Rocking that *International* Paradise

My students are currently working on debates in class, and Annette and I gave them topics which relate to what they're currently studying during their Middle School Issues unit in Life Skills.  One of the teams was set the task to argue that "Positive peer pressure is more powerful than negative peer pressure."  A lot of them were having trouble with this.  They immediately whined, "How are we going to debate this?  It's not true!  You never see positive peer pressure...only negative."   Their strong reactions surprised me a little bit.  I could immediately think of times in my own life I'd been influenced by positive peer pressure dating all the way back to high school...but very few times that negative peer pressure has worked on me.  So I've come to this conclusion: it all depends who your friends are.  When I was in high school, I never touched a drop of alcohol or was tempted to try smoking.  The reason was only partly b...

One of my best friends here in Guatemala, Chris, works as a project manager at a silver mine.  For the last year we’ve known him, he has wanted to take us out to the mine so we can see the “other half” of his life.  He finally made it happen (for the first 3 of our friends at least) on Saturday. As we got closer to the village where Chris lives 5 days of the week, he asked us to lock our doors.  A lot of the locals are in opposition to the mine, for many reasons.  From what Chris told us yesterday, a lot of their unrest is based upon ignorance.  They are scared of pollution and contamination from the mining chemicals.  What many of them probably don’t know is that Chris’s mine is one of maybe only 5 in the world that uses a new filtration system which enables them to use water on something of a “closed circuit”—meaning that there is no contaminated water being discharged into local streams.  Some of the locals are also against a US company coming ...

I went to the Festival de Bariletes Gigantes in Sumpango, Guatemala last year for Dia de Todos Santos, and I was impressed.  It was a good day.  But when Chris, Michelle, and I went today, it was one of those rare wonderful days that combined good friends, adventure, culture, spontaneity, new experiences, and laughter.  Michelle started the day off on the right foot by bringing breakfast burritos along for us to enjoy on the drive.  Chris set the tone with good music in the truck.  Even the fact that we spent probably half an hour stuck in traffic waiting to turn off the highway into Sumpango couldn’t get us down.  When we got close to the turn-off, Chris rolled down his window and shouted to the gent' manning the parking lot across the street to find out if there was a spot.  “Una!” came the response.  “Para MI?!” Chris entoned enthusiastically.  When the guy nodded “sure,” Chris popped the truck into 4 wheel drive, checked that th...

We may look like adults on the outside, but we teachers need very little excuse to dress up in ridiculous outfits and act a little silly.  Months ago, a few of us dreamed up an amazing party idea, and Kenra’s birthday this weekend finally provided us with the opportunity to make it happen.  Everyone who signed up to come to the party was given someone else’s name and a budget of Q100 (approximately US $12.50) to spend at Megapaca, which is a chain of thrift stores similar to Goodwill…except word has it that everything that doesn’t sell at the Salvation Army outlets in the States gets shipped down to Megapaca here in Guate.  So there are some pretty exceptional finds hidden among the copious racks of the stores.  So, the goal of the party was basically to dress someone else in the most ridiculous Megapaca outfit imaginable.  We then had a contest for the best worn costume, complete with fashion show, at the party.  Everyone made their outfit int...

I always tell myself: “Low expectations are often exceeded, whereas high expectations are sometimes met.”  I try to live life with low expectations.  When I can manage that, all of the good things that life become bonuses, and everything seems exponentially better.  My expectations were pretty low this past long weekend.  We were headed to Lake Atitlan, and I’ve been there plenty of times before.  People kept getting sick and dropping out prior to the trip, nothing was really planned for most of it, and to top it off, our group’s shuttle was leaving on Friday at 3pm right after school…which ensured that we left the city at a crawl that didn’t really ever get much faster, due to the mess that is the town of Chimaltenango, finally to arrive at our hostel at 10pm.  But here’s the thing: Lake Atitlan is just good for the soul. When I woke up on Saturday morning to the view of the volcanos, unshrouded by clouds, the placid lake, and the tranquilit...

A few weeks ago, I received a message from two friends of mine in the Netherlands.  They've started up a travel website and asked if I'd be willing to write a piece on Guatemala for them.  I was thrilled and excited!  My first foree into actual travel writing.  So, while they translate my article into Dutch to post on their website, I'll post it here for your reading pleasure.  (And, because it's my blog, I'll add a bunch of links back to prior entries about each of these things).   I moved to Guatemala City just over a year ago to teach at an American School here.  I don’t pretend to know everything about the country, its sights and sounds, or its people after one short year, but I started to discover some of its treasures in my time here.  So if you ask my humble opinion, here are my top ten tips for what to do in Guatemala. 1. Hike a volcano.  This is my absolute favorite thing to do in the country.  Guatemala has 33 ...