Zapotes, english lessons and vulcanoes

ey hey everybody! I've been a bit sick these last few days, so I haven't been able to update my blog - untill now that is.

I'm still going to school every day, but I've discovered that I'm not as proficient in Spanish as I thought I was when I wrote my previous post. It's true that I understand more or less everything my teachers say, but they speak really slowly and with simple language. The locals are a bit harder to understand, unfortunately. But I'm making progress, so I'm guessing that I'll know sufficient to travel in a couple of weeks. The same thing goes for my salsa, by the way. I know a couple of spins and stuff, so I hope that I'll be able to dance without making a complete fool of myself in a week or two. Yay!


The first part of last week was pretty much business as usual. There was the weekly lunch and a visit to a local macadamia nut farm. The farm was founded by a Swedish guy, so it was actually called "Valhalla", the old Norse word for heaven. We didn't get to see too much of the plantation itself, but we got a free facial massage with macadamia nut oil. Not too bad.

On Friday I had to have a presentation about the Zapote, a local fruit. I had never heard of it before, but I had ample time to prepare myself, so the presentation went fine, even though it was in Spanish. What didnt go quite as smoothly was something that happened later that afternoon.

As I might have said earlier, the school got this program for local kids. The lady in charge of the program asked me if I'd care to help out on the fridays, and I thought "why not". What I didn't know was that I was going to be in charge of the whole thing. Needless to say, I got a bit surprised when all the kids asked me " what are we going to do, what are we going to do?" After a few moments of utter confusion, we decided to play soccer in the park. So far so good, right? Well, when we were done, they wanted to learn some English. Therefore I had to improvise an English lesson - in Spanish. The first fifteen minutes or so went fine, but I only know so many animals and furniture in spanish, so after fifteen minutes, the kids grew a bit restless. Right after that, the teacher left, so we just ended up playing hangman. Probably not the most pedagogic class seen by this world, but I think I did well, considering the cirumstances. Gold star for me!

On Sunday Terry and I went on a trip to Pacaya, one of the nearby vulcanoes. The first thing we learned was that some of the local travel agencies lie - a lot. We were told that the price we paid included all costs, a private shuttle, a bottle of water and security. "private shuttle" meant a minibus ride to the bus that took us up to the vulcano. The bus was one of the local chicken buses, old school buses from the US, and they are not too comfortable really. The price we paid included the guide, but not the entrance fee to the natural park. And the water we didnt get, but we could buy it for more or less twice the price as in Antigua. The security was non existent as well, but we didnt need it. Despite this, the trip was very nice. There were approximately 30 other people in our group, and we spent probably 90 minutes or so walking upwards. We couldnt get to the crater itself, but a ledge a bit below. The view was amazing, AND we got to roast marshmallows on the hot rocks. That was kinda cool. Another cool thing was that there were som other norwegians on the tour as well, three guys from Bergen and two girls from Trondheim. There also was this swedish guy who lives in Oslo, so we had a little Scandinavian club going on. What was not so cool was that the trail was so incredibly dusty, so when we got back I brought with me half of the vulcano in my shoes, in my hair, and in my lungs. Walking that trail everyday is probably worse than smoking a 20-pack a day. Anyways, the trip was good, and I'm now able to say that I've been on a live volcano. Yes, you may touch my hand.


Monday afternoon the school went to a local jade factory and museum. They had a lot of cool stuff, and we learnt a lot, for example why a tiny jade necklace could be worth US$ 9.3million. I also discovered that I'm born in the sign of Aq'ab'al. That means that my guardian spirit, according to mayan mythology, is a bat. The bat signifies darkness and the night, but also sunrise and sunset. Since my guardian is the bat, my house will forever be a safe place to spend the night ( Girls - pay attention). We bats are also strong and noble, merciless with our enemies and suitable occupations for us are physio therapists, economists and leaders. As I'm going to study economics and leadership, this seems to fit as well. What I didnt like is that those born in that sign are more likely than others to be robbed and assaulted, and that we must watch our health closely. Especially the health thing worries me a bit, since I've gotten a bit sick (again). Last time I got this I was sick for almost five months, but I hope that won't be the case this time... For some odd reason the mayans also thought the bat was the guardian for couples in love, and some other stuff with love. I actually think the mayans did a good job with this one, the batman-description isn't too far off. However,I feel like my spirit got some catching up to do on the love-part - but Im sure he'll get around to that as soon as he's finished messing with my health.

Anyways, that's all for now. See you soon!

-Magnus

Terry enjoying a macadamia oil- face massage

Hangman - Guatemalan style

Lupe

On our way to Pacaya

Roasting marshmallows on hot rocks

Marshmallows are awesome!

It's photo-time!

Here are a bunch of photos, as promised. they are a bit out of order, though. I tried to take some fancy photos, but as you can see, I'm not a professional photographer (yet) My camera isn't that high class either, but at least you're able to see the motives. Another thing, I love toreceive comments, but it would be nice if you could, log in or sign them. If not, I'll have no idea who wrote what :) -Magnus

The courtyard of "La Capuchina", a big convent ruined in 1773

The inside of La Capuchina s main room

Yours truly in front of the rear of La capuchina

Coffee beans being dried at La Azotea, a nearby coffee farm

The different phases of coffee production. The berries are in the middle, beans with shells are up, without shells to the right, roasted to the left and grounders down.

The entrance and garden of my house here

A typical Antiguan street.

The park in front of La Merced, one of the biggest churches in town currently in use.

Fountain in la Merced

The front of La Merced

The courtyard of La Merced

Mike and Terry

Me, Tim and Tracey

A reconstruction of a local marked

My room here

The second floor and rooftop terrace of the house. The Vulcan Pacaya is in the background.

First week in Latin-America

Even though I've split the text into paragraphs, it comes out as one big chunk of text. Ill try to fix that later, but for now you just have to work your way through First of all; I’ve posted two posts at the same time. I wrote the first post the evening I got here, but I haven’t been able to post it before now. Anyways. It’s been a week since I left home, and so far it’s been awesome. Despite being long and tiresome, the journey went without problems. The family I live with are really nice. There’s a mother, Margarita, a father, Mariano, and a daughter named Anna. They live in a nice colonial-style house on the edge of the city, just a five minute walk away from the school. The Perezes have three rooms for students, and currently there’s a couple of Americans living in the other two. An older lady and this other guy, Terry. The rooms are like the rest of the house, a bit worn and old, but nice and clean. Indeed the whole city is like that. Antigua was once the Spanish capital in Central-America, and as a result, they made it into a beautiful city. The streets are lined with nice, colorful houses, and there are plenty of squares and pretty churches. But, a big part of the city was ruined in a big earthquake in 1775 or so, and afterwards the capital was moved a bit further north and is now known as Guatemala City. Most of the normal houses and some of the churches has been rebuilt and restored to its former glory, but there are still quite a few ruins here. And besides, that was a long time ago, so as I said, it is worn. It’s still a nice place though, especially the many gