Antigua, Guatemala: Lights, Camera, Action!

This just happened last night and I thought it was really cool, so I wanted to get it up on my blog quickly, so here we go:

I went to dinner at Café Flor last night and ended up hanging out for a little while. When I left to come back to the house I ran smack dab into a huge fiesta in Parque Central for the lighting of the lights and as it turns out, I got there just in time. The event is held every year in Antigua to kick off the Christmas Season. It was really fun and just what I needed on a Sunday night, so let the countdown begin!...

Antigua, Guatemala: A Change of Plans

First off let me say, "Happy Thanksgiving Everyone!"

Ok, now on with the post...

After being here for a month it seems that I may have to make some adjustments to the overall plans of my trip. The good thing is, since my plans weren’t really rock solid plans to begin with, adjusting will be easy.

First, it looks as though I will have to get an apartment for my last month living in Guatemala, as opposed to staying with the family. I’ve done some analysis of my spending over the last 23 days, and it seems that I’m spending quite a bit of money here on a daily basis. I actually anticipated this while I was to be staying in Guatemala, since I’m also paying for the Spanish school, as well as costs of living and having fun.

One of the things that appealed to me about living with the family, other than being forced to speak Spanish 24/7, was that my meals were included in the payment for the accommodations. As it turns out, and as I’ve said in one of my previous posts, we don’t get fed very much around here. I know I eat a lot, and I have discussed this with other students in the house and they had said basically the same thing…that they are always hungry as well. As it turns out over the last 2 weeks, I’ve been going out and buying 2 to 3 separate meals a day, as well as eating what the family feeds me, or just completely skipping their meals all together; because bread, beans, water, and fried banana is not sufficient for a dinner, and I don’t care what anyone says about the issue, that’s a fact.

With that being said, and since I’m paying $400/month to stay with the family and I'm also buying 2 to 3 meals a day on my own, I think it would be more cost effective to rent a nice apartment for $200-$400/ month instead. With the savings, I could definitely be eating really well considering the fact that last night I splurged on: an Angus steak sandwich, french fries, a bowl of soup, a glass of Argentine Malbec, and a bottle of water at a high end restaurant which, including tip, only cost me $8.

Which also makes me wonder why I’m being fed such little food when I pay $100 a week to stay here. There are 4 other students that stay here aside from myself, which means the family is generating revenues of approximately $500 a week in US dollars. So if 1 huge meal plus wine at a high end restaurant is $8US, imagine what you could buy at the market with $500 per week! Seriously, you can feed a small army in Guatemala for $500/week, so it makes me wonder where the hell is all the money going?? Anyway, enough about food because it’s making me hungry…

Also, it looks like I may swap going to Belize for Costa Rica. The main reason being, is that a round trip flight to Belize from Guatemala City is outrageously expensive (I’m talking like $430!). I actually could take a bus to Belize City, but that would mean a very long trip there, and then I would have to turn around and return back through Guatemala City to fly over to Panama, since it’s my next destination. Flying directly from Belize to Panama would be out of the question since it’s even more expensive just for one way ($350-$500!). I figure it would be easier to fly one way into San Jose, Costa Rica from Guatemala City and bus through the country doing some exploring as I make my way into Panama. This way I could have an amazing trip through Costa Rica and save cash at the same time, as I want my entire trip to last as long as possible, or at least so that I wont be forced to return to the US before I’m ready. I also wouldn’t lose any of my Spanish in Costa Rica. In Belize everyone speaks English and I would be concerned that I would start to forget what I had learned. Even though I would have liked to have tasted the enormous lobsters in Belize that people have told me about, it looks like at this point Belize is out, and Cost Rica is in.

