Fast Food in Tactic

Last night, Amber had a hankerin' for some churrascos. So I jumped into the car (with Blaise) and fired into the centre of Tactic where hundreds of other locals were making their way too.



The churrasco is a very thin piece of beef steak, similar in cut to what they dice up for you at Edo Japan. The beef has been marinated and precooked over coals, so it only lacks a quick warming up.



The dish that is prepared is a bed of cooked cabbage with mayonnaise covered with a 10 cm X 10 cm churrasco that is covered with 4 corn tortillas.



Then we pick up some accessories: some deep-fried breadfruit (mazapán) and french fries (papas fritas) doused in mayo, ketchup and green hot sauce.



Two tasty meals like this for exactly $4 (Q28).

Collective Thought

Got an email from my friend Carole suggesting I take a look at this video clip from TED.

It discusses using technology to link the collective images on the web to form one master image of the world. In other words, if I post a picture of my house and add a bit of meta data, people could come across it if they take a 3-D look at Tactic, Guatemala - and it could be connected to other pictures of the area. The video shows this effectively using photos from Flickr that are tagged with "Notre Dame" and composites these photos into a 3-D (sort of) image of the cathedral in Paris.

This is not a new idea, just a new application of the collective thought. The most successful application of it so far has been Wikipedia, the online encyclopedia that anyone can contribute to. There is also Project Gutenberg where people can submit and share eBooks for free that are free domain (over 50 years old).

This article in the NY Times (you might need a free subscription) shows how they are doing the same thing with maps.

The most important part of all this is that no one owns the information because everyone contributes and can share it for free. Those who put together the composite can charge advertisers to pay for their costs, but that doesn't hurt anyone or put controls on what is happening.

The idea of collective thought is a recent one for me. As social ideas shift and are moulded through time, it is believed that we all start to think the same thing and hold the same memories. Globally, this is a recent phenomena due to information and communication technology. I detect a serious danger in the way that social ideas can moulded by advertisers (or amoral corporations). These ideas can't be checked because once they are out there and permeate the culture, it takes time to dismantle.

Example: Many people in Guatemala feed Pepsi and coffee to their infants in bottles. This idea won't go away too quickly, but it will over time as it is introduced to a healthier idea through the collective thought - as long as that is the idea that is passed on from the majority.

Finally, there is the issue of collective guilt. If we all believe the same things and as a consequence do the same things (for example add to landfill sites), then we are all at fault and responsible for finding a solution (global warming, urbanization, use of water sources, etc.).

The Swamp

Blaise and I kicked the soccer ball back and forth a bit in our driveway before supper. He's quite a good kicker, though he enjoys carrying the ball in his hands too. He says "One, Three, Five, Goal!" before kicking.

He smartly suggested we play in the grass and I agreed, not so wisely. Our front yard is a swamp, only when it rains though. It rains almost every day.



We got our feet wet.

Travel Guatemala

I've been really blessed to see a lot of the Guatemalan countryside (and neighbouring Honduras and El Salvador) over the past 2 years and on our trip 5 years ago. Some unique places include:

1. Salamá & San Miguel Chicaj
2. Tikal
3. Flores & Santa Elena
4. Lake Atitlan (and 5 towns around it)
5. Pacaya volcano
6. Copán Ruinas and aguas termales, Honduras
7. numerous mountain villages around Tactic
8. Livingstone and Río Dulce
9. Antigua Guatemala
10. Guatemala City
11. Fray Bartolomé de las Casas
12. Semuc Champey and Lanquin
13. Cobán
14. San Juan Chamelco & Caves at Rey Marcos
15. Santa Ana, El Salvador
16. Juayua, El Salvador
17. Purulhá
18. El Rancho
19. Caves at Candelaria

For a long time, I've wanted to get a GPS system that I could carry with me and connect to my computer to generate maps of where I've been. I look forward to many more trips in the future, there are huge chunks of Guatemala that I haven't seen. We hope to go to the Cancún area of Mexico in January to meet family, so that will take us through Belize.

Trip to Salamá

This little afternoon/evening trip marked the first time I had been anywhere new in Guatemala for a very long time. Vicky invited us to go to Salamá and meet her relatives and eat boshból.



