This week I got to go from being the tourist to the tour guide. My mom and my roommate Jenna from Spring Arbor came to visit for the week of Thanksgiving. It was so cool to get to show them all around Antigua and getting to experience Guatemala with them. I was able to take them to all my favorite places in Antigua and introduce them to some of my friends here. Marta was so excited to have them here and they definitely got some special treatment. On Sunday we went with the group to Earth Lodge for the afternoon. Earth Lodge is way up in the mountains and being that our transportation was in the back of a pick-up truck, I think my mom was less than convinced of my safety. However, we all made it there and back in one piece and had a really good time. Both my mom and Jenna got to go to the market with Marta which not even I have gotten to do. I am not sure how but somehow they communicated with each other even though neither my mom or Jenna speak Spanish and Marta doesn’t speak English.
For Thanksgiving my mom decided to make a traditional Thanksgiving meal. Being that we are in Guatemala we had to adjust the menu a little bit. We had roasted chicken, red beets, green bean casserole, dinner rolls, and instead of apple pie we had a traditional Guatemalan dessert made out of a vegetable called guiskil. Marta said that this was the first time in her 21 years of hosting students that she got to have a Thanksgiving dinner.
Earlier in the week we also went to Camino Real where me and Kyle are doing our practicum for dessert. We got to take everyone on the grand tour and introduce them to some of the people we work with. My mom and Jenna had to go back to the states on Saturday but it was so great to have them both here and I am really glad they were able to come!!
On Saturday we went to Monterrico which is a beach on the Pacific Ocean. Because of all the volcanoes in Guatemala the sand at the beach is black from the volcanic ash. The waves at this beach were the most powerful waves I have ever seen. We would be about a good 10 feet out of the water and when a wave came it would pull you right down. I think that it is called a rip current because it literally rips you off your feet. It was a little frightening to have no control of where my body was going. After getting plunged onto the ocean floor over and over I finally had to take a break. We had lunch at a little resort on the beach. It was really incredible to be on the beach swimming two days after Thanksgiving. After lunch we went back out to swim. Some of us girls were standing in the shallow water when one of the girls screamed for one of the guys to get out of the water. She had seen at least 10 sting rays in the wave that went over his head but luckily he did not feel any of them. After that we all decided that being out of the water was a better decision so we went sting ray watching. We followed the little buggers all down the beach. When a big wave would come we could see their silhouettes in the water. It was really creepy to think that we had all been just swimming with the same creatures that killed Steve Erwin. It was certainly the most exciting day at the beach I have ever experienced.
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