The past four months have gone by quickly, but as soon as Semana Santa hit, it's like things went into serious overdrive. I have no idea where the weeks are going. It's probably because my weekend schedule looks like this:
April 17-18: Spending the entire weekend in El Progreso, Guatemala with NPHG's Student Leadership Group
April 24-25: A trip to gorgeous Semuc Champey with Miss Samantha Fien-Helfman
May 1-2: Hanging out around here, catching up on the previous weeks, and spending Saturday hunting down a bar in Antigua that will let me watch the Kentucky Derby on their TV!
May 8-9: Proyecto Familiar and Kermes at the NPH house
May 15-16: Panajachel, Lake Atitlan!
May 22-23: San Cristóbal de las Casas, Mexico!
May 29-30: Begins the 3 weekends left to teach and perfect the girls' quinceañera dance!
June 20: Quinceañeras!
Immediately following quinceañeras, it's a week of vacation (not sure where yet), July??, new volunteers arriving, old volunteers leaving, and me no longer being "new."
This. Is. IN. Sane.
Monday, April 12, 2010
Friday, April 9, 2010
Weekly Story Update 7
Well, well, well. NPH International has been insanely delayed in publishing anything I write, which has been annoying. So this week, after sending a semi-pushy "I'm feeling a little frustrated with you all" email, they published seven of my stories within about 24 hours. Hah.
Happy reading!
NPHG's Older Students Learn to Become "Heroes" - During a three-day camp for our básico school (middle school), NPH challenged students to develop their leadership skills, personal relationships, and ability to control emotions.
Guatemala Welcomes Visiting Consultant to Psychopedagogy Department - Ruth Gerstacker, a German psychologist specializing in family therapy, grief, and trauma, is spending three months working with the psychopedagogy department at NPHG.
NPH Guatemala Takes Disaster Precautions - The personnel and students of NPH Guatemala participate in an earthquake preparedness workshop.
Visitors' Day in Guatemala - On the last Sunday of March, nearly two-thirds of NPHG's children welcomed visitors into our home for the first Visitors' Day of the year.
Saribel - Having spent the last 13 years growing up in NPHG, this young woman has big plans for her future.
And I just coordinated these, didn't write them:
Harry Volunteer Testimonial - (Germany) Caregiver in Boys' House
Meike Volunteer Testimonial - (Germany) Occupational Therapist
Happy reading!
NPHG's Older Students Learn to Become "Heroes" - During a three-day camp for our básico school (middle school), NPH challenged students to develop their leadership skills, personal relationships, and ability to control emotions.
Guatemala Welcomes Visiting Consultant to Psychopedagogy Department - Ruth Gerstacker, a German psychologist specializing in family therapy, grief, and trauma, is spending three months working with the psychopedagogy department at NPHG.
NPH Guatemala Takes Disaster Precautions - The personnel and students of NPH Guatemala participate in an earthquake preparedness workshop.
Visitors' Day in Guatemala - On the last Sunday of March, nearly two-thirds of NPHG's children welcomed visitors into our home for the first Visitors' Day of the year.
Saribel - Having spent the last 13 years growing up in NPHG, this young woman has big plans for her future.
And I just coordinated these, didn't write them:
Harry Volunteer Testimonial - (Germany) Caregiver in Boys' House
Meike Volunteer Testimonial - (Germany) Occupational Therapist
Wednesday, April 7, 2010
"We're in the United States Right Now"
Yesterday morning, nine of us new volunteers had to make a trip to Guatemala City (a.k.a. Guate, a.k.a. the Capital, a.k.a. La Capi) to pick up our passports from the immigration office. (We'd sent them there to renew our visas.) After picking up the passports, we had a couple hours to kill, so we headed over to Tikal Futura and Miraflores -- two giant mall/hotel/movie theater complexes right next door to each other.
As we ascended the third or fouth escalator up to the food court on the top floor of Tikal Futura, Leti said it best.
"I think we are in the United States right now."
Everywhere I looked, it looked like U.S. civilization. I'd almost forgotten what that was like. Quizno's! Payless Shoes! Taco Bell! McDonald's! Bagel shops! Zara!