Salamá is the capital city of the department of Baja Verapaz. It is much hotter, cleaner, and prettier than our capital, Cobán. We walked around the city market and central square for an hour and a half, then made our way to San Miguel Chicaj about 10 minutes further.



We met up with Vicky, Eldin, Mercedez, Belén, and their relatives in San Miguel and were promptly served a corn drink (sweet like cream of corn) and boshból. Boshból is a squash leaf wrapped around some corn dough that is then boiled. A spicy red sauce is added to it. It reminded me quite a bit of fiddleheads.



We got in at 9 pm. Blaise didn't sleep a wink the whole trip home.

girl / boy

Fresh from the cute patch.



Living to rumble toughly.

Visitors, Crawlers, and Geography

On occasion I like to get an idea of how many people visit my website and what pages are visited most often. The stats give me an idea of which days there was the most traffic (like last Sunday after I sent an email to family and friends that I had posted a bunch of photos).

Two things don't work too well with these stats:

• pictures that I post on my blog monopolize the stats for most visited URLs because my blog gets more traffic than my website and the photos are stored on my website
• 75% of the surfing on my site comes from Web Crawlers

Now, I know the web crawlers do a service, they allow people to find my site based on searches, like these ones: her ankle, tan lines, zaakistan.com, abbadie de saint-castin, amber isaguirre, amber pacific, amber tan, amber hay, anne van nostrand, ben pyper universe, bronze cross, exerpts from chicken soup for the teenage soul, fireweed souvenirs, madokawondo

I added ClustrMaps to my website a couple months ago. I like this one because it localizes where people are visiting my site from. For instance, I know now that my relatives do indeed visit my site from Vancouver, central Alberta, Montreal, New Brunswick, Florida, and China. I can also assume that the dozens of visitors from the midwestern USA are actual web crawlers. Then there are the international visitors like us in Guatemala, friends in South Africa (hi Waldrons), Romania (hi Chels), Peru (hi Victoria and Anna), and Germany (hi Steffi).

There are a few mysterious ones like Switzerland and the one on the edge of Hudson's Bay. Maybe they are the ones searching for tan lines and her ankle.

Rolled into One

I've been super busy. The last two days, I've put in 24 hours of work, plus 8 hours on the weekend. During all of this, I've had lots to write about, but now I've forgotten most of what I've wanted to say. Here are a few snapshots of some experiences / thoughts.



I've installed 23 stoves so far. Jorge helped me out with the last 10 and we had to hike up three mountains to install the last 4. We ran into his brother. Jorge told me that his brother's wife left him a month ago while her husband was at work. She took their two daughters. No one knows where they went.



This is one of the reasons why these stoves are important. This is the soot on a tile roof. The hole is where the stove pipe will go.



My firstborn son turned 2 on Friday. We had a little party that lasted 3 hours - pizza, piñata, and cake. Oh, and lots of toddlers and preschoolers running around. Blaise is awesome.



It is election year in Guatemala - municipal, departmental, and federal. So a helicopter can be seen over Tactic occasionally as it transports campaigning politicians to our region. I want to do a post outlining the various parties and how people campaign in Guatemala.

I am managing a pharmacy at a 4 day medical clinic in Mocohan this week. Got a little break this morning so I could get some translating done. See you on the other side.

7.7.7

This is a day worth celebrating!

I think it is cool that we get to live through two palindromic years - 1991 and 2002. The next one is in 105 years.

Avoidance

About 5 weeks ago, I drove a 13-year-old to a private pediatricians clinic. The boy had been steadily declining in his condition of stiff joints and severe pain for 6 months. His parents had brought him to a local doctor who had said that he had rheumatic fever and prescribed some antibiotics and other things. The drugs had done nothing to improve his situation so far and he hadn't begun his school year in January because of his condition. The director of the children's afternoon program he is involved in asked me what Impact Ministries could do.

The doctor I took him to asked for a long series of tests to be done. The next week, we were told he likely has systemic juvenile idiopathic arthritis (JIA) and she referred us to a specialist, the only one in Guatemala, in the capital 4 hours away. Systemic JIA is a very serious disease that attacks the tissue in joints and can cause irreparable damage to joints and the spine if not treated early on. I contacted the boy's sponsor and asked if he would be willing to help with the costs of the treatment and he said he was and has sent money.

