A Hot Shower

The things i would do right now for a hot/warm/ even lukewarm shower right now would probably land me in Jail. There´s many things about roughing it that i don´t mind, but i´ve seriously considered the possibility of cutting down to one or two showers each week. It´s almost like my daily workout, jump in the freezing cold shower for a good two minutes, and shiver furiously for mintutes after. I´ll try and get some other subjects now...

I left off before i went to the soccer game on saturday. We went out to a bar for pizza and drinks before the game, then took a ten minutes walk or so the Xela Stadium. They gave us facemasks with out tickets to wear becasue of the swine flu, but because it was raining very hard (just like it does every say here) their weren´t as many fans present. The Xela soccer team is know to have to craziest fans in the league.. they show up every game, all dressed up to the max, bringing drums,trumpets,fireworks and sing/chant all game long with no breaks. The soccer game was more amusing then i expected and Xela won 1-0, scoring their goal with ten minutes left, driving the fans crazy as Xela was the underdog going into the game.

I didn´t stay up too late that night because of the hike I was planning on going on the next morning. A group of 6 of us took a micro bus to the chicken bus terminal, which is also a small market, the dirtiest place i´ve yet to see in my travels. The chicken bus ride took a little more then an hour and was very good considering what there usually like. Imagine a retired north americain bus with 6 grown men, a couple children, and some unidentified objets on one row (two benchs) of seats. This supposedly wasn´t even crowded... on the way back we asked to ride back on the top of the bus but it´s not allowed in guatemala, only in mexico.

The hike itself was very nice, taking around two and a half-three hours, with an absolutely beautiful lagoon at the top.

I uploaded one or two pictures on my facebook for those who´d like to see it, i made a open album for everyone to see my pictures from Guatemala, i´ll try to post a link at the bottom of this post.

The lagoon was crystal clear when we arrived, allowing us a perfect view of it, i was very impressed.... top 5 most beautiful places i´ve seen in my life. I posted 2 pictures in the album, 1 of me when we got therre, and 1 twenty minutes later, where the fog was so heavy, you could barely see a meter in front of you. The clouds came in so quickly that we actually sat and watched them rush in. The lagoon is in the crater of a volcano, making the hike even more interesting.

We got rained on a bit on the way down, but this sprinkle was not bad at all considering how it is usually pouring at this time.. i´ve learned to expect rain everyday, my umbrella is with me nearly all the time.

I got back and decided to treat myself and eat a small restaurant when i got back. After that I did a good two hours of homework. The spanish classes are something I havenñt tlaked about alot on here, but they have been great so far. Each day when i find myself tlaking to a vendor or some other locale, i notice the improvements in my spanish each day. The school itself it much more intense then i had predicted... well i really didn´t even think about the span¡sh that much before i got here, but it´s five constant hours of 1 on 1 intruction.. not like school where you dooze off or start daydreaming.

Yesterday was monday, and i wasn´t feeling to well, so after my classes ( 8-1) i went back to my hostel and sleep/read most of the day to try to feel a little better. I think it worked|| this morniung i felt muich much better. I was convinced that i might have got food poisoing or something similar becasue all the different food Içve been eating. Half the time Im not even sure what im eating when the family feeds it to my, but i usually donçt mind iut...... The only person i can honestly say that would enjoy this food would be my brother Vince.

Im going to move back in wiht the host family again becasue on friday im taking a 6 day trip all over guatemala, seeing Tikal, going to the caves, hot pools and ab bunch of other places. Im really excited to go and use my spanish some more.

Today me and some others took an optional two hour class on slangs/swears in local spanish. To say the least, i now would have no problem initiating a confrontation on the street.

Later on, there´s a movie on child labour and abuse in central america that i think i´ll go to...

I feel like I just wrote a novel, my fingers are hurting....
thats it for now

link for pictrures http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=110385&id=513794304#/photo.php?pid=2624642&id=513794304

i hope it works