Across the Border and into Guatemala

Moving along in the story.........in the last post, Michelle and I were leaving Tiscao hoping to make it to a hotel on the outskirts of the park before dark (a nice cliff hanger... glad you liked it Candeye!). The short story is that no we did not make it before dark, but it did all work out. We caught the last collectivo of the day, and by the time we got out of the park it was getting pretty dark and it was difficult to see places as we flew by on the highway. Sure enough, the driver stopped at the turnoff to the ruins, which meant that we had missed the hotel I was hoping to find. We paid the driver and cut the umbilical cord that connected us to the outside world and turned to face our predicament. We were on a single lane road with no shoulder, it was dark and we were in the middle of nowhere with basically farmland all around us except for the tienda at the corner and a restaurant that looked closed. Barely being able to see where we were walking at this point, we quickly got off the road and asked at the restaurant, and also at the tienda at the corner, if there was a place for us to stay the night. There was some dialoge about an owner of cabanas who was there in the daytime but not there now, and they tried to call him, but he wasn't home, etc. etc.... Additionally, no one seemed to be familiar with the place I was looking for called Doña Maria Cabanas. It was really strange for us because in Mexico everyone seems to know where to find whatever you need, almost to the point of amazement, but in this situation the name did not ring a bell with anyone. At this point I was getting a little stressed, I have to admit, and that only made

3 Days in Lagos de Montebello

So, where to begin.......so much has happened since the last post but I'll do my best to give some justice to the last 2 weeks, most likely posting the info in increments starting with the oldest.

After leaving San Cristobal, we caught a collectivo bound for the town of Comitan. The drive was beautiful, and we were able to see the terrain change as we descended in rolling waves of terraced landscapes, as we went from the highlands of San Cristobal to the lowlands of extreme southern Mexico which stretch to the border with Guatemala (where the mountains very abruptly begin again). In Comitan, we roamed the streets in search of another collectivo bound for Lagos De Montebello, and as every experience in Mexico has taught us, it's easy to get just about anywhere via public transport. Sure enough, we found another shuttle, and were off within the half hour to the lakes. Our challenge in the second part of our journey was to figure out where to get dropped off, because supposedly the (many) lakes were kilometers apart, and there was conflicting info in the guide book as to what area would work best in terms of a base camp for us. Reinforcing this challenge was the fact that most people do this excursion as a day trip through local tour companies because of the difficulty in getting between all the lakes. We asked around before leaving Comitan, and went with our best guess as far as where to get out of the van....you know, there's the whole language barrier thing. Just as the sun was setting (we barely made it before dark), we arrived at a small village named Tsiscao where a joven (teenager) offered to take us to some cabanas that he knew of and we proceeded on a 20 min walk with our loaded packs to the location which ended up being right on the banks of one of the largest of the lakes in the area. Food was a little hard to come by as we quickly discovered and we ended up eating a meal provided by our cabana host comprised of eggs, beans and tortillas, which sounds good, but

Adios San Cristobal

We are leaving our beautiful casa in San Cristobal at this very moment to head to beautiful Lagos de Montebello and then to Quezaltenango (aka Xela, as the indigenous people call it), Guatemala. We will arrive in Xela by Thursday and will enroll in one-on-one intensive Spanish language school for five hours per day beginning in exactly one week. We also hope to live with a Guatemalan family in order to fully immerse ourselves in the language. We are planning to be there for about a month so make your travel plans now to come and see us.

Love,

Mark & Michelle

If You Build It, They Will Come.

I know...I have to stop referencing movies. It's almost like I'm obsessed. Maybe it's because of our inability to see a good flick where we are living. The release of Wolverine has been postponed due to the Swine Flu, and the only other movies playing here are Mall Cop and Fast and Furious which has been dubbed over in Spanish.....painful.

Anyway, there is some relevance to my title. About a week and on half ago, San Cristobal was practically a ghost town. Our theory was that the tourists who come through here are typically on trips where they are just passing through for a day or two on a total trip of 2 to 3 weeks for example. Due to the Swine Flu, our suspicion was that those trips ended (some abruptly), and the new wave of tourists did not continue to come. As a result, the streets around town were very quiet at night, and many businesses were closed. Michelle and I started trying to look for tourists, and it was rare to find one. On the RARE occation that we would see one, we would point and say, "look a tourist", as if we are not one of them, and then we would laugh, realizing how ridiculous it was to say that.

