Last day at La Selva

Today has been really emotional as we spent our last day at the school.

The children spent the whole of the morning session finishing their posters on the ozone layer, deforestation, water pollution, litter, noise pollution and smog. They were so brilliant, and really enjoyed it. Once again I had to fight back the urge to train as a primary school teacher when I get home!!!!

At the end of the day, T and I received little pressies with a terribly formal speech given by 2 of the children. We were really touched, and will keep our pressies for ever! I always feel so strange when I see children here. It's that knowledge that I won't ever see them again, and I'll never know what happened to them and how their lives turned out. The future of Guatemala is uncertain, although I hope that the atrocities of the civil war will never be repeated, it's hard to know what exactly will happen. There are so many challenges here, and I wonder how they will be overcome. But then, I mustn't underestimate the power of the human spirit.

In the meantime, strikes are continuing to protest against the Central American Free Trade Agreement, and our teacher Olga, is becoming concerned about money as the strikes go on next week.

With only 5 days left in Xela, wandering around the streets has also become an emotional experience. Xela feels like a comfy jumper that I don't want to take off. There's so much here to love, especially the people. I love the people on my bus in the morning to La Selva. There are the man and woman that sit at the back, giggling as though they are lovestruck teenagers, and the man that shouts out every time we go over a bump, there are the other 2 teachers at the school - they were profuse in their thanks for our help today, and promised us that the door of the school will always be open for us. Then there's the driver with his big smile and even bigger leather hat, and his assistant, the guy that's always running up and down the ladder and carrying peoples luggage and livestock onto the roof while the bus is moving! And all the people in the villages that wave at us as the bus chuggs up the dirt road, turning up clouds of dust into the sunshine.

It's going to be really odd to be back in the UK, although part of me is really looking forward to it. I love going away, but I always love coming home too. But before that, we have a week and a half of doing terribly tourist things with T's brother and his pal that are coming to visit us. They will arrive on Sunday, and it will be so lovely to see them. A confusing part of our other lives thrusting into this one! On Tuesday we're doing a 3 day hike to Lake Atitlan, one of the most beautiful places in the world I'm told. After this we are travelling to Antigua, and then flying to Tikal to see the Mayan ruins. After this it's back to Antigua, and then flying home on 14th April. We'll arrive, dazed and confused and very short on sleep on 15th.

Six months gone!

It feels like Autumn!

Today on the bus to La Selva it felt as though autumn was in the air! I have seen several thunderstorms flickering over the mountains from my home in Xela, and travelling up into the mountains this morning, the rainfall is evident. The dusty roads have gone, and the fields are studded with luminous green shoots pushing through the volcanic soil. Most of these crops are maize - a very important crop around here. Everyone seemed to be out in the fields this morning, working with these enormous tools that I hadn't seen before I came here, enormous hoe-like things for turning the soil over into big mounds.

It's lovely to see the life coming back into the earth after so many months of parched dryness. From here on in it just gets better I guess.

But this is my last week in Xela, and my last 3 weeks in Guatemala, so it's not possible to feel totally happy. The children are as lovely as ever, and the villagers as friendly. This morning T and I were dragged into someone's house and force-fed plantanes. Have you ever had one? When I first came to Guatemala I really liked them, but now the novelty has worn off, and eating one is quite a challenge (although I'm sure I would have happily devoured one on Saturday, now I have returned to my normal eating habits, I really can't face them). It's something between a potato and a banana. It's not sweet or soft enough to eat raw, so they are served cooked, but there's something about them that I really don't like. Eeek! I hope I didn't cause too much offence by eating hardly any of mine.

