blow up your tv...

Dear Kristin,

Here in Tucson, the early mornings and late nights are beginning to feel like fall. Soon it will be layering season--boots and sweater weather--my favorite. Life is funny, how things settle and change. I talked to Becca today, and she said it was chilly fall in North Carolina. She was wandering around an antique store in long sleeves and a sweater. Sometimes I miss how cozy Fall and Winter are. I get the urge to hunker down, build a fire, and read books and books and books all winter long.

But here I am in Arizona. It's beautiful here. Uppie, Dave, Pam, Emily, and I went to Romero Pools the other day. It was gorgeous and green from the end of monsoon season. There was a ton of water in the pools and we swam all day. The temps are still 90 degrees everyday, and I've been sweating bullets on the farm. Adam and CJ are making progress on the microgreens. Here they are, looking lovely. These are specifically arugula microgreens. We ate them on crackers along with my most recent batch of goat cheese (green onion and garlic flavored), and they were delicious!



Here are pictures of Adam and I from a recent sunset at Gate's Pass. There some more neat ones from that day (there was a whole car-load of us that went up there), but they're on CJ's computer.





In other news, I'm doing some temporary work at the Native Seeds farm with Chris and am starting my job at the Food Bank Farm on October 1st. We've been putting in some sweaty hours at Adam and CJ's sinking chicken wire along the fence to keep the rabbits out. I drove the tractor (Fidel) down the road and back. I think I did pretty well, considering.

I love seeing your Guatemala pictures, but I want to see pictures of YOU in Guatemala!!! I miss you!!

Love,
Debbie

La escuela de la Montaña

Dear Debbie,

I spent my first week of language school up in the rural mountains at a school on an old Coffee Finca. Today I am headed back up there for two more weeks of peaceful relaxing study. Es muy tranquilo.

Algunos photos de la escuela

This is the front porch, used for relaxing, studying and drinking beer.

These are two of the ranchitos where we have our classes outside under the little thatched huts during the afternoon rain storms.

The school is of course small and intimate. I quickly got to know the 9 other students and all 5 teachers, much more so than at the larger school in Xela. The small size of the two local communities that work with the school makes the impact of the escuela very apparent. Once a week a noche cultural is held in an old barn for the children. This basically consits of playing games involving one person being IT and trying to get someone else to be IT. Ejemplo- the first game was everyone sitting in a circle in chairs, facing in with one extra empty chair. The joven who was IT tries to sit in the empty chair but the kids in the circle keep moving one chair over, trying to fill it and so the empty chair moves around the circle. If IT manages to sit down, the person in the chair to the right is now IT. This reminds me of an inside out musical chairs. Another game we played consisted of IT secretly picking a veggie or fruit and asking people around the circle to guess it. But you don't want to be correct, because if you guess right you get a small glass of water thrown in your face and you become it. The prize that now you get to toss water on someone. The secretness of the chosen fruit gives the water holder an awful lot of power. During one round a compañero de classe guessed Piña and did not get wet but about three guesses later I heard una chica guess Piña as well, getting herself a faceful of water.

Muy divertido.

Love y Amor,

Kristin

Kristin says "Goodbye, Tucson!"

Gracias por su ayuda, Marcos

A few days ago I left Antigua because it dawned on me that the city resembled a Disney World village. A clear separation existed between the many tourists and the Antigua residents. The kind of separation built up over years by both sides until a foreboding wall divides the two contently solitary sides.

I took my first round of chicken buses in order to get to Xela. On the first I sat next to an elderly woman. I started the conversation by asking her what the cost for the bus would be. She helped me out and we attempted to get to know each other regardless of the language barrier. As we arrived in Chimaltenango, she tried to tell me which bus stop I needed to get off on in order to catch the bus to Xela. Unfortunately, I could tell she was trying to communicate more information to help me out, but couldn´t for the life of me grasp what she was saying.

Then the bus stopped again and the ayudante told me this was the final stop. Shit, how do I get to Xela? He vaguely gestured in one direction and mumbled something about 4 blocks that way. I was alone in a city I didn´t know with no idea where I was or where I needed to be.

(edititors note: all stories related here are many days after they happened)

Back to Chimal, I started walking in the vague direction indicated... I felt completly out of place with my turtle shell of a bag. I knew I would have to ask for more information so I approced a man walking down the street who looked like he knew where he were going and also had no interest in me whatsoever.

