March Madness

As the NCAA games are about to begin 'March Madness' stateside, the ball is rolling so fast here with my life on the coffee co-op that it seems only right to call this March blog update, 'March Madness'. I have been back at my site after the 'state of siege' was lifted for the area for several weeks and it already feels like home again. I'm drinking lot's of coffee, enjoying the manic weather of hot, sunny days and then several cold, rainy days, eating lots of tortillas and black beans, and constantly trying to communicate better with the people with whom I live and work. Peace Corps' slogan, "the toughest job you'll ever love", proves to be true on a daily basis. Daily life can be more than frustrating but I love living here and striving for improvement of the coffee tour operation/quality of life on my co-op.

My Guatemalan March Madness includes the following:

* the change of our co-op's governing board and coffee tour personnel (it has been a waiting game because no one can make decisions or start planning projects until the new board starts, which is tomorrow) Today we had a going away party for the outgoing group with our specialty coffee drinks and tostadas. It was a win-win idea we had yesterday because we needed to brush up on those barista skills.

* the level of tourism in the region suffered a LOT over the past couple of months. However, we have begun receiving more tourists on a steady basis. Also, WE ARE NOW FEATURED IN LONELY PLANET GUATEMALA (however, I have no idea how they got our information completely incorrect- wrong phone number, price, and time of tour)-oh well, it's a start!

* We have been having so many goodbye gatherings over the last few weeks for volunteers leaving our region, whether for personal reasons or not able to go back to their specific sites. It has been pretty hard. My training group had seven volunteers that came to this region and now we are only TWO! Our region now only has about six or seven volunteers in total, in comparison to the near twenty volunteers before. Hopefully PC will send more volunteers in the next training cycle.

* Things with our tourism alliance have really been picking up. More organizations are interested in funding our promotional projects. Also, the workload for myself and other PCV, Evan, has increased dramatically because we are the only two PCVs left working with and supporting all of the tourism sites.

*We are soon to start english classes with a group of 'guides in training'.

* I am working with the school principal to plan activities for the school year, including a huge comprehensive trash plan for them (hopefully the co-op can use this example to implement on a whole community level in the future).

* The co-op has one month left of coffee harvest. After that, hopefully we will restart meetings of the artesian group.

* There is a big 50th year anniversary of Peace Corps international at the Ambassador's home this month. Still waiting to find out if I will be going to that or not, depending on transportation options.

* We are having a St. Patty's celebration this Thursday Guatemalan style. I should prepare some kind of printout because i have not been able to explain it well, or at all for that matter. I just say everything must be GREEN! (currently still waiting on a care package from my mom and grandmother that is full of decorations and food coloring for the party...AND GIRL SCOUT COOKIES!)

Well in addition to my work/life update, I FINALLY updated the photo albums. If you look to the left there is another slideshow. Picassa only allows 1,000 photos each album, so now I have three! The pictures from the wedding of my host sister start in the second album and continue into the third. Hopefully the captions will help. Also, I added links to my friends', Evan and Kamille, blogs. They both work at a tea co-op on the other side of Coban. Check out their great work and writing if you like!

Hope everyone is having a happy March!

PS. If anyone knows of a classroom/teacher stateside that would be interested in communicating with me about my experiences here, please let me know. One of PC's goals is to increase awareness and understanding of this country, Guatemala, on the part of Americans. The class I was supposed to communicate with last year never worked out. The program is called Worldwise Schools and is part of Peace Corps Washington.