flea-less & sunburnt!

let's just say that the Lord had His hand on this weekend. everything about it, people, timing, weather. LOVED IT.
This weekend, Rachael, Sarah, Rebecca and I went to the lake! This was actually a trip with their organization (CAM-Central American Missions), but the leaders were so great and let me join in the fun! We got picked up on Friday about 10am by Mike and Sandy Glick, their daugther Maria, and the 4 other interns in Guatemala right now: Erin, Amy, Heidi, and Allison. These 4 girls are living together too and working at a child care center "Casita Benjamin" right near Guatemala City.
We all piled in the big van, and headed for the LAKE. 1st stop was at some ruins Iximche (don't ask me to pronounce it, cause I can't) These ruins were semi-cool. Basically there weren't really any whole structures left, so everything just looked like overgrown stone walls with lots of weeds. The COOLEST part of this time was in the back of the ruins. There are still some Mayans that perform rituals back behind all of the ruins. We got to walk right up sort of in the middle of some sort of sacrifice we think. There were several traditionally dressed Mayans there all hovering over a fire with something inside the fire. There were lots of rituals that went into building this fire. If we're going to be honest, it was a little creepy. I had to keep telling myself that they were "just cooking lunch" so that I wouldn't get creeped out. As I decided to be the brave one of the group, I met some other tourists. I started talking to them, and they had that undeniable, drippy sweet, never felt so good to hear it, SOUTHERN ACCENT. mmmmhmmmm! They were from Charlotte, and one of the men had lived in Myrtle Beach for several years in the late 80's, and two of their wives were Clemson Alumni! HOW COOL! We all talked about the south, and they were so excited to go back and get some Chickfila as well! However, they got to leave today. They assured me that they would eat some for me.
Post ruins, we went to a Swiss Restaurant alongside of the road headed towards the lake! Let me tell you. The best food I've had in awhile! This restaurant was SO nice. They had a big wood burning stove inside, VERY clean restrooms, and more to choose from on the menu than I could handle. Because the burgers were recommended, Sarah and I decided to split one, as well as a chicken sandwich, just so we'd have a variety! :) I ate every single bit of food on my plate. Never have I been so satisfied. As we were all eating lunch, we were watching the World Cup (of course-it's on in every building in this country). Uruguay and Ghana were playing. SUCH an intense game! For those of you who aren't soccer savvy, and haven't been following this tournament like a Spanish nut-they went into 3 overtimes, and then had to decide the game by having a "shoot-out". I though everyone in the restaurant was gonna pass out. Of COURSE they all wanted Uruguay to win, so we sided with them (being all continental & everythinggg) The game was about the most evenly matched thing I've ever seen, but when Uruguay slugged it out and WON at the end, I can tell you that all of Central and South America were rejoicing!!
We pulled up to the lake around 5pm but couldn't see the MAGNIFICENT view we'd heard all about because it was soooo foggy! We found our hotel, and got all checked in, dropped our bags, and went for a quick shopping trip! In the town of Panajanchel where the lake is, there is a main street-sort of picture King St. in Charleston except filled with market-y things and beggars. There was SO much to choose from. We shopped for about an hour or so, and then all met back up at the hotel to go to supper. We went to this really really yummy restaurant for supper. We were able to enjoy chicken, rice, soup, salad, garlic bread, and steamed vegetables. After supper we went back to the hotel to have a meeting, where we had some worship, and just talked about our experiences thus far into our trips. The hotel was AWESOME. I mean, it's Guatemala, so it really isn't a lot a lot to brag about, BUT our beds were SUPER comfy, no fleas, clean floors, and great views. We slept so so soundly last night that I didn't think I'd ever wake up. But, alas, at 5:15 this morning, we made our way to the roof of the hotel to watch the sunrise. Supposedly it's beautiful and one of the best we'd ever see. Too bad it was cloudy and there was a giant mountain in our way. So, about 5:25 we went back to bed for 4 more hours.
Today started out by a morning quiet time on the roof accompanied by massive amounts of sunlight (i almost cried i was so happy). Then, at 10, we went to this DELICIOUS breakfast restaurant. We had, again, SO many options of food. I decided on the breakfast Americano, which was scrambled eggs, hashbrowns, and 2 pieces of toast and jelly with a glass of orange juice. I'm not typically an orange juice fan, but it was so good this morning! A lot of the others at the table got omlettes or banana pancakes. I loved mine so very much! After breakfast, we went on this crazy fun boat ride across the lake to the town of Santiago. Santiago has a giant market too, so we were just going to walk around and shop. Honestly, I was just in it for the boat. Ohhh how good it felt to be out on the water, with sun kissing my skin and cool saltwater breeze on my face. Oh my word. I was in heaven! I never wanted to leave that boat! The ride over was about 45 minutes, and then the ride back was the same. We had so much fun just singing our way there, and sittin in the sunlight!! After boating (they tore me away) we walked back through town to Sarita & got some DELICIOUS ice cream. I was counting coins out to pay for this ice cream because, whoops, Betsy ran out of cash Friday night! EEK! However, I made exactly 9 Quetzales and got my cone of fresa con anecillos! After sweating through our ice cream, we walked around town to find a dress shop, where a few of the girls wanted to look for pretty sundresses-not me, I didn't have money. erg. we had to go to the bathroom really really bad, and the only way to do this is by paying 2 Q per person to use a public restroom. HOWEVER. We cheated the system. The dressing room in the dress shop had a toilet in it. So, we all went, one by one, faking clothes to try on, just so that we could use the toilet for free. Did we feel bad about cheating a poverty stricken country of their bathroom money? Not really. Guilt-free bathroom using is just so delightful!
We had to leave to come back at 4, so we all loaded up the van and went on our way! We rode about 2 hours until our supper pit-stop at Burger King, where a sweet little girl was having her 6th birthday party! There was cake and balloons everywhere! All 13 of us filed in line to order and ended up with all Double Cheeseburgers or Whoppers. (A little America hungry with tomorrow being the 4th and all!) After that yummy-ness, it was all we could do not to snag a piece of that birthday cake on the way out. Man. It looked GOOD. We got back to the Oasis at about 7:30 tonight, and went and talked to our houses. Today was visitors day for them, meaning that their parents or grandparents, or siblings could come visit them and play for a few hours today. It's always interesting to see the attitudes of those who got to see their families compared to the girls who didn't have any visitors that day. Some girls it bothers, others don't care at all. After visiting, we made some hot chocolate, grabbed some Oreos and headed up to do our blogging and socializing!

TODAY WAS MY 1 MONTH ANNIVERSARY HERE! Congratulations Betsy & Guatemala for a successful relationship so far! We've had our ups and downs, but so far so good. I am SO grateful to be here, and even more grateful for your prayers and continual encouragement! It makes me feel so good and so confident in the work that I'm doing here to know that I'm webbed in prayer everyday. Man, I've been given some GOOD FRIENDS!

Tomorrow, the other interns and I are going to San Lucas for the morning to the fruit market. We're hoping to get some really yummy fruit and other peelable vegetables for the remainder of their time here! After San Lucas, the Chinese Church will be here for the day, and they'll host a church service and lunch for all of us! Our friend Tiffany will be coming with them, so we're all really excited to see her!

Sorry for the super long post-but I wanted to keep everyone up to speed! Hope ya'll have had a really great weekend! For those of you who are Chapelers, please enjoy for me! There's a sweet sweet spirit in this place!

Te quiero!