So to sum it up, there are a few changes to the plan and ahhhhh....life is still good. :)

Antigua, Guatemala: At Random

-Birthdays are celebrated by the lighting of firecrackers at 6am.
-Many people assume that I am Guatemalan.
-Mac Donalds serves fried chicken called “Pollo Mc Crispy”.
-Soccer is the sport to watch here.
-You cannot flush any sort of paper waste down the toilet… Get it?
-The street dogs walking around routinely use the sidewalk, and look both ways before crossing the street... amazing!
-There are a lot of Gringos here…I’m one of them.
-You can pay $7.00US for lunch or $1.70US for lunch, if you know where to go.
-Never imagined that I’d be saying…“The worst date I’ve ever been on in my life happened in Guatemala”. LMAO
-Beans come with every single meal. Period.
-Sitting in the park is my favorite thing to do.
-Drinking is a close second.
-I was picked up on by 2 gay guys who didn’t want to believe me when I told them, “I am NOT gay.”
-The women here are beautiful.
-99.9% of the house wines are from Chile.
-I was reminded that I have a serious allergy to scented laundry detergent.
-When it is quiet you can hear the volcano rumbling.
-The mosquitoes love me.
-There is a talking parrot that lives next door. It knows more words in Spanish than I do.
-Spanish is easy after 5 beers.
-Spanish is hard when you are hung-over.
-Café con leche is good.
-Soggy pig skin for dinner (Chicharron) is bad.
-That’s all for now.
Bye!

Antigua, Guatemala: Carrera de Charolas

Once a year in Antigua each restaurant sends its best Meseros (waiters) and Meseras (waitresses) to compete in a grueling competition with hopes of claiming the title and becoming the reigning champion of the Carrera de Charolas. This competition takes the utmost skill, incredible balance and precision, and stamina that goes beyond just that of a normal Mesero. Given 4 beverages on their tray, each Mesero must make their way through the streets of Antigua on a mile long course, carefully navigating the cobblestone streets and dodging potholes at every turn, all while balancing a full tray of beverages with a mere single hand. If any of the beverages fall, or two hands are used at any time, they will be disqualified. The competition is fierce and only one can be named champion. Who will come out on top? Who will reign supreme and forever be immortalized into the halls of history??

Haha… Ok, I think I’m getting a little carried away at this point. LOL!! But all joking aside, it was a really great race and tons of fun! Everyone was out to have a good time and we really cheered hard for all the Meseros and Meseras. I was stoked that I got to see it, and I tried to make a really fun video of the race so... Enjoy!

Antigua, Guatemala: The Cross

Yesterday we had some really great weather, so I went with some of the guys from the house and hiked up to the cross above Antigua. It was a nice hike and the view was amazing with the massive Vulcan Agua looming in the background. Check out the pics here...

Antigua, Guatemala: Desayuno, Almuerzo, y Cena…Guatemalan Style.

It’s Friday afternoon and I just got back from chilling at the park. I had gotten out of class at around 12 and came back to the house for some food and a little R&R. I had a few too many cervezas last night and the phrase of the day was definitely “Hola, Estoy de Goma” or “Hello, I’m hung-over”. One thing is for certain, drinking muchas cervezas a noche and then having to spend your morning in Spanish class definitely don’t mix. Other than that, I’m really stoked I had Mario this week as mi maestro because he’s totally cool. We spend half the class just joking around in Spanish, and every other example in class is either about cervezas or las bonitas chicas en el parque…LOL! I’m definitely going to ask for him as a teacher again before I leave because he was great and I had a lot of fun!

Anyway, I came home from class and stuffed myself full of Albondigas y arroz. And as usual, a meal like that when you’re hung-over puts you to sleep faster than a Mike Tyson upper cut. Needless to say, I had a nice little nap this afternoon, ha ha.

But it’s always hit or miss with the meals here at the house though. The meals are either really good, or really bad. I don’t think the family eats much meat, and myself being a huge meat eater it kind of presents a problem. Typically from what I’ve experienced, we only eat meals with meat for lunch. Breakfast is usually some kind of cereal with fruit or maybe a pancake or two, then lunch will have some sort of chicken dish or carne with rice (which is usually awesome), and dinner is usually totally all fried carbs of some sort with beans. I believe on Thursday night we had beans, bread, and these little fried tortillas with cheese in the middle; and then last night we had beans, bread, fried bananas, and some sort of fried sweet potato type fruit. I don’t know about anyone else, but I cant really get full on that type of diet, so a lot of the time during the first week I was going to bed and being really hungry y no es bueno.

