The Legendary Guate Story

Unfortunately during our field base training I have come down with a severe sore throat and a cold. I didn’t get to join the group today, but I have had an awesome trip. You never realize how many friends you have until you become sick. Everyone has been trying help me get well and asking me if I need anything. We traveled through the mountains to Huehuetenango. It was such a beautiful trip seeing the mountains with volcanoes in the distant background. The first day we visited a volunteer outside of Huehue who works for the municipal government there. Afterwards we had a dance competition between all of us in the group. There were two main dance competitions and on the first one Mary and I got second, but on the second one we took first. That’s right Drewski is learning salsa moves.
Now it comes to the legendary Drew story that is floating around Guatemala. All of my friends here know this story and ask me again and again to retell it. It may be a little gross or inappropriate for the entire internet to see… but it is to damn funny to stay here in Guate.

So there I was one morning just like any other ready for a fun filled day at the training center. I stepped one foot onto the street when… my stomach started turning like crazy and I knew I had to get the bathroom not now but RIGHT NOW. Got to the bathroom and did my deed and to set the scene I better describe the bathroom. We don{t have a door but rather a curtain and a chicken screams as it lays eggs every morning while I do my business. As I was nearing the end of my NUMBER 2 I heard these little foot steps moving rather quickly. Suddenly the curtain was ripped to the side and my little 3 year old brother Jarol was screaming at me. { Andrés Andrés YO TENGO QUE POPA.} He said it about three times telling me that Drew Drew I have to go poopy. At this point I am really embarrassed because my little brother needs to use the toilet but there was no getting me off that puppy. I was trying to tell him {Espere por favor Jarol.] {please wait Jarol.} But the poor little guy just couldn’t and before I knew it he said Andres Estoy popando {Drew I am pooping} then as he was pooping his pants he started to cry hysterically. At this point I am still sitting on the toilet thinking that this couldn’t get any worse when my mom came from around the corner only to see me taking a poop and her son crapping his pants. She picked him up and took him to the neighbors house to finish his job. I walked as quickly as possible to class and laughed the entire day as I told my friends.

I love being here in Guatemala and this maybe one of the best times of my life. Sorry if you thought the story was gross, but everyone here seems to laugh pretty hard. Even my Spanish professors who have nick named me {Señor Rompe Corazón Bigote.} Which means the Mustache Wearing Heart Breaker cause they think because of my dance moves and mustache I am going to break many Guatemalan girls hearts. That we will have to see.

Take care,
Drewski

Please don't make fun of the Fire Truck

More pics later

Here is dad ready to kill a chicken.
Please vote on the Gaute Stache.
Kloz will be happy to know I am dancing to "Jump On it" on the bottom pic.

Killing in the Name of...

Well…

I should start off the blog for today by stating that I am in fact growing a Guatemalan Mustache. I have about a week’s growth and well… it is mostly hideous. Pictures coming soon and I want everyone to rate the stache and vote if it should stay or go.

My independence day started out with my most unusual Peace Corps experience yet. I was woken up by the sound of 9 chickens screaming for their life as my host dad ROCAEL was yelling “Púchica.” I then learned that on Friday we were going to kill these chickens and start preparing them for the birthday party I am about to attend. Now I have hunted most of my life with Grandpa and Dad so I thought to myself how bad could this be…

Well the process started out like the Rocky Movie where Rocky has to chase the chicken around to build up his speed. After 5 minutes of chasing around a single chicken it was my job to hold onto the wings. As I held onto the wings Rocael tied a piece of string onto the leg and then the rest of the string was tied onto the fence. He then twisted the neck of the chicken and gave me the signal to let go. As I let go the chicken would fall and hang upside down. While the chicken was hanging upside down it would start to freak out and flop all over the place with its neck twisted. As it became more freaked out with it’s head twisted eventually it would pop it’s head right off it’s body. If you are having a difficult time understanding I don’t blame you but I was lucky enough to do this nine times.

After the heads popping off Rocael and I went to the streets to watch the celebration. It was so much fun to see all of the kids dancing. I am not making fun but it was kind of comical to see the Guatemalan fire truck leading the parade. We are talking a 1985 Ford Mini van painted green with a red light on the top. They had a huge town dance that I attended later in the night. Two different Guatemalan girls asked me to dance, but the looked like they were 16 years old maybe so I decided just to watch.

In the next couple of days I hope to show pictures of the Parade, Birthday Party, and best of all the Assassination of the Chickens.

