see renee’s cartoon strip and caitlin’s video for a much better picture than i could put on here with just words.
day 2: visit the hospital for the first time and wander through the crowded antigua markets.
the hospital/orphanage was a really tough place for me to visit as a nurse. the first time i stepped in, all i could see what which patients were being neglected, what kid had been in bed too long, what woman wasn’t really as handicapped as she looked but appeared worse because of the conditions she was living in. then i met a girl named sonia and her smile was contagious. i pulled out my spanish bible, and she told me her favorite story was “noe” (noah) so we read about the flood and the hundreds of days of rain and the hundreds of years that abraham lived, and we formed a special bond. i promised to visit her again before we left, and headed back out to explore the city that she lives in but hardly gets to see.
i wandered through the markets (la paca, the “thrift store” of antigua; el mercado – the actual food/goods market; and the guatemalan traditional market) with some of my teammates, taking in the sights and sounds and the crowds of people, stopping occasionally to inquire of the price of a hammock or dress or purse, bartering with the locals to get the best price, and eventually buying my own hammock and a couple souvenirs to take to people back home. i love wandering through markets, perusing the goods, looking for the best quality “stuff”…but i don’t like being heckled by every shop owner, i don’t like hearing “i give you cheap price, you get best deal today” or other such phrases that are often thrown around in markets all over the world. i think when i get home, i’m going to miss the market feel but i’m going to enjoy going in to stores and not having people pounce all over me trying to get me to buy their “very special products.”
day 3: brunch and eventually communion…in a bar
we went as a team (minus heather, who was still in el salvador) out for brunch and good-old fellowship instead of heading out to an actual church service (because we’ve learned this year that you can have/be church anywhere…not just those big pretty buildings with the crosses on top). after eating until we were stuffed (all-you-can-eat breakfast buffets are not very common, so we used and abused this one like we had never eaten before), we had a really good talk as a team, and ended up taking an extra roll and finishing our morning with communion (and instead of traditional grape juice, we had a few sips of someone’s watermelon juice left…very different, much sweeter, but still got the meaning across). what a good way to spend a sunday morning.
day 4: find that special guatemala t-shirt and visit the hospital one last time
i spent the morning looking at various souvenir markets for a guatemala t-shirt (i’ve been collecting t’s throughout the year as they’re one of my favorite things to wear) and, though i think i paid way too much, picked up a really cute one with a small frog emblem on the front and a bigger replica on the back.
after lunch time, i headed back out to the hospital for a bit of visiting and a lot of goodbyes. i hung out with sonia for a little while but had forgotten to take my spanish bible along, so communication was much more limited (i understand a lot of spanish, but sonia, along with having some physical disabilities, has a hard time speaking…but she is so smart and goes to school across the street from the orphanage). anyway, she had to go do something so i went and found a couple little boys to play with (and by play i mean push their wheelchairs around and help them try to stick things to walls with tape that was far from sticky, but it was fun anyway)…and they kept me entertained for a while until sonia came back out, and then i had to start saying goodbyes and head out. it ripped my heart out to have to say goodbye to her after such a short time, but we already had commitments in nicaragua we had to get back for.
day 5: catch a ride from our good friend chris back down to guatemala city, eat amazing subway for lunch, and take a bus back toward nicaragua.
the end.
