El Salvador and bus etiquette

So on Wed. i left antigua for San Salvador. I am traveling with Stine, another volunteer from the project from Norway. we bought our bus ticket from a travel agency in antigua, we later realized we paid way to much. on wed we went to guatemala city, and then switched to a pullman style bus to go to San Salvador. It went well except for one hicup on the border. It took us a while to clear the border because on our last trip to El Salvador they gave us a stamp for 90 more days on our visa which they normally dont do because theres an agreement between the countries. i needed to renew my visa so we asked them and they said it was fine. This time around the immigration officer didnt understand why we had the extra 90 days, she had to talk to her boss but eventually said it was fine. We stayed the night in San Salvador and went to the immigration office in the morning to make sure everything was alright. there we found out that our extra 90 days stamp wasnt valid so we needed to get new stamps. we made friends with the immigration officer because she asked us to help her with her english homework. it only took us 3 or 4 hours to get the new stamp which was pretty good. then we left san salvador and got to playa el tunco. this required 2 buses but was very easy to get to. playa el tunco was very relaxing with not very much happening. our first night there, there was a bunch of locals playing in a mini soccer tournament on the beach that was fun to watch. the next day we just relaxed on the beach, i tried to surf a little bit but wasnt able to do much. this morning there was a surf competition at the beach right next to playa el tunco which we got to see some of. we left around noon for san salvador and then took a bus through town and caught another bus to the quiet little town of suchitoto, where i am now. the place we are staying isnt that nice but its only one night here so we think its going to be fine. this afternoon we walked around the town a little bit, it overlooks a nice lake. we had dinner at a pizza place that was very nice and we got to wath the sunset there. now were getting ready to have an early night because were getting up early tomorrow. We are starting at 6:30 in the morning and have to take at least 2 different buses to get to the el salvador/honduras border. then from there another bus up to copan. then either tomorrow afternoon or monday morning we will see the ruins in copan. After that I think i will split up with stine and try to go to utila to scuba dive. i had a little question with insurance but found out that the dive schools cover you with there insurance when you take classes. so hopefully by the end of this week i will be a certified scuba diver. after that i think i will head up to tikal and see the ruins there and then head back to antigua to relax for a few days before my flight home. All my plans are very rough and we will see how closely I will follow them.

Now I want to tell you about bus edicate, which I got to experience today in the buses. We were taking the equivelant of guatemalan chicken buses in honduras and here are some of the rules i learned.
1. Elderly people always have priority to sit in a seat and if they come on a full bus you should stand up to allow them to sit. It was interesting to see this in the buses because they always seem so hectic and chaotic but there also is some order to it.
2. Mothers with babys have next priority. this was not followed as closely but I had a first hand experience with this. A mother holding a baby was standing in the aisle for a little bit and I was thinking of standing up and leting her sit in my seat with my bags. then I looked around and caught the eye of a younger woman and kind of gestured to the mother and she noded. so i got up and let her sit down. Next time i looked around all of the el salvadorians were smiling at me.
3. You have to wait to pay for the bus. This seemed a little strange to me because I was trying to pay when we got on the bus, but actually the buses work with a team of 2 or 3 people. the driver, and two others. the others along long stretches of roads without stops will go around shaking change in the hand and thats when you pay.

It was a very fun experience going on the chiken buses because we got to see more of the el salvadorian culture and interact with more people. I felt even a little bit more safe in these buses then the pullmans because they seemed less likely to be targeted by robbers and the people running them seemed less likley to scam you.

I dont know when Ill have internet next and/or ill have internet long enough to upload my photos. but probably in a week or so ill have photos from my travels up!

Photos from the project

Photos from the project
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=107873&id=516009306&l=b0ce52d29b

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=107875&id=516009306&l=04e145924e

