Rocking that *International* Paradise

October has been a difficult month for me this year, and it’s not even over yet (though nearly).  But I sincerely hope the hardest things I will encounter this month are now behind me.  October began with some rockiness in my personal life.  Now, three weeks later, I can look back with clarity and see that what happened was for the best.  But at the time—well, I was a mess for a little bit there. And then, one week after my personal life had been turned upside down, the school called the foreign hire teachers into a meeting and informed us that they wanted our decisions about whether we wanted to renew our contracts at the end of this year or not soon .  Like within the next week, soon. Last Christmas, I had decided this would be my third and final year living in Guatemala.  I felt the time was right and I would be ready to return to Wisconsin after this school year.  But then eight months later, I came back here after summer vacation,...

I hate Friday traffic in Guatemala.  Hate it.  With a passion.  From 3pm until about 8pm, trying to leave the city is horrendous and takes twice or three times as long as it would with no traffic. On Friday afternoon, a group of us left right after school to go to the beach for the weekend.  I was one of the drivers, and I was adamant that we would leave the school parking lot at 3:02pm and we would make no stops until we were out of the city.  We did leave the parking lot by about 3:05, but after that my master plan to arrive at the beach early in the evening started falling apart.  First of all, we didn’t make it fifteen minutes before we had to pull over because my car was making odd grating sounds with every turn of the wheel or bump in the road.  We deduced that there was too much weight in the trunk, and we were able to transfer some of our load to one of the other cars.  Back on the road again. Traffic was unusually slow le...

How could a volcano hike on which we saw only clouds from the summit rank in my top 5 hikes of all time?  I'll tell you how.   It's all about the journey,  people. We started our hike from our hotel,  Finca Montaña Sagrada, on the Nicaraguan island of Ometepe,  a little after 8am.  The day was cloudy,  but we left with hopes that the skies would clear.    Right from the start,  the hike was a whole different world from what Rachel and I have gotten used to in Guatemala.   The heat and humidity had us dripping sweat in short order.   Thankfully,  the route was shaded and we were more or less comfortable,  even sweaty as we were. Farmland and petroglyphs at the base of the volcano The air was filled with the sounds of howler monkeys,  and soon enough,  we actually saw a couple.   Our guide also pointed out a mean looking venomous land crab (a different species than the k...