This morning we set the children off an a science project, making posters using information on various environmental issues that T and I have put together in our no doubt confusingly bad spanish (yes, we're brainwashing them to be environmentalists from an early age!). It was quite interesting, as it's obviously the first time they have had to do anything like this. Due to lack of resources and teacher time, all of the lessons are pretty old fashioned, with the teacher reading out of a text book and the children copying down random facts into theirs. (Incidentally, this reminds me of a piece of graffiti I read at university, which went "lectures are a means of transfering information from the notes of the lecturer to the notes of the student without it passing through the brain of either"). Tomorrow they will be putting their designs onto big poster paper and presenting them to the class - I can't wait! :o)

I'm also trying to make sure that the stuff we have done for the school at La Selva, (buying books and providing classroom assistance) carries on after we leave. To do this I have had to jump through a number of hoops provided by a local charity so that La Selva can become one of the schools it officially supports. My last remaining task is to get hold of a locking bookcase and transport it to the school. We have ordered the bookcase from a carpenter who promises it will be ready on Tursday (I will reserve judgement*), then somehow we have to get it from here in zone 1 to La Selva, on top of the chicken bus (with the chickens). Once we have done this, our task as far as the charity is concerned will be complete. I then need to put an advert in the local paper for volunteer teachers to replace us, and we can breathe a sort-of sigh of relief.

So if you fancy living in an absolutely gorgeous village in the mountains of Guatemala, with some of the poorest and friendliest people in the world, and some of the loveliest kids, in a place where the sun shines every single day, just drop me a line - you will be very warmly welcomed I promise.

*reserving judgement because for 3 months now we have been trying to get a plumber to fix a leak in the kitchen. The last one came 3 weeks ago. He said he was popping out for 5 minutes to get a part, and we haven't seen him since. This is pretty par for the course in Guatemala, so I'm asking my angels for a miracle that this bookcase will actually be ready when the bloke said it would be.

Mmmmmmmmmmm it's just started raining here, and that beautiful smell is pouring through the open doors filling my nostrils. I love the rain so much! :o)

The Fast is over!

Just a quick note to say I survived!!! There are 2 reasons I didn't blog yesterday
a) It was good Friday, and almost everything was closed including all the internet cafes
b) I felt as close to death as I have ever felt! I could barely drag myself out of bed!!!

You know how they say you should never go shopping on an empty stomach? Well, as it's semana santa weekend we dragged ourselves up to Paiz - the big out of town supermarket - the only place that was open, to buy food for breaking our fast. This with 11 hours to go until we could eat!! Imagine the trauma! I don't think I have ever filled my shopping trolley with so much sugary rubbish! But also loads of delicious fruit and vegetables!

We broke our fast last night with a watermelon licuado, and then snuck off to our room to feast on mini mars bars and muslei bars - very much against Johns recommendations for breaking a fast. My trusty stomach was reliable as ever though, and totally untroubled by 5 days of emptiness. It was happy to accept all I could pack into it!

Today has been a day of blissful solidarity among the fasters as we all rant about how amazing tomatoes and lettuce taste, and how olive oil is the most beautiful thing in the world.

Would I repeat the five day fast again?

Not on your life!

Fast day 4

Hours since eating - 87

I'm in my least favourite, but nearest to my house internet cafe. Least favourite for 2 reasons:

a) It has a pub/cafe downstairs, which serves the most enormous and delicious pizzas
b) There are frequently cockroaches crawling over the keyboard whilst I type.

But today I´m lucky, it's too early for the smell of pizzas to drive me wild, and the cockroaches seem to have disappeared.

Well, today I'm feeling remarkably chipper. This morning I led the 7am yoga class, and everyone said I was really good, so I'm feeling really great. I would love to do a morning yoga class followed by breakfast back home in Leeds. I think it would be really nice. I wonder if anyone would come!?

Some of the fasters are feeling depressed and weak today, but for me it's my best day so far. Although I'd be hard pushed to do a 5k run, I'm feeling really alive. My body feels healthy and lithe, and my mind feels quite clear and sharp. All the things that John the yoga teacher said we would feel on the fourth or fifth day. It's great.

Although I have a strong desire for food, it wouldn't be correct to say that I'm ravenously hungry. I can tell the difference now between stomach hunger and brain hunger. It's definitely brain hunger - the desire for the pleasure of food, and to be doing all the food type things like cooking and shopping - that I have today. I think that this has been a valuable lesson learnt.