With some gestures and none of the directional words like Left, Right, Blocks, that I know in spanish, this nice man spent a while trying to explain how there were two ways I could go. I just wasn't getting it and he had this look like he didn't feel comfortable leaving me to figure it out. So Marcos introduced himself and walked with me up the four blocks or so to the busy intersection where you are apparently suppose to just flag down the right bus as many buses speed by.

Marcos gave me his card in case I got lost again and needed someone to call, he waited till the right bus came by and flagged it down for me. In a moment of total vulnerability I was so greatful to have found a genuinly nice person.

The rest of this ride was about as eventful as any highspeed bus ride through the mountains can be. For the next several hours we climbed up through clouds, wipping around curves on poorly maintained roads. At one point two haggard looking American girls got on the bus on their way to Xela also. We ended up sharing a cab from the bus to a cheap hotel where we stayed for a couple days till both going seperate directions.

Now I am up at the Escuela de los Montañas, attempting to lean spanish. It is amazingly beautiful up here and because it is still the end of the rainy winter season, it has been raining everyday. If you have never slept under a huge rainstorm hitting a tin roof, let me tell you, it really really loud.

all my love,
Kristin

La ventana de mis sueños

This was the window in the dorm room I stayed at in Antigue for two nights. It took up most of the wall from floor to ceiling and looked over a brightly painted courtyard.
Someday when I build a house, I will have one.

Ch-ch-ch-changes...

Dear Kristin,

Today is hot. And tomorrow will also be hot. And the next day too. Ah, Tucson, how I missed you. I went to put up the greenhouse with Adam and CJ on Tuesday and almost died from dehydration. In the two short weeks that I was back in Cincinnati, I forgot how a desert dweller (especially one working out-of-doors) must constantly be remembering to hydrate.

But enough about the weather!

More importantly, you're knitting in Guatemala! I'm so proud! Please take and post pictures of all of your projects. That also includes any puzzles you get around to doing. [Note to loyal readers: Kristin is stellar at the lost art of puzzle-doing. She prefers landscapes.]

Anyways, my dear Kristin, after Uppie and I dropped you off at the airport, I suffered a momentary bout of depression. All of a sudden, we were like mother ducks sending our little duckling off into the big world. I don't know-- chalk it up to my two-ness. I was, in fact, so sad that I immediately drove to the store and purchased two gallons of secondhand light-colored latex paint. Goodbye dark red and horrible turquoise! Goodbye forever!

So now I have a gray living room (not as ugly as it sounds. Actually quite chic and Martha Stewart. I left the one red accent wall as we discussed), and a light blue-ish bathroom with a yellow floor (not the color I had anticipated. Going to try and re-sell the paint on Craigslist, unless any of our loyal readers want it for $15). Here's hoping that my new light colored rooms will also lighten my heavy Kristin-less heart.

con mucho amor de Tucson, and send pictures!!!

love,
Debbie

P.S. Definitely go with the slightly bigger needles.
P.P.S. What are you knitting???!
P.P.P.S. My mom's knitting savvy friend suggested we take a look at The Yarn Harlot. I read a few chapters from her book and it was quite hilarious. My mom's friend tell me that her book is classified as "knitting humor". Who knew?! Anyways, when you're bored in a Guatemalan internet cafe, check out her blog.

¡Guate!

Dear Debbie,

You can all rest assured, I made it- no problems.

Different tourists stand out in their out of place outfits on every courner here. The buildings come right up to the cobble stones streets and hide ruins or beautiful little courtyards. For all that there are many people around, it doesn´t feel like walking in a crowd.

I dumped my bags at the Black Cat Hostel and just wondered around the city today, I kinda spiraled out from the central park, turning anyway I felt like and then turning again. The shops and restaurants smell like old wood when I pass the open doors. This place is for getting my feet wet. While most people at the hostel speak english, I did learn two knew words today while looking for something.

Wondering into a couple of shops, with some difficulty I managed to explain/pantimime what I was looking for. At the third shop, the young man wrote down for me that I was looking for a condado, and told me I could get it at a Ferreteria and pointed one out down the street.

The Ferreteria was closed and I had another conversation with the shop owner next door about some knitting needles. I asked if she knew about a condado and if the shop was open. She said yes its open. But it looked closed. Oh, because its 1pm, she told me. Of course they will be back later.

Now my real question: I need size 3.25mm (and size 3.75 which I have already) for my knitting project, the shop only had 3mm and 3.5 mm... do I keep looking or try up a size or down a size?

All my love,
Kristin