Peter came home from his mission and I left about 2 1/2 months later for a study abroad. I really wanted to go and have this experience but I believe it was also my back up plan in case somehow I felt Peter was no longer the guy for me. Well, that was not true because he proposed at the airport which he barely made it to because he had gone to tell his dad that he did not care if they (his parents) wanted us to wait, he was going to ask me to marry him. He asked as they were making the final boarding call. I didn't say anything but stood up hugged everyone good bye started to cry and boarded the plane. Maybe I thought I said yes but I am pretty sure I said nothing. I assumed Peter would tell my parents on the way home (since we picked him up there- again he was talking with his dad) but no he did not.
After a long flight and no phone or internet for a few days, I was finally able to check my email and he had proposed again via email to which I quickly responded yes! I then sent an email to my parents. It was all kinds of craziness!
I did have a most wonderful time in Guatemala.
I learned some Spanish and saw things that were amazing, beautiful, heart breaking, testimony building, humbling, and life changing.
The experience actually helped me to understand Peter a little bit better post-mission. He had served in Peru and had seen these same humble and amazing things that I was now seeing. It had changed him but not in a bad way. I just could understand him a bit better after my experience.
Teaching the kids in a local school about good nutrition and hygiene.
Helping to make breakfast for the kids. I am crushing this nutrition pellet stuff that they mix in with a soup.
One of our last weekends in Antigua there was a festival. There was live music and people were just standing around. Well we crazy Americans started dancing and soon more people were dancing. Then a police officer came up to me and started talking to me. I thought we were in trouble because I could not understand him. No, he wanted to dance with me! I do have a picture of this and will post it when I find it because I am laughing so hard while dancing with a man that was probably 5 inches shorter than me.
There was a local orphanage we spent time at. This is where kids with disabilities or kids who their parents could not raise were brought. It was a nice place and the people who ran it did the best they could for these kids but it was still heartbreaking!
Oh, riding the buses was such an experience. They are old school buses from the US that have been painted and decorated. They will pack these buses with 4-5 people per seat and the aisle full. The man standing in the doorway is the ayudante or helper. He would collect your money after the bus was going. It was easy when the bus was not full but if the bus was full he would shove his way down the aisle or I even saw one climb out one window and in another while the bus was moving along a freeway!!! It was also not unusual for someone to have a basket full of chickens or some other animal. It makes me smile just thinking about it.
The market was a great place to buy produce. We were responsible for our own lunch and I would often go here and buy some bananas or fruit of another kind and eat that with crackers from the grocery or one of the many little shops like the one below. The produce there was huge- I still have never seen such large papaya or avacados.
If you bought a soda they would pour the glass bottle out into a bag and stick a straw in it and hand it to you. This way they could send the bottle back to be refilled. I only did this a time or two since I am not a big soda drinker but I had to document it.
The woman in the middle was my Spanish instructor. Half of us were spanish speakers and the other half were not. We were paired with each other. All of us took spanish classes, non-speakers took 4 days per week and the speakers still had to take 2 days per week. Mariella during my first week of classes started asking me questions about the church. I had very limited spanish and she had questions about chastity and a few other topics that my limited spanish struggled to explain even with the aid of a dictionary. The other girl in the picture is Kim Proffit- an amazing woman! She had served as a missionary in Guatemala a few years before this. With her help and the help of the local missionaries Mariella took the discussions. She moved out of her mom's house (her mom did not approve) and she moved to Guatemala City. She planned to continue learning about the church there but I have no idea. It was a very powerful experience for me. I remember feeling the spirit so intensely during the discussions even though I did not always know what was being said.
This is the house we stayed in. It was owned by a couple who lived in Texas during the school year and then had this house where they had housed nursing students for years. They were very nice people. I can not remember his name but her name was Mercedes Benites (I believe that was the last name). I will always remember her saying to us girls, "Now listen hermana...."
