Todavía aquí en Guatemala

The past month and a half has been a bit of a battle- I've questioned myself what I am really here to do, what my goals are and how I am able to achieve those amid the challenges my host country agency faces as funding has become much more difficult to come by. Many community members, who have contributed an immense the last three years our agency received funding were unable to come back because of the financial difficulties our agency is facing. Our funder basically told us that they are being more picky about what projects they are funding as well as who they will give funding to. The crisis has hit here in Guatemala's small villages, too.

On 11 February I celebrated my 24th birthday in my village. My APCD (Assiciate Peace Corps Director- basically our program coordinator), came out here to check up on things, how my projects are doing, where I'm living and speak to the my counterpart, Isa, and see how the work is going, what could be improved on and give suggestions in general. The site visit went quite well. After lunch we even returned to the office to celebrate my birthday- my APCD was kind enough to buy some goodies at one of the bakeries to share with the others who were there and then my counterpart started talking about me and as Guatemalan tradition goes, everyone went around in a circle and basically said why they liked me. A bit corny, but really sweet. At the end, they presented me with a beautiful crocheted bag with a very intricately woven strap- one of the many products made by the ladies.

The day after my birthday I was awaken at 11:45 from deep sleep by a phone call from my parents. A plane had crashed into a house just minutes away from our's. All 49 people on board and one person on the ground had died. A bit confused I went back to bed and woke up again the next morning not knowing whether or not it had just been a bad dream. I check my incoming calls and sure enough I had picked up a call at about 11:45 the previous evening.

I later found out that the flight was en route from Newark to Buffalo and on board was a girl I had graduated high school with in 2003. The house that it had crashed into was yet another girl I had graduated high school with. Her sister was blown out of the house and her mother managed to escape. Both survived. Their father died.

I've flown that flight in bad weather before, and the mere thought that had it been in air 15 seconds longer it very well could have been our house. Of course it wasn't, and my heart goes out to the Wielinski family, the Kausners and all others directly affected by the flight 3407 tragedy in Clarence, New York.

On a lighter note, with the beginning of February came a new beginning of water. After four weeks of a dry tap, words cannot express how happy I was to finally have water once again in my own flat. And not only that- to my pleasant, pleasant surprise, my landlord kept his word and started fixing up my bathroom, tearing out the old, small basin and put in a new, plastic blue pila, or a water deposit with a large washing area. I had been drooling over Kelly's (my site mate) pila since I had moved into my place and had to wash my pots and pans, bigger than my basin, splashing water all over the floor and wall. I now understand why women get all excited about new appliances and kitchen renovations. They change you life forever.

The next two weeks our community has visitors from both Canada and the US- a delegation of dentists have come every year in March the past few years to do dental work on community members free of charge. A lot of teeth pulling goes on, along with cleanings, fillings and other general dental-fixtures. Unfortunately for the community members I don't think that the dentists put in golden stars as a decorative fixture, but who knows, maybe the dentists have been able to adapt their procedures to the community members' taste!

Having the dentists here means a busy two weeks, which I am really pleased about since the last few weeks have been quite uncertain in a lot of respects due to not as many people working at the agency. After the two weeks of the dental delegation, our training group will have a "reunion" to talk about our time out at site thus far, things we've accomplished, problems, solutions and general frustrations and stories that we care to share with one another. Semana Santa (Holy Week) is right after, and then almost two weeks before my parents come and visit. Thankfully it will be quite a busy next month and a half to keep me distracted, and hopefully some things will sort out by then as well. I plan on giving my ladies some lessons on the importance of being on time for meetings, since some other artisan organizations who have come to give lessons are often left waiting for almost two hours before half of the group shows up. I am definitely not the most punctual person in the world (and I'm sure many of you can attest to that!), however when free trainings are being given and the trainers are left around waiting for hours, it is not only embarrassing, but makes me wonder how serious the trainers must think the groups are about actually learning new and different techniques and designs. Start small, and hopefully grow on from there. The ladies have a lot of potential, but most of them don't realize that, unfortunately, nor do they see the business aspect in it.

Overall it's been a very mentally challenging past six weeks. I'm doing it though, I didn't come here to "try it out." I knew the challenges would be there, just not the height of them.

I hope you are all well and would love to hear from you. As I've said many times before and will keep on saying, hearing from any of you has been what has kept me going and puts me in better spirits. Take care and until next time...