Something Different

Hola a todos,

Life has been a whirlwind of wonderful things.

This past week I decided to change things up a bit by going to Antigua for a week to volunteer at Casa Jackson (casajackson.org/). Before getting there, I enjoyed another weekend with good friends and good food at Lake Atitlan. Apparently, I wasn’t in the picture-taking mood, so I have no photos to share. We passed our time in the typical Atitlan manner: blissful boat rides, tasty lake-side eats, and a leisurely afternoon of kayaking along the pueblo of San Pedro.

Before we knew it was time for some of us to head onward to Antigua while the rest headed back to Xela. Four chicken bus transfers later, Brittany and I (and our backpacks which were carelessly flung on the roof) successfully made it to our destination. We stayed with a friendly Guatemalan couple, Esperanza and Jose, in their beautiful home, complete with a patio filled with tropical plants, a great rooftop view of the city, and real shower (love those). Esperanza’s cooking was top notch and I even got some recipes for my future life as “a person that may actually cook some.” Antigua is a remarkable little town. Very historic. Very beautiful. Very Gringo. We did a little sight-seeing and indulged in some of our favorite American-tastes-like-home snacks like bagels and cheesecake.

                 During our week, Brittany, who is a friend I met at Pop Wuj, and I volunteered at Casa Jackson, a recovery center for malnourished children. There were 13 cuties there, all with their own personality quirks. Their ages ranged from 2 months to 4 years. Malnutrition is a major issue in Guatemala, and especially for infants, it can have irreversible consequences. All of the toddlers are developmentally delayed in terms of motor skills, language, and cognitive skills as a direct result of malnutrition. As heartbreaking as their reason for being at Casa Jackson is, it is a sunshiny-kind-of-place staffed with nurses, a nutritionist, and doctor, with volunteers as well. The kids stay until they are100% healthy again. Also, Casa Jackson focuses a lot of time and energy on prevention, through providing mobile clinics to communities with limited access to health care, educating families on ways to attain a nutritional diet with modest resources, and working with the families to combat the underlying problems of malnourishment. My shift work consisted of changing diapers, feeding the babies, changing their clothes, playing with them, giggling a lot, doing laundry, disinfecting and cleaning the floors, etc.  I walked away from the experience with a lot of thoughts and questions. The worldwide issue of hunger became much more real when you are holding a 12 pound 3-year-old girl. People (in this case little people) can grab hold of your heart in a much more transformative way than statistics ever could.

I said my farewells, with hopes of returning soon and hopped on a chicken bus for Xela. I learned firsthand why they are called chicken buses that day. It is not because there are actual chickens on the bus (which there actually were), it is because it can get so packed inside that you feel a chicken smashed together with tons of other chicken. Fortunately I have no issues with claustrophobia because sitting four to a seat with another kid asleep on my lap, zipping around sharp mountain turns on a school bus older than me is no task for the fainted-hearted.

The end of my weekend was spent remembering how much of love Xela weather (comfortable dry Xela > hot humid Antigua), playing soccer with my host brother and his friends, playing (and losing) at Scrabble with Jenny, and countless humorous talked with my 85 year old abuelito.

It is back to work this week with all sorts of activities going on at the Guarderia.

Stay tuned!

Carrie