The slump in Tourism has been hard on this area in many ways. Many people here, especially the indigenous, live hand to mouth. With no tourists to buy their trinkets and shirts, etc. (that were made via microcredit loans), they very possibly

Some Down Home Culture.

It's good to know that some things are translatable from one culture to the next. For example.... a midget in a mask kicking a large guy, also with a mask in the groin is just funny, no matter how you look at it. Apparently it's also funny in the Mexican culture. Enter the world of Nacho Libre, or Lucha Libre as they call it here. After receiving an invitation from some of our friends to attend this event, we couldn't pass up the opportunity. Especially after seeing the movie with Jack Black. We had to see if this thing was for real. On top of our curiosity, it's also really important for us to explore the culture of an area when we're travelling, and we only have so much time. We had to pick between several museums, or a walk through a protected ecopark, and, well.... we had to prioritize - Nacho Libre came first that day! By the way, the man in the suspenders on the outside of the ring had a stage name of EL GUAPO, or "handsome". I hope you enjoy the video.

In other news. Michelle has become a Market buying specialist. Market meaning the flavela type shacks that house tienda after tienda after tienda of different products, mostly food. If you saw Slumdog Millionaire you got a taste of what a flavela is, only here, people don't live there, it's just a market. She is so good at finding all the right herbs and vegetables, and even bought a cute little market basket for her trips there. She has also perfected a recipe that she picked up during our time on the farm in Zahala which is mashed up bananas with wheat flower rolled up into a ball with a little chunk of Oaxacan cheese inside. These are baked or (cooked on range top) to perfection and are soooooo delicious. (we've kind of dropped the Vegan thing here, but still no meat) Fun stuff. Thanks for visiting!
Ciao for now.

Our site visits from the US are in the shape of a heart

I think if we took a poll and had people guess who has the most patience between Mark and Michelle the consensus would be that MARK is the most patient of the two. That is why he has been in charge of the blogs--I'm not very 'into' computers at the moment. I think the last several years of school have cured me for a spell. But, Mark is studying en la casa right now so I'll share a couple of brief observations.

1. The visitors to our blog from the US make the shape of a little heart if you look at all the dots just right (especially on the flat map). I think that's pretty neat.

2. For the first time in my life I was able to smile and

Our New Home (for now)!

Let me just start by saying that we're safe and healthy. Neither one of us are currently carrying the Swine flu, although Michelle thinks (jokingly) that I may have been the first person to carry the disease! Many people were in San Cristobal on vacation from Mexico City during Semana Santa and I did get really sick around that time. Factoring in the incubation period, and my symptoms matching the description of the virus, Michelle may be right! In reality though, most flu symptoms match the description of this flu virus. For my flu, after 1 week of feeling like garbage, I finally went and saw a homeopatica doctor who was highly recommended by a local Real Estate Agent. This man fit the description of some sort of true medicine man. He was so calm and collected and, I guess you had to be there, but I thought he was such an interesting person that after the initial consultation, I asked for a picture with him. By the way, the two medicines that he gave me totally worked and NO ANTIBIOTICS! That's the best part. Thanks Doc!

So much has happened since our last post so I'll try to bring you up to speed. We decided to hold off on our journey to Guatemala right now, and instead rented an apartment in San Cristobal de Las Casas. We just love this town so much that we decided to stop fighting it and embrace our life here. Our new apartment is more like a little house, and it will be hard to describe how perfect it is for us, but I'll give you the details. Its a 2 story loft with a perfect living room for studying including rustic furniture, a fireplace, lots of windows that open, and a beatiful kitchen with tons of light and a fridge and stove! Michelle's excited because she can try some new recipes that she's discovered on the trip, and I get to make cowboy coffee in the morning! There are beautiful flowering vines all over the property including several right outside our windows. We even get a little view out of

More Tidbits

Last week was Semana Santa, holy week, and it is a big vacation time for all Mexicans. San Cristobal is a tourist town, and so many natives flocked here to celebrate the holidays. On Friday, Sat, and Sun, there were large events around town that were part of the festivities. Friday featured the Crucifiction of Christ and procession through town which I covered in the previous post. Saturday featured the a display of the "Judases", which were basically artist representations of people or events that have either done the world wrong, or specific segments of society wrong. Saturday night featured

