I woke up early this morning — very early. I think it was due to too much caffeine yesterday. 4 AM was a good time to work on a few things with no chance of interruption, though, so I spent some time looking for plane tickets to Guatemala. I’ll be going back down to visit […]
My Baby Is All Grown Up
No, not that one. Mason is unquestionably still an infant, as proven by the fact that I’m sitting in the dark typing up a blog at 4:30 AM while the Squirmy Wormy sits beside me and the two of us try to leverage a bit of sleep for his mom. He had his six-week birthday […]
Guate trip I
Da Guate It’s always good to be here, and renewing, even at a time like this when my heart is pulled strongly toward the US. With my dad in the hospital and my baby boy getting ready to make his grand appearance, there’s a lot to feel and think about these days. Hugs and songs […]
Fathers and Sons and Guatemala
US Airways Flight 1831, Charlotte to Miami Da Guate 081016 Touching down in Miami It’s extraordinary to realize that I woke up in Missouri yesterday, in Black Mountain, North Carolina today, and will wake up in Santiago, Atitlan, Guatemala tomorrow, after spending brief moments in Asheville, Charlotte, Miami and Guatemala City. Even for me, that’s […]
Guate V: Chacaya
So THIS is exciting… It’s not often that you get to visit “before” and “after” in the same day. On Thursday Caroline, Alan and I caught a boat across the lake to visit the village of Chacaya, where the public school has been holding classes in makeshift rooms on rented land for the 135 students […]
Guate IV: Escuelita David LaMotte
After a couple of hours’ ride on an unusually empty public bus (known affectionately by the ex-pat community as a “chicken bus”), Alan, Caroline and I caught a boat across the lake to get to Santiago, checked into our hotel and crashed. Wednesday morning we caught a tuc tuc (motorcycle taxi) up to Tzanchaj to […]
Guate III: Flora and Fauna
These don’t merit much explanation, but I thought they might be visually blogworthy…
Guatemala II: El Tejar Music Program
And now the updates about the actual work… On Tuesday we met up with John Van Keppel in Antigua and headed to the pueblo of El Tejar, where the CEDIN school has a music program that PEG funded in cooperation with LEAF International. John works for an organization called Child Aid, which supports this school. […]
Back in Guatemala
I woke this morning to the familiar sound of a long string of fireworks going off below my window. It was about 6:30, and it’s interesting that it no longer startled or surprised me. Guatemalans love fireworks and in Antigua they celebrate by setting them off first thing in the morning most mornings. Four years […]