Whirlwind week!

It’s been a crazy week, full of community visits, traveling, and exploring new places. My apologies for such a long delay between blog posts – there never seems to be enough hours in the day here, and my internet has also been spotty thanks to the low pressure system that’s been sitting over us for the past week or so. Silly me, just because it didn’t torrentially rain for two days last week, I thought that rainy season might be over…but this week’s monsoons have proven that that’s clearly not the case…

Halfway point!

So tomorrow marks exactly one month since I arrived in Guatemala. Bad news for all of you back home: I’m not sure I’m ever going to be able to leave. There’s something about Guatemala, and the people who live here, that just sticks with you and doesn’t let you ever forget.

Darcy and I have had a wonderful time over the past week spending time with new friends and exploring the lake. We’ve made a great group of friends here – locals, volunteers, visitors – and almost every evening, we gather at our friends café to play bilingual scrabble. We were considering taking some Spanish lessons at one point, but we realized that spending a few hours each evening playing scrabble and just talking with friends is about as good of language practice as we’re going to be able to get! Not to mention the amazing coffee that I’m slowly becoming addicted to…

The Start of Rainy Season, Tuk Tuks, and La Palapa

I woke up yesterday to a beautiful, sunny Pana day and went to OB around 10 to meet Andrea. Darcy and I spent the morning looking over OB’s brand new website (http://www.oxlajujbatz.org/) - launched today! – and giving Andrea some feedback and suggestions on how to improve it. Then we went over a more detailed orientation with Andrea and talked specifically about our Work Plan. The plan is definitely ambitious – and it’s possible we might not get through everything that we hope – but we will be spending the next week or so doing the research and planning necessary to accomplish as much as possible. A large part of our Work Plan involves working directly with the cooperatives of women that OB and Nest partner with, so starting in a week or so we will be traveling along with OB’s facilitators to these communities to conduct interviews, take pictures, and do the research we need to put together the production guide, look book, and other projects we’ve been assigned.

!Hola de Pana!

Darcy and I overlooking Lake Atitlan, which borders Panajachel

After landing in Guatemala City this morning and and a three hour drive on winding mountainside highways, Darcy and I finally arrived in Panajachel this afternoon. We were greeted by Andrea, who showed us the beautiful little house where we will be living, with our own bedrooms, a sitting area with couches and a TV, a dining area, and a fully-outfitted kitchen, all surrounded by a beautiful garden. The whole place is clean, spacious, and just a short walk from Panajachel’s town center and from the OB office.