Already missing Camino Seguro

Yesterday was my last day at the project and I am already missing the kids. The week went well, everything was normal. We had a despedida (going away party) on Wed. because I'm not the only one leaving this week. There are 7 others leaving! After we leave the project is going to be pretty low on volunteers. I decided to make paper cranes for all my kids for my last day, so all of thursday I spent making around 50 paper cranes. My last day was really nice, all the kids kept on saying I needed to stay and asked why I was leaving. I got cards from all the kids which were really nice and really cute, I'm gona keep the cards for as long as I can to remember the kids. It was really sad hugging all the kids goodbye for the last time. My time at the project went by sooo fast. I can't believe its over now. From my time at the project I got to see first hand how hard the kids lives are, and also see how much Camino Seguro is helping the kids, and their whole families. I really want to come back because I think it would be amazing to see how the kids that I work with have grown up. One of my friends here has been here 5 times and he says its amazing to see the kids grow and change. This has been a very powerful experience for me, coming to a new country and the experiences I have had here are amazing. I have had the time of my life here, the past 2 months have been some of the best I have ever had... and now I get to travel. I have pretty much confirmed what I'm doing now. I'm going with my friend from the project who just finished as well, Stine, to El Salvador for 3 or 4 days, get to maybe try some surfing again, then go to Utila, Honduras for 3 or 4 days, get to learn to Scuba dive, then go up back into Guatemala and stay in Rio Dulce for a night, then head up to the Ruins in Tikal, and then get back to Antigua for 1 or 2 days before my flight home. It should be an action packed couple of weeks, hopefully I'll be doing enough stuff that I won't have time to think about the kids and miss them. Anyways, next time I post I might be in El Salvador so bye until then. And I might post some photos later when they upload.

One week of volunteering left

A week has passed by and a lot has happened. Last week was a short week because May 1st was a national holiday, and Thursday was family day. Monday through Wedensday went smoothley and were fun. Tuesday and Wedendsday I brought in my camera to the project to take photos. I had been a little aprehensive about taking my camera to the project because I had already seen some cameras get lost or stolen but it turned out to be great. I let the kids take the camera around and they loved taking photos of everybody. I will post the photos at the end of the blog. On Tuesday, two friends I met in Antigua came to the project. Aaron, and Taylor are studying abroad in Antigua and for one of their final photography projects they came in to Camino Seguro and took pictures. It was a good day and the kids loved having visitors. Thursday was family day and it ran very smoothley. I played bingo with the mothers while they talked with Julvia, my teacher, one on one. Thursday night there was a Camino Seguro party at a group of volunteers house which was a lot of fun. It was cool cause we got to see the staff outside of work. Friday was when the adventure started though... We decided to go to Semuc Champey, one of the biggest attractions in Guatemala, and one of the most beautiful places in the world. We left friday morning around 8, and took a chicken bus to Guatemala City, about 1 hour, that cost 8Q (1$). Then we took a taxi to the Monja Blanca bus terminal where we got a greyhound style bus to go to Coban, about 5 hours away, 50Q (6$). Then once we got to Coban we had to walk to another bus terminal that took us to Lanquin, the nearest town to Semuc Champey, 2 hours, 30Q (4$). This was a very bumpy shuttle that ended up taking us to the tiny town of Lanquin, hidden in the numerous mountains and valleys around there. When we got to Lanquin we got on the back of a pick up truck to head to our Hostel near Semuc Champey. This was another hour, hour and a half. We ended up getting there around 6 or 7 at night and set up our tents by the trucks headlights. There was a small kind of restraunt there and we had brought some food so we ate and hung out for the evening. The next morning we joined a tour of Semuc Champey (I will post my photos of Semuc at the end as well) First we went to the park and hiked for about 20 minutes up the steep side of the valley to get to the Mirador, lookout. This had an incredible view of the river and the pools of Semuc hundreds of meters below us. We then hiked down to the river. First we went to the start of the pools and saw what really makes Semuc Champey amazing. It is created by the huge river going underground and then the pools are above the river. You can see a little ways down the river as it goes underground. We then went and swam around the pools for a while. When we got to the other end of the pools, the guide tied a rope to a rock and we climbed down a fairly steep rock face to see where the river came out from underground. We had to swim across the river which had a pretty strong current and then climb up some rocks. We then were able to go up the cave a little bit and see the underground river. It was amazing, the rocks were incredible and there were bats flying around. We then climbed up the other side of the river and this is where I did one of the craziest things that day. Me and 4 other people jumped off a rock that was about 50 feet high. That wasnt the craziest thing, it was crazy because we had to aim where we jumped because there was a rock on onesided of the pool under about 3 or 4 feet of water so we had to jump to the right to land in the deep water. It was amazing, but I dont know if I would do it again. Then we chilled in the pools a little bit more and went back to the camp site for lunch. Then we went to the Maria Caves which was another amazing experience. These caves are formed by an underground river and so for the tour we just had candels we had to hold as we waded through the water. At some points we also had to swim so we had to hold the candel with one hand and swim with the other. At one point there was a rock about 10 feet high in the cave that we were able to jump off of which was fun. Then at the end we had to squeeze through a little gap with a kind of water fall and drop down 6 or 7 feet into a lower pool. That was kind of scary cause you were dropping down into pitch black. It was an amazing experience. Then we got back and the tour had included tubing but the guides had left so we just went by ourselves. It was getting dark so we just tubed down the river for 30 minutes or so, it was nice though. I fell asleep early that night because it was an exhausting day. We then got a shuttle straight back from Lanquin to Antigua which was nice, so we didnt have to worry about switches or anything and could just fall asleep. We got back to Antigua around 3 and had the rest of the day to relax and shower. Today was a good day in the project as well, nothing unusual happened. I will take the camera in my last couple days probably to get some last pictures of the kids. Here are the links to the photos and next time I post ill probably have finished volunteering. It went by so quickly and Im gona miss the kids so much...
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=106532&id=516009306&l=d6545ccb91
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=106552&id=516009306&l=febc7b22b4
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=106562&id=516009306&l=5fc00de166
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=106563&id=516009306&l=4ffa2ee7cd
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=106567&id=516009306&l=2575547d08

Volcan Acatenango

So i'll just go through how my weekend went from start to finish:
7:00- Wake up, have breakfast at my homestay, check my bag that everything is packed.
8:00- Billy comes over and we head out to meet the other people were going with, Jacob, Evan, Lizzy an Lily
8:30- Everyone meets up and we head behind the market to try to find a bus to La Soledad (Solitude), the pueblo near the trailhead. Are first offer came from a guy with a pick up truck who offered to take us there for 300Q (~$35) but we had heard that there was a bus that went to San MIguel, a pueblo near Soledad. The truck driver said it was another 30 km but he didnt seem very trust worthy. We then found the Chicken Bus that was going to San Miguel and decided to take it, luckily it was not very crowded. The bus driver said that La Soledad was only another 3km past San Miguel.
9:20- We get to San Miguel, the bus costed 3Q (35 cents) and we asked around and the locals said if we walked down to the bridge there are usually pick up trucks going to La Soledad that you can hitch rides from. Some of the locals told us it was 6km, and some told us it was 13km, we didnt really know what to believe.
10:00- After getting to the bridge we tried to flag down maybe 10 or 15 trucks but none of them stopped. We were starting to get anxious and so Billy went down the road to try to find a number of a taxi. Right as he went down the road he stopped to talk to a truck driver and the driver offered to take us to La Soledad for 10Q each. We hopped into the back of his pick up truck, trying not to squash the vegetables he was taking to the pueblo and set off. 13km was probably around the most accurate estimate we got for the distance, and it was about a 20 or 30 minute ride on a gravel road in the back of the pick up
10:45- The truck driver stops and shows us where the trail head is for Acatenango, we pay him and thank him and he drives off.
11- We have started heading up the trail and we start to see the beginning of why they say Acatenango is so hard, the trail started on a sort of ravine between corn fields where we were walking through volcanic ash. Making every 2 steps we took slide half a step back. After maybe 30 minutes we saw a sign for turning of this path to go to the summit. We went there a walked through some more cornfields before passing a little straw hut on our right. This was when we started to go into the forest. After about 30 minutes more we came to the first of 5 "Descansos" (a rest stop kinda place). It was better than what we expected to be on the volcano, with a little wood shelter and some benches.
12- We kept on walking up and up through the forest. It was constant switch backs and I would say the slope never was less than around a 30 degree angle.
1:30- We stopped for lunch at one of the Descansos and kept on heading up. We met 2 people coming down who said it was around 2 or 3 hours more. I think it was around then that we started heading up into the clouds. We started to only be able to see about 30 ft. around us and thats when things started to get worse. It started getting a little windy and a few drops of rain fell. We got a little higher and no more rain fell, it started HAILING. Little bee bee size balls of hail started falling for around 20 minutes. After that it was windy with a few on and off drizzles.
4- With the conditions still not being that great we finally came out of the tree line. This, however, did not mean we were very close to the top. We still had about an hour or an hour and a half of steep hiking up switch backs up the ridge, in the clouds, with strong winds. It was pretty intense but we finally got to what we later found out to be the first false peak. We didnt really know at the time because we could only see around 5 or 10 feet around us. The false peak was all volcanic rock and gravel so we decided to just stop and set up camp because we didnt want to walk in circles on the rock because there was no real path.
