Hello everyone,
Just wanted to take a moment, and a quick breather, to say hello to all of our followers out there. It´s been a busy first week that started off with a few bumps and potholes. We had a misplaced passport before getting on our first flight from PDX to SFO, a student whose flight was so horribly delayed they couldn´t meet the group to fly down to Central America and a lost bag upon arrival in Guatemala. Luckily, the force was with us and everything was resolved with no adverse or long lasting effects.
Earth Lodge is a beautiful hostel that sits nestled on a volcano side looking over the UNESCO heritage site that is Antigua. Sitting in our breakfast nook or hammock we were able to gaze upon the beauty of multiple volcanoes and marvel at how insignficant we seem compared to the enormity of nature. The students were extremely impressed with our digs and multiple quotes were heard in the vein of ¨I could just stay here for the rest of the trip¨ Fortunately for them, we have a ton of other amazing experiences in the near future and we like to think they might make that quote about every place that we stay.
Orientation went well and everyone bonded in a curiously short amount of time. It´s almost like we were family before the journey even started. We played all sorts of games, icebreakers, and also talked for waaaaayyyy too long about the important safety stuff (an important one for all you parents reading!). One of the most well liked activities of the orientation was life maps in which the students were allowed to share an overall picture of how they arrived in Guatemala with Carpe Diem. We learned a lot about each other and everyone was refreshingly candid. This has already created some strong connections between our group and we hope it leads to a feeling of peace, harmony and well being for our semester.
We have found that we have a good mix of personalities and characters in our group. A mothering figure, some sarcasm, a naivete, a garbage disposal for meals and a great sense of humor among all.
Arrival in Pasac happened a few days ago and the students have quickly adapted to life in the village. We walk around with an armada of small children in our wake, often in the arms, on the shoulders or holding hands with members of our group. The feeling of unconditional love, affection and adoration from the children has certainly aided in swelling our egos and hearts with love. Today was a rather exciting day as we headed out to the fields and spent a very short amount of time in a coffee plantation workers shoes. We had the opportunity to pick-harvest coffee beans and will be learning more about the coffee making process tomorrow. One of our goals for this semester is to have our students fully immerse themselves into roles and situtations which are foreign and potentially uncomfortable for them. We believe this will faciltate an internal growth that will lead to a more well rounded being upon arrival back in the USA. In the afternoon, we spent the day making bread from scratch and got to stand in front of a gigantic brick oven as we watched the fruits of our labor rise. The smell of hot bread emerging from the oven put our salivary glands into overdrive and every single one of us overindulged in bread fresh from the oven.
Rest assured everyone is well and enjoying the experience. Today was also a special day as Regina celebrated her 20th birthday, complete with cake and birthday games provided by our wonderful guides from Roots and Wings. We hope that everyone is well and look forward to sharing more of our stories, experiences and memories in the near future.
Hasta Pronto,
Nic and Aimee and Maya Crew