Viacruces passion y muerte de Cristo (The Crucifiction)

What a procession! It took us awhile to find the genesis of this event. In our quest, we asked many people on the street and everyone seemed really vague, or just said the name of a particular avenue. While looking, we ran into our friend Nancy from the school who was also looking for the event, and with her help, we were able to narrow down the exact location. With some luck, we caught the event right when it began, and followed it all the way through town. This took several hours. It was difficult to hold our positions in front, and a few times I was shoved by the Roman soldiers with spears, but overall we were able to stay

Around San Cristobal

This is a photo of Michelle near the zocalo which I understand to be the central square. Most cities that we have visited have a zocalo, it´s a typical city structure. The woman walking in the other direction has a baby wrapped in a shawl behind her. This is a very common way of carrying babies in this area. Indiginous women especially, will carry a baby while carrying out their work, sometimes strenous work, as if the baby was not on them at all. Also it seems like the babies love it. I have not heard a baby cry yet! Additionally, women carry enourmous loads here on their backs to get their goods to the marketplace. (I´ll try to get some pictures this). It puts anything a man would want to do to shame.....seriously, in fact, I have not seen a man yet carry loads like these women do. Sometimes, they wrap rope around

Escuela en Espanol

Today we began our formal schooling in a local language school here in San Cristobal called La Casa en el Arbol (house in the tree) www.lacasaenelarbol.org . There is actually a tree house on the property which apparently was built with no nails into the tree itself. There was lots of symbolism with the support beams being mankind, and the tree being nature, the ground being the earth, etc, etc, but due to the translation, I didn't get the complete concept.

I was told that if we don't do our homework tonight, this crazy Mayan warrior will sacrifice me to the gods, so we gotta go....

Chow for now.

Through Palenque to San Cristobal de las Casas, Chiapas, MX

We took an overnight bus to Palenque and almost immediately caught another bus to Ocosingo, thereby bypassing much of the treasures of the state of Chiapas, but you can't do everything! Upon arriving in Ocsingo, we wound our way through the market place where the indigenous and local peoples sold their goods, eventually making our way to a VW bus colectivo which took us out to the Mayan ruins of Tocina. It was a hot day, and the sun felt like it was piercing our skin. Notice how I am ducking out of the sun, behind the shade of this ancient column. Michelle is on her way down a staircase on the backside of this temple (these are just a hair steeper than stairs in your average townhouse).

We are currently in San Cristobal de las Casas, Chiapas, MX. We will likely be here for the next several days to a week. We will hopefully start some schooling tomorrow in Espanol. More to follow.

Love,
Mark & Michelle

We Made it!

I´m happy to say that this is my first official post on our blog. Thanks Michelle for all the hard work you´ve put into this over the past year.

So, we´re finally here. It´s funny how an idea can feel so different when you actually put it into action, and also how you don´t realize what it will take to accomplish it. Selling things, moving essentials into a storage unit, and travelling to central America didn´t sound that challenging. Our move out of the house and into the storage unit proved to be more than we expected. We had more items than we thought and even though we kept selling and selling on Craigs list, our house didn´t seem any less cluttered. It finally came down to the wire and we were able to sell just enough to where our necessary items fit in the storage unit.

All of our friends helped us so

Adios

Well, we're off to experience beautiful Central America and points beyond. Our primary goal is to learn Español and to find volunteer positions. We will post photos and updates here so our Moms know that we're still alive and for everyone else to see and comment on. See you soon!


Love, Mark & Michelle

Mark hit a home run; Michelle's on deck

Mark swears he'll update this blog soon and put up all our Christmas photos. He just finished the GRE (Mark rocks!) and is getting to a list a mile long of 'Things Postponed Until After the GRE' and I think the blog is pretty low on that list. I'm studying myself for Friday the 13th so wish me luck. Then it's off to meet the new niece! I can't wait to find out her name!

Study, Study, Study whilst celebrating a new President!

Our noses are buried in books--Mark's for the GRE and mine for the NCLEX--but we came up for air on Tuesday to celebrate our new President. On day one in the White House Obama has already made important changes and has again reaffirmed our trust and hope in him.

