Some Observations From Our New Home

Hola from Antigua!  In this edition of blogamos I thought I would jot down a few common, kinda comical, occurrences we’ve experienced in our short time here so far.  Keep in mind, Guatemala can be kind of crazy, but it all adds to the experience.  The experience is best described by each of the 5 Senses:

Smell

      1) Our breath – apparently there’s something in the water, or not in the water, but we both noticed pretty quickly that each other’s breath is truly “kickin’” since we started living here (could it be a lack of fluoride in the water?)

      2) The Smog – where we live is much better, but arriving to Guatemala City (aka “Guatemala” to the locals), this is the first thing you notice when you get out of the aeropuerto.

Sight – so many to list, but here are some highlights

      1) Volcanoes – Antigua is surrounded by volcanoes and it’s truly a beautiful site.  Vulcan Fuego is the most active and you can see it spouting off smoke in the distance almost every day.

      2) Explicit Feminina Fountains – I don’t know why, but the biggest fountains in the most public parks and many others feature women emitting water from their bare breasts; it’s umm, interesting.

      3) Perros in packs – the dogs stick together here, it’s common to see 10 dogs taking a siesta on the sidewalk in the middle of the day.  We have yet to see a canine West Side Story develop in the alley, but for some reason I wouldn’t be surprised if it happened.

      4) American Products in Weird Places – We’ve witnessed several of these, from a Guatemalan man wearing a sweater proclaiming “I love Belgian Chocolate” , to a semi truck with a sign indicating “baby on board” which isn’t too unbelievable actually.

Notable mention: 1) My water bottles disappearing  2) me being extremely quiet at all meals/me looking like a dork in front of the 4 and 5 year-old girls at our house (no hablo mucho Espanol yet, but I’m getting better), 3) sunrise at 6 am & sunset at 6 pm – like clockwork, 4) Up to 5 people on one motorbike (including small children cuidado!), or the dangerous undertaking pictured below...(why can't he just ride the bike?? Quien sabe!)

Sound

      1) Boisterous Birds – Alfred Hitchcock may have received his inspiration from the birds hanging out in the trees on Santa Clara Avenida where hundreds of birds squawk all day, sounding as if they’re engaging in some sort of warfare (they could be warning the dogs to stay off their territory)

      2) English is Funny – Brave locals (usually young boys) murmur English phrases as we pass which are then followed by giggles (“howdy partner…hahahahaha”).  It’s funny because they know more English than I know Spanish J

Taste

      1) Mama’s Cooking – I love the food we have in our casa.  Our Guatemalan mama’ always keeps us full with the typical Guatemalan fare (black beans, rice, veggies, tortillas, and mucho mucho pan dulce – sweet bread)

Touch

          

      1) Do I still have my toes – the dog at our house (Camillo, some kind of terrier) is friendly by day and extremely vicious by night.  I feel lucky that we still have our 20 toes in tact 

As you can see we are definitely immersing ourselves in the Guatemalan culture; nevertheless, we’ve still found quite a few opportunities to be Americanos down here:

1) Mc D’s stop – I might get in trouble for sharing this one, but we did indulge in McFlurry’s at one of the nicest McDonald’s in the entire world – no kidding, McDonald’s has a gorgeous patio area and is probably the nicest dining establishment in the entire city

2) As for sports, there’s some great sports bars where I’ve been keeping up with NFL/College football and theBaseball Playoffs (just saw the Giants take the lead with 2 outs in the 9^th after the Braves hit a go-ahead HR in the bottom of the 8^th!).

In conclusion, we are truly loving our time down here.  We decided to switch Spanish schools and we started at the Christian Spanish Academy today, we love it there.  Thanks again for all your prayers and for keeping up with us.   Adios!

La Escuela

We had our first day of school yesterday y estamos aprendiendo mucho! We are both studying 5 hours/day, one on one with un maestro. Unfortunately we aren't 100% sure how we feel about the actual school yet. We are trying out a different school than Kelley went to last time she was here and we admittedly had a lot of expectations. This particular school seems to have great teachers but there was no entry test, no real 'levels', no workbooks, and no homework! Pretty nice right? Unless you actually want to learn something :) So...we are praying about switching to another school that is more expensive but seems to have their stuff together a little more than our current school. Any and all comments, suggestions, and especially prayers for wisdom would be appreciated! Gracias! 


On another note...we have been failing to bring our camera with us because Greggs a little paranoid about getting robbed :)  I like to live on the edge however so I will try and get more pictures up here for y'all pronto. 
Abrazos y Besos!

Estamos Aqui!