What else? Xela is deathly quiet and very beautiful. As I mentioned before, it's semana santa, easter week, and many of the businesses are closed. The streets are quite deserted too. T and I just walked up to the video shop in zone 3. Some of the fasters are going crazy wondering how to pass the rest of the time until they can eat again. We decided to get the Lord of the Rings trilogy to while away 9 hours! This is great for me as I can disappear into an Aragorn frenzy. However, when we got to the video shop, they needed about 15 telephone numbers, a passport, proof of address etc before they would rent us a DVD, it´s ok to get a video cassette though. No problem. We found the Lord of the Rings and paid for it. Then discovered that unlike most films here, which are in English and with Spanish subtitles, this one is in Spanish with no subtitles. So now we have 9 hours of Spanish practise too! Cool!

If you're interested, here's how Trevor and I plan to spend our next 3 days of eating:

1) friday 8pm, official end of fast, watermelon and water in the blender (here these drinks are hugely popular, they are called licuados and I adore them)

2) Saturday 8am, watermelon and banana licuado

3) Saturday lunchtime, salad with spinach, raw broccoli and tomatoes

4) Saturday evening, a tofu burger with hummous on the side at Casa Babylon (groovy cafe in the middle of town), disgusting amounts of tomoto ketchup slathered everywhere

5) Sunday morning, TOAST (oh God, the smell of it drives me crazy) with honey

6) Sunday lunchtime, massive blow out for all the fasters at El Alquimista, a fabulous veggie cafe on the hillside overlooking Xela. They do salads, curries, veggie burgers and chocolate truffles to die for, and I possibly will!

Fast day three

Hours since i last ate: 60

I feel really, absolutely, completely terrible. So weak that it took all I had to struggle here and write to you (but I thought I had better do it or you might assume that I had died!). I actually don´t feel very far from death, not in a melodramatic way, but in a kind of passive accepting way. Of course, deep down I know that I´m not going to die, and that the day after tomorrow I can eat, which isn´t so bad after all. I´m just over half way through the fast, and I plan to spend the rest of the day and night asleep.

We´re supposed to do 2 hours of exercise per day during this fast, presumably to help with fat burning and therefore the release of toxins stored there. But I just can´t face it today. I also can´t face taking my molasses or psyllium husks (or whatever they are called) I wish I could because they take the edge of the hunger, and provide some bit of nutrition and cleansing. But right now even the thought of taking anything but water makes me feel horribly nauseous.

Allegedly, tomorrow I will stop feeling hungry and start feeling really good. THat means that today is the last of the horrible days. I hope so. This is the most unpleasant sensation I have voluntarily undertaken. If I wasn´t part of a supportive group of 6, I would have quit by now. If it was just T and I, we would be feasting on an enormous breakfast, throwing all thoughts of fasting happily to the wind. But as it is we would feel like failures, and letting the group down, so we carry on. The other day I wanted to complete the fast more than I wanted to eat. Now it´s very much the other way round.

I can feel the day 3 headache kicking in, so I´m going to sign off here.

If there´s no entry tomorrow, it´s because I am refusing to get out of bed!

Fast day 2

It's 39 hours since I last ate.

John warned us that today and tomorrow are likely to be the most horrible days of the fast, with things like headaches, stomach cramps and irritability. I seem to be doing remarkably well, apart from throwing up my vitamin tablet this morning (too much on an empty stomach, I'll take the vitamins after I come off the fast). I managed to do the 7am yoga class, and then go to spanish school and study for an hour or so wihthout feeling especially brain dead. Now I'm here, sharing my fasting experiences with everyone.

I think the boredom is the worst thing. As soon as I got home yesterday I felt like I was in the big brother house - and it sucked. All the fasters were just lying around, some doing jigsaw puzzles, others competing in the freecell tournament, juggling or reading. Although I don't object to these things per se, doing them to kill 5 days is a very different sensation to doing them as a relaxation or break in between doing something else more productive.

Yesterday afternoon I suddenly became utterly miserable and dispondent, feeling as though pretty much most of my life has been a disaster, and what the hell am I doing sitting in a room full of gringos in Guatemala? I was also really distressed about what I'm going to do for a job when I get back home, and maybe it was a really big mistake to waste 6 months of my life coming here.

Looking back on this, I see that all these thoughts are really freakish, and not the sort of things that usually trouble me at all.

