Tuesday, June 24, 2008

Postcards from Guatemala - 20 June 2008

so today i worked with diego, who´s in charge of donaciones. we drove his pickup truck way high up in the mountains to santo tomas las milpas altas, where there´s some kind of storage facility or packaging plant or something that wanted to donate boxes and boxes and boxes full of frozen fruit chunks: melon and mango. we made two trips, and i think they´re doing more tomorrow, just filling the truck (and stacking so high i thought the boxes would surely tumble out, even though we criss'crossed rope over the whole thing... the mountain roads are really curvy) and unloading it back at the dreamer center. my hands were so freaking cold. but then diego bought me doritos. who knew processed food could taste so good?

i talked a whole bunch more to jessi, who´s the harvard student. she´s cool. i might go out with her tonight... i still haven´t decided. depends if tonight, like the last jillion nights, is super rainy. i did decide,though, that i´m not going to lake atitlan with her and liz and eli (the funnest crowd of volunteers) tomorrow. it would require taking the very sketch chicken bus. and buying a ticket from a sketch travel agency in town... even though the ticket would only be like $14. i´ll stay home and read dostoevsky. if it´s not rainy, i´ll walk around town.

cue the thunder. haha that was good timing.

i heard ¨girls just wanna have fun¨ playing in town the other day, and it made me smile.

guate is reminding me of bosnia! how odd, you know? but i think it´s the cobbled streets, and the laundry hanging up to dry everywhere, and the old cement of the houses paired with the occasional shiny new door, and the wood smoke, and the little tiny stores selling curious junk food. the graffiti i don´t understand.

angel took my photo today to go up on the board of volunteers. it´s a whiteboard, and i was sad that i didn´t have an information card up there, so i drew one, with a little smiley face where my photo ought to go. nieto asked my name (nieto is patricio atkinson´s adopted son), and i pointed at my ¨¨card¨¨ and said, i´m ruth, don´t you recognize me? teasing him. and he went, ahhh it´s the smile. hahaha.
i met two dutch volunteers! geraldine and mijlaan. i talked to geraldine about pannekoeken, because they were making fresh tortillas in the cocina this morning, and she always has a hard time with them, because the dough is different. i got one fresh, though... it was delicious. tortillas come fresh to rosa´s door every morning, from some mayan women who walk around selling them. yummmm.

LOVE YOU!

ruth

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