5:30- Freezing, in the clouds, and in the rain we ran around trying to set up the tent and get our packs under the tarp. Before the weather me, billy, and jacob, had been planning on sleeping on or under a tarp we brang but it was a unanimous decision that we all should just pile into the tent that lily, lizzy, and evan brought. It was a 2 person tent that ended up having 6 people in it all night. It took us about 20 minutes to set up the tent and then we all piled in and shared are body warmth.
All Night- I think the most anyone slept during the night was 1 or 2 hours and it was a small smelly oddly warm tent. It was warm because of the people but if you sat up in the tent you would just get wafts of horrible smelling wet or damp clothes, sweaty bodies, and the general dirtiness that comes from a day of hard hiking.
5am- Me, BIlly, and Jacob ended up getting up around 5 to try to see the sunrise. It was clear around summit but there were still lots of clouds which made it not that great of a sunrise. It was really cool though because we were above a huge layer of clouds and were able to see the points of other volcanoes and mountains, like Agua. I have some pictures that I will post at the end.
6-Billy and Jacob decided to go to the real summit, about 150 meters higher, and about a 1 hours hike up the steep gravely sides. The rest of us decided to stay and rest a little bit more, we decided the view was not gona be that much better and we could kind of see that Fuego, the volcano behind the actual Summit (a very active volcano) was not really erupting. The went there and back in about 1.5 hours and we broke camp, ate breakfast, and readied ourselves for the descent.
8-We started going down which was very cool because it was clear so we could really see what we had done the day before. We were impressed by what we had accomplished. Going down went very quickly, we were able to jog/run down the switch backs kind of like a slalom. So parts that took us 1.5 hours before took us 30 minutes. The descent was very beautiful because it was so clear and we stopped in many places to see the view. It ended up taking us around 2.5 hours for us to get down the volcano, as opposed to the 6 hours it had taken to go up.
10:30- Earlier in the morning at the top of the volcano Jacob had talked to the guatemalans who were up there as well and they had said that there was a bus back to antigua at 11. So we walked down the road at the bottom of the trailheads and asked some locals about the bus. They said we just had to wait on the road we were on and a bus would come heading to Chimaltenango and if we got of at Parredos, there were buses every 5 minutes to Antigua.
11:15- The bus came a little late but we got on and it was very crowded, like the stereo typical chicken buses. I had to stand right near the driver because I couldnt even get down the aisle. The guy on the bus ripped us off and made us pay 7Q instead of 3Q which is what I had seen the locals pay. But even so, thats still less than a dollar. The chicken buses are ridiculous because they pick so many people up and theres a guy at the door that will just kind of shove the person on, and as soon as his feet are off the ground he jumps on and shouts "dale" and off the bus goes again. Then there were people who had big bags of vegetables or firewood and the guy at the door would jump off and take it and climb/throw the bag on the top of the bus. To do this he has to climb the back of the bus, and one time, the guy was on the back of the bus and he just shouted "dale" and the bus went and then when the bus slowed for a speed bump he just jumped off and ran back up to the door and got on. The bus didnt even have to stop. It is a surprisingly efficient method of travel. We got back to Antigua around 12:15 and I went back took a nice long shower and have been relaxing the rest of the day.

That pretty much sums up my trip to Acatenango, which to say the least was a real adventure. I'm not sure when i'll post next but here are some pictures.
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=104809&id=516009306&l=525bb938ad
and the descent-http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=104827&id=516009306&l=0a9194382a

