Western Highlands

I said goodbye to Jack and the babies and about one hour later Smith arrived. Smith is the female version of Jack which means I love working and traveling with her soooo much! (Seriously her and Jack have so much in common!)

Smith also brought with her one of her students and the little sister who have not been back to see their families in about 2.5 years.

Our first stop was Chichicastenango. Chichi is known for it's enormous market, Mayan roots, and mix of Mayan and Catholic religions. Read more on Wikipedia because it's very interesting. In the morning we set foot out of our hotel and into the market, which is only on Thursdays and Sundays. Absolutely loved it! The churches are also gorgeous and have Mayan altars outside of them. Highly suggest a visit there.

Also while in Chichi we got to visit and tour the former school of one of my super sweet and smart babies! I really wanted to go to his house but it was about 5 hours farther north so it wasn't possible this year but I really enjoyed at least touring the school and sending greetings to his best friend.

In the afternoon we were off for Huehue (3rd time for me this year, 6th time total). The student's dad picked us up at Pollo Campero and cried when he saw his daughters. It hurt to see, I can't imagine being away from my babies that long or what they were going through. We had another 2 hour ride to their house from there and we did it in the back of the truck. We love riding in the back for the better views and fresh air, but the double takes at 2 gringas in a truck in extremely rural Guatemala from every single person we pass are also fun to watch. It was dark when we arrived and the tears from mom and grandmas were hard to take as well.

The next morning preparations for the day's meals started at 3:30 a.m. We knew because walls in Guatemala only go up so far, not all the way up to the tin ceiling. When we got dressed and came out there were so many people!! Only 5 people live in that house but we think there were around 60 there that day. All the women were in corte, even the babies, it was gorgeous. Every single one of them told us 'buenos dias' and the all shook our hands or hugged us. The women all got around a table to make tamalitos with their own corn and leaves, somewhere around 1,500 of them! They set up to have a blessing/church service to thank us for coming and for Smith bringing the two girls back to Guatemala to visit. We ate caldo and tamalitos and talked with the family all afternoon. The family always spoke mam, a dialect that sounds nothing like Spanish. Some of them spoke little or no Spanish at all, but most spoke Spanish with us. It was a great experience.

That afternoon we took a 5 minute truck ride up the road to another student's house. This student graduated this May so it was fun to be able to show the family pictures of him in his cap and gown. We called the student, put him on speakerphone, and spoke English to him. His parents were so proud! Dad walked with us back to our house saying "I'm responsible for you now, I'll walk back with you". They were so sweet!

The next morning we said our goodbyes and set out in a truck and almost literally went uphill for 3 hours. We were already really high! Imagine how long it takes you to get up lookout mountain, pmaybe 15 minutes? To arrive at our destination that night, Tuimulco, we had gone about 4-5 hours uphill total. We were past the clouds and the views were breathtaking, it was also really cold!! We stayed at another student's house that night and got the pleasure of drinking coffee with grandma and great-grandma together. After we had said goodnight to the family and they had left us with lots of blankets we hear a knock on the door and mom comes in and says 'oops, I forgot something' and goes under my bed and pulls our a big tub with a chicken in it sitting on 10 eggs. The sweet mama chicken had been quietly sitting under the bed all day while we came in and out .

We set out in the morning on a camioneta. Camionetas (chicken busses) are a bunch of fun, super cheap, easy to access, reliable, and packed full of people. Drivers take pride in painting and giving some flare to their camionetas. This particular one had a TV that played an 80s karate movie dubbed in Spanish, it was so cheesy and hilarious. After that camioneta we took a minibus and after that we took a tuk-tuk to arrive at the last student's house of the trip.

This student has been one of my sweet babies for 3 years and he'll be mine this year as well. His mom and 2 little siblings share one room while they are waiting for more rooms to be built.  Mom was very 

sweet and loved getting to hear me speak English with her son on speakerphone. Little brother had the opposite personality of my outgoing, social butterfly student but had the exact same face. Brother had to translate most of what I said to mom because they only speak mam at home.

Went traveled after that to Retalhuleu. In total that day we were on 3 tuk-tuks, 2 mini-busses, and 3 camionetas. We have mastered traveling through rural Guate though so it was all smooth sailing.

In Retalhuleu we went to a gorgeous finca, plantation, in the rain forest and got to see a lot of wildlife. The finca focuses on coffee and macadamias but also has rambutan, mangos, mangostin, rubber, cinnamon, oranges, limes, avocados, cacao (chocolate), guisquil/chayote, and lots more!

I have had the trip of a lifetime need some time to process it all! For now I can't wait to get back home to the big girls and the fam and spend a few days lounging around.