Last Week in November thru December 14th

So I'm going to condense this down a bit because I'm so far behind.

November 25th - December 2nd
This was my third and final week of Spanish school and living with the Velasquez Family. I changed my afternoon class to the morning so that I could do my morning orientation at the project. On Thursday I went out after work to meet up with a guy from the states, Jack, at Reiley's. He was having a sort of going away party. It started slow but soon there were a ton of people from all around the world. England, Ireland, Sweden, Germany, Israel, Austria, France, Australia, Guatemala, Brazil, and the U.S. were all represented..., amazing! On Friday the 30th, after work, I went to meet up with Rocio and her boyfriend Terry so that I could meet Rocio's dog Mailo (My-low). I agreed to watch him while she was on vacation over Christmas, he's a beautiful and playful Golden Retriever. Later that night I went to another house in Santa Ana for the going away party for my roommate Andrea. The house was in the same place as where I was going to be moving too. It is a gated piece of property with three houses on it and a common garden. Met a bunch more people from all over the world including a young woman, Kristin, from San Fransisco that used to work at the church that helped Chris Gardner (The Pursuit of Happyness) Glide. We chatted about homelessness and life and all sorts of stuff. The next morning I had breakfast and took my laundry to the project to wash it. Then that afternoon I packed all of my stuff up and moved to my new place in Santa Ana. Jorge drove me there and then brought me back for my bike. After some quick goodbyes and I'll come to visits I was back in Santa Ana unpacking when Bob arrived. Bob is the long-term volunteer in the warehouse and he was taking my new roommate Britt and her boyfriend Carlos (Charlie) to see a dance recital. He had an extra ticket and invited me to join them, so I did. Bob's girlfriend's daughter was dancing in the recital, it was at these ruins just north of the market and it was such a cool atmosphere however, I didn't bring my camera with me so I don't have photos to share of that. Sunday saw me do absolutely nothing all day. I slept in, ate, read, watched a movie, ate, thought, read, ate, and went to bed..., good day :)

Decmber 3rd - 9th
Monday the third marked the start of my Full-time presence at the project, I still had some orientations to complete in the afternoons, but I was at the project all day. I worked with Pablo, doing what I will be doing a lot of over the next 11 months, making the panels for houses. We have two tables that we fabricate the panels on so that they come out basically the same all the time. In the afternoon I helped to cut out 1000 construction paper stars to decorate the project for Christmas. Tuesday we moved all of the planchas, concrete pavers 23" x 23" x 2", to two homes. They will eventually become a floor, there are 48 planchas for each floor, lots of heavy lifting, good for the muscles. After work I played soccer with a group of the employees. On Wednesday we laid the floor for a house in San Gaspar using the planchas, now it's ready for a house. That night I went to this little food stand across the plaza from our house. Background: Our house is on the corner of the central plaza in Santa Ana. The plaza consists of the cathedral on the East side, a small plaza, and a basketball/ popi-fut court. The stand is owned by Miguel Angel, and he cooks all sorts of stuff. That night I got a Chalupa, now this isn't the kind of Chalupa you'll find at Toxic Hell, it was more like a quesadilla with lots of extras inside. Thursday we laid another mobile floor, this one in San Miguel. That night my roommates, Britt (hospitality volunteer at C.H.) and Pamela (Guatemalan) and I went out with one of our Belgium neighbors to a bar called La Sala. We danced some Salsa, a little, I still need some more instruction, and had some laughs. Friday December 7th was the Common Hope staff Christmas party. We all loaded up in buses and headed South towards the Pacific Ocean. We came to a water park called Guatepeque. Some of us played a game of soccer for a while, it was very hot and humid, so we played for about an hour then all headed in to get in the pools. It was fun to watch some of the Guatemalans who had never seen or been on a water slide before. Some tried it out, others would have nothing to do with it. Saturday I started slow, but about 11 AM I got motivated and went to the market to buy food. While there I came across a laundry basket for Q25 = $3 and I needed one so I bought it. Now, I live a couple of kilometers from the market and I had ridden my bike. So, I took off my belt and ran it through the slots on the side and lid of the laundry basket, then clipped it to my backpack (which was full of food) and rode home. I wish someone would have taken a picture of me, it was a very Guatemalan thing to do. Later Britt and Charlie and I went to a BBQ at a friend Vance's house. Sunday I had another lazy day, it is quite nice to not have to get up on a Sunday to go to work. Britt left for the states for the holidays and Pamela's Step-mom and little brother came over, we talked an hung out and I played some basketball with her little brother until Bingo started. Sunday Night is Bingo night in Santa Ana. People come to the plaza to play bingo for Q2 and win little prize baskets, very cool small town feel to it. It reminds me a bit of my Grandmother's town Millstadt, IL.

December 10th - 14th
Monday built the house up in San Gaspar. Pablo, Felix, Mario and I worked fast. Tuesday we built the house in San Miguel. It was cool to see how excited the families were, they would have a new home to celebrate Christmas in. When I got home Bob was there and said he was going to the market, so I tagged along. We walked around and he did some shopping for Christmas gifts, I found a christmas tree for the house. It was about 4 feet high, and pretty cheap, so perfect for my house. The fun part was riding back home on the back of Bob's motorcycle with it. The next day we went to get lumber from Jocotenango. We got 20- 2"x3"x14' and 75- 2"x3"x12' boards then went to Mastil (the Home Depot/Lowe's) and got 30 sheets of the cement fiber board plus 7- 100lbs. bags of cement. When we got back to the project we set all of the wood out to dry, yes it comes wet, then started to make the pile of sand and rock that we would need to make more planchas. 14 wheelbarrows of sand, 8 of rocks and left it for the next morning. The rest of the day was just doing little things around the project. The next day we added 12 bags of cement to the sand and mixed it up, then added all of the rocks and started to added water. Mixing a large amount of concrete by hand is a great work out. We finished all of the planchas an hour before lunch and just hung out for a while. In the afternoon, more panels. That night I went out with William and David to Rainbow Cafe, then La Sala, then the Cajba. Friday we made more panels then we, the construction crew: Mario, Felix, Pablo, Chicho, and I, all went to lunch for our own little Christmas party. I had Ceviche (Say-v-chea), a Guatemalan seafood dish and a Michelada, a beer with vegetable juice added to it. After our lunch we headed back to the project and made some more panels. That night Pamela took me to Pollo Campero, which is a big chain here in Guate similar to KFC. It was an experience and the food tasted like fast food. Later we met up with William, he was leaving the next morning, and danced and stuff. Eventually I was back at the MonoLoco until it closed at 1 AM then we all headed to the after party. At around 3 am I finally ran out of gas and went home.

More of these to come..., I'll be up to date soon...

Pictures:
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http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=12599&l=3385b&id=752630746