Obama stated, "I will also hold myself, as president, to a new standard of openness," as he signed the Presidential Memorandum on Transparency and Open Government. President Obama also stated: "For a long time now there's been too much secrecy in this city. The old rules said that if there was a defensible argument for not disclosing something to the American people, then it should not be disclosed. That era is now over. Starting today, every agency and department should know that this administration stands on the side not of those who seek to withhold information, but those who seek to make it known."

I love our President's ethics and values. Here is my favorite part of the Inaugural Address:

"To the people of poor nations, we pledge to work alongside you to make your farms flourish and let clean waters flow; to nourish starved bodies and feed hungry minds. And to those nations like ours that enjoy relative plenty, we say we can no longer afford indifference to the suffering outside our borders, nor can we consume the world's resources without regard to effect. For the world has changed, and we must change with it."

Back to studying.

Happy New Year

We're home but we're self quarantined due to some crazy virulent cold virus. Utah for Christmas was a ball. Chris joined us and we all had fun with the Morris family. What a Christmas! The drive to and from Utah was sunny and clear but most of the days in Utah were incredibly snowy. The valley was pristine and chilly. Mark and Chris spent a day in snowshoes up American Fork canyon. We all got sick but we kept going and going and going. There were many late, late nights playing games--mainly Mexican train and golf; it was a blast.

We are currently studying for our respective tests: Mark for the GRE and Michelle for the NCLEX. The quarantine has some benefits--we are studying a lot more. We celebrated the New Year together on our front and back porches, watching the fireworks and clutching a box of tissue paper.

Happy New Year to all our friends and family. We love you and hope to go outside and play with you all as often as possible in 2009!

Bella

We just watched the film Bella and all we have to say is WOW! What a poignant film. It really touched both of us deeply. The soundtrack, the cinematography, the storyline.... touching and beautiful. Besides the fantastic movie which we recommend wholeheartedly, we also loved the following musicians in the film: Nina Simone (obviously that goes without saying--we already have about everything she's ever sung and if you don't then WHAT ARE YOU WAITING FOR?), and some new folks who we'll have to hunt down for Christmas named Rachael Yamagata and Jon Foreman (totally separate musicians who have nothing to do with each other except for the fact that their songs were chosen for the film/credits). Maybe they're not new but we've never heard of them until this film and they're awesome!

By the way, you might be wondering why we're watching a film. Well, I'll tell you. . . We're watching a film because I just took my final final. Oh yeah baby! That's right, my final final. Woo Hoo! That's what I'm talking about. Four and one-half years after quitting my job and I'm DONE (for now) baby! Yes! I guess I'll start answering the phone now so go ahead and call.

Ooooh, I just found a youtube video for a song in the movie called Meet Me By the Water by Rachael Yamagata. Turns out she must have sung for the film Pride & Prejudice also. Hmmm. The video consists of cheesy Pride & Prejudice clips but the song is beautiful so just shut your eyes and crank the tunes.

Okay Heather. . . You caught up now? I'd love to know how you are except YOU don't have a BLOG that I can check. Shame. . .

Yes We Can!

Remarks of President-Elect Barack Obama : Election Night (Link to the live speech)

Chicago, IL | November 04, 2008

If there is anyone out there who still doubts that America is a place where all things are possible; who still wonders if the dream of our founders is alive in our time; who still questions the power of our democracy, tonight is your answer.
It's the answer told by lines that stretched around schools and churches in numbers this nation has never seen; by people who waited three hours and four hours, many for the very first time in their lives, because they believed that this time must be different; that their voice could be that difference.
It's the answer spoken by young and old, rich and poor, Democrat and Republican, black, white, Latino, Asian, Native American, gay, straight, disabled and not disabled - Americans who sent a message to the world that we have never been a collection of Red States and Blue States: we are, and always will be, the United States of America.
It's the answer that led those who have been told for so long by so many to be cynical, and fearful, and doubtful of what we can achieve to put their hands on the arc of history and bend it once more toward the hope of a better day.
It's been a long time coming, but tonight, because of what we did on this day, in this election, at this defining moment, change has come to America.
I just received a very gracious call from

Go Barack!

Happy Voting Day Eve!
Don't forget to vote.
Mark is in Colorado right now working like mad to get Obama elected.

Go Obama!