Final days (part 4)

Friday-July 23rd

Today was our trip on the river. I had hired Jorge for our boat driver. I have known him for many years and he has always been very responsible. We had breakfast and were going to start out but there was a film crew at the Backpackers doing a commercial for tourism for Guatemala and wanted us to be in the background. We watched them film for a while and finally were able to leave. Our first stop was the orphanage. The children were on a school break so there were only about half of the kids there. The other half are children that just come and go to school at Casa Guatemala so they go home on their breaks. Miguel met us at the dock and several people told me that he had been asking for me for the past few days. That was good to hear and it was good to see him again. He had really been having a good time renewing acquaintances. He had lived at Casa Guatemala for 6 years, and had spent most of his childhood there. I gave the group a short tour. We wanted to go all the way to Livingston by boat today so we wanted to get going because the water is rougher in the afternoon.

The ride was really pleasant. Jorge would slow down and show us the birds on the islands and take us through some of the small inlets. The water was calm and it was a beautiful day. As usual the contrast between the rich and the poor was quite evident. There were beautiful expensive houses along the river and not far away would be a small hut with a woman washing her clothes in the river. At one point a small boy in a cayuca (dug out canoe) came out to greet us, hoping we would have candy or something to give him. We had some gum along so gave him that.

We stopped at Ak'tenamit. This is a clinic along the river. It has really grown in the last few years. It started out to be a small clinic where they did outreach work to the villages. It has now grown and they have a school, a restaurant a crafts area and many other things. They mostly try to train the native people in health care so they can take care of the people around. They have a web page so you can find out more about them if you would like. I asked if my friend Maria was there. Maria is a young girl who had been educated at Casa Guatemala although she was a village girl and had a family. Anyhow, she had been working at Ak'tenamit since they started. At one point she needed more medical training so Sharing the Dream paid for her schooling. She now heads up the clinic. I am really proud of her, she has really made a difference in her community. Her dream is to go on to medical school. It is also a dream of ours to help her when she can do that. Medical school in Guatemala is not very expensive by our standards and is something we can help her do. Maria was a meeting so I gave the group a quick tour of the grounds. We left word that we would be back later to meet with Maria. We were going to eat at the restaurant there but found out they only had fish, so we decided we would eat in Livingston when we got there.

The ride to Livingston was nice. Livingston is right on the coast and has a Caribbean flair. The native people who live there are Garfuna and their skin is very dark. The town is not very big but is very colorful and busy with people braiding hair, and music playing. We walked around for a little bit. This morning Marta had tripped on a step at the Backpackers and bruised her leg and turned her ankle so a lot of walking was more difficult for her. She was quite a trooper though and kept up pretty good. Ak'tenamit runs another restaurant in Livingston so this is where we ate. The profits go back to Ak'tenamit. Several people ordered different types of soups and when it came it looked like it was the serving bowl it was so large. The food was great and very interesting. We stopped and bought some coconut bread on our way back to the boat. This is a treat from Livingston that is really good. You just break off pieces and eat it. The bread we bought was still very hot and it was wonderful.

On our return trip down the river we stopped at the craft store in Ak'tenamit, which is up the river from the clinic. ( I can't ever remember if you say up or down the river, so please excuse) We were going to meet Maria there. They called to see if she was coming and pretty soon here she comes in a small boat. It was wonderful to see her. She had just gotten back from a village visit the day before. She looked very tired. She said they had seen 150 patients in 2 days. This was after boating and then walking and carrying their supplies to the village. She is really quite a young woman. We talked about her going on to medical school. She said right now she is helping 2 of her brothers go to school and can't take the time off, but she hopes to go in a year or so. She did say that her niece really wants to go to nursing school right now and introduced us to her. She needs money for transportation and books. After the group met her there were people who seemed interested in sponsoring her. Maria is going to put a budget together so we can look at it.

After leaving Maria we traveled by boat to the hot springs. This is just a spot by the edge of the river that has hot springs coming out. Kyle was the only one that went in the water, although Marta went in a little to help her sore ankle. I had forgotten my swimsuit so I wasn't going to go in and I think the others were just enjoying sitting. Kyle said it was quite nice. I have been in the springs on numerous occasions and always enjoyed it.

Our last stop was back at Casa Guatemala the orphanage. We continued our tour of the orphanage, the farm, etc. Miguel and many of the children joined us on our walk. We spent quite a bit of time in the library seeing what types of books they needed. We have been working on the library project with them for years. They have so many English books, which they can't use, so we are trying to build up their Spanish books. We are making quite a dent as they are starting to get quite a few. You can tell the children are enjoying the books because some of them are starting to look worn. The volunteer in charge of the library said that the teachers bring their students in quite a bit to read. This is a change from early years. Casa Guatemala has a web site so if you want more information about the orphanage you can check that out.

We gathered up our empty suitcases, Miguel got his clothes together and we went back to the Backpackers. It had been a good day. We had dinner and of course it was dark early, so we decided we were going to stay up until at least 9. Kaye was our game planner and she had a couple of word games that we played. We laughed a lot about this because even Kyle sat and played these games. We changed one of them to Spanish so that was really quite challenging. Even with going to bed early there is not much sleep at the Backpackers. There is noise continuously all night and then when the noise stops the rooster's start. This is a good place to use earplugs.

Tomorrow we will head back to the city.

Diane