Individual Directed Activities

With Kay in Ixchiguan

On Miriam's balcony in Xela

Tallest point in Central America! Tajumulco

One part of our training to be volunteers is visiting another volunteer to see their work and lifestyle. So last week we were sent off (first time trying to navigate the crazy bus system alone!) with the name and location of a volunteer to visit. I went to visit Kay in San Marcos. San Marcos is a department (state) north west of where I am currently, it touches both the pacific coast and the Mexican border. Kay lives waaaaay up in the mountains where you have to sleep with wool socks and winter hats on in order to keep warm.

It was absolutely beautiful there. The drastic mountains gave way to rolling hills as we climbed higher and higher on our way there, and the giant trees shrunk to shrubs because the oxygen is so thin at 12,000 feet. We could see two volcanoes from her window; one, Tajumulco, is the tallest point in Central America and looked like a pretty small hill from our vantage point not far below it.

Not only did I get to experience another totally different part of Guatemala, I also got to see the work Kay is doing in her office. She works in the OMP- Oficina Municipal de Planificacion (Municipal Planning Office) and is currently working on a community diagnostic. There’s about 80 small communities in her municipality and with the help of her counterpart, Annabe, is visiting each one of them to fill out a census type form that will help the municipal office determine where the greatest needs of their communities are. They ask questions on everything from how many people live in the community and what type of water services they have, to whether or not the community has a library and if there are children with special needs. It was pretty neat to see the people gathered to answer these questions and willing to work to achieve real development in their communities. Kay thinks the whole process of collecting this information will probably take the rest of her service, but once finished, it can be passed along to the next volunteer and used by the Muni to complete projects for the communities that need them most.

Lastly, I also got to see how volunteers lived. On the trip I visited 4 very different volunteer houses that ranged from a huge house in a cabbage field to a small apartment in a big town; I also collected advice on things like how to make an oven, how to get to know neighbors, and how make shelves out of cinder blocks. Three weeks and counting until I’m on my own…