Meanwhile, the boy's parents returned to the first doctor they had brought him to who had consistently misdiagnosed him for 6 months. This doctor said that the doctor I took him to was wrong after looking at the tests. They took the boy to an evangelist in Cobán where he was prayed for and liberated from a bad spirit, after which they believed he was healed. He wasn't healed, though he did seem in better spirits.

I managed to convince them to make an appointment with the specialist and they did for the following week. I checked in on them two days ago to see what the specialist said and ask how we could help with the costs of the treatment. They had decided not to go and instead had gotten a referral from their employer to another pediatrician in Cobán who said he just had an infection and prescribed erythromycin, an antibiotic that fights repiratory tract infections along with chlamydia, syphilis, acne and gonorrhea. He is almost finished his prescription. This is his third of fourth series of treatments that will do absolutely nothing to help his condition.

Again, I explained the severity of the disease and the importance of going to the capital. This is a difficult thing to do when they don't want to hear that it is serious and when other doctors are telling them it's just an infection. They agreed after 30 minutes of me telling them they were being irresponsible and careless to make another appointment with the specialist. We'll see if they go through with the trip to the capital or if they will wait another six months to see the JIA worsen and have their son in a wheelchair.

Climb this one mountain

When driving from the Capital, each time I approach Purulhá (Km 164) I reassert that I want to climb this one mountain. It is an awesome sight and the perfect shape. This is it at 8:20 this morning with the mist still shrouding it.

So, in an effort to achieve goals (notably #81) and to be a good host to Will who is visiting, I invited him to climb the mountain with me this morning as I had it open from work. We drove to Purulhá and asked around if we should ask permission from anyone before making the climb. We talked to Don Roberto and he said "Dele!" So we did.



We crossed the barbed wire fence and began our ascent through a thicket of thorns, vines, ferns, alders, and muck. We would run accross a path every now and then, but they usually ran horizontal and didn't give us any hope of reaching the summit. So, without a machete, we scratched our way up the mountain.



After an hour, we were level with the tops of some of the smaller mountains level with us. My goal was to get to the top and see over into other valleys. After scrambling up some rock faces and more scrub brush, we had to quit and enjoy our achievement about 20 minutes short of the summit. We still had to get down, drive home, clean up and then I had to work all afternoon.





The hike down proved more difficult than the one up. We ended up going down the wrong side of the mountain after finding a favourable route, but we would end up a couple kilometres from my car. So we pushed and at a rate of about 2 metres per minute, we bushwacked to the other side of the steep mountain. It was quite demoralizing. It took us just as long to get down as up.



This is Purulhá.



We shot for a corn field that was up the mountain and trudged down the steep hill between 50 cm high corn plants. From there we walked half a km to the car at the base of the mountain.

There was no water for sale at the corner store, so we each downed a freezing Pepsi. My forehead contracted. Both Will and I are very scratched up and sun burnt.

But it was worth it.

After an extensive shower, I went to work deworming children and taking a team to visit their sponsor children in San Antonio.

Pissing my life away

WARNING: MAYBE SOME OF YOU DON'T WANT TO READ THIS

My red baseball cap is on the floor of the bathroom in Pollo Campero (Country Chicken fast food joint in Guatemala City). My elbows hurt and so does the back of my head. I hunch over the sink and breath and slowly wash my hands. I stumble out of the bathroom and make it to a chair where I rest a moment. I zip up my pants. I walk to our booth and sit with the three Guatemalans who are with me to pick up the group at the airport in 20 minutes. They tell me I look very white, whiter than usual. I lay down in the booth behind my own and let the blood rush back into my head. My lasagna arrives.

(2 minutes earlier) It's 9:20 pm and I haven't eaten since noon. After nursing a small sweet coffee, I walk into the bathroom to let out some gas and take a whiz. My stomach has been bothering me all day. As I'm urinating, I can feel the blood leave my head from top to bottom. My eyes stop being able to focus. I put a hand on the urinal separator to support myself. I think to myself that the last time I felt this way I fainted, and because I know this I can prevent myself from fainting again.

