War stories over an open fire

January 30, 2006
Well another windy week in Solola. It was beautiful though; the days were sunny and clear while the nights were wild with the howling of the wind. I still had a great week, but I must say that Saturday was the best! All the Peace Corps volunteers who live and work in Solola came to a BBQ at Michelle’s, a fellow volunteer’s house. Now you have to understand that Solola is called a “department” here like a “state” in the U. S. There are 22 departments in all of Guatemala and there are roughly 18-20 volunteers in Solola. Michelle is my site mate, meaning that she lives in my same town. We chose to have it at her house because she has an amazing view that overlooks the lake.
So the purpose of the BBQ was to just hang out and meet the newbees, not that we needed a purpose to be social with our fellow American. There are 3 new volunteers in our department that came in about 2 months ago. Not only do we want to hang out and meet the new volunteers, but we also like to vent our emotions. We are like a breed of people who truly understand one another’s frustrations and heartaches. Call us a brotherhood if you will who share war stories involving stool samples, bowl movements, ravishing dogs that run in packs and the foul rides on chicken buses. Maybe we were a little rough on the newbees but someone’s got to break them in. We can’t all be fooled by Guatemala’s rich culture and saturated beauty. That’s just one side of Guatemala, the other side; we volunteers work with and know all too well. It's the side we're not afraid to talk about.