Define ¨Very Difficult¨

Yesterday in my lessons I tried to make myself feel better about not having done enough homework by explaining how difficult it is to balance what I want to accomplish down here with the fact that I am on vacation. ¨It´s very difficult to find a balance,¨ I said too many times. Then I used some lousy mountain metaphore to explain the lingual plateau that I´m on this week, and my teacher graciously drew a mountain and explained how she would help me climb to the top over the course of the next week. I´m a bit nervous, but it may just work. Monday, I begin morning classes from 8 am- 12 pm and return to volunteer with the local school children from 3-5 pm. (Yippee! We are going to start by picking up garbage and learning why-- that is for sure.) Then I have conversation club from 5-6 pm, followed by the evening´s lecture, and dinner back at the house with the family. No time for English, you see?

The complimentary event at the school last night was a lecture by a war survivor. As he described his capture at age 16 by government soldiers, the torture and execution of his fellow Mayan villagers, and his excruciating journey back home after having been shot twice, he kept saying, ¨It was very difficult at that time. Very difficult.¨ The war in Guatemala, some say, is still going on, although it ended decades ago and peace accords were signed ten years ago. Many people say that the agreements are not being upheld. It sounds exactly like all of the treaties the US government signed with our indigenous population, all the way up until the time that we forced them into reservations or sent them into extinction. Very difficult times...

My teacher brought us to the market in Santiago today. The town is much bigger than this one, and it is the victim of a landslide in 2005 that buried 200 residents alive while they slept. Today you would never know that such tragedies as the war and the landslide and disappearances of people each week had taken place. The color that the women wear in Santiago is purple, and many shades of it. Perhaps it was strategy and not luck that put my teacher in a red shirt so that we were able to stay with her as we wound our way through the beautiful booths of weavings, fresh foods of all kinds, and unending rows of shops. Despite the gruesome stories of the past and the hardships that these people still face, I am continually impressed by their gentle spirit, openness, and kindness.