The days seem really long also because of the lack of food, I don't mean that I am miserable and weak because I'm not eating. Doing this fast makes me realise what an enormous proportion of my life is spent thinking about food, like planning what I'm going to have for dinner, buying food, preparing it, eating it, clearing up after eating it. I'm not actually hungry anymore, but about 2o times a day I think, "hmmm, what shall I do? I know, I'll make a sandwich!" And then I remember that I'm on a fast, so I can't make a sandwich (well, I could, but I couldn't eat it!), and then I have to find something else to do, and that's when I feel bored and miserable.

There is so much pleasure for me surrounding the whole food thing. I love everything about it:

1) there's the taste (obviously)
2) then there's the smell, that wonderful mouth-watering smell that tells you that this meal is the most beautiful you have ever prepared, and eating it is going to be the most amazing experience you have had to date
3) the social thing - how much do I love sharing a meal with friends, or taking my Mum and Dad out for a really wonderful meal??!
4) shopping for food, especially yummy fresh fruits and vegetables, interesting spices and seeds, and of course chocolate it's a pleasure that I spend enormous amounts of my time indulging in.

So here I am with 3 more days to fill, and I really don't know how to do it. I don't feel as though I can't go without food for 5 days - and I want to complete the fast more than I want to eat. It's jus the prospect of 5 days doing so little. This week being semana santa, everything is closed, and there's no voluntary work to be done, and very little paid work to be done either. I don't want to go home! Perhaps I'll just sleep!

5-day fast

It's half past nine on Sunday morning. The sun is shining, but it's not too hot yet, and the streets are quiet. I love Xela like this. It's also the beginning of semana santa, saints week, which leads up to Easter. This is a really big celebration in Guatemala, and all the businesses and schools are closed this week for the party. There will be lots of beautiful processions and stuff going on in all of the towns and villages too. This is the week that most people choose to visit Guatemala, although most of the tourists are in Antigua, a city just outside the capital, that is really beautiful.

Tomorrow is also the first day of the house 5-day fast, and I´m feeling a little nervous. Today we are eating less than normal, and then tomorrow we start properly. We are going to have 7 "meals" per day, alternating between a colon-cleansing bentonite clay stuff, and molasses, cayenne pepper and orange juice (or something). There are 5 of us doing the fast altogether, and already we feel like a group of close friends that are going to support one another through the fast.

Here's what I have learnt about fasting:

1) all major religions and cultures recommend some kind of fasting

2) fasting, together with the use of abrasives such as the bentonite are really good for cleaning out years worth of debris that allegedly accumulate in the colon, apparently we can expect to produce some amazing poops!

3) Our bodies work really hard all the time processing and digesting food. During a fast, the body takes a rest from this activity and can work on other things like repairing damaged bits.

4) After the third day of fasting, the sensation of hunger ceases

5) Fasting is a really good time for meditation and spiritual stuff

6) It's really difficult because even when you stop feeling hungry, all the other social and habitual aspects of eating and preparing food have to be dealt with.

7) I can expect to go through feelings of anger, depression, worthlessness, and tearfulness.

8) On around the 4th day of fasting, I may feel healthier, clearer, more focussed and better than I have ever felt in my life

Luckily for me I don't have to get up at 4.30 to go to La Selva and teach this week, as it's semana santa! Most of the fasters will be staying home, meditating, doing yoga and taking part in all the activities that we have prepared to while away the hours of misery. These include a Freecell tournament, a Dali jigsaw puzzle, millions of South Park videos, and a pooh competition. I'll also be going to work at the Language School, although I've warned them that my brain might not be up to much.

I wonder how I'll do? To be honest, I can't imagine going without food for 5 days, but I am quite interested. Obviously people manage to do it all the time, and as far as I know, I'm not much different from the average person. I wonder if my relationship with food will change as a result? I wonder if I'll achieve spiritual enlightenment (ok, probably not!).

What else? I'm going to try and come here each day and write how the fast is going. Maybe I can publish some photos of me in various states of misery and distress (grin).

Whistle blowing and CAFTA

2 weeks ago, the president ordered a big operation in the capital city, whereby hundreds of gang members and leaders were caught and arrested. Gang activity is one of the big problems of Guatemala city, and is probably responsible for the horrific number of murders that occur there every day. A rumour is circulating around Xela that one of the gangs has come here, and there is a lot of fear among the residents of the city that the problems of the capital may be replicated here.

