Day 9

2/25
I awake still queasy but at least with some relief. But now it sure hurts to sit down. Rita Diaz and Cathy Frank, the two sisters who are both nurses, offer advice and give me Pepto Bismol and Rice Krispies. I go to breakfast and have a Sprite and a roll as I sit with some of the COED staff. Word has apparently gotten around that I had a rough go of it.
From elsewhere, Joe gets on his two-way radio and transmits to the others, “Anyone track down some Pedialyte? Eric Brown’s had diarrhea really bad.”
Jeff and Jess’ radios are up loud, and that announcement gets broadcast throughout the whole dining area. How embarrassing. Even more embarrassing is the bottle of yellow liquid I am soon given, which features a cute little teddy bear on the label.
I feel well enough to go on an optional tour led by COED. A group of us, maybe twenty, board one van. A lot of people have other plans and even business in Antigua. Richard is climbing the volcano, having left at 6:30 this morning. Jennifer, Karen and Mike are visiting a native home to see an example of the stove project they sponsored. Bob and George are visiting a hospital. The Tepes are visiting a child they sponsored.
Our tour visits a large convent that mostly survived the big earthquake and has several parts renovated or still being worked on. There are a lot of “ruins” in this city but not like the ruins one might think. The setting of a still bustling city seems wrong for these ruins in their present glory. But, here they are. These grand churches struggling to remain upright with the rest of their surviving architecture.
We tour the convent’s dormitory, the bath, a large fountain and the crypt, with a mock-up display of a deceased sister at rest. We stand in the choir loft and look down at the main floor of the church. There are domes being renovated overhead. The floor is set up with plastic chairs and a movie screen for some future presentation. It doesn’t make for a good picture, but the feeling of grand scale is definitely present.
We tour a church with baroque décor on the outer walls. Howard pays for the group’s admission. Charging to tour this church keeps the riff-raff out. A terrace on the second floor traces around the center courtyard, framing one of the largest fountains in Guatemala. From here is probably one of the best views of the city and the volcano.
Joe tells us the story how he proposed to his wife at the very spot where we stand and how Howard, who was there separately, saw him and almost inadvertently interrupted him.
We head to Parque Central, Central Park, to meet about twenty students who are receiving scholarships from COED to attend Básico. Our plan is to take a student or two out into town then to lunch and be back in the park by 1 o’clock—two hours from now. I’m not sure I feel well enough to do that, and two hours seems like a long time. Boy, do I turn out to be wrong! The kids, twelve to fourteen years old, are all dressed nicely. The girls are in colorfully embroidered and knitted blouses and huipils, and the boys wear slacks and nice dress shirts. They smile brightly as we awkwardly all gather together. Victor, from the Guatemalan COED staff, has been with the kids explaining what will be going on. Various students come into our crowd of Americans and hand out cards and gifts. I get two homemade cards nicely decorated and a boxed gift of something knitted. I don’t open it all the way just yet.
Carolyn J., Jim, Nick U., Noreen and I form a group and take four students. We meet Brenda, Sylvia, Orlando and Jorge—all twelve to thirteen years old. We walk along the streets to different shops, no stores, each of us trying our Spanish skills to learn a little about the child we’re walking with and to tell a little about ourselves. We go into a building that houses a large flea market atmosphere. There are a lot of neat things here. Things we’ve seen all along our trip and some new items.
One of the girls, Brenda, indicates she can lead us somewhere else. We follow her to Mercado de Artisians, the Artisans’ Market. There is a nice walkway along the outside of a large building that takes up the whole block. Small coves of shops are set in along the shaded walkway. The kids help us with our shopping, trying to talk down the merchants. They even carry our purchases for us, something we try hard not to get them to do, but they insist.
I figure I need to buy one more gift for Sam and see wooden toy “Chicken Buses,” but the one I like is broken.
“Maybe later,” I tell the seller, using the common English phrase.
I see some more in another shop and I’m about to buy one, but the man won’t give me the same price to what the last person went down. Oh well.
The story of the “Chicken Bus” is an interesting one. Old school buses are brought down from the United States then overhauled. They are painted various colors, red and turquoise being quite popular, then adorned in chrome. Lastly, decals are affixed to the front windshield and the back windows. Letters in an elegant font spell out the name of a woman whom the bus driver or owner fancies. They are called “Chicken Buses” because these buses are the main mode of long range transportation and can and do carry everything a passenger can carry aboard, including livestock.
