, iron his pants and shirts correctly, keep a separate soap ball for washing his clothes, etc but they seem like a more progressive couple than that so I shouldn’t worry.)  As crazy as all that sounds, nothing compares to the actual wedding day.  I don’t want to go in to too much detail, but let’s just say that as we’re sitting in the decorated church waiting for the mass to start, the priest comes out and says that the ceremony won’t be taking place!!!  Everyone is shocked (just like in the movies).  It’s a drama-filled story complete with an ex-girlfriend coming to ruin the day.  I felt horrible mostly for the bride (she’s super sweet and of course was so excited for her wedding day).  The party for 400 guests had already been arranged so that still took place (they were technically married anyways).  Kind of hard to celebrate with everyone upset (mainly at the priest for listening to the crazy rantings of the ex) but there was still the meal, cake, live marimba, dancing and so forth.

Fútbol

The World Cup is just around the corner!!!  I’m getting super excited :)  Lately I’ve had the chance to go to a few games (almost all in Novillero) but last weekend I made it to the Guatemalan finals and sadly watched the Super Chivos (Xela) lose horribly to a team from the capital (Municipal, aka the Rojos).  We sat in the rain and cold all afternoon only to see them end the night with a score of 0-4. 

Luckily the next day the boys played in the finals in Novillero and won 5-4!

Birthdays

I love birthdays.  Mostly because it represents a time where everyone comes together to celebrate someone they all love.  And also because it implies good food, cake, presents and if you’re lucky, a piñata….hehe.  I am fortunate to live with a family that shares the same mentality; we are mad birthday partiers.  Here are pics from the past two birthdays (Chico and Mama Lupe).

I made chocolate cake for Chico and the most amazing brownies (got the recipe from the US ambassador here) for Mama Lupe.