The residents of Xela have not taken this lightly. Knowing that they can´t rely on the police to do anything they have organised themselves into taking action. Each person in Xela has been issued with a whistle, and at 10am, 2pm, 5pm, 7pm and 11pm everyone comes out of their houses and blows their whistles. This is a warning to anyone thinking of making trouble that there are a lot of angry residents with baseball bats and other things that aren't going to take any messin'. If anything kicks off, the blowing of the whistles at any other time is an instruction for everyone to get their baseball bats and get out onto the streets.

Although it's a bit depressing that there is the perceived need for this action, it always warms my heart when people actually get together as communities and do things to help one another. I was on my way to spanish class at 2pm when the whistling started. It was defeaning! I could hear whistles being blown from every direction! It was quite cool!

This week has also seen huge protests in the capital about something else - the Central American Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA). You may already have heard of NAFTA, the North American equivalent. Essentially, these agreements, brokered by the USA (who else?) have been put forward to ensure that the USA has access to markets for its products across Central and South America, without any restrictions in place. Why is it so important we wonder that the USA should be persuing this agreement so agressively, when Guatemala and the other Central American countries are small, poverty stricken, and therefore not large markets for American produce? Another important part of CAFTA is that it will allow US companies to set up in Central American countries, taking advantage of the cheap labour and lax environmental legislation in these countries. This is not only bad news for the inhabitants of Guatemala, but also for workers in the US. Companies relocating to countries such as Guatemala will be quick to get rid of their expensive US labour force and replace them with cheap Guatemalan counterparts. The fact that Guatemala for example has virtually no environmental protection measures, will allow US companies to produce goods at astonishingly low cost without soiling their own back yards. This idea makes me, and several million inhabitants of Central American countries very angry indeed.

Canadian-based Glamis Gold provides a perfect example of the sort of thing we are going to see more of if CAFTA becomes a working policy. In 2003 the Portillo government granted Glamis Gold a mining license without conducting the obligatory consultation of the local indigenous communities - something that is required by international law. The World Bank has approved a $45 million loan to Glamis to finance their operations in Guatemala. Despite its own guidelines stating that: before investing in extractive industries, there must be broad community support and the project should clearly help alleviate poverty.

The extraction of gold requires the use of cyanide, which everyone knows is a very nasty chemical that causes you to die of suffocation. The indigenous communities living in the area of the proposed mine are rightly concerned that leachate from the mines will contaminate their land and water, making their lives there untenable.

In terms of the agreement brokered between the goverment and the Glamis Gold, Glamis has agreed to give ONE PERCENT of its profit to Guatemala, whilst pocketing the remaining 99% for itself and its shareholders (hardly a project that clearly helps to alleviate poverty). For the purposes of comparison, similar investments in Chile and Cuba have resulted in a 40 - 50% share in the profits between the company and the country.

Recently, angry clashes between the police and local people have resulted as locals blockaded roads that were being used to transport mining equipment to the site. One local farmer was killed during the protests. The current president, Oscar Berger has said that he will involve the military if protests continue, saying "we must protect our investments".

If you would like to do something to help the local people fight the might of the Glamis Gold and the Guatemalan "goverment", please visit the site below to see what can be done.
http://www.rtfcam.org/take_action/guatewb.htm

The rainy season approaches

It's lovely to see the weather changing! For the first time in ages we are beginning to see clouds forming, and even bursts of rain as we move towards the rainy season.

In response, the tired and thirsty fields are beginning to become green again, with fresh grases and big red flowers popping up in the hedgerows.

I really love my journey to La Selva now, even though it's quite long, bumpy and dusty. As I mentioned before, the same people get on the bus every morning to go to work, so it's really lovely. There's just T and I, and one other gringo on the bus - we stick out like sore thumbs with our giant statures and pale skin.

That reminds me, I had a freaky incident in the market yesterday. Not really that freaky, but just a bit odd. I was walking around in a dream state looking at all the vegetables and I passed a man leaning against a wall. He reached out and stroked my wrist!! My first thought was that he had smeared something horrible on it, but when I got round the corner I looked and he hadn't. I think he just wanted to touch my freaky pale skin!!!

