It turns out there are some really wonderful people around these parts all willing to come together to celebrate our beloved holiday, Thanksgiving. My whole staff, the staff from the other bilingual school in town, other folks from the States and from other parts of the world gathered at the Goodwin's house for a potluck feast last weekend. It was delicious!
We met these two Irish fellas a couple days earlier. They are from Dublin and are spending close to a year backpacking through the Americas. They came through Gracias to climb Mt. Celaque, but decided to stay a couple extra days after we invited them to the feast. They were pumped for their first Thanksgiving! They were quite fun and I hope to cross paths with them again when I (crossing fingers) go on a backpacking trip through Europe some summer.
This is the Goodwin's new house. They have a beautiful place and will be using it to open an orphanage for local children within the next few months.
This was the view as we were walking home. Gorgeous!
The day before the grand feast, I was able to go to San Pedro Sula to visit my cousin, Mark. He was in the country for work. I couldn't resist the opportunity to see family, so I hopped on the bus with two friends at 5 AM for the 5 hour journey. We went to the mall for a couple hours, then met Mark at an Italian restaurant for lunch. What a TREAT that was!!! Living in a small town here means limited food and shopping, so we all geek out when we are in a bigger town or city and can find items, especially food, that feels like "home." Anyway, lunch was great and it was fun to see Mark. After that, we got back on the buses and were back in Gracias by 8 pm.
I was touched to be invited to my student's birthday party, which happened to be the same day I was in San Pedro Sula so, unfortunately, I couldn't attend. But it was quite the gesture as they took a moto-taxi to my house the night before to drop off this darling invitation. She also brought me a treat bag at school on Monday since I wasn't there. Impossible not to love these kids!
The weekend prior, several of us went to Santa Rosa for a day so we could watch my roommate, Richelle, play in a volleyball game. She found a local men's team that let her join their team and she gets to travel with them to play in games and tournaments. Who would have thought there would be a volleyball team anywhere here? Not me! I went to practice with her a few times, but she's the pro and does a great job showing up all those men!
While we were in Santa Rosa, we also went to the mall, which is basically one store and a Pizza Hut (Pizza Hut is a pretty big deal in this country)! As mentioned above, we enjoy finding different food options, so indulged in the fine dining experience at the Hut. The most exciting part of this experience was the lovely bathroom with automatic faucets, paper towels and full length mirror. I'd try to explain the wonder of this, but no words can describe. Pictures were taken, though!
The most recent and most grand adventure of the month was this past weekend. While Thanksgiving obviously isn't a holiday that is celebrated here, the school was nice enough to call off school on Thursday and Friday for us. Our first long weekend in a couple months meant only one thing- skip town and go as far as possible! My roommate has a friend that is currently working and living in Guatemala City, so that is what we set our sights on. We left immediately after school got out on Wednesday to catch the first of 4 buses. However, this first bus moved at a glacial speed, and took 2 hours instead of 1. We decided to stop for the night afterwards so we didn't get stuck in the next town, which was way less safe of an option. Here we are crammed into a little taxi to get to the hotel. That's Nina, sitting on my lap in the front, and the other four girls squeezed in back. That's how they roll in C.A., no safety rules! Or, better, no rules at all!
That morning, we caught the next two legs of the journey, and arrived in Copan Ruinas around 10 am, hoping to get on a noon bus into Antigua, Guatemala. However, ran into another snag and was unable to get tickets on that bus, leaving us to stay in Copan that night. Finally, on Friday morning, we were able to get to Antigua. What a beautiful place!! There were so many tourists, which meant many great restaurants and shops! I was pumped to sit at a coffee shop and sip on an iced coffee. I was also able to glimpse at the score of the Nebraska-Iowa game and sported my Husker shirt all day long. Go Big Red!
This is Holly getting her hair wrapped:
On Saturday, we took a bus to Guatemala City, or "Guate," as they call it. It was huge! I definitely saw a Wal-Mart and a Wendy's. Woah, big time. We didn't see much of the city, though, as we had limited time. We stayed with Sydney's friend, who happened to be hosting a Thanksgiving feast for him and his co-workers that night. Who could say no to a second feast? Certainly not any one of us!
Finally, our journey came to an end yesterday as we had much better bus luck, catching all four legs in row for a total of 12 hours on stinky, dirty buses filled with people, chickens and broken windows and seats. It's the good life, folks!
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