Last 2 weeks in Guatemala

@Paul: het appartement is inderdaad op de bovenste verdieping, in mijn video (op mijn Facebook profiel, kan helaas geen link voor niet-leden maken) kan je een beeld krijgen van mijn buurt en de stad

It has been a long time since my last blog and a lot has happened in the meantime, so in this blog I'll update you on my last few weeks in Guatemala and then I'll continue in the next blog and write about life in England.

In my last blog I wrote that we would go to the beach, but that didn't really work out. But that is not really surprising, in Guatemala promises are often made out of politeness and not because the person really intents to do it, and then in the last moment he has an excuse why it is not going to work out. For me as a European that is really strange of course, to me it's more impolite to break a promise than not to make one, but that's another cultural difference that makes this experience so interesting. And by now I know that it happens and I know that I should ask some questions to figure out if it is a sincere or a Guatemalan promise..

Anyway, we decided to go to Panajachel again (the village next to the lake - Lago Atitlan - that is surrounded by volcanoes). This time I didn't go by chicken bus, but with Alberto, our colleague and his friend (who drove), so a lot more comfortable and safe. Once arrived in Pana (we were sent the wrong direction by a local, again out of politeness, it is considered more polite to at least try to give directions than to say that you don't know..), it rained too much to make the boat tour around the lake, so we had some lunch, some beers and some dinner together. In the night we went out and the next day we took the boat to visit some villages around the lake (San Pedro, San Juan and San Marcos). Especially San Marcos was really beautiful, very different from the other places. When we came back to Panajachel, it was already time to go back to Guate..

That Monday I just worked, but on Tuesday we had a day off (national holiday, nothing special), so I went with my Dutch colleague (and nowadays my team leader) and his family to the beach, near Sipacate. It was a very relaxed day, the black (!) sand (I'm sure you can guess why) on the beach was very hot, so we had to walk very fast, the sun was also really hot, so we stayed in the shadow most of the time, but the best thing was that the see was also pretty warm (probably around 25 degrees), so I could really enjoy the waves.

The weekend afterwards we stayed around Guate. On Saturday we went to the Pacaya volcano and I was surprised to see how much it had changed. The lava was on the side of the volcano this time and it is was much more solid, it was more like really hot stones coming out of the ground, rather than the small river I saw last time. But still, it was an impressive sight, and I still haven't had enough of it, so I'll definitely go back.

On Sunday we were picked up in the morning by another colleague to go to Antigua, which she knows pretty well. She took us for brunch to hotel Santo Domingo, a beautiful place that serves a really great brunch. Afterwards we drove a bit through town, bought a lot of things on the market (after a lot of bargaining) and we took of to Finca Filadelfia. Finca Filadelfia is one of Guatemala's famous coffee farms where the type "Genuine Antigua" is made. We got a tour of about 2 hours around the farm and we saw the whole process of coffee making, from seed to the coffee, really nice and interesting to see (although I still don't like coffee). Then we went back to the city after a long, tiring but nice day.

The Thursday afterwards we had a day off to prepare for our departure for England of the next day, so we made good use of that by going out the night before, sleeping in that day, shopping, having a haircut, packing our bag and doing the dishes of the last few days. Unfortunately all this took longer than we hoped, so in the end only 1 hour of sleep remained before we would have to leave. But we were allright waking up shortly after, taking a taxi to the airport, where we met our colleagues to start a journey of 21 hours (14 hours on the plane, the rest waiting in Houston and New Jersey on the airports). On Saturday morning we arrived in Manchester and that is where my next blog will continue!

PS: check my pictures for illustration: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=9812&id=226700492&l=418bd15192