Easter approaches, and I'm looking forward to seeing all the celbrations here. As this is such a catholic country it promises to be quite a celebration, with processions and celebrations everywhere. Something interesting/amusing I've been meaning to describe for ages are the religious placcards that adorn every shop and business place I've seen. Almost every one has a sign that says something along the lines of 'may God bless this tienda, and everyone that buys their bread here', or 'this business is dedicated to the glory of God'. However, the best one I have seen is in all the chicken buses. They almost all have a sign that says 'God help us on this journey' I have added my own fervent prayers many times! It reminds me of a long-dead great-aunt of mine, who used to annoy my parents by insisting on saying a prayer before mum or dad started the engine of the car.

There's far more need for prayers here though, all in all I think it's a pretty sensible thing to do! One of my amusing chicken bus stories happened on the way to Todos Santos. We were going down a really steep hill, and suddenly I could smell burning, and the bus was engulfed in smoke. The driver and conductor got out of the bus, took the wheels off, chucked a bucket of water on the brakes, and off we went! Ho hum, so many chicken bus stories and so little time! In fact, the first class buses aren't any better. The last one I travelled on had a bullet hole in the windscreen!

I may have told you that T and I are living in the 'Wellbeing House', with loads of yoga, no alcohol etc. Well, next week one of the members has proposed that we do a 5 day fast. Apparently this is supposed to be good for you, although I must confess I'm rather sceptical. Nevertheless I'm quite tempted to see whether I can do it or not. Even the prospect of going without food for a few hours fills me with horror. I wonder what will happen?

Well, that's about all my news for today!
H

View across the future basketball pitch, with the Las Rosas settlement behind. 

One of 6 classrooms that are being constructed. 

The future bathroom of the new school! 

Work on the new school is well underway. The lease on the old building is up in June, so these buildings need to be completed by then. Guadalupe invited me to the official opening in August! I wish I could go!!! 

Another classroom at the escuela 

When we went to make the donation to the director of the school, we were lucky enough to receive a tour of the old and the new school. Here, grade 4 (10 year olds) are having a reading class in the open air. Guatemalan children love to have their photo taken, and although you might think we have been friends for months, I had only met these children 2 minutes before hand! Guadalupe, the director of Escuela de la Calle is pictured at the back of the group. 

The surrounding neighborhood of Las Rosas. This is one of the poorest areas of Xela, and many of the city's most vulnerable live in this region. 

The current school/house that holds Escuela de la Calle. 

School children at Escuela de la Calle. This school is funded entirely by donations, principally from Save the Children, and Xela's Quetzaltrekkers. The school gives free education to street children, and those that are in danger of taking to life on the streets. Currently the school is located in 2 houses, but is embarking on plans to construct a purpose-built school, which will serve the pupils and staff much better.

Blueprint plans for the new school in Las Rosas, a deprived urban area in Xela. Thanks to a donation from back home, we have been able to make a significant contribution to this project.

Another picture of Las Rosas. In common with the rest of Xela, this area is roamed by packs of ferile dogs. I have never seen any evidence of them troubling humans, but the number of them is amazing. The biggest pack I have seen was a group of about 12. They live quite good lives scavenging on litter and avoiding cars!

Teaching at La Selva Primary School

I have had such a lovely day! Just being in La Selva and at the school makes me feel so lovely! (as well as utterly exhausted!). One of my objectives for this trip was to cry when I leave, and I know that it's definitely going to happen! The children are so lovely, and I'm feeling a bit sad and whistful. I will *never* see these children again. I will never know what becomes of them.

I often think this when I meet young children, but even more so here because I wonder what the future will be like for people that are growing up now. I hope that it will be better, and that progress will be made, but just now I feel strangely pessimistic. The rich countries know that to stay rich they need to keep countries like Guatemala poor, and the richer they are, the easier it is to keep other countries down.

I read today that the USA has given the Guatemalan military $32 million. WHY?? Imagine $32 million spent on food and development projects.

Teaching in La Selva primary school

Me and a pig in the village!

children in my class, holding the text books that we have been able to buy with donations from back home. If you are interested in making a donation, please contact me for further info. 