Less than 3 weeks left at Camino Seguro

Time has been flying by working at Camino Seguro. It's crazy to think that I'll be leaving the project in 2 1/2 weeks. I'm going to miss the kids a lot. It's been amazing getting to know the kids, its been a very interesting experience as well, with all the different characters. I'll give you guys a little overview of some of the kids in my classes. In the morning it's 7th graders and there are a couple of different groups, they're the girls from Inca JV school who always are making jokes with themselves and never seem to split up, then they're the three lovers from Penatt school who are always touching each other, whether it's fighting or hugging, then there are Oscar and Hector who always steal the toothpaste at lunch, and Julio who is the lady's man in the class. Then in the afternoon the kids are in 4th grade. There is the class trouble maker Carlos, then there is Miguel, Fransisco, and Eduar who always are together talking or fighting. Then there's Jonson who always shows off his breakdancing skills (they are pretty impressive, he can walk down a staircase while doing a handstand) and always says "Que onda voz" (Whats up dude). Then the girls in the afternoon- There's Katy, the daughter of the cook at Camino Seguro who is always everywhere at once, and whenever I pick up the guitar she wants me to sing Hallelujah. Then there is Kimberly who will always hang on my arm. Then there is Karen who is the one of the nicest and smartest girls in the class. Those are some of the kids that I have gotten to know during my time at Camino Seguro. Outside of the project I didnt do much this weekend. I am planning on hiking volcano Acatenango this weekend and spending the night there. I think it is the 3rd tallest volcano in Guatemala, and it looks over the crater of Fuego, one of the most active volcanoes in Guatemala. So if were lucky we'll get to see a huge fireworks display of lava at night, and then wake up for the sunrise on top of a volcano. The weekend after I am going to Semuc Champey with some other volunteers. This is supposed to be a beautiful series of pools with beautiful swimming and caves to explore. I am also starting to figure out what my plans after the project will be. I think I will first head north to Flores, and see the Mayan ruins at Tikal, then I will head south to Lago Izabel, with Rio Dulce and Livingston. Then I will head down to Utila, Honduras. I will spend the majority of the time in Utila I think, it is a bay island of the coast of Honduras. I think I will try to learn to scuba dive there, and I also am in contact with the Whale Shark Research Center in Utila and possibly might volunteer there for a week. This would be amazing, because this would give me the opportunity to swim and possibly scuba dive with whale sharks, the largest fish in the world. Whale sharks can get as large as 15 meters long. After Utila I will head back to Antigua and Guatemala City for my flight, and if I have time I might stop by Copan and see the Mayan ruins there. I am incredibly excited about this traveling and although I will miss the kids immensely, I think I am going to have a blast traveling. I don't know if anything else has really happened thats that interesting, work is going along well, I've been teaching some of the kids a little guitar at lunch but not much. I don't know if there will be enough time to organize any actual kind of lessons for me to give to the kids. I got to play guitar with the accountant at Camino Seguro today, Moises, which was a lot of fun. He new lots of American classics and we played together while I waited for the kids to finish showering in the bathrooms. I don't think there is anything else to say, so when I post next i'll probably have been up and back again from a Volcano and should have some good stories.

Back To Work

So work has started back up and things are getting back in a rhythm. Things are getting back to how they were before Semana Santa. Not that much has happened thats interesting, though I have noticed an interesting trend. As the kids get more comfortable with me and start interacting with me more they start to talk to me more, this is good and bad. Now with the kids talking to me more I have to try to understand them more and so more and more I have to tell them to speak slower and repeat themselves. Its a funny cycle because the more they want to interact the harder the interactions become. A good example of this was today, during my morning class, some of the girls started talking to me and I could not understand them. I kept on having to ask them "What?" and to repeat themselves. They kept on asking me why I didnt speak very much and I told them it was because Spanish was hard for me. Then during lunch there was a film crew for a TV show there and I was talking to one of the people there in english about the project and my time there, and at one point one of the girls in my class turned around and said "wow, you actually can talk a lot!" The film crew was kind of interesting. It was a group of people from New Zealand with a famous New Zealand singer Anika Moa. They filmed me and asked me some questions about the project and my time here. I'm not sure exactly what kind of thing it was, they said it was for some New Zealand TV show. So that was kind of interesting. One development that I've had in the project that I'm not sure where it is going is that one of the volunteers who has been here I think over 2 years started asking me about possibly giving guitar lessons to some of the kids. She said that there were a few who had taken lessons before from one of the teachers at the project but now the teacher doesnt have time. So I might be giving guitar lessons at some point, although I don't know exactly how the logistics will work out and how long it might take to work them out. Other than that everything has been going great as normal. I had Salsa classes this evening and I might be going out later to try to practice some of the stuff I learned. I'll probably post in a couple days, or when some interesting things come up.