Three layered jackets, crazy wind, a vividly clear blue morning sky. Four us of had woken up at 4:30 to catch a chicken bus to Antigua, then a shuttle to the closest active volcano to us. Mar and I of course slept longer than the others and grabbed our chacos without a second thought. We make it to the top of Pacaya, soak in the view, start our descent. Theres an opening near the base with exposed magma you can roast marshmallows over, so we’re hype for that. But the downhill path- slipping and sliding, volcanic pebbles allllllllllll up in the toes, stuck in the shoes. Small stabbing pains. Walking .5 miles an hour, laughing our butts off. People stomp past us in boots. The boys look back and glare, were holdin up the show.
If you ever hike a volcano, please wear real shoes.
AIM Base English class, a Thursday. Michelle Ryan and I move the little kid class outside so they wouldn’t be much of a distraction to the others. Eight kids are intently scribbling on name tag necklaces we created for them. A shy looking girl looks up at me. She’s sweet, but never says much. I glance at her sheet, sad looking letters are on the page in a kind of confused disarray. I quickly realize that this one doesn’t know how to write her name. I ask her some things and she quietly tells me she is Andrea, seven years old. Almost eight. At first I’m shocked that she made it this far without the most basic element of grade school down. This poor girl, I wonder how, why, but none of that matters. I put the alphabet I front of her and point to the letters. A-N-D-R-E-A. We write them over and over. It takes her a while to get, they’re messy and kinda upside down at first but eventually she can write her name on a line.
Every class, Andrea and I practice writing her name. patiently, letter by letter. Shes getting a little better every day.
“Alright guys, time to say goodbye.”
A trailer, a truck, a friendly Guatemalan man. A very confused looking mini horse loaded on said trailer. For the past couple of weeks, Princessa, Byron, Sebastian, (we never agreed on a name) had been chillin in our courtyard. But she had wandered into mrs. Beckys casita and started eating some stuff so someone had agreed to give her a better home. We all rush over to lovingly harass her one last time and 30 kids tearfully gather around a beat up truck for pics. Someone jokes about one last ride and then suddenly Liz is riding the pony, stays on for about 10 seconds, and has pictures to prove it.
The field is kinda lonely without the sassy pony. Were trying to sneak our local stray dog friend Ralph into the base. Pls pray for success.
The sun beams down on my neck, a Spanish radio sermon drifts through the air, the black bulldog, sniffs around my dirty feet. Rudy walks over and points to a bag in his hand. “Lechuga,” he tells me. Oh okay, looks good. I have no idea what that is. I have no idea what most things that Rudy says mean. I look behind me and pull the slack out of the hose. For the past two days my job has been to water. But there’s nothing in the ground yet. I water the dirt. I look to my right, Joe and Ryan are putting together the sixth row. We are making a garden at the school that is down the road from us so that the kids there can have fresh stuff for lunch. Rudy wants me hose them all down, it takes longer than you’d think. I finish all of them and look to him for a new job. He glances around and points back to the first mound. “Mas agua,” oh okay! I go on laughing to myself, hoping im being more productive than I feel like I am.
If anyone knows what Lechuga means, let me know.
A shy nod, a woman in traditional Mayan clothes, 2 small kids. “Buenos tardes.”
I scoot as far as I can to the left, the woman slides her little boy in beside me and sits on the edge of the seat. There are now four of us in this school bus seat. The only way to get anywhere in most of the places we’ve been latin America is by chicken bus- old school buses shipped down from the states, redecorated, used for public transport. Run the same routes everyday, 5 quetzales. Were on the way home from Antigua and the buses are always absolutely packed in the afternoon. Personal space is not a concept. The woman hands her smaller baby to her daughter in the seat in front of us. The baby girl is facing me, her hair has little butterfly clips in it. She smiles at me, a little slobber, a lot of gums, no teeth yet. She’s so pretty, all of these people are. Huge brown eyes and dark hair. Its funny how all of us can look so different, be so beautiful in unique ways, but all still share the same image of one perfect God.
“Guys can we slow down a bit !! haha sorry (in canadian accent)”
Friday night, cobblestone streets, Michelle’s hand tightly gripping mine for dear life, a very hungry stomach. Caroline is taking us out to dinner at a nice restaurant, a NICE place with decently expensive food lol. We don’t do that very often on the world race bc our dinner budget is about $2 a night . Needless to say were all very well dressed right now, so there was no question as to if Mike was gonna wear the high heeled boots that Makayla bought for salsa dancing because the obvious answer was yes. But Antigua is made up of cobblestone streets, and we of course forgot that small detail. So right now were laughing at how hard it is for her literally just to walk. I’m pulling her along to the restaurant, doing fine and dandy in my beat up birks.
I cried into my $15 chicken alfredo. Michelle walked home barefoot. We watched a majestic sunset over the cloud covered mountains. It was a real good night with some real good girls.
How how how is time moving so fast ?!?!?! my mama comes to see me in 2 weeks and I feel like I just got here. But even so, were trying to love every second. Just thankful, feelin lucky for moments like these.
also, fuego by billy bunster is on spotify. Its the most lit worship song you will ever find.
