Xela-The 1st Week

Day #1

I arrived in Guatemala City at about 5:30 AM. I had a direct flight from LA. I slept for a few hours only on the plane. Upon arrival, I was met by someone from the school who does this sort of thing. She was standing outside with a cool sign that said my name on it. She helped me get to the bus station for my long ride to Quetzaltenango (nick named Xela). I had to wait in the bus station for a few hours while waiting for my bus to leave. The bus ride was through the hilly and mountainous countryside. I was able to get probably 3 hours or so of sleep on the ride over. The bus was a pretty nice grey hound type tour bus. Very much unlike most of the buses in Guate which are old American school buses.

The bus station in Xela is just around the corner from the school, so I headed there and met some of the teachers and my host family. Then on a taxi to my home! My host family is a young couple with grandma and two little girls. They are all fantastic. The dad speaks a little English but the others do not, and he is not around too much. So the first few days were a super struggle to understand each other. Now that I have been here a week things are much easier.

This is my grandma...she cooks for me. :)

After unpacking I made my way back to the school, which is about a twenty minute walk. Down the street I noticed a church spire that look very Mormon. And lo and behold it is! I am about 1 minute away from the church. There are 8 located here in Xela…and the new temple groundbreaking just took place this week also. So, I kept heading to find the school and I got totally lost on the way. On my search I ran into two young men in white shirts and ties! Cool the elders…they helped me get to the school. Then I had an orientation.

After that I ran into another set of Elders at the mall! Crazy huh…well they were full of good advice.

The Pop Wuj school in Xela

Pic of the church from my casa. You can just barely see the spire on the right side of the road.


Day #2

Breakfasts have been eggs, beans, and sometimes a cream of wheat type hot cereal. Then off to my class. I have class every morning. We are all one-on-one for our Spanish instruction. We have been able to burn through the material, but it comes a point where there is just too much vocab to get down. Yikes. It has been fun to learn finally some Spanish grammer. I really need to get more studying done though. Languages come pretty easy for me especially after learning a couple. The trouble comes with the vocab when I always want to throw a Hungarian word into the mix. It is coming much faster than Nepali or Hungarian...so that is nice. But it still requires just sitting and memorizing vocab.

After my class I went running. There is a dirt track that I could run on and I have once, but it actually is pretty nice to run on the streets. My home is located in a pretty good and less busy area. I have been able to get out three times this week, which is a record for my running. I hope to continue that and come home super in shape! The elevation of Xela is over 7,000 ft. So, I do get a little more winded, but it will be great for my stamina back home! I have also been following these two programs to build some core strength. Both or these are great. And I highly recommend doing them.

There is also a pool in town that I could swim in, but they require a swim cap (even with my bald head) and the $10 for the cap for swimming a couple times just didn’t seem worth it. So, I guess will stick with running, push-ups and sit-ups with a weekend hike for my exercise!

On day #2 I also ran into the local Hermanas! Sweet! They cover the ward I will be going to. So, now I have seen three different sets of missionaries. The church is right out of window too. The Church is cool and true too.


Again, but with me.

Day #3

Wednesday was a great day, because I didn’t try to pack everything in that day. After class I spent a couple hours just reading my book sitting out on my roof in the sun! It was great. The weather here is actually pretty chilly. At 7,000 ft we are cold in the night and AM and then the afternoon is broilin’! So, I have to wear my sweatshirt and then shed it by the afternoon. I went running again on Wed also, otherwise I just settled in and relaxed.

Day #4

Class again. Which is great, but I really need to spend more time memorizing! In the afternoon, I walked around the old part of town, which is the opposite direction from where I live from the school. There are some really cool narrow cobble-stone streets.

I also finally bought a Spanish-English dictionary as the one I brought was pretty crappy! Thursday night is a night for all the students to get together and have dinner. We bought pizza…my belly started to get a little queasy. Some nausea without any actual up-chucking kept with me for the next day or so. Good thing I brought some Reglan, which helped a bit.

So, I wasn’t feeling too hot that night as I made my way home. BUT then the church was totally packed with people. I headed in to see what was going on. There seemed to be two activities. A choir practice, and about 20 guys playing futbol. So, even in my sickness I had to play a little bit and give a good impression for an American. We played for about 45 minutes. And well, I scored a goal, but apparently goals don’t count from outside some arbitrary line….I guess that is what happens when you don’t understand anyone.

One of the members I played with

Day #5

Today we had class in the morning and then went to a hot springs/pool area. We had to catch a couple of the local buses. The trip was fun, the water warm, but nothing too exciting. Just relaxing. And it was nice to get out of the city for a while. The terrain here is pretty amazing! Towering mountains with terraced fields etc. The land is quite formidable, and would be a pain to drive an army through, if that is your thing.

Beautiful land...

Sacred Mayan Cave...or so she said.



The warm pool..wow

Day #6

Saturday…ahhh…I slept in which was way nice. Then went for a walk to the central park and to some of the city sites. The big activity for the night is starting a little trip. One of our teachers put together a hiking trip to the highest volcano in Guatemala, which also happens to be the highest point in all of Central America. I am pretty stoked. We are leaving the school at 10PM and then hiking to be at the top for the sun rise! I am way excited about this amazing opportunity. I am feeling a little bad about missing church tomorrow. But I will have to bring my scriptures and pretend like I am Nephi or something.

Well, I guess that is all for now. I should probably have broken that up into smaller chunks, but oh well. Check back for some random thoughts on the people, food, and shotguns.

I love you all at home!