Where to start?! We had such a long day yesterday. My alarm clock went off at 2:15am. I took a shower and shaved with hot, running water…who knows what there will be in Guatemala. We were all SOOOO tired, but it was good that we all got to the airport and checked in with plenty of time to spare. Thanks Mom for whatever you did for my bags…I didn’t have to pay for my bags, which I am positive were overweight, because I checked in with the one guy who didn’t have a scale at his desk. We all got checked in with minimal problems in no time, with three hours to kill at the Reagan airport. We all got delirious at one point and I thought it was a good idea to tell my story about being “wanded”, which was hilarious! More last meals during the hours spent at the Reagan and Miami airports include bagel with cream cheese, pizza, and peanut butter M&M’s. On the plane to Guatemala, I swear we hadn’t been on the plane for 20 minutes and the girl next to me reached for the barf bag. We quickly got her to the bathroom before anything happened.
When we were arriving in Guatemala, we were all anxiously looking at the beautiful scenery through the plane windows. The views were incredible. We were all so excited about our new home! We were greeted by PC officials at the airport, got our luggage, quickly passed through immigration and customs, and then boarded the bus for the hour ride to Peace Corps Headquarters in Santa Lucia. When we first walked in the doors at headquarters, the PC country director said she recognized me from the newspaper article. What?! Seriously?! She wasn’t the only PC official who said something about it. I guess I just can’t escape that damn thing. After a few introductions and getting some basic info, we had a chance to pack our bag for the next three days. Then someone took us to our host families’ houses.
Thankfully I was paired with Brent who is much better in Spanish than me. We had some spaghetti, tortillas, and tea for dinner and then went right to bed at about 7pm. I woke up so many times during the night to strange noises, not comfy mattress/pillow, coldness, etc. At about 5am, we woke up to someone hammering continuously inside the house. Come to fine out, our shower was broken and someone was trying to fix it. So this morning I took a COLD bucket bath!!! This was definitely my first real life, Peace Corps experience. I remember Mom telling me before I left that thankfully I can laugh at myself in tough situations. Well I definitely laughed to myself trying to take a bucket bath. Another first this morning was HOT milk and cereal for breakfast, with bread and bananas. We got to headquarters at about 7:30 am after breakfast….early to bed….early to rise. We had a long day of meeting with people. We found out more about ecotourism, had our Spanish interviews for class placement, got more health info like taking malaria pills and getting shots, and had a security talk. After a long day, a lot of the trainees and some host siblings went to the basketball courts and played/hung out. Our host brother kicked ass! When it started to get dark, we went home and had beans, rice, and greens for dinner. Afterwards, I broke out the invisible playing cards and Brent and I tried playing cards with the family. Since we are their first houseguests, there are definitely a lot of awkward moments. We start Spanish classes tomorrow so hopefully soon the language barrier will be narrowed!
One thing that is definitely going to take some getting used to is putting all toilet paper in the trash can and not in the toilet. It is such a hard habit to break, believe it or not. That’s all for now…buenas noches!
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