So I’ve had to kind set up a game plan as to what I’m going to do for lunch or dinner depending on what’s going to be served. I found out the hard way, when you don’t eat the meals that the family prepares, and then go out to eat or buy food without a good reason, the family gets a little offended. I don t even want to go in to what they said a few days ago when I decided to bring home a roasted chicken that I had picked up while out and about during the afternoon. I heard so many comments about “the pollo” that I could write a book… Ha ha ha.

So last night I ate a few fried bananas, and some beans and chilled out and talked to everyone for a while. Then at about 8 or 9 I told everyone I was going out for a bit for some creveza and then went and got myself a huge steak!

I found a pretty sweet place called Casa El Escudo that has a little café where you can get steak dinners for about 60Q ($7US) and huge pasta dinners with carne for 30Q ($3.50US). Casa El Escudo also has two bars which where jammed packed full of people and that’s where I ended up downing too many Gallos. Mario also hooked me up with an awesome little place for lunch right by the school. They have breakfast (eggs, beans, tortillas) for 10Q ($1.19 US) and the other day I had an awesome churrizo lunch that included macaroni salad, steamed veggies, tortillas, a drink, and a pineapple dessert for 15Q ($1.79)!!

Now that’s what I’m talking about!!! :D

Antigua, Guatemala: Total Immersion!

I’m really stoked right now because I had a great weekend hanging out in the park, and also because I actually managed to survive my first week of Spanish immersion school! Now, when I say immersion, I mean total immersion! That means zero English, in class, and at home!! The past week has been really intense, in and outside of class, so here’s a recap of what’s been going on…

Let’s rewind to the beginning shall we? Before I left the US I signed up for 2 months of instruction at PLFM, which is short for Fundacion Proyecto Linguistico Francisco Marroquin. PLFM is the oldest Spanish language school here in Antigua, and is a non profit where all the revenue supports Myan language literacy projects. The program at PLFM is a total immersion program, which means that you have intensive individual Spanish instruction one-on-one with an instructor during the day, and then you room and board with a Spanish speaking family at night for the duration of the program. In both cases there is little to no English spoken, hence; total immersion.

One of my good friends once told me that the key to learning Spanish is to get your ear accustomed to hearing the language, and I remember the total culture shock that I experienced last March in Buenos Aires when I got off of the plane and heard all the people speaking Spanish. It was a kind of an “oh shit, I’m screwed” feeling because I couldn’t make out a single word and I was going to be there for 2 weeks! When people spoke to me it seemed as if all the words were running together, and I might as well have been listening to static on the radio, as opposed to listening to someone trying to speak to me in Spanish. So I was a little apprehensive when I arrived last week in Antigua, not to mention, delirious from not sleeping a wink on the flight.

When I arrived at my new home I was greeted by Yolanda, Javier, and their grandson Jerson. They welcomed me in and then immediately ushered me into the kitchen where I was served some amazing pollo con arroz (chicken with rice). I thanked them for the meal in my best Spanish, and tried as best I could to explain to them where I was from, and that I hadn’t slept since the prior morning. Even though they spoke no English and my Spanish was absolutely horrible, we seemed to laugh and have a good time over dinner regardless. It’s really great because they are such nice people, and it turns out that they have many different kinds of students that stay at the house. I ended up crashing out after I ate and got some of the best sleep of my life that night…LOL.

The next day I met Lluven and Ices. They are two really nice girls, both 17 and 16 years old, who are on a work program with their schools. They come into Antigua and stay here at the house during the week and work in some small offices during the day to get some business experience, and then they go back home for the weekends. The girls are really nice and they love to help me with my Spanish. They are totally my new amigas!!

Their grandson Jerson is also really cool. He’s 12 and knows just a few English words. We had a really fun time the other night at the table. I came in and he was watching wresting. It turns out he’s a huge WWE fan, just like I was when I was his age. I was telling him all about my favorite wrestlers back in the day like Hulk Hogan and The Ultimate Warrior, and we had a great time laughing and watching guys get body slammed left and right. BTW, if you’ve never watched Mexican wrestling, those guys are seriously bad ass! I saw a guy jump completely out of the ring and do a triple back flip right onto another guys face!! Siiick!

