For the past week I've been living with a Guatemalan family in the centre of San pedros. It's headed by francisca and felix with Judith, rebecca and 11yr old chica.
A typical day here involves breakfast at 8.30am which can be anything from corn flakes to a chicken stew with tortillas. From 9am-1pm I go to school by the lake for Spanish lessons then back home for lunch. Lunch is the main meal of the day here usually consisting of a stew with rice or some meat, always served with tortillas. I can´t count the amount of tortillas I´ve had in the last week!
After lunch I do my homework(!) then try and get some exercise like kayaking on the lake, swimming or running. Admittedly I´ve only kayaked once but it was very tiring, must be the altitude, right?
Last week was special as Rebecca was graduating from high school. There was a fiesta dinner with the grandparents and family. Such is society here the girls (including rebecca) spent most of dinner making tortillas for the rest of us. When they finally made it to the table they were eating off polystyrene plates. Kinda surprising to have the guest of honour working in the kitchen until the end. The meal was a quiet affair with the main focus being the consumption of food, there was no real chat or alcohol.
After dinner grandad #1 spoke for ages in maya, giving advice to rebecca and lots of thanks to the big man above and to felix and franny for all the hard work they put in over the last 18 years. At this point felix started to cry uncontrollably. By the time grandad #2 took the stage fran had started leaking too. Meanwhile the three giants (fi, rob and I) were sitting there not knowing what to do as our maya isn't quite up to scratch and we didn´t know if we should stay around to watch the breakdown of the family!
Everyone had a go at giving advice to the poor girl (I didn't say anything as my advice probably wouldn't quite fit in with the guat life.) finally they were done and after a buen proveco and a muchas gracias we made our escape glad to have been a part if it.
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