First and foremost, being able to use the internet at normal speed!! There is internet here, but the pace is more 1999 than 2010. For instance, to upload a picture to the website I have to first shrink it to 100 kb, and then there is still not guarantee that it will load. There will be a lot of retrospective posting from Guatemala because I have some breathtaking photos and I just can't bear to make them the size of peas.
I will not love the increased cost of all fruits and vegetables and the very limited selection. Or the idea that queso fresco is a luxury item. It's not... and it's delicious! (I may have had peas and queso fresco for dinner today... Mmmm).
This next year is going to be a whirlwind for me. I have a list of papers to write (5!) already, and anticipate adding a 6th. If I submit 5 papers this year, I better be getting a cake at the end of it! House selling, job-finding (applying! there's something I haven't done in a long time. I was 21 last time I was applying for a long term position. I'm going to be 30 in the spring.)
So what have I not blogged about that I should? Volcano. Volcano is definitely worth noting. There are many active volcanoes in Guatemala (something ridiculous like 10?). And several of them are very close to tourist towns where it is an afternoon's entertainment to scale one and take pictures next to flowing lava. Weeell... one of them decided it was tired of being a tourist destination and erupted in earnest. 25 miles from where I live. It promptly rained very small rocks. And now the entire place is covered in very small rocks (People call it "dust" but it's really a misnomer. This is big to be dust, it's rocks. Slightly too big to be sand as well.) So now that Guatemala city is covered in miniature black volcanic rocks, what do we do with them? The common solution appears to be put them in bags. Plastic bags, grain bags, paper bags...really doesn't matter. Bags are the answer. We have no option for removal, at least not in the whole city at the same time, so all of the street corners are covered in bags of rocks. When all the bags have been depleted from a region, people just make giant piles of volcanic debris on the sides of the roads or in the middle of the lawn and leave it there. Eventually it will integrate with the soil, but not yet!
And secondary to the volcano, Guatemala had its first tropical storm of the season. Moderate as far as tropical storms go, but we were right in the path and it lost most of its power (read: WATER) here. I happened to be away for the weekend and missed both of these natural disasters, but no worries, they saved the evidence! Since all of the mountains here are made of dirt, the roads cutting through the mountains were covered in mudslides, and several of the bridges were washed away by rains and flooded rivers. The city seems to have made out fairly well with one exception. The SINKHOLE. Please google. I'm sure the first hits will be Guatemala City. And yes for all you doubting Thomases...IT"S REAL.
There will be more updates once I am stateside next week about Guatemala and Belize and Tikal... but for now, just a post to say I'm alive and well in the land of natural disasters!
I will not love the increased cost of all fruits and vegetables and the very limited selection. Or the idea that queso fresco is a luxury item. It's not... and it's delicious! (I may have had peas and queso fresco for dinner today... Mmmm).
This next year is going to be a whirlwind for me. I have a list of papers to write (5!) already, and anticipate adding a 6th. If I submit 5 papers this year, I better be getting a cake at the end of it! House selling, job-finding (applying! there's something I haven't done in a long time. I was 21 last time I was applying for a long term position. I'm going to be 30 in the spring.)
So what have I not blogged about that I should? Volcano. Volcano is definitely worth noting. There are many active volcanoes in Guatemala (something ridiculous like 10?). And several of them are very close to tourist towns where it is an afternoon's entertainment to scale one and take pictures next to flowing lava. Weeell... one of them decided it was tired of being a tourist destination and erupted in earnest. 25 miles from where I live. It promptly rained very small rocks. And now the entire place is covered in very small rocks (People call it "dust" but it's really a misnomer. This is big to be dust, it's rocks. Slightly too big to be sand as well.) So now that Guatemala city is covered in miniature black volcanic rocks, what do we do with them? The common solution appears to be put them in bags. Plastic bags, grain bags, paper bags...really doesn't matter. Bags are the answer. We have no option for removal, at least not in the whole city at the same time, so all of the street corners are covered in bags of rocks. When all the bags have been depleted from a region, people just make giant piles of volcanic debris on the sides of the roads or in the middle of the lawn and leave it there. Eventually it will integrate with the soil, but not yet!
And secondary to the volcano, Guatemala had its first tropical storm of the season. Moderate as far as tropical storms go, but we were right in the path and it lost most of its power (read: WATER) here. I happened to be away for the weekend and missed both of these natural disasters, but no worries, they saved the evidence! Since all of the mountains here are made of dirt, the roads cutting through the mountains were covered in mudslides, and several of the bridges were washed away by rains and flooded rivers. The city seems to have made out fairly well with one exception. The SINKHOLE. Please google. I'm sure the first hits will be Guatemala City. And yes for all you doubting Thomases...IT"S REAL.
There will be more updates once I am stateside next week about Guatemala and Belize and Tikal... but for now, just a post to say I'm alive and well in the land of natural disasters!
2 comments:
why did this not register that you are there?!!? that sinkhole is crazy - i've been watching it all week, scared the earth is going to swallow me whole. Where does it go to? can you actually see the bottom of it? and that volcano -you should bring back some of the rocks! Hope you make it back to the US of A safe and sound.
I was thinking bringing some back actually! They're pretty cool... very tiny.
Sinkhole pictures that I have seen, the bottom seems to be water. I am thinking there's some type of underground river/lake under the city? (Great place to build, huh?) but it might be new-ish, because this has only happened once before (I think 3 years ago)
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