A “huehue” fun Christmas

December, as November, flew by, and I am already in my third month of Peace Corps service. I have learnt a lot and met many people in the past two months, but still am meeting new people, trying to remember old one’s names… it’s tough in a municipality of 60,000 when you are one of two people who are given the automatic “celebrity” status. It can sometimes be overwhelming when you get asked the same questions over and over again, but helpful in building up your Spanish conversational skills and practice your vocabulary, to say the least.

Though this was not my first Christmas away from home, it was my first Christmas I didn’t spend with any relatives or family friends. Since a majority of PCVs stayed in-country (while some decided to go home for a few weeks), most PCVs who stayed back either got together or spent Christmas with a family at their site or went back to their host family from training for the occasion.

I decided to take up at invitation at one of my fellow PCV’s site in the department and close to the city of Huehuetenango. Since my site mate, Kelly, was going back home for Christmas, she trusted me with her hairy beast, her Golden Retriever, Amalia. Since I have no other mode of transportation than the “chicken bus,” Amalia joined me for the 8 hour ride, laying on the floor of the bus, occasionally popping her head up or sneaking to the seat behind and giving the other passengers a fright. On the way to Xela (Quetzaltenango City… Xela is much easier, don’t you think?) a blind man sat next to me. A few minutes later, Amalia popped her head up and her snout touched the man’s hand.

“Is it alive?” he asked me

“I hope so!” I replied

“What is it?” he asked

“A dog, her name is Amalia”

“Oh, I thought it was a chicken.”

Amalia and I arrived in Huehuetenango with two other PCVs and headed to Charlotte’s house, just 30 minutes outside of Huehue. We all had a humble Christmas Eve dinner of cereal then exchanged presents. Instead of doing a “real” gift exchange, we decided to do a Q5 ($0.65) gift exchange of something “interesting” we could find in our local market. Among the gifts were green plastic nails and a chicken “piggy” bank.

Christmas Day we watched a movie and played a game, made a delicious bruschetta for lunch and for dinner made falafels and brownies, accompanied by some “fine” boxed red wine. All of us spoke with family and friends who called us or whom we called, so it was a really nice alternative way to spend the holiday. And for those of you wondering, no snow, but because so many of us are at such high altitudes (2300 m for me), it does get quite chilly here, even during the day!

For New Year’s a few more PCVs met up in Xela to bring in the New Year. We all danced our way into 2009 and headed back to our hostel not to late after; it seems like PC not only gives you a new term for “bedtime” (anywhere from 6-9pm on a normal, day-to-day basis), and two beers has the same effect on you of what 4 beers did just before PC… which, considering our budget, is probably not that bad of a thing.

The past few days I have been bringing all of my belongings into my new apartment. Just before Christmas I bought a bed and a stovetop burner, and just yesterday I bought a kitchen table as well. Today I finally bought my water “tambo” (5 gallon / 18.9 liter filtered water container), got my gas tanked filled and have bought wooden planks and cinder blocks to make “PC shelves,”- cheap, durable, and most importantly, easy to assemble. I bought some shorter wooden boards yesterday and nailed two nails into the wall, tied string around the nail and looped it around the board- an instant shelf. It’s amazing how much two nails can hold, and also the skills, like the abovementioned, I have learnt in just the past couple months.

Tomorrow will be the first day back for everyone at my agency. Everyone is a little nervous, because our funder may not be funding this year, which would mean about half of the office would be out of a job, leaving the other half to pick up slack. Neither my counterpart nor my project would be affected by this, since the funding doesn’t cover the artisanal part, but it would be sad to see everyone leave, and know what the community would be losing. Hopefully I will have good news on this next time…

Other than that I am just trying to keep generally busy, whether it’s with temporary things, such as organizing my apartment, or with my project. A few weeks ago I picked out a different color combinations for scarves, an existing product, but tried to spice it up a little. I actually bought one, and some other PCVs bought some in Xela when I took a handful with me to New Year’s. I’ll probably be doing a round sometime soon to the more touristy cities and see what kind of bite we may have there, also to see what other products we could make with the existing ones in mind.

I hope every one of you had a wonderful Christmas and holiday season and enjoyed the New Year, whichever way you may have celebrated! Best to all for a fun, awesome and successful 2009 and may you all achieve what you strive for.

It has been really wonderful hearing from all of you who write back- whether it’s just a line or a juicy email. Keeping in touch has really kept me going, so whether it’s an email, a text or a call, please remember that it is extremely appreciated and I am and will do my best to reciprocate the gesture!