Salir a San Pedro

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Tomorrow we leave San Pedro, our home for the last two weeks. We are now full of spanish for the time being and ready to put our studies into practice for a while.

We had our first bout of food poisoning this week. It involved a day of laying in bed trying to stay hydrated as our bodies tried really hard to keep dehydrating us. Kevin had a high fever for about 8 hours and is now feeling great. I was not as sick, but am feeling the lingering effects and now have a cold.


Many of you have asked about the people here. They are mostly Tzutuhil maya with a few foreigners who have dropped out of the world. There are lots of dirty hippies here who have decided to live the cheap life in Guatemala. There is some controversy with the local community about this as they make money with restaurants and tourist businesses that does not all go back to the community. However, they also pay more than any of the local businesses and so provide good jobs. This (and the fact that you can get a hotel for $1.50 a night) make it a big party town--what this means is that they play REALLY loud music on Friday and Saturday night and that a few people dance. It also means that you can buy beer cheap and drink it in the street. We did get to see a live version of Buena Vista Social Club (from Cuba) in a tiny club which was pretty cool.

All of the local people here are friendly and extremely helpful. They work hard and most are up and in the"streets" (many of which are dirt or stone trails) by 5:00 a.m. One of the biggest industries here is growing coffee. There are coffee plants in every available space--between houses, in the front yard, where ever they can find room. The processing is interesting and I will try to get a photo of it. Then you will hear my plea for fair trade coffee.

They are shocked that we don´t go home at lunch to eat with our families. Most indigenous people in Guatemala live in poverty and many in extreme poverty (defined as less than $1 a day for a family of 4). This means that many people eat only one small meal a day. This makes it a challenge for me to bargain at the market!

One of the hardest things for us to stomach has been the amount of garbage here. People just throw their trash in the streets for some reason. There is garbage service and it is cheap. We have asked why people do and no one really knows. It makes this beautiful lake kind of gross, with plastic covering the shores everywhere. The locals love the lake-- they swim in it, fish in it, do their laundry and picnic by the beach on sunday. So it is a puzzle. The neighboring town is really clean and has garbage cans in the streets and there are places like that here, too.

The weather is really pleasant. Cool enough in the evenings to wear a jacket and pants and warm enough for shorts when the sun comes up in the morning. It is not very humid and not too many bugs. Although we did see a scorpion last night on our terrace!!

We head off tomorrow for the city of Xela which is the coldest spot in Guatemala. They have had nights in the 30´s so we hope we can survive! We dont plan to stay long, but there are some sites we need to see including the largest market in Guatemala!