Hello everyone!
I am finally here in Guatemala!! This country is beautiful! I feel so so grateful that I get to live here for three months! I don’t know when I’ll be posting this but wow this is an amazing country! I already love the landscapes, chicken buses, Guatemalan coffee, and the locals.
The base we’re staying at is amazing and my team really made our room our own. There’s two huge fields at the base that we’ve been playing soccer on (yes Mum and Dad, I’ve been active and playing soccer haha). Those of us that brought hammocks have them up in front of our rooms and common area/kitchen. On one of the fields there’s soccer goals, and on the other there’s a big area for a camp fire! I love my new home!
Each team has their own room. My team really made our room our own little home. We have Christmas lights and a bunch of pictures of friends and family back home. I even have a picture painted by my good friend back home, Eleanor, above my bed and a good morning note from one of my best friends, Paige, on the wall against my bed under all my pictures. My team mate Makayla even made name tags for each of our beds (so cute!). Mine has a lion on it because she told me God told her to tell me that I need to be courageous and remember how brave I already am. I also told her I’m a Gryffindor so that may be a small part of it too haha.
We’ve been getting mini Spanish lessons from the Adventures in Missions Guatemala team, which has been very helpful. Not only in learning a little bit of the language, but also in tips on teaching since we’ll be teaching English about twice a week.
I learned my team will be serving a ministry down the street called “Bola de Oro” which in English means “Ball of Gold”. I’m super excited to see what God is going to do in this community through my team. I’m so thankful God has invited my team into His work and go to this village and serve the community for the next three months.
The first day my team went to meet the kids and people of Bola de Oro was so fun! We just played with the kids for a bit. Then when it was time to go, we realized we wouldn’t be able to get back to our base in time for dinner if we went on a “chicken bus” like normal (chicken buses are public yellow school buses), so our Bola de Oro ministry host offered to take us to the base by riding in the bed of his truck! Of course we weren’t gonna miss this fun experience so we hopped in! Sorry Mum and Dad, I was safe promise! This first week that we’re here is Guatemala’s Independence week, so when we were sitting in the truck bed we had bags of water thrown at us and it was AMAZING! One hit me on the side of my face and went all over my hair and down my back it was great. Ten out of ten would recommend.
We’ve also been able to explore the area around us! It’s absolutely beautiful! We were able to walk around Parramous and Antigua a lot. I vlogged in Antigua quite a bit this past week so head over to my YouTube channel if you wanna see where I’m living the next three months!
That’s it for now! More stories to come!
See you soon!
-Chelsea
P.S. IM FULLY FUNDED!! Thank you so much to everyone that has donated I really appreciate it and am so grateful for all the generosity I’ve received! If you’d still like to donate to this trip, however, it would be amazing if you could help my team get fully funded! Head over to the “Meet My Team” tab on the side bar here to find my team and help take off the stress of fundraising while on the field (and getting limited WIFI). Thank you!