Now, there are certainly lots of things I don't miss about the States right now. However, while I was enjoying my coffee and hashbrown (none of the European volunteers understood what a hashbrown was haha) and plotting my Quizno's lunch order for my next trip to the Capi, I had to admit -- it was very nice. :)
As we ascended the third or fouth escalator up to the food court on the top floor of Tikal Futura, Leti said it best.
"I think we are in the United States right now."
Everywhere I looked, it looked like U.S. civilization. I'd almost forgotten what that was like. Quizno's! Payless Shoes! Taco Bell! McDonald's! Bagel shops! Zara!
Now, there are certainly lots of things I don't miss about the States right now. However, while I was enjoying my coffee and hashbrown (none of the European volunteers understood what a hashbrown was haha) and plotting my Quizno's lunch order for my next trip to the Capi, I had to admit -- it was very nice. :)
Dad Will Visit in August!
Dad just booked a flight to come visit the good ol' Guatemala for a week at the end of August! The planned itinerary: the ruins at Tikal, gorgeous Lake Atitlan, and hanging out around NPH and Antigua (which I'm hoping will include several meals that would normally be out of my price range, right Dad??).
Sounds like it will be a good week!
Sounds like it will be a good week!
Tuesday, April 6, 2010
We Made A Magazine!
This is exciting!
About a month ago, my roommate and I decided to team up and create a brand new magazine, X-PRES-ARTE, for NPH Guatemala. Leti is the Art Therapist here at NPHG, and she wanted to use the magazine as a way for her kids in therapy to express themselves through writing and art. I had extra time on my hands, love all things magazines, and will nerdily admit that I miss long hours of publication layout (DoG Street Journal office, where are you when I need you?). There's also a big movement this year at NPH to promote a culture of reading and writing, so we figured we could do our part with that too.
After a first issue that was, surprisingly, not as unorganized as I imagined it would be, the issues are hot off the press and out to the kids!
We're low on resources here, so they're only printed in black and white and on regular paper, and we only had about 25 copies to distribute around the campus (we're thinking about trying to get some outside funding though...hint, hint). However, you'll still find a jam-packed issue: news stories, interviews, art, love stories, games, travel stories, and more. The kids were super into writing for it, and we think it turned out really well for a first go.
And on another note, I am incredibly impressed that Leti and I pulled this off. She doesn't speak much English, and let's just say that my Spanish is still in need of improvement. Pretty cool that we did this together, right?
You can view the PDF here. Yes, it's all in Spanish, but even if you don't know your hola from your adios, you should still go check it out. At least do it for me. :)
April 2010 Issue of X-PRES-ARTE
About a month ago, my roommate and I decided to team up and create a brand new magazine, X-PRES-ARTE, for NPH Guatemala. Leti is the Art Therapist here at NPHG, and she wanted to use the magazine as a way for her kids in therapy to express themselves through writing and art. I had extra time on my hands, love all things magazines, and will nerdily admit that I miss long hours of publication layout (DoG Street Journal office, where are you when I need you?). There's also a big movement this year at NPH to promote a culture of reading and writing, so we figured we could do our part with that too.
After a first issue that was, surprisingly, not as unorganized as I imagined it would be, the issues are hot off the press and out to the kids!
We're low on resources here, so they're only printed in black and white and on regular paper, and we only had about 25 copies to distribute around the campus (we're thinking about trying to get some outside funding though...hint, hint). However, you'll still find a jam-packed issue: news stories, interviews, art, love stories, games, travel stories, and more. The kids were super into writing for it, and we think it turned out really well for a first go.
And on another note, I am incredibly impressed that Leti and I pulled this off. She doesn't speak much English, and let's just say that my Spanish is still in need of improvement. Pretty cool that we did this together, right?
You can view the PDF here. Yes, it's all in Spanish, but even if you don't know your hola from your adios, you should still go check it out. At least do it for me. :)
April 2010 Issue of X-PRES-ARTE
Monday, April 5, 2010
Being A Parent to 17 Girls for 4 Days Straight
I did it. I officially survived Semana Santa and the experience of being a tía (a.k.a. a full-time parent) from Wednesday morning to Saturday night. Woohoo! And to be honest, it wasn't at all as chaotic or stressful as I thought. I'm not sure why I was freaking out.
Yes, it had its not-so-fun moments:
Yes, it had its not-so-fun moments:
- Reporting for duty at 7 a.m.
- Not getting off duty until 9:30 or 10 p.m.