Take care,

Drewski

Día de Independencia

Let me take you through some of my nicknames here in Guate. Sad to say that I am not Drewski and that is sad for me. Well… it has become apparent to the other Municipal Development volunteers that I have a love for making maps. The programs that they use here are ArcMap and ArcView. In honor of me being a huge Geography Geek my friend Megan has started calling me ArcDrew. Lot’s of people make fun of the way I say my O´s so several people are calling me a Hoser or Dakoohhhta. Maybe the best is that since there are two Andrews in our group I am called Andresito with translates to Little Andy.
September 14, 2006 what an excellent time to be in Guatemala. Tomorrow is Independence Day here in Guate and the celebration is huge. I like it almost more here compared to the 4th of July because of the participation of the youngsters. Every grade from the school has a marching band and they dance through the streets. They have been practicing everyday we have been here and it is fun to actually see them march now. Last night I went with the family to a school play in honor of the Día de Independencia.
Tonight we have to say goodbye to one of our fellow trainees. He was a great trainee and much fun to hang out with, unfortunately because of family matters he must return to the US. I definitely wish him the best and that he can return to Peace Corps Guatemala again someday.
Tomorrow we have a much needed day off and it should be interesting to take in the cultural experience.
Still having a blast here!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Take care,

Drewski

Pics of the kids

Ok so these are my cousins. From front to back Anderso, Christin, and Emilia. I want Kloz to know I taught them the Apache Jump On It dance.

This is Jarol who is my little shadow. Consuelo said whenever I leave the house he whines that he can't come with me. We hang out all the time.

I eat lunch everyday with Jarol and Anderso. Check out Jarol's KoolAid Stache. They remind me so much of my cousin Nick and I. They are the same age and a blast to hang out with. I give them "Vueltas"

I have a challenge for all of you. First of all thank you so much for the comments and it is one of the most exciting parts of my day usually. My challenge is for you all to see the movie “El Norte.” It is a movie in Spanish with English subtitles. The movie depicts the life of two Guatemalans that dream of life in the U.S. and stop at nothing to get there. I hope that you can not look at the movie thinking about Inmigration opinions but rather just to see what life is like here in Guatemala and how people dream about having the things that so many Americans take for granted. A toilet that flushes, your own car, a lawn, or whatever else it may be…

I won my basketball game yesterday. Many more of my fellow trainees came to watch so that was fun for me. I must say that I did feel a little bit bad though… This short Guatemalan dude drove the lane for a layup and I absolutely swatted his shot into next week. We are talking an Amy Anderson Volleyball spike on him, the crowd kid of went “OOOHHHHHH” but my Peace Corps crew was screaming “YYYYEAAAHHHH.”

It is so funny how everything is shrunken down here. I went into the restroom of a bathroom the other day and started to laugh – the toilets are almost like they were in grade school with them being so low to the ground. Also then when you go to wash your hands the sinks are way lower like at the height of you knees. My friend Jacob and I were discussing that how when you watch a basketball game here One guy might stand out as being super tall… but when I stand next to him we are the same height. For the first time in my life I am taller than average. YESSSS EAT THAT AMY.

Take care,

Drewski

OK ONE MORE PHOTO

This is Jarol and Roy. Roy is my other brother here in Guatemala and has a birthday next week. Should be a fun one.

I

Hello

We are all starting to gel really well here. There have been some intense games of volleyball after training hours, and to make my sister proud lots of people have been impressed by my skills. Josh asked me if I honed my skills on the beach volleyball circuit of Dakotas. I wish you could all be here to see how much we laugh and give each other a hard time. My fellow trainees have been making fun of my South Dakota accent. Didn’t even know I had one, but yah doooon’t yah knooooow ; Oh yah ya betcha.
Yesterday a group of us went to Antigua for a little getaway. It was so much fun to hear stories about similar experiences of trying to keep the Guatemala food under control and not visit el Baño multiple times a day. I probably should send the stories in an email because they are quite grotesque but also hilarious.
I can’t believe that I haven’t even written about Bill in this blog. At staging in D.C. I met Bill and we are not sure on Bill’s age but he has a shirt that says “70 isn’t old… If you are a tree,” and he told us it was an old shirt. When I met him I thought to myself isn’t this cool that this nice older man wants to serve in the Peace Corps. After visiting with him we all learned that this was Bill’s fifth time serving in Peace Corps Guatemala. Today Bill leaves us to go to his site to work already and we will definitely going to miss his profound wisdom on this experience and about life in general. My favorite quote from Bill was “In Guatemala you can’t trust your farts.” That might be one of the funniest things I had ever heard.

Take care,

Drewski

For Uncle Mike

For all of you to understand today’s blog entry I must first tell a story. In Montana this summer while visiting family I came across an unusual book in my Uncle Mike’s (who also served in the Peace Corps) truck. It was a book and a tape on how to learn Spanish rapidly. I was quite intrigued by this so I asked Uncle Mike “Please speak a little Spanish to me.” My Uncle Mike responded with simply one phrase “FFFEEEEEE” which is how you pronounce the letter “F” in Spanish. Since that moment the big joke in my family is to say the Spanish letter of “F” to each other.

