Happy 29th Birthday Belize!

I'm not sure if I have ever been so exhausted. Yesterday was Independence Day and San Ignacio was the place to be.

Every year there is a huge parade that goes all around Cayo. It's probably about 3 miles long total going in a huge circle from San Ignacio to Santa Elena and back. Our float consisted of the Women's Group, Youth Ambassador Program (my youth group), and the Volunteers. Our float had a huge set of speakers pumping out all the dancehall music.

Obviously we were all required to dance the whole time.

Myself and the YAP group spent their time passing out information on HIV/AIDS.

Four hours later we finally reach the end at Makal Park. The big Beliken tent was up and pretty every person from Cayo was was in the park. Luckily I live right across the street so my friend Jamie and I went to my house to bathe, mad a quick drink that involved red tang and rum (not too tasty), and headed back out to the party. We found our Belizean friends and danced for the next four hours or so.

I honestly believe that their is no funner place in the world then San Ignacio on Independence Day.

(Jamie, Ms Elise, and me)

(YAPpers Tracy, Gillian, and me)

(me and Jamie)

One Down.. One to Go

Welp, One year I've been living in Belize (minus vacation with the fam last week). The overwhelming majority of my time has been amazing. I can count the bad days on one hand. I'm looking forward to another year (hopefully) as good as the previous. While I do miss my friends and family I love living in Belize. I can't wait to share my experiences living here when I get my visitors this Christmas. The past year has flow by. I can't believe it!

Diablo Francisco Hernandez

Who knows how to make love stay?

1. Tell love you are going to Junior’s Deli on Flatbush Avenue in Brooklyn to pick up a cheesecake, and if love stays, it can have half. It will stay.
2. Tell love you want a memento of it and obtain a lock of its hair. Burn the hair in a dime-store incense burner with yin/yang symbols on three sides. Face southwest. Talk fast over the burning hair in a convincingly exotic language. Remove the ashes of the burnt hair and use them to paint a mustache on your face. Find love. Tell it you are someone new. It will stay.
3. Wake love up in the middle of the night. Tell it the world is on fire. Dash to the bedroom window and pee out of it. Casually return to bed and assure love that everything is going to be all right. Fall asleep. Love will be there in the morning.



Still Life With Woodpecker
by Tom Robbins

home, sweet home

Hey guys. A few people have asked for me to describe my living situation so I thought i would be easier to just post pictures...enjoy..

This is is the first thing you see when entering my house.. my living room

This is the view of the living room from the hallway


My bedroom is directly on the right of the hallway


My bathroom is in the middle of the hall




and the kitchen at the end

Easter in Antigua

Hola!

Well, I just got back from Antigua, Guatemala for Easter break. It was a great first vacation.

It started by meeting Heather and Tonia on the bus from Belmopan to Benque (Belize border town). That particular bus ride is only about 10 minutes for me since i'm so close. From there we took a 5 minutes taxi ride to the border of Belize and Guatemala. After we crossed the border and exchanged our money we crammed into a collectivo for the 2 hour ride from Melcor (Guatemala border town) to Flores.

Flores is a beautiful little island city in the middle of Guatemala. As soon as we got there we bought our bus tickets for later. We hung out in Flores for a couple hours just walking around and shopping. At 9pm we boarded our overnight bus to Guatemala City. It was a very long bus ride, about 9 hours, and I passed out in minute 5. So much for the huge book I brought for the ride. We got into the City around 6am and took another hour car ride from Guatemala City to Antigua.

It was a very long trip but really not too bad since I slept most of it.

As soon as we got to Antigua we checked into our hotel, The Black Cat Inn, and I passed out.


Antigua is known for having the biggest Easter celebration in the Americas. It was very big. All day long they had parades where men and women would walk the streets
with huge platforms with different religious figures on them. It was intense.








On Sunday Kristen, Heather, Tonia, and I toured Lake Atitlan. It was a beautiful lake. We went to three small communities surrounding the lake. It was so much fun.




It was a great vacation. I hope to get to spend more time in Guatemala.

Belizean Birthday!

So I'm now 23. I really think 23 is going to be my year. 23 is a much better number then 22. I don't like the double digits.

