More time at Camino Seguro

Things have been going pretty well down here, although I have been having to deal with huge shocks from the different culture and just the completely different and terrible situation that is currently in Guatemala. One of the first things I encountered when at Camino Seguro I already talked about a little. It hard while in the project with all the kids are running around and laughing and screaming, to think about the situation the kids are in. I learned very quickly once I arrived because I had to do questionnaires. It was hard to do just because I was talking with kids and I had to ask if they had a father before I was able to ask one of the questions on the sheet, what was their parents jobs. Then it really struck me when while asking about the kids favorite activities many of them said coming to Camino Seguro everyday. It really struck me that this was a place that the kids were able to escape there day to day life. I think this was the reason that it was so easy for the children to run around and play even after I had just been talking to them about the hardships of their family. Today I had another shock to the system though. The day started off fine and the morning ran smoothly, but then during lunch Yaelle, the volunteer coordinator told us that the project would be closing early today. This was because just today 4 of the inner city bus drivers in Guatemala City had been killed. She told us how it wasn't uncommon for gangs to demand money from the bus drivers, and if the say no then they get killed. Already this year 30 bus drivers have been killed. As a result of this all the inner city busses stopped running because they are demanding more protection from the government. It is possible the project won't open tomorrow because the busses may still be on strike and so many people rely on the busses around the city. It is crazy to think that almost 1 bus driver every 3 days is killed. These are realities in Guatemala. I am starting to read the news paper around here and would encourage people to look at local Guatemalan news. Prensalibre.com is a good Guatemalan news website, i'm not sure if you can get it in english but it is a good local news station. Apart from some of these shocks things are going well, i've been writing and grading some review quizes for the kids homework and been helping them out with there work. One of the best things that has happened was one lunch at the project I was playing the song Hallelujah on the guitar. As many of you may know this is one of the main songs in the movie Shrek. A bunch of kids started coming over and singing along to the chorus and afterwards kept on wanting me to play "Cancion de Shrek". Anyways, I will be getting a call tonight saying whether I will go to work tomorrow or night. Tonight also it my friend Billy's birthday here so I'll be going out, and I also am playing a basketball game with Yaelle's boyfriend which should be fun. I'm going to Salsa lessons now so I'll post in a couple days.