So yesterday in my Spanish class to take a break we played the game HANGMAN. Surely all of you remember the game hangman where you guess a letter that is in the secret word. When it came to my turn and the teacher asked me to guess a letter. Funny enough I looked at her and proudly said “FFFEEEEE.” I could only chuckle as I thought of goofy Uncle Mike.

I am still having a blast here in Guatemala. They use the voz form for those of you that are interested. My favorite new Spanish word is “Púchica” which is like saying “Shoot” in English. It is a good way to express your feelings without saying a vulgar word. Today the kids and I danced to Michael Jackson in my room. I took some pictures which I hope to share with you soon.

Well take care,

Drewski

Best game in Guatemala

Oh the basketball game…

Well, as I was writing my last blog entry my friend and fellow volunteer Mary was also in the computer lab. She lives with a family right by the basketball court so I invited her to come watch me play. It was neat as I looked up and saw her and her family there to watch me. It reminded me so much of High School days of my family coming to watch me play.

I better give you a setting.

The basketball court is a cement area with puddles all over it because we are in the middle of the Rain season. There are two small lights equivalent to flashlights that light the court at night. In one of the corners there is a stair case, which dangerously enough a chapine (a chapine is a Guatemalan) went flying down during the game. And to top everything off there is a decent sized crowd there. Wasn’t sure what I got myself into.

When I got there I learned that Rocael doesn’t play, but he is the director and ref of the basketball league. He introduced me to my teammates and I was ecstatic to learn there was another gringo on the team. Seth is a missionary who has lived in Guatemala for 3 years. He could possibly be the whitest man in the entire country; it was fun to visit with him because he is from Minnesota and knows pretty much exactly how I feel here. We are practically neighbors in the US!!! He told me our team started with 15 guys and last night I made five. ¨”Lots of people have quit” he told me. ¨”Oh and by the way tonight we play the toughest team in the league.”

I looked to the other side of the court to find a group of 12 chapines that were around 20 years old. The team was extremely athletic and had a very serious coach. Our team had myself, Seth, and three chapines that looked as if the should be playing soccer instead. Right away I knew that this was going to be difficult and I wanted so badly for all my boys from our intramural basketball team there.

To start off the game I had a couple of steals and a three pointer with several cheers from Mary and her family. I was really having fun. We were down one point at half time. The game stayed really close the entire way, and I must say that I handled myself fairly well with my teammates who had no background in basketball besides watching it on TV. The other team was really cocky and so it was fun to be in a game so close with them.

Devastation sets in…

With 30 seconds left we were down by one point. I got a rebound and passed the ball the entire court to Seth who was wide open for a lay-up. Sadly he missed it and the other team got the ball. As they brought the ball up one of my chapine teammates stole the ball and went the entire length of the court. As he shot it the buzzer rang and he missed the shot… but he got fouled!!!!!! All he had to do was make one of the two free throws and we went into overtime. This was maybe the most exciting thing I have been involved with for quite a while. As my teammate took aim he was shaking he was so nervous. He missed the first free throw to the right so bad he didn’t even hit the backboard. OH MY I THOUGHT. So what does he do??? He moved all the way over to the left side of the free throw line, sadly he missed the second free throw even worse.

So the other team won. I wasn’t really mad because I had so much fun. More importantly then winning I made a new friend in Seth. He said he could help get a cell phone or anything I needed. He also said any time I wanted to go to Antigua and visit I was very welcome. After the game Mary and I visited with her family for about 2 hours telling jokes and sharing laughs. All in all it was a great night.

Take care,

Drewski

Exercise, Exercise, Exercise

Everything is still going well!!!

Last night was really fun. I busted out the card game UNO. After nearly 25 minutes of deliberation and explanation we all figured out how to play the game. My little brother Roy won two games, the dad won one game, and the gringo (ME) also won a game. Afterwards Rocael and I watched the Astros/Mets game and played with the kids.

After Spanish class today (yes that’s right I had Spanish class on a Saturday from 7:30 to 11:30, but I really like it and am learning a lot) ten of us participated in a soccer match. After about five maybe four minutes all of us thought our chests would explode. Take into account that soccer is a sport of endurance along with the fact that we are all up in the mountains. However, we persevered and my team ended up overcoming a 3 goal deficit to win 10 to 9. YEAHHHHHHH!!!!!

After soccer and lunch the family and I went to Antigua. What a beautiful place and I was very happy to find out there is a McDonalds and Burger King there.

In one hour Rocael and I have our Basketball game. Wish me luck.


Take care,


Drewski