Papas en Llantas!

With much legwork behind us now, we have hit the ground running with a new project! After hauling 125 used tires in from an hour away (and nearly throwing out my back in the process) we distributed them to around 50 women in the community. This week I am busy stopping at each women's house to plant. 

We are growing potatoes in a stack of tires. We begin with one tire, filled to the rim with dirt and compost...

...and plant four potato plants.

As the plant grows to the height of 8-10 inches, we place another tire over the first.

By filling the second tire and burying the existing leaves, the plant is forced to grow upward,

while the buried leaves will form new spuds.

We will stack to the height of three tires,

Which should give us a bountiful yield in four months from now, if all goes well. 

Of course, it's always fun for me to drop in on the women and get a glimpse of their lives. 

Beautiful Beans

What I love about the markets here is that anyone can sit down along a street and sell just about anything they make in their house or grow in their yard. I try to buy from the old women that just have a few items; avacados, limes, peaches, greens or beans. The last batch of beans I bought carried a small rainbow of speckles and colors. 

From Scratch

Those who know me know I love to be in the kitchen. Living in rural Guatemala, I have enjoyed the challenge of making foods I love out of ingredients available and with the tools available. 

On days like today, for example, when plans get cancelled I like to browse recipes and see what inspires me. I've had a recipe for homemade raviolis bookmarked for a while now so I thought I'd go for it. 

As far as tools go, I am fortunate to have inherited a food processor from another volunteer, which made making the dough a snap. For the next step I had to use some muscle, rolling out the sheets of pasta as thin as my arms could bare. 

Ricotta is easy to make with powdered milk and using vinegar to curdle it, thus forming the cheese. I had some parmesan in the fridge and with some thyme from my garden, some lemon zest and a squirt of lemon juice from a lemon a friend gave me, I had my filling. (For those who were wondering, yes, the grapefruit-sized yellow thing in the back left is, in fact, a lemon.)

After piecing them all together I had an army of raviolis drying on my table. They will be enjoyed tonight in a white wine sauce and with good company.

Chujuyub Feria, '10

Feria is a fun time for all. People travel from distances of sometimes over an hour to go to feria. Here, a man walks the lonely road that ends in the happiness that is feria. 

A few days before feria actually begins vendors begin to arrive. At every feria there are people that sell these cookie/bread rings. They arrive with huge baskets of them and people seem to love them...

A carousel for the kids...

Comedors, or eateries are set up...
       

Local men chat about local business...

The ferris wheel is always a big hit...

And of course feria food! Here, Cali, Charlotte and Sara enjoy 'elote loco', crazy corn-on-the-cob. It's corn covered in any combination of mayonnaise, ketchup, hot sauce and a parmesan-esque cheese.

However, the highlight of any feria is the music and the dancing. Most ferias have "El Baile de Disfrases", the costume dance. This is an extra big deal where Nic lives in Chujuyub and this year, we were fortunate enough to be asked to participate. We had no idea what we were getting ourselves into...

After two nights of two hour practices (we skipped the third night), we went to rent our costumes. 

The Aztec King and the Aztec Goddess.

Getting ready with all the other dancers. All the costumes were elaborate like ours. The crowd had gathered outside by 8:30 a.m. and the live music, "Los Conejos Internaciónales de Marimba", The International Marimba Rabbits, was bumpin'. 

It was show time. Even our costumes couldn't disguise us. We were head and shoulders above the other dancers and the band repeatedly announced that there were gringos dancing. (Thanks Cali for the photos!)

We danced in a big, dusty field with around 50 other people participating. 

The dance moves were not complicated and definitely did not require the three nights of two hour practices. Circles...

Lines...

After two hours we were released for a short break.

And this is how we felt: tired and sweaty. These costumes were hot and stinky. 

One of Nic's buddies. He was drunk, like many Guatemalan men choose to be at 11 a.m. during feria. He was excited to see us dancing and offered us cold Cokes that tasted so very good.

We were a sort of celebrity with the kids, some of whom Nic works with in the schools. Also some of our friends, here Cali, came out to watch the action. We danced for another two hours and couldn't take anymore. Many of the dancers were smarter than us and shared the costumes with another pair, so they only danced half that time. There were some though that danced until 6 p.m. that night. We learned that El Baile de Disfrases is something many Guatemalans take very seriously. During a break, we saw one man having his calves massaged by his wife while he stood rehydrating himself. 