Teaching in La Selva

I´m sitting in an internet cafe, nicely exhausted after a day (or to be strictly correct, a morning) ´s work. Since T and I have been back from Costa Rica, we have been working for 2 days a week at a rural primary school. It's fab! Our working day starts really early, as we have to get up at about quarter to 5, and to be at the house of one of the teachers by half past 5. From there it´s an eerie (is that how you spell it?) walk through the deserted street of Xela to the terminal Minerva bus station. This bus station is like nothing I have ever seen before, and I may have mentioned it before here. It doesn´t get light until about 10 past 6, and so we approach in the dark. There are huge piles of rubbish everywhere, many of which are on fire as people gather around for warmth. I'm never quite sure exactly who these people are. Perhaps they are the vendors that crowd around the buses as they pull in and out, selling things like newspapers, crisps, cold drinks and cooked food. Perhaps they are the busdrivers waiting to go on shift, or perhaps they are homeless people. I honestly don't know. In the dark it's difficult to tell. Our bus leaves at 10 past 6. There's only one bus up to the village of La Selva in the morning, and it's operated by the same driver and conductor every day, which is nice. There are also the same people on the bus every day, and we greet one another, peering bleary-eyed through the gloom. The first hour of the bus journey is comfy enough, and sometimes I manage to doze off as the sun climbs higher in the sky, and melts the frost on the ground. Once we reach the town of Palestina, the bus turns off onto a dirt road, and begins a slightly precarious ascent into the mountains where the village of La Selva nestles. We climb for about 45 minutes, turning up enormous clouds of dust. The country is so dry and parched here. I can almost hear the ground crying out for water. Everything is dusty brown, with hardly any green anywhere. It's really quite strange. A number of older people on the bus wear surgical masks to try and keep the dust out of their noses, and I think I might invest in one too! There are also a number of forest fires ranging in the Quetzaltenango region. None of them are close enough to Xela or La Selva for me to have actually seen one, but I have seen and read about them in the local paper. It seems that there is a real problem in fighting the fires. I guess for a lack of firefighting equipment like planes, and of course the lack of water. All of the rivers are dry. Anyway, at about quarter to 8 we are deposited outside the school gates in La Selva. The school was built by a charity called Inter Vida, which is a Spanish charity building schools all over Guatemala. Almost every rural school I have seen has an Inter Vida sign outside, and is painted is the custom Inter Vida blue and yellow. The school is nice enough. A brick building with three classrooms and an office. For more info about what InterVida does, visit http://www.intervidausa.org/ T and I help Olga teaching grades 4, 5, and 6. Olga usually teaches the 3 grades at once, with all the challenges that entails! T and I help with reading, maths, and science, and I teach them some english too. This experience at times makes me want to become a prinary school teacher, but then I remember that british children are evil, and it´s only Guatemalan kids that are this lovely, and well behaved, and enjoy being at school. I love their faces when I´m teaching them some English words, and they are all shouting them back to me, at the tops of their voices!! They are #so# lovely! School starts at around half 8, and continues until break at half past 10. At 11 it´s back into the classroom until half past 12. In the afternoon the children go back home and work with their parents, who are predominantly farmers. Today, when we tumbled off the bus, there was a man waiting outside the school gates with a pick up truck containing some boxes. These were the government supplies that Olga had told me about. The government is supposed to provide a snack to all school children, many of whom are poorly nourished, and don´t eat much in the morning. The delivery containing boxes of wafer biscuits and cornflakes. Apparently this delivery is received approximately once every 3 months, although the teachers complain that the supplies are insufficient to last that long. Today was certainly the first time I had seen any food provided by the school. The teachers complain that the government is corrupt and is stealing the funding for the school and using it for other purposes. I also wonder whether food gets lost along other parts of the supply chain. Who obtains the food? who distributes it? Who drives it to Xela? Who delivers it to each of the individual schools? With the poverty as it is here, what is the possibility of a little food being taken here and there to feed their own families? Last week, we were thrown in at the deep end, when Olga had to take one of the children home, and left us to teach the class for an hour and a half. It was kill or cure, but thankfully we survived (having planned an english and a science lesson - phew!!!). Who would have thought that I would be standing up in front of three classes of children, and teaching them in Spanish??? Bad Spanish, but Spanish nevertheless, I am quite chuffed! :o)