Belize
Hola tod@s.
Sorry for the lack of an online presence recently - I was in Belize, and then the wireless has been not working at the UCA and I'm really lazy when it comes to going to the internet cafe.
I survived the Belizian rainforest! I didn't see any snakes, which was kind of a disappointment, but overall the trip was a lot of fun. We had a long journey starting at 6:00 a.m. on Thursday. We drove up through El Salvador, through part of Guatemala to the eastern coast, and took a boat from Puento Barrios in Guatemala to Punto Gorda in Belize. I have now been splashed with water from the Caribbean! The boat ride actually reminded me of a Disneyland ride because of the bumpiness and splashiness. It was fun though. When we got to immigration, or whatever it's called, it consisted of us walking up to a desk where they looked at our passport and hand-wrote our names, countries, and passport numbers in a binder. We left to go back to El Salvador on Sunday, early in the morning, and the office isn't open then, so Kevin, our leader, collected our passports and took them to be stamped on Saturday (with the stamp post-dated to say March 4). We just walked through an open gate to leave on Sunday. Craziness. Anyway, we took a bus from Punto Gorda to Blue Creek, where we stayed. It is in the rainforest, and the place we stayed is right on a lake, where we could swim. It was incredibly hot and humid there. I can stand heat okay, but the humidity was terrible. It felt very good to get in the river, though there were a ton of fish and it was pretty creepy to feel them brushing against you. The fish nibbled on some people, but they left me alone.
Friday morning some people did the jungle climb, which I could tell by the word "climb" was not for me, so I just relaxed. In the afternoon, a couple friends of Kevin who have spent a lot of time in Belize came and talked to us for a little while, then we went to a cave that the river runs out of, and we swam in the cave. That was very cool. No one got attacked by a cave monster. The cave also made me think of Disneyland. Friday night we did the night hike. We didn't see any particularly interesting animals, but we saw a couple toads and scorpions and a tarantula. We didn't see any snakes or 40-pound rodents, which apparently do exist and live there. Oh well. Ooooh, but there was a really cool bug that we saw (not on the night hike) that has two lights that look like eyes (though they're not). It has two glowing spots. SO cool!
Saturday morning we went to the house of one of our guides, William, and he and his wife showed us how to make tortillas (they do it differently than in El Salvador), chocolate, and woven fans made from palm fronds. That was fun. In the afternoon some people went back to the cave we went to the day before, this time with a guide so they could go far into the darkness to where there's a waterfall. I decided to just stay and chill (a.k.a. take a nap).
Sunday we traveled back to El Salvador, and I will now be able to stay here legally for the rest of the trip. Hooray. And I have now been to a total of eight countries (including the U.S.). I'm planning to go to Guatemala for spring break (next week!), going to Lago de Atitlán. We're leaving Saturday and coming back on Thursday. I'm going with one other student, Stephanie. It should be fun.
In other exciting travel news, one of my roommates, Monique, and I are planning to spend the weekend before our campo week with one of the Salvadoran students and her family. We're spending the first week of April in the campo (rural area) in or near Arcatao in the department of Chalatenango. Lupita, one of the students who lives in my casa, lives in one of the communities around Arcatao, so we're going to go up early and stay with her family a couple days, then meet up with the rest of the group in Arcatao. I'm really excited. Lupita is amazing.
I was going to post my Voces Inocentes response and a paper I wrote for Liberation Theology, but once again I'm out of time, and USFfiles isn't working for me to upload them (they're not that special to get into the blog entry), so I'll post them another time.
By the way, sorry I haven't posted photos yet. I really want to, but I never seem to have time to upload. Soon!
Sorry for the lack of an online presence recently - I was in Belize, and then the wireless has been not working at the UCA and I'm really lazy when it comes to going to the internet cafe.
I survived the Belizian rainforest! I didn't see any snakes, which was kind of a disappointment, but overall the trip was a lot of fun. We had a long journey starting at 6:00 a.m. on Thursday. We drove up through El Salvador, through part of Guatemala to the eastern coast, and took a boat from Puento Barrios in Guatemala to Punto Gorda in Belize. I have now been splashed with water from the Caribbean! The boat ride actually reminded me of a Disneyland ride because of the bumpiness and splashiness. It was fun though. When we got to immigration, or whatever it's called, it consisted of us walking up to a desk where they looked at our passport and hand-wrote our names, countries, and passport numbers in a binder. We left to go back to El Salvador on Sunday, early in the morning, and the office isn't open then, so Kevin, our leader, collected our passports and took them to be stamped on Saturday (with the stamp post-dated to say March 4). We just walked through an open gate to leave on Sunday. Craziness. Anyway, we took a bus from Punto Gorda to Blue Creek, where we stayed. It is in the rainforest, and the place we stayed is right on a lake, where we could swim. It was incredibly hot and humid there. I can stand heat okay, but the humidity was terrible. It felt very good to get in the river, though there were a ton of fish and it was pretty creepy to feel them brushing against you. The fish nibbled on some people, but they left me alone.
Friday morning some people did the jungle climb, which I could tell by the word "climb" was not for me, so I just relaxed. In the afternoon, a couple friends of Kevin who have spent a lot of time in Belize came and talked to us for a little while, then we went to a cave that the river runs out of, and we swam in the cave. That was very cool. No one got attacked by a cave monster. The cave also made me think of Disneyland. Friday night we did the night hike. We didn't see any particularly interesting animals, but we saw a couple toads and scorpions and a tarantula. We didn't see any snakes or 40-pound rodents, which apparently do exist and live there. Oh well. Ooooh, but there was a really cool bug that we saw (not on the night hike) that has two lights that look like eyes (though they're not). It has two glowing spots. SO cool!
Saturday morning we went to the house of one of our guides, William, and he and his wife showed us how to make tortillas (they do it differently than in El Salvador), chocolate, and woven fans made from palm fronds. That was fun. In the afternoon some people went back to the cave we went to the day before, this time with a guide so they could go far into the darkness to where there's a waterfall. I decided to just stay and chill (a.k.a. take a nap).
Sunday we traveled back to El Salvador, and I will now be able to stay here legally for the rest of the trip. Hooray. And I have now been to a total of eight countries (including the U.S.). I'm planning to go to Guatemala for spring break (next week!), going to Lago de Atitlán. We're leaving Saturday and coming back on Thursday. I'm going with one other student, Stephanie. It should be fun.
In other exciting travel news, one of my roommates, Monique, and I are planning to spend the weekend before our campo week with one of the Salvadoran students and her family. We're spending the first week of April in the campo (rural area) in or near Arcatao in the department of Chalatenango. Lupita, one of the students who lives in my casa, lives in one of the communities around Arcatao, so we're going to go up early and stay with her family a couple days, then meet up with the rest of the group in Arcatao. I'm really excited. Lupita is amazing.
I was going to post my Voces Inocentes response and a paper I wrote for Liberation Theology, but once again I'm out of time, and USFfiles isn't working for me to upload them (they're not that special to get into the blog entry), so I'll post them another time.
By the way, sorry I haven't posted photos yet. I really want to, but I never seem to have time to upload. Soon!
posted by Amber at 3:37 PM
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