Adjusting to Guatemala time

Noel, Jason, Kari, Michael and I walk on crowded streets weaving between little red motorized tricycle cabs (called tuk tuks), bicyclist and pedestrians as we approach the cities centralized soccer field. We are all keeping a secret from Michael. It was Michael’s birthday and he thought that his extra large pan cake and birthday song were going to be the climax of honor. We climb through the mangled fence that protects the field from the masses, but has been torn open by local children. Disregarding the reinforced barbwire around the hole we guard eachothers bodies from cuts and begin walking toward the center of the field where aaron stand with a Frisbee in hand. Michael yell to aaron “where’s Marla?” moments pass in awkward silence as aaron considers his answer. Then with a triumphant yell we here “surprise!” from Marla as she springs from behind a gray concrete structure. This is no ordinary surprise, because marla is carrying a blue and yellow piñata. Watching Michael spin in circles 22(the amount of years he has lived) times as we set off firecrackers at his ankles, jumping, swinging, missing several times before knocking the legs off the penguino piñata, was a real treat. After the plethora of candy was scattered on the grass field we began indulging in its nectar, preparing our spirits for a celebratory game of ultimate Frisbee.

Running in the heat with candy in our bellies made for some serious queasiness.

Unfortunately this is the highlight of our past week in Guatemala. According to our original schedule we should be finishing up our water-purifying segment of the trip. For you that have visited places of third world stature, you know that our westernized planning rarely comes to fruition within our time frame. So now… we wait and have been waiting for the hospital here in uspantan to have a platform built for our water tanks. We are confident that our water system goals will be met with in our time here, but we have had to move our schedules around and remain lenient for the unknown time in which we will need to work in the hospital. Pray for us that we would be patient but bold in meeting our goals.

So we are now planning our coffee farm visits, we have been blessed to make friends with Laura (one of the peace core ladies) and she has directed us to 3 new farms with in the relative area. Kane, our friend from Louisville (a roaster for sunergos) is also coming to visit us this Friday for 3 weeks. Kane has made contact with a farm in Antigua, Guatemala that we already receive coffee from. This farm is apart of a collective in which sunergos is apart of, the collective already has achieved creating a direct trade relationship with this farm. It will be nice to finally meet these farmers who are serving us in person, document their farm, and deepen the relationship we have with them.

Things we’ve done in our boredome

Noel has been reading a book called Three Cups of Tea about a North American man that built schools in Pakistan. It has been helpful to see the patience that this man had to have in order to do what he had promised to the people of Korphe. It took him 3 years and many trips to get the first school finished. He learned a lot about the differences between the way that we are programmed to do things and the way that the people in the small village operate. Being humbled.

Tyler has been putting finishing touches on his website/business card. This has been exciting because it puts him one step closer to making himself offical.

We also cultivated community through a marvelous dinner gathering the other night, something that I really miss about being back home. We were both in our happy place. Our neighbors, who are from Spain, one of their friends, as well as another lady (Kelly) that lives in our building who is in the Peace Corps, Laura (from peace-corps) and a Swiss guy named Diego. We met Diego in a microbus on our way back from Coban (a 3 hour drive to uspantan.) we all ate happily in our little space. There were so many people that they were bringing chairs from their apartments so they could have seats. It was also nice for us because we were able to converse with and understand the Spaniards: They enunciate their words a bit more than Guatemalans. Over all we want the few people we get a chance to deepen relationships with around here that we totally our in love with our God and totally in love with them.

Sincerely the deebs