- Dragging my blankets and pillow up from my house so I could do vela on my assigned night (vela is when you sleep in the section with the girls)
- Less than lovely bathrooms in the sections
- Screaming, fighting, and nagging in very high-pitched little girl voices
- Sunburns
- And in general, just zero time for yourself
- Getting super lucky that my section had me, fellow volunteer Sarah, and Saribel working in it. Most sections didn't get to split the work between two volunteers, and most sections didn't have an año de servicio like Saribel working with them. For her año de servicio, Saribel works as a tía in my section. So, the girls were used to listening to her and behaving for her. Saribel pretty much ran the show, and Sarah and I just needed to be there for side support.
- Also getting super lucky that my girls are the age they are. They're old enough so that they can do everything themselves (dressing, cleaning, etc). But, they're also not quite old enough to where they're moody and sneak off to hang out with their boyfriends. They're still little girls at heart, and they like hanging out with us and with each other. That was definitely nice when other sections were constantly losing their kids.
- Getting a little bit of a tan. Being a tía puts you out in the sun more than you would think!
- Just how much fun it was choreographing a dance with the girls to perform at a going-away assembly for a group of visitors. We danced to "Umbrella," and of course, we used umbrellas. It was adorable, and we got tons of compliments.
- Giving in to my inner 12-year girl and giggling right along with the girls while we analyzed how cute the boys were in Camp Rock, Center Stage 2, Bring It On, and Alice in Wonderland.
- Making pizza from scratch with 17 girls and needing three different ovens to cook them all. So delicious.
- Having a giant bonfire with the entire girls' house where we roasted hot dogs and drank hot chocolate. Yum!
- Learning the life of a tía and having 1,000 times even more respect for them now.
- Getting to know my section of girls in a setting other than just eating dinner with them and hanging out in the section for a few hours at night.
Alfombras!
Alright, back in the blogosphere! I survived Semana Santa working as a tía (more on that later), but first, you just have to hear about Tuesday's alfombras at the NPH school. I'd been planning on updating you guys all along, and after talking to Mom yesterday, I definitely have to.
"Just what was that a picture of on your last blog entry? It looks like a carpet or something, but you didn't describe it anywhere!"
Ok, ok, I'm on it, Mom. :)
It is, in fact, a carpet -- well, an alfombra.
An alfombra is a carpet made of dyed sawdust, and they cover the streets of Guatemala (especially Antigua) during Holy Week. I've never seen anything like them before. Last Tuesday, the kids of NPH decorated the entire campus here with these gorgeous carpets. For hours, the kids squared off carpet areas using planks of wood, patted down the sawdust, and kept the colors bold by constantly spraying the alfombras with water.
They used stencils to create elaborate designs, and they added finishing touches with fresh flowers and fruit. The finished products were incredible. Around 10 a.m., when they'd finished, the entire school participated in a procession of the Stations of the Cross, going from alfombra to alfombra. After each station, the entire proecession would walk through the alfombra...destroying it. Kind of depressing after all their hard work, but hey, it's tradition.
Anyway, I took something like 300 photos this day, so I'll quit jabbering now and let the photos (not all 300 of them, chill out) speak for themselves. :)
"Just what was that a picture of on your last blog entry? It looks like a carpet or something, but you didn't describe it anywhere!"
Ok, ok, I'm on it, Mom. :)
It is, in fact, a carpet -- well, an alfombra.
An alfombra is a carpet made of dyed sawdust, and they cover the streets of Guatemala (especially Antigua) during Holy Week. I've never seen anything like them before. Last Tuesday, the kids of NPH decorated the entire campus here with these gorgeous carpets. For hours, the kids squared off carpet areas using planks of wood, patted down the sawdust, and kept the colors bold by constantly spraying the alfombras with water.
They used stencils to create elaborate designs, and they added finishing touches with fresh flowers and fruit. The finished products were incredible. Around 10 a.m., when they'd finished, the entire school participated in a procession of the Stations of the Cross, going from alfombra to alfombra. After each station, the entire proecession would walk through the alfombra...destroying it. Kind of depressing after all their hard work, but hey, it's tradition.
Anyway, I took something like 300 photos this day, so I'll quit jabbering now and let the photos (not all 300 of them, chill out) speak for themselves. :)
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