We eat at a nice restaurant. I order pan, which is just bread, and a Sprite. I’ve been sipping my Pedialyte off and on, telling my group to make sure the teddy bear doesn’t show when I take it out of my pocket for a drink. The kids don’t know what they can order. We try to indicate they can get whatever they want. Between Jim’s dictionary, Carolyn’s cheat sheet, and my odd way of piecing words and phrases together, we get by. Jim has some stickers with him and hands out packs to the kids. We talk about the fact we should have gotten something a little more substantial for them, but we’re running late. It’s lucky Jim has those stickers on him.
Back at Parque Central, we learn that some of the other students get harmonicas, jewelry, shirts or books from their Americans. We all have an enjoyable visit. It was certainly better than one on one would have been. Many pictures later, we leave the kids with Victor.
Carolyn and I rush back to check out of our rooms. It’s very close to time for check out with departing for Guatemala City scheduled a half hour after that. We make it with a few minutes to spare after a few quick stops for that last gift. No luck. As we still have some spare time before the vans leave, Carolyn says she doesn’t mind going back out to the Artisans’ Market for that chicken bus if I really want it. We head out. Where’s my energy coming from? We get turned around and can’t locate the market. That’s OK. I’ll find something in Guatemala City.
We do find a jade shop, however. The saleslady speaks English very well, but that doesn’t stop me from trying Spanish. She welcomes us to a free piece of rough, unpolished jade. She says it’s carried for luck. I buy Becky a sterling silver bracelet with a green jade center. I get some One Quetzal coins as change and ask if I could get change for one of them for my kids. Another woman working there gets in her purse, makes change for me and shows me the pictures on each coin, explaining their significance. That was nice of her. She puts the coins in two small knitted bags, and we leave satisfied.
We get back to the hotel, and I have to use the bathroom one more time. I see a table of wares inside the hotel in a side walkway near one of the gardens. I buy Sam a slingshot. The wooden handle is a carved quetzal bird. I’ve avoided buying the noisy toys like marimbas, bongos and flutes and finally get something that kills and breaks things. Go figure.
I board my van at the last minute. I can barely sit. Thankfully, it’s not a long ride back to the Hotel Radisson, where it all began. I get a little nervous when I don’t see my bag being unloaded from either van. I never did witness it being loaded up in the first place. It’s on the truck that goes along in our caravan. Whew!
After collecting Q120 from each of us for tips to split between them, we say goodbye to our drivers and the security personnel. (My Quetzales are going fast). Besides Jose, the other one I remember most is 28-year-old Fernando. I exchange business cards with Jose.
“Good luck with your job,” He tells me in English.
We check in to the hotel, and John and I receive a corner suite on the top floor, 18. It’s huge. The living room area has a couch with a hideaway bed, a desk and office chair, and a table and kitchenette. A small hallway houses the bathroom then opens up to the master bedroom. It contains a king size bed, a sliding mirrored closet and large dresser with a hutch. The two walls on the corner are all windows. The view is awesome. I think we’re in one of the tallest buildings in the city. In the distance, I can see the volcanoes that have been such a focus and reference for us during our travels. They really don’t seem that far away.
It’s hard to believe, among all the noise, commercialism and crowded surroundings, that we were just deep in the countryside where some people have never even heard of the many things in this city that we take for granted. I lie on the bed for a while very tired, but I don’t want to fall asleep.
I’m wearing my tan slacks and light blue golf t-shirt, one of the two I bought at Kohl’s prior to my trip. I wore the matching maroon shirt on my first day here. So, my outfit is appropriate on our last official day here with COED as we have a reception in one of the hotel’s banquet rooms, and we are invited to dress up.
We sit at large round tables covered in white linen table clothes, sipping drinks as each COED staff member takes the microphone and says a few things, praising others and us as a group. They say they’ve seen more cohesion and more conviction with us than with any other group so far, and this tour marks the Ten Year Anniversary of book deliveries.
Holly says a few words about future fundraising and pledges. I would really like to sponsor a school ($2000) or a computer workstation ($1000), but I don’t know if I can raise that kind of money again from everyone who contributed to me in order to take this trip in the first place. Plus, I want to come again (after I send Becky). I want this to be a cause for us. I pledge $120. It’s all I think I can personally afford throughout the upcoming year for right now.
The staff hosts a little humorous award ceremony. The first winner is Mike for Most Competitive and Most Likely to Injure a Student. This is a result of him knocking into a girl during a basketball game of our guys against their girls. She fell down and hurt her ankle. The group I was in delivered to a different school on that day, so I wasn’t privy to that performance.
