Written By Cece & Jackie
This week was the first of 2 weeks in Xela, aka Quetzaltenango! Our first morning here was a Sunday. We spent most of it trying unsuccessfully to find an open lavanderia to wash our clothes that had been covered in mud from Comalapa. Turns out most of them are closed on Sundays!
After we took a tour of the city, and later we explored the bustling Parque Central. This week a festival has been going on there in honor of the patron saint of the city, Rosario.
Monday was the start of our first session of Spanish classes! Along with one-on-one classes matched to our Spanish speaking levels, there were also activities after school everyday that we all had the opportunity to participate in with other students at the school, the Quetzalteco Linguistic Project (PLQ). Some of these included a documentary, a super fun soccer game, and a trip to Aguas Amargas, a hot spring about an hour outside of Xela.
Some activities within our little Carpe Diem group involved a full moon ceremony, focused on self reflection and transformation as the moon enters a new cycle. We also, of course, had some major dance parties this week! This Wednesday’s self care night ended up being an insane dance party at our hostel. On Friday, we had a salsa class with some locals and other students from PLQ, which was a little less crazy than our typical dance parties within our group, but just as fun!
While this week was amazing, we also faced some challenges along the way. Learning and practicing Spanish for 5 hours a day can be mentally exhausting and many days this week we came back to our hostel tired and needing a power nap before the next activity. On Saturday, we also faced a more physical challenge. We set out to climb Mt. Chicabal, a dormant volcano located near Xela that’s crater is now a lake. We woke up at 6 AM in an attempt to reach the top before the clouds rolled in, but after just walking through town to reach the trailhead, we realized we had met our match and got a ride to the top from a Torito. After some amazing views, the fog began to roll in. For a while, it was so thick that we could barely see five feet in front of us. Tomorrow we will meet our homestay families who we will be living with for the next week! We are so excited to see what this week holds and what adventures are coming up next!
What were three of the top highlights this week?:
- Salsa Class – It was super fun and we learned a ton of new moves!
- Self Care Night Dance Party – We love to dance and it was a great way to hype each other up and hang out together.
- The Impromptu Scary Carnival Swing Ride – After salsa we went on a swinging carnival ride in Parque Central that was so fun and memorable, but also mildly terrifying
🌎 What are you most grateful for this week?:
This week we are so grateful for all the new people we have met, from teachers and students at PLQ, to the very kind locals that we have interacted with! We are so excited for what is to come in the next week as we move onto the next adventure: homestays!
