Kimberly Abroad: Group Adventures In Field Based Training

For a week long field trip, throw a group of people together in a microbus…

Although they are given a schedule beforehand they never know what is next.

In the many places they visit, they will usually not know where they are.

During lectures, when they are accessible, they will play with sticks (draw in the dirt, debark, build mini houses/Mayan sacrifices, throw them at each other).

Nicknames will begin forming within the group.

They will become close, fast.

They will laugh and learn much more than they could in a classroom.

Intense group separation anxiety will settle in shortly afterwards.

I have been on almost ten long fieldtrips and those have been the common trends. Can I get an amen?

(front to back) Christine, Lily, Edrick, Ana & Kim, Ben, Rob

The last night of the trip I had a migraine so I didn’t get any sleep and skipped breakfast in the morning. I started to hear a sawing noise outside and then a big boom that shook the whole cabin. Right after Mimi came in smiling and chatting. She then proceeded to calmly tell me she was going to throw up now. I just plugged my ears while she was in the bathroom. As she was throwing up, Rosemary and some others girls entered the cabin talking about their diarrhea and I just said out loud, “OK, now I feel like we’re in the Peace Corps!” and we all started laughing. Even when some of us had diarrhea, were down with a fever, were throwing up, or had migraines—it didn’t seem to rain on our parade.

Field based training was a great overview of different possible sectors of tourism we could be working with at our site. We traveled around quite a bit and got to hear stories and advice from current volunteers to go along with the experience.

Day 1- Cultural Walking Tour in Totonicapan

We went on a walking tour throughout Totonicapan entering the homes of local artists while experiencing first hand the craft creation process. We got to visit weavers, box makers... and a

Pottery workshop! He told us about his family’s long history with clay, where he gets his clay from, how he prepares it, how he molds it, and then let a few of us play “Ghost” with him. He has spun the wooden circle below with his foot about 8 hours per day for the past 50 years so it has a nice groove.

As we finished the tour, we strolled down the road and watched a beautiful show of sunset colors and lightening storms.

Totonicapan

That night we ate at a small comedor. All of the artists joined us for the meal and spoke afterwards. Everything they had to say was very kind and touching. The funny, quiet box maker had my favorite quote:

“We all have the same blood, just not the same height.”

Day 2- Environmental Education in El Aprisco forest, Totonicapan

Off with a bang! First thing in the morning we begin to prepare our lesson plans. What better way to start off a day of environmental education than to actually give a lesson?

They paired us off in twos and divided us up along the trail that wound through the El Aprisco forest. Each of us had a station where we would talk about a specific topic and had an activity for each group of children that came through.

We waited nervously, shivering (Toto is almost 3,000 meters above sea level) in the dark pine forest, for the first group to come while we paced back and forth mumbling phrases in Spanish to ourselves.

Ours was “El Ecosistema”. We split each group up into “the plants”, “the deer”, “the wolves”, and “vultures & beetles”. We asked each group what they eat and then asked them to put their hands and weight on the shoulders of those they depend on. Then we would pull one away and ask “Now what happens when you pull a part out? Everyone falls! You can’t just take out the parts you don’t like, even the spiders and rats have their place”.

It went better than I expected. The kids were very smiley and receptive so they must have understood us. I asked one group of kids if I could get a picture with them and they got so excited, rushed over, and clung on.

It just so happened that it was “Dia de Carino”. It is their equivalent of Valentine’s Day, except they also celebrate affection between family and friends. Lily and Joey at the last station helped children make cards for baby trees that they would take home and plant.

Una familia llena de amor hace la vida mejor

The rest of the day was filled with interesting presentations on education topics from current volunteers and our program director.

Day 3- Trail Building in ???

We packed our bags early to leaving the freezing pine forest. We headed towards a volunteer site on the coast that had coffee and macadamia tourism. A strike and blockade prevented us from reaching our destination. Supposedly it was supposed to end at 2 pm so we decided head back to freezing Totonicapan for the trail building and come back to stay the night there later.

This is Oliver, one of the many current volunteers kicked out of the Verapazes for the stage of siege that is going on up north. Luckily for us it means that they are free to help in training. He is almost done with service and has seriously been roughin’ it for the past two years. His site has no Spanish (Q’eqchi’), no electricity, no running water, and he literally had to build his residence. He got a brief mention of his site (Adetes) in the newest LonelyPlanet on page 221, check it out grandpa! He accompanied us for FBT and for trail building showed us how to build this to measure slope grades.

I have 2 Oliver anecdotes to share.

1) His first night at site the hammock he was sleeping in was tearing into his skin. Because the floor is dirt he moved to sleep on top of the table. He then started to feel something biting him all over and started screaming. His host family that was sleeping in the same room (the house is the room) came over and started getting bit too. Turns out it was a troupe of ants that were marching through. This whole scene is much funnier when you picture Oliver not understanding anything. Now he is fluent in Q’eqchi’ though.

2) He would go on runs around 5 in the morning. One morning a little kid saw this strange gringo running around in the mist and was frightened because he thought he saw a ghost. Oliver had no idea he had scared him. Later on Oliver’s host parents explained that they needed his hair to make a soup that the little boy would eat to cure his fear. He gave them his hair.

Also apparently the more indigenous the area, the more they like Chuck Norris, Bruce Lee, and Rocky.

We tried driving back to the warm coast but yet again were stopped by the blockade. Blockades are really common here. I remember on my last trip always having to wait at them. Our directors called around to see if it would be safe to walk across. After about an hour of waiting and rumors of tear gas we decided not to. Because it was getting dark soon, sadly we had to stay at a really nice hotel right across from where we were parked. The air conditioning, the pool, the restaurant, the big beds, the hot showers, oh the horror!

Here is a photo of the security guard on grounds showing us to our room. I think it is so funny that even if they are guarding a case of pop they will carry something like this around.

Mimi (left), Grace (front), Christine (back), Kim

Corazon Del Bosque

For the remainder of the trip we stayed at a small park “Corazon Del Bosque” where a current volunteer is stationed.

Our bonfire and moon (upper right)

At the bonfire we made smores, had a guitar, sang tons of songs, and laughed about movies that make us cry.

For all the documentary buffs, we got to see “south of the border”, “crude”, and “exit through the gift shop” on various nights. The few days here were amazing and we learned a lot about writing business plans, marketing, how to mudplant during an ultimate tournament, the state of tourism in Guatemala, birding, agrotourism, preparing for emergencies, tourism alliances, and making things out of recycled materials. Like earrings, bags, even schools, and playgrounds like this one below:

On our dawn birding trip I saw a Quetzalillo! The brown backed solitaire had the coolest bird call too. Almost as cool as the black faced solitaire I heard in Costa Rica. What is it with solitaires?

Last Day At Chuiraxamolo

Chuiraxamolo is another current site where one of us will be lucky to serve. Complete with a zipline, beautiful forest, and this view of Lake Atittlan.

Some people call it the most beautiful lake in the world. It is a collapsed caldera surrounded by volcanoes.

Our technical trainer, the one and only Chris Mayer helped put in place an awesome interpretive trail at this site.

He taught us the process of putting in an interpretive trail at our site and taught us first hand about maintenance and sign building:

Chris Mayer (he’s like Chuck Norris, you have to include his last name) lives on the lake and kindly took us into his home for the afternoons lessons. Then came a Peace Corps Response volunteer doing trash management at the lake. The communities around the lake drain RAW SEWAGE directly into the lake. On the edge of the lake you can see water pumps (water treatment is very minimal here) right next to the sewage drains. It is recommended by the medical office to even wash yourself in purified water here.