The second award goes to Alisha for Most Fashionable. She always wore tiny leather sandals or even small heels wherever we went and had to buy all new outfits as the airline lost her luggage for a day.
The third award goes to Don for Always Smiling. He always had a kind word and good attitude toward everything and everybody on the trip.
Another award is the Trooper Award. Two people are awarded this for handling the trip with the most grace, never complaining, or drawing attention to themselves. Firmin Widmer, 73, who walks with a cane and suffered a stroke some time ago and Kathleen, who is five months pregnant, are both deserving of this award.
The final award, and Holly makes sure we all know this was Joe’s idea, is another tie. It is for the Most “Flow” (their hygienic, clinical word for diarrhea). The winners are Connie, Firmin’s wife, and Yours Truly. Everyone laughs. We walk up to the front and accept our awards. I put my arm around Connie as we pose for a photo and take the whole thing in stride. Like the other winners, we receive small key chains made of small beads in the shape of various animals. Mine is a colorful Quetzal bird.
We are then treated to a slide show that Jess put together from over 1770 pictures her team took during the entire trip. She whittled it down to about 250. The show ends with an interesting story about Jeff, Joe, and Howard jumping naked into a natural spring as Jeff races for the camera while Howard rushes to undress and jump in before Jeff can come back with the camera. Jeff snaps a shot as Howard is in mid-leap and gets a hilarious picture of him, which is the last photo of the show.
Connie reads a nice poem she wrote about our journey, tying it in with “hands.” It’s very thought provoking. Lisa also has a poem. She says hers was just kind of thrown together, but its main focus is on a particular, mutually adored or observed attribute of each team member. Mine was “Love for my family.” That’s nice.
Throughout the days, I have always tried to keep my meal seats fairly random in an attempt to talk to more people and learn more about them. Sure, there are people I have more in common with and may enjoy talking with more than others, but I don’t think that’s the idea. Plus, I didn’t want to look like I was stuck up or in a clique. Ironically, I end this journey officially by sitting next to the same people with whom it began—Bob and George.
Our table, which also includes Robin and Nick K., Lisa, Suzanne, Mike and Alisha, shares our favorite moments of the trip. Being escorted by the little children ranks high with everyone. The kids waving American Flags and playing our National Anthem at Chinique School (I had been at a different school) was mentioned as well. Eating lunch on the hillside was a big moment too. I enjoyed singing the Guatemalan National Anthem, and being recognized for doing so was especially touching.
I want to get a picture of each table so I can definitely be sure of having pictures of everyone on our team. My plan only works for one table as I find that no one is ever sitting down all at once at each table. I also don’t have many shots left, and I’m too “camera’ed out” to worry about taking individual or other candid shots on this last night.
Jeff’s brother-in-law brings Guatemalan coffee that a lot of us ordered earlier in the week. He’s involved in making and packaging it. It comes in small burlap bags stitched to the bright weavings we’ve grown accustomed to seeing these last days. I pay Q100 for two bags. Oops. I’m now down to Q14 plus Q20 I’ve put aside for the departure tax at the airport. I really don’t need to spend money on anything else, just maybe dinner tomorrow, but it’s nice to have some leeway. Maybe I can find a working ATM tomorrow.
After dinner, everyone stands up and moves around, saying their goodbyes. Diana and John cut out quickly. They have an early morning flight out. I tell the women whom I went shopping with, as they tried their best to help me with ideas for gifts for my wife, that I did finally get her some jewelry. They applaud me.
Walking around, seeing people shake hands and hug, reminds me of the end of a Saturday Night Live TV episode. Each Saturday night, the cast members walk around on stage at the end of the show, shaking hands, hugging and congratulating each other. They are all friends, and it seems silly to an outsider watching it on TV that they’re doing this, because they’ll see each other again and do it all over next week. Just like we will, won’t we?
I reach everyone to say my personal goodbyes to him or her. Everyone except Richard. I don’t know where he went. Some goodbyes are definitely harder than others. I tell them I’ll see them at future COED functions and picnics. I mean it. I want to have a cause, and I already know everyone behind the scenes on this one. Some people, I know, I’ll never see again, but the locals, I hope they all come to Cincinnati at the next COED get-together.
It was either Tony or Colin, but one of them likened this reception to the last day of Summer Camp. I can see that.
Some people are still going out on the town after this. I’ve never been about that. I want to write some more, get to bed at a decent time then sleep in. Satisfied with my goodbyes, I slip out and back to the room. John’s already asleep. I write until 10:45 p.m. when it’s lights out on day 9 in Guatemala.