And of course no feria, at least for Nic and I is complete without the recuerdo. A guy behind the camera made me laugh. 

Morning

I get up around 6:30 each day. I open my eyes to a dark house (shutters cover my windows and only small beams of light penetrate the cracks). I get up, put on my shoes and a jacket and open the door, eyes squinting in preparation for a waking world outside.

A particularly beautiful morning with cotton ball clouds, light breaking over the ridge and a view of Nahualá. 

Corn stalks, doubled and dried, waiting to be cleared out.

It might be a latrine, but it's a beautiful latrine. 

The Waiting Game: Update

The meeting that was scheduled for last Wednesday was, as anticipated, a bust. Ela had to go to Sololá for a meeting for the day and only 5 of around 50 women showed. One of them showed two hours late. As one might imagine it left me annoyed, disappointed and disheartened. 

When Ela returned from her all-day meeting she immediately came to my house and said, "Let's go! We're going to meet with a new group!". Guatemalans, as a whole are not the most informative people. I'm not sure why, but on most occasions they will simply fail to inform one of a meeting or an important or interesting or helpful bit of information, often then leaving that person in an unprepared or clueless state. So, as we walked the dusty paths and I began to interrogate Ela about this new group. They live in another community, in another municipality even, but this community is pegged to Chirijox. There is a Y in the road, seemingly still in the middle of Chirijox, and at that Y the village of Xolcaja in the municipality of Nahualá begins. 

They are a group of about 20 women that Ela had worked with in the past. She had recently talked with the leader and she had expressed interest to participate in the larger group again. We met with the leader, Ana, and Ana said that her group wants to participate with the projects but they don't want to arrive at my house for meetings, a ten minute walk away. At this, I was immediately annoyed and thought of how typical this was. Groups want the benefits of the projects but don't want to have to put in the work or responsibility to receive them. I have officially become jaded. 

As Ela and I walked home I asked about this. Apparently, years ago, there was a conflict between the two towns over a soccer field that is near the boundary. People of both towns still have animosity towards each other but they don't even really know why or remember what the conflict was about. Ela said she is a good mediator because she is neither from Xolcaja nor Chirijox. In fact, Ela said that the committee may be upset with her for even going to a meeting without speaking to them first. Ela said the animosity is purely psychological. 

A few day's later, Ana had spoken with the women of her group and they decided that they would attend meetings and participate fully in the larger group. Today we will go to meet the group and register all the women. I asked Ela about taking to the committee first before starting work with the group. Ela basically said to forget about the committee as she had called them all to try to organize a meeting but they aren't returning her calls. 

Because the thing is, Guatemala is a culture where rarely will this, or any, committee be called out on their negligent behavior. At the next meeting all will be as though everything is fine and the psuedo-power of the committee will continue, which is, as one might imagine, incredibly frustrating. As such, it made me very happy to see Ela stand up to the committee. 

Panqueques

For Hendrick's 6th birthday, Nic and I found the perfect gift. Hendrick LOVES Spriderman (pronounced speeder-mahn) and he LOVES pancakes (more, he loves sugar). While in a fancy grocery store in Puerto Escondido, Mexico, we spotted a pancake pan that burns the face on Spiderman on the pancake. Since we gave it to him on his birthday in late December I've been telling him I'll make him very special pancakes whenever he wants. Only yesterday did he take me up on the offer. 

He arrived at my house around 5:30 p.m.. He said he wasn't too hungry so he suggested we build some hunger over a game of Uno. Earlier that day Ela told me how Hendrick hadn't eaten much for lunch the day before. When she asked him about it he said it was because he was fat and shouldn't eat too much. I asked Hendrick about this over cards. He said, yes, he was fat but that it should be okay because as a person grows they loose their fat. But there was one thing Hendrick didn't understand; his grandpa that lives in another town is grown but he is still fat. See photo for reference. 

I explained to Hendrick that sometimes people grow and are thin and then as they get old they get fat again. It seemed to understand. 

After our Uno game we prepared to make the special pancakes. Hendrick asked if I had a chef's hat and coat. I looked around and gave him my pink frilly apron and a straw hat. 

He pulled up a stool to my big table and went to work mixing the batter. 

He was an eager chef's assistant. 

The final product: Chocolate chip, peanut butter, banana pancake. 

He said he had never tasted anything like it in the world and ate with the usual gusto.