Anyway, despite being a little apprehensive at first about staying with a family and being totally immersed in Spanish every second of the day, looking back, I’m really glad that I did it. I’m starting to pick a lot of things up and I’m beginning to be able to have real basic conversations with people. It’s kind of crazy how it works, because you start to get better at the language with out even being aware that you’re making progress. For example, Yolanda’s brother came over Friday night and I talked to him for about 3 minutes in Spanish with out even thinking about it. Then, when I went back into my room it hit me… I think I just talked to that guy with out using any English, did that actually just happen? Crazy!!!

Pics to match the post…

Antigua, Guatemala: Hangin Out in Parque Central

Yesterday was awesome! After lunch I walked a few blocks down to Parque Central and hung out for most of the day. The parque, which is unbelievably beautiful, is centered around a 250 year old fountain called La Llamada del las Sirenas or “The Sirens Call”.

As it turned out, they had a bunch of festivities going on in the parque with some great food, music, and dancing. It was so nice to be able to just sit there and relax and enjoy my day. Here’s a little piece of what I was able to experience and I hope you enjoy it…

Here's the Video:

Antigua, Guatemala: Boots on the Ground!

I made it! Now that I’ve been in Antigua for a few days, and I’m relatively settled, I have a little time to update my blog… So, yes I made it here safe and sound, but it was quite a trip!

I took the Red Eye from LAX on Sunday night assuming that I was going to be able to catch a few hours of sleep before my connection in Ft Lauderdale. I mean, that’s the point of taking the Red Eye…right? So wouldn’t you know it, I didn’t get one minute of sleep on the flight. We left LAX at 11:30 and were due to arrive in Florida at 7:00am eastern standard time. So basically, you only have about 4 ½ hours to try and get some sleep and it was pretty much impossible for me to go to sleep when we left at 11:30. I was awake for a good 2 hrs then just as I started to doze off we had a sort of “in flight emergency”.

So I’m sitting there dozing off and this girl comes walking down the isle really fast and bumps me pretty hard as she’s passing by, so I look up and she just collapses at the back of the plane. Her boyfriend was right behind her and managed to grab her as she’s falling. The flight attendants rushed over and the girl started coming to. I was within ear shot and heard her say that she started to feel weird at her seat and then felt faint. So they have her on the ground and are calling the captain on the intercom and I’m thinking, “Ok were going to have to do an emergency landing or something.” But after like a minute the girl came to and was talking and sort of back to normal. While this was all going on, one of the flight attendants was questioning the boyfriend and asking him all sorts of questions about her health right next to my seat so I got to hear everything that he said… like, “Yeah, shes late and we think she might be pregnant but we don’t really know for sure”. LOL!!! Anyway, to make a long story short; the plane landed right on time, the girl who might be pregnant was OK, and I got zero sleep.

After a 4 hour layover in Ft.Lauderdale, a terrible cup of coffee, and an egg sandwich that tasted like crap, I got on the plane to Guatemala City. It was a short flight, and I really have to give credit to the airline. I actually went the low cost carrier route and took Spirit Airlines and seriously they were really good. All the planes were brand new, so you didn’t feel like the wings were going to fall off in mid air or anything, and they were really efficient. So props to them!

When I arrived in Guatemala City, a driver from my Spanish school picked me up at the airport and gave me a ride to Antigua, where I will be staying for the next couple of months. So for those who don’t know here’s the deal…

I decided to do some traveling through Central and South America, and before I go through all those amazing countries I felt that I needed to learn Spanish so I don’t end up missing out on talking to the people and doing all the things that I wouldn’t normally do if I only spoke English. So, I enrolled in a Spanish Emersion School here in Antigua that a friend recommended. They put you up with a family and you have private Spanish lessons with an instructor at the school Monday-Friday. I’ve been doing the program for a few days now and its friggin awesome! The family is great, and everyone at the school is SUPER cool. But I’ll get into all that later and put pics up and everything of my Spanish school and the town where I’m staying.

So now here’s the good part, I managed to capture a little video as I made my way all the way down to Guatemala. I’ve been fooling around with my video editor in my downtime and put together a little clip of my journey so here it is…

PS. I did a little commentary right after I got out of the airport and stuck it in the middle of the video. The weather was a bit of a surprise and you’ll see what I mean…Lol. Oh, and by the way, if you’ve never seen what I look like totally exhausted after being awake for 26 hours straight, and in serious need of a shower, your about to find out…