(9 hours earlier) I'm eating lunch in Honduras; it's one of those tall triple bread sandwiches. I have more than 4 hours of driving to do before I get to Guatemala City. I've spent the morning in my hotel room playing with the kids, watching Wimbledon, and going between the bathroom and the bed. I take an Immodium before getting behind the wheel.

(5 hours earlier) As I lay in bed, I can feel a bit of gas coming on. I consider sitting on the toilet for this one. It's a good thing I do. It's going to be a long morning, perhaps even a long day.

Clean, Economical, Healthy, Safe, Environmental

This is how most Guatemalan's cook. There aren't many benefits to this. The one benefit I can think of is heat when it's cold.

The damages are numerous. The smoke is thick. Lungs and eyes are constantly irritated and related illnesses are common. Children are often burned when they pull burning sticks onto themselves or fall into ground fires. The metal roofs are ruined by the soot and smoke. The walls and everything in the kitchen are blackened and filthy. The cost of the wood is very high, either by time collecting it or purchasing it. One woman told me she spends $14 a month on firewood on this kind of fire (we spend the same on propane for ours). An estimated 6 trees are cut down each year in order to provide firewood for one family.



I've been spending the last three days delivering, installing and photographing new Onil stoves in people's homes. These of course eliminate the smoke, soot and burning dangers (unless someone sits on griddle, the concrete only gets mildly warm). They use up to 70% less firewood on top of that.

I really enjoy seeing these stoves go into people's homes. Their quality of life improves so much! What's funny is that when we drop off the stove, they often have it almost completely put together before I can get in to make sure it's put together correctly, they are so excited. It's quite the treat!

Shoot

So we got 50 bullets.



Picked up Erick's pistol.



Put up a target.



And mostly missed.



Comment: It was really loud.

Failed States Index

The Fund for Peace publishes an annual report called the Failed States Index. This year it studied 177 countries and rated them on 12 criteria which polled social, economic, and political factors.

A few observations:

• Canada's three greatest weaknesses are shown to be:
  • Mounting Demographic Pressures
  • Massive Movement of Refugees or Internally Displaced Persons creating Complex Humanitarian Emergencies
  • Uneven Economic Development along Group Lines
• Only 18 of the 36 most failed states are in Africa
• The United States is failing as a state better than 17 other countries
• Guatemala is failing more as a state than Mozambique, Madagascar, Dominican Republic, Cuba, Mali, and Vietnam
• The 5 countries that are succeeding the most all have high taxes and are in Europe
• South Africa is the most successful country in Africa
• Haiti, Columbia, Bolivia, Guatemala are the biggest failures in the western hemisphere and also the sites of US military intervention (and the cause of much of the failure)

Papa's Day #2

Amber put together a splendid father's day for me. I was nearly as pampered as the kids. It was my second year as a father (my first year we hiked to a waterfall) and already look more haggard (see above photo).

The dear mother of my children got a DVD* for me and let me watch all 6 episodes on the disc throughout the day. We went out for brunch and played at the playground outside the restaurant. Amber cooked up my favorite pumpkin soup with biscuits. Then after the lambs were in bed, we watched Pan's Labrynth (superb!!).

My papa wasn't home all day so I couldn't call him. Besides there was no signal on our phones most of the day anyway. I'm going to call him later today.

I only had to change 2 diapers the whole day too!

* Thanks Saison for picking it up and thanks Tureena for bringing it to Guate. The DVD was The Office, Season 1

House Hunting in Tactic

We had two visitors to our ministry over the weekend. One of them sponsors a girl, Olga, and so I ventured to take her yesterday to see her. It went like this.

1. Stop by Oscar and Evelin's to see if they know where Olga lives. They don't know, so they direct me to Olga's aunt's house (Alma), close to Tienda Amarilis (store).

2. Stop by Tienda Amarilis where the lady at the counter sends me next door to Alma's house.

3. Stop by Alma's house/store. She tells me that Olga just recently moved. She doesn't know where she lives now except that it's in a small village up the mountain. The road there has a sign that reads "Salam."

4. Stop by the SDA Church because Olga's father is the pastor there. It's Sunday and no one is there, so I ask the owner of the store across the street if he knows where the pastor lives. He doesn't know, but he knows that Porfilio Ayala knows where the pastor lives. I get directions to Porfilio's house.

5. Stop by Porfilio's street and ask a teenager where the Ayala house is. He says that no Ayala's live on this street. I should try the street over.

6. Stop by the street over and ask a woman there if she knows which house is the Ayala house. She says the Ayalas live on the street I was just on. The teenager was wrong.

7. Stop by the Ayala house and no one is home. They've just left according to a neighbour. They went to their other property on the highway next to the Telgua phone tower. They have a white car.

8. Stop by the white car parked on the highway and ask three neighbours and several pedestrians if they know where the people are that came in the white car. No one knows any Ayalas nor to whom the car belongs.

9. Drive down the road leaving town looking for the "Salam" sign. We don't see it anywhere.

***

10. We meet Olga at school this morning with her sponsor. After the morning devotional, Olga carries a flag in the morning's civic ceremony that happens once a month. It's her class's turn to lead the service. Olga also proudly leads the school in the Guatemalan National Anthem.

I guess I could have been pro-active and talked to Olga on Friday and gotten directions to her house. It's usually not that tricky to find a house though. Usually it's 2-4 stops.

Will Salomé get two in a row?

Any crackers out there to crack this one?

Kids' Favorite Verses

Our latest mailout to sponsors from their sponsor children was the child's favorite verse. It took a long time to translate the 450 sheets. The younger ones added drawings and the older ones explained why they chose the verse. There were some very funny and very touching verses that I thought I would record here.

There were lots about obeying parents and God such as:

Children, obey your parents in all things, for this is well pleasing to the Lord. Fathers, do not provoke your children, lest they become discouraged. (Colossians 3:20-21)

For whom the Lord loves He corrects,
Just as a father the son in whom he delights. (Proverbs 3:12)

There were those on poverty, like:

Blessed is he who considers the poor;
The Lord will deliver him in time of trouble.
The Lord will preserve him and keep him alive, (Psalm 41:1-2a)

Then Peter said, “Silver and gold I do not have, but what I do have I give you: In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, rise up and walk.” (Acts 3:6)

Those about judgment such as:

And as it is appointed for men to die once, but after this the judgment, (Hebrews 9:27)
(the accompanying drawing was of Winnie the Pooh)

and the very popular

for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, (Romans 3:23)

To obscure verses, perhaps open and point), for example:

Now John also was baptizing in Aenon near Salim, because there was much water there. And they came and were baptized. (John 3:23)

Of how much more value then is a man than a sheep? Therefore it is lawful to do good on the Sabbath.” (Matthew 12:12)

And the ones that had special meaning for certain students:

So he said to them:
“Out of the eater came something to eat,
And out of the strong came something sweet.”
Now for three days they could not explain the riddle. (Judges 14:14)

from 13-year-old Ervin:

Let him kiss me with the kisses of his mouth
For your love is better than wine.
Because of the fragrance of your good ointments,
Your name is ointment poured forth;
Therefore the virgins love you. (Song of Songs 1:2-3)

from 10-year-old Jessica whose father abandoned his family to go work as an illegal in the USA nine months ago:

When my father and my mother forsake me,
Then the Lord will take care of me. (Psalm 27:10)

From 18-year-old Juan:

do not be afraid, nor be dismayed, for the Lord your God is with you wherever you go.” (Joshua 1:9b)

This is my favorite verse because when I am in a place where there are many guys drinking alcohol and there are people passing in front of them and the drinkers hit them, but when I pass by there, they don’t do anything to me because God is with me always.

The 23rd Psalm was the overall favorite, edging out John 3:16. One boy had this to say about John 3:16:

God loved the world so that the world would love Him. I love Him. God sent His only son to die for us. God gives us eternal life because God loved the world He sent His son so that he who believes will not be lost and have eternal life.

16-year-old Eddie adds perhaps a little more coherence to why he chose John 3:16:

...in my life there have been many problems and temptations, but I remember this verse and I feel that the burden is lifted, to know that God loves me and loves me a lot. He has a hope for my life and also has prepared something for my life.

And for the hasty:

Jesus wept. (John 11:35)

Early Morning Rain

I've been so messed up by this quick trip to Guatemala City. We got up at 4:30 AM to pick up Tureena at the airport and I can't nap, so I've been passing out early in the evening ever since. This means I wake up early; this morning it was 5:30.

It was just dawning and there was rain. The temperature, light, humidity, sounds of birds chirping, fog in the mountains, and being alone. It just brought me back to so many other mornings in the woods growing up, standing on our patio in Montreal, walking to the beach on Carlos, packing up the tent on the Mackenzie or on the bike trip, delivering the newspaper at CUC, and on and on. Mornings all over the world are awe-inspiring. Add rain, and you have purity.

The atmosphere was so perfect, I had to indulge in one of my current favorite passtimes: pissing off the back step.

Disney DVD Deal

Between movies #1 and #2, and right after eating a quick supper, I shot into an appliance store that also sells movies. You know, just to see if there were any deals. Before I could get to the shelf with adult movies - by adult I don't mean pornography, I mean not for children - I ran accross a big shelf that had a sign "Liquidation of Disney Movies."

I'm not a big big fan of Disney movies. My sisters watched The Little Mermaid religiously when we were kids and I laughed when I saw Aladdin. But I never sang Disney movies or watched one over and over again.

So this shelf had about 50 different titles - most of them straight to video sequels of originals, but some were the classics like Dumbo and Pinocchio. The more I looked around, I found more really great cartoons - some recent ones too like Chicken Little and The Emperor's New Groove. They were selling for Q43 ($6.14 & no tax, no shipping). From what I remember in Canada, Disney movies sell for $25 and old movies only come around every 15 years or so.

So I did the only thing any film-addicted parent would do: I bought every original theatre release they had: 19. I may never have to buy another Disney DVD again. Sweet.

Action, Action, or Action

I will spend tomorrow afternoon and evening at Proceres, a mall in Guatemala City. I'm picking a friend up a the airport at 5 AM on Tuesday, so we're heading in early because driving in the dark is scary and it might take 8 hours to do a 3 hour trip, you never know!!

So, at Proceres, there's a nine screen cinema where they play English language movies with Spanish subtitles. I saw The Last King of Scotland there a few months back and so I am excited to return and perhaps pull off a triple-feature. I just looked up what is playing there and I'm mildly enthused. I'm wishing there were more compelling dramas, but alas! I'm stuck with 3 of 7 films playing in all of Guatemala:

1. Piratas del Caribe 3
2. Spiderman 3
3. Panico en Alta Mar* (Adrift)
4. Crank, Muerte Anunciada** (Crank)
5. Prueba de Fe*** (The Reaping)
6. El Tirador (Shooter)
7. Exterminio 2 (28 Weeks Later)

Looks like I've got a choice between Action Adventure, Action Horror, and Action Thriller. I will endeavor to see Action movies behind curtains 2, 6, & 7. (though #6 is at another theatre... and it might be the best film of the three!)

*translated Panic in the High Seas **translated Announced Death ***translated Test of Faith

No Pets Allowed... No Pets Needed

When it gets dark, the toads come out, and so does Blaise.



A flashlight is commandeered and the creatures are probed.



The toad is the usual main attraction and Blaise enjoys ordering them around.



Tonight's beetle is a bonus. It's BIG. And relatively quick too.
(You can see it in the second photo in the middle)



Acadia is more comfortable with tamer, plusher organisms.

Ultimate iPod Advert

No clothes needed.

Rained Out

I'M NOT BEING RAINED OUT BECAUSE I'M GETTING WET (WELL, NOT YET). IT'S BECAUSE IT'S SO LOUD! AMBER AND I SAT DOWN TO WATCH THE GOOD GERMAN AND BEFORE THE OPENING CREDITS HAD ENDED, IT STARTED TO RAIN. WE STRUGGLED THROUGH THE FIRST 40 MINUTES AND DECIDED WE BETTER JUST GIVE IN.

FORGIVE ME FOR SHOUTING, BUT IT'S THE ONLY WAY I CAN BE HEARD. ITS THE METAL ROOF THAT IS THE PROBLEM. WE EVEN HAVE A BUFFER OF PLANKS BETWEEN US AND THE SHEET METAL.