We made it!! Praise the Lord our trip down was uneventful and full of encouraging experiences. God has been so good to us already and we have only been here two days. Kelley's Spanish is a little rough but has been getting the job done so far. Gregg is starting to learn slowly but surely. Our host family is amazing and we are getting very spoiled so far. Check out our picasa album for a few pictures of our house! (also has pictures from the going away party which awesome...thanks friends!)


http://picasaweb.google.com/gregg.a.brown3


Another highlight was in LA. We had a long enough layover to sneak out of LAX and have one last American meal...Can you guess where...

In & Out por supuesto!

Anyways...Unfortunately our internet situation is not quite as reliable as we thought it would be so we aren't 100% sure when we'll be able to get back on. We will try our best to keep in touch and keep everyone in the loop. We are very excited for what God has in store in the coming future and want to know whats going on with all of you also! We love and miss everyone and are keeping you all in our prayers. God Bless and Hasta pronto!

Last Requests...

Only a week and a half to go! The time is going by so fast we seriously feel like the date snuck-up behind us and screamed, "BOO!" In light of our imminent departure we are trying to make the most of every minute of every day. For me(Kelley) that means eating as much non-Guatemalan food as possible. For Gregg on the other hand, that means playing as many games of Madden Football as humanly possible but that is besides the point. 

Luckily, we live in a city that has more amazing restaurants then people (yes I am an exaggerator thank you) so we have our pick of great places to eat. Here are a few that we have been to lately or that are on our must-eat-before-we-leave list...

Serious Pie

Bakery Nouveau - do yourself a favor and just go get a

twice-baked almond croissant right this second

Toulouse Petit

Poppy

Paseo, Mr. Gyros, Trophy Cupcakes, Molly Moons, Maximus Minimus, Ocho,

Bizarro Italian Cafe - They were on the Food Network so you know its good :), Maximilien, Sweet Iron Waffles - Bacon and pure Maple Syrup on a Belgian Waffle...yes please

And so so many more...are you hungry yet? Vaminos!

Gregg's last day of work

He's a little excited to be done....can you tell? 

Fun with Friends

  One of the things we are going to miss most while in Guate is our fabulous friends!! We have been game-playing, block-partying, cooking, wine-drinking, eating, eating, and more eating, baseball-playing, biking, hiking, celebrating, zip-lining, kayaking, tour-guiding, and much much more.


Here are just a few highlights...Enjoy!

All your questions answered...

We have been (understandably) getting a lot of questions about our trip over the past few weeks. We wanted to quickly fill everyone in on the basics. As of right now we still have a lot of questions of our own that we will be figuring out as we go. But, here is what we do know...

When are you leaving and how long will are you planning to be down there?
We are leaving September 29th and will be staying about a year. The plan for now is to study Spanish, be engaged in the culture, and help anywhere and anyway we can.  Gregg is looking to volunteer in microfinance, and Kelley wants to volunteer in Public Health.

Where will you actually be living?
Initially we will be in Antigua, Guatemala. We will be studying Spanish there for 3-6 months, depending on how long it takes for Gregg to 'master' Spanish (he keeps bragging that he is going to know more than me when we come back. Yeah, ok buddy). For at least the first month we will live with a local family that will feed us, speak Spanish to us, and be our 'Guatemalan Familia'. After that we will possibly rent a furnished apartment in Antigua which is where you will stay when you come visit us :) There is also a chance we will be moving to a smaller, less touristy city after we're done at language school, where we can be more immersed in the culture.

Will you guys be working and/or volunteering? Are you going down with an organization?Are you raising support?
We technically are not going with any particular organization. Since we have a few different goals for our time we didn’t want to make any long term commitment to one specific organization. That being said, most of you know that we do work with Mano Con Mano which is in Guatemala. We will continue to do various things for MCM and hopefully visit the village and feeding center at least once per month. Check out MCM’s new website for more information about what they do in Yalu.
Since we are going 'solo' we didn't feel comfortably raising support. But we have known that we wanted to do this for a while, and Gregg IS a finance man after all, so we were able to save up enough to live without income for the year. Its pretty amazing actually considering our grocery bills :)

Why in the world do you want to do this?
Ever since Kelley got back from Guatemala before we got married, we both knew that she was going to have to go back someday. There is something about the people, the beautiful surroundings, and the culture in general that just sucks you in. Then, after our trip in December, it was clear that Gregg also felt "the calling" and the planning began. This specific time in our lives is perfect because we don't have kids(whew!), don't have a lot of debt or bills, we both felt good about exploring this opportunity, and it just seems like life is slowing down in general.  We are excited to be immersed in a different culture that will challenge our traditional preconceptions about most things and we're excited to do this together.
Another motivation is that Kelley is planning on going back to school hopefully next fall and the program she is interested in requires International experience. Add everything together and how could we not go! Like we said in our first post, we are VERY sad to be leaving our family and friends but we know God is calling us to do this and we can't wait to see what He has in store for us!

So thats that! Feel free to keep asking those questions. The purpose of this post wasn't to make people stop asking us about our trip, Promise! :)