It´s been a long two weeks on the farm, but interesting and full. Eng and I stayed in different homestays to challenge ourselves more - it turned out good but at the moment when we had to split up I wanted to change it! I walked up a long windy dirt path with Josephina, my new house mom, to the little concrete house where she lives, with her husband and 3 kids ages 8, 10, 12. It was a simple three room house - kitchen, and two rooms with beds, one with a TV that functioned as a family room as well. The sink, toilet and shower were outside in little stalls. There was no running water in the house, but they kept a big filtered water jug in the house. So yeah it was different! And they spoke no English, so it was all Spanish all the time, or just silence sometimes. It was great though! It´s amazing how you can really bond with people despite the language barrier. I could even joke around with them or make small talk, etc. It was fun. I bought the little girl shoes for her birthday and would randomly bring home fruit or stuff for the kids. On the last day, they surprised me with this HUGE industrial sized strawberry pie, which I had seen them making in the Farm kitchen but didnt know it was for me. I was so happy! It was amazing. I was so sad to leave them.
Work at Ijatz was cool. Everyone was nice and again, it crazy how you can bond and have relationships with people when you can barely speak. My spanish got a lot better, or at least I was forced to be more comfortable giving it a shot, putting together shoddy sentences combined with the occasional charrades. We worked in the office with Victor a lot, sometimes with Pancho with the conjehos (bunnies) or in the gardens, and sometimes with the mujeres (woman) who make snacks and drinks to sell on the street as a side business. The first day was the hardest as we had to scoop up rabbit poo for the organic fertilizer. Yay organic! It was gross but we had a really good time with Pancho and just laughing to each other.
We were really glad when it was over though, to be able to come back to San Marcos and enjoy the peace and pleasantness here. And get some normal food. This is a whole other issue, but its really sad how people eat in the small towns, the regular people like the ones we were staying with. It was mostly sweet breads, very sweet watered down coffee, tortillas (fresh and yummy but just carbs), rice, beans and the occasional vegetable, eggs, chicken and carne (least frequent). They dont eat many vegetables. I thought since they were more indigenous they would all have backyard gardens and be really healthy, but just like in the states, people just buy what is cheap, including sugary processed stuff. Anyway, ts nice to get some yogurt, fruit and western-hippy chow here in San Marcos.
Ciao for now!