This year was possibly the best birthday I have ever had.

It started Saturday night. We had dinner at my favorite resturant in Cayo, Erva's. I had my favorite, fish fillet with veggie salad and potato. It was so delicious. I wish I had thought to take a picture of the group.

Afterwards we headed to the hotel (Tia Maria, the balcony is a great hangout spot) and drank for a bit before heading out to Faya Wata. We pretty much closed the place down drinking and dancing all night.

Sunday was my actual birthday and it was amazing. Two of my friends Jose and Tedren decided to give me a BBQ for my birthday. They did all the preparing and cooking. Unfortunately Tedren messed up his hand a couple days before and had to go to the Belmopan hospital and missed the BBQ.

It was a great BBQ. Probably about 25 people showed. The food was so good. We had BBQ chicken, bake beans, potato salad, and tortillas. We swam for a bit, ate a lot, and spent the rest of the time talking and enjoying each others company. For my birthday cake they made lemon pie. My favorite.

It was the perfect Belizean Birthday.


Francis

Jose

Good Touch, Bad Touch

About two weeks ago the teacher at San Ignacio Pre-School requested I do a 'Good touch, bad touch' presentation to her kids for their wellness week.


It was very interesting.

Erin (another CS volunteer) and I went over them and started the presentation.

First, we went over what a good touch is; a touch that makes you feel good or not uncomfortable. Like a hug or shaking hands. I asked the kids if they could give me an example of a good touch. One little girl raises her hand and says "if you touch your glasses, thats a good touch". She was were sunglasses at the time. Another little boy said "a good touch is to touch your hair"... I said that i suppose that's okay but we were really look for when you touch another person. Another girl raised her hand and said "a good touch is when you pet your cat"

When we finally moved on to a bad touch I described it as something that makes you feel uncomfortable, embarrassed, or upset. Like someone pushing you or touching your privet parts. I asked if someone could give me an example of a bad touch. The conversation went like this:

girl: "miss! a bad touch is if you're touched by a ghost!"
boy: "or a monster!"
girl: "miss! I dreamed about a ghost and it touched me!"
boy: "miss! I dreamed about race cars!"

In conclusion pre school is too young for the good touch bad touch conversation.

Caye Caulker

I know, I'm really late on writing this one but here it goes...

Last weekend, my friend and volunteer with Cornerstone, Nadia, was leaving Belize as the end of her month here was over. She decided for her last hurrah she wanted to go to Caye Caulker. I was pretty strapped for cash but, what the hell, I went anyways. We had an AMAZING time.

I loved Caye Caulker. It's so laid back and calm.

The weather was supposed be bad but by pure luck the sun came out and stayed out all weekend.

We were plaining on heading over there at 6:00 but of course we slept late. She thought I set my alarm clock, I though she set hers. We made it on the bus at about 9am. We arrived at the Caye at about noon. Quickly got a room at Tina's Backpackers, changed into our suits, and hit the beach.

We spent all day working on our tan.


Once the sun went down we started wondering around town in search of grub. We had an AMAZING salad at some restaurant that I can't remember the name of but it started with A.

After dinner we started walking around an noticed a sign that said "happy hour 8-11" That is our kind of happy hour. AND! They had guacamole which I have seriously been craving badly. Outside they had this circle of swings set up with some rasta guys playing music. They were really cool so we ended up just swinging and listening to music all night.

Sunday Nadia wanted to go snorkeling but like i said i was strapped for cash so I just laid in the sun all day. Elizabeth showed up around noon (yay!) and we just hung out till Nadia got back.

We met her out at the split.



Then we went to an amazing restaurant. Outside of the seating area there is this table of lobster and fish that had been caught that day. You pick which one you want and then they grill it for you. I picked a red snapper. I was kicking myself for not getting the lobster though.




After eating we went back to the swings where we learned that nobody goes out on Sundays in Caye Caulker. We then went to bed pretty early.


Monday Liz and Nadia got up early to ride bikes while I slept in a bit more. We then got on the water taxi, said our goodbyes to Nadia at the airport, and headed home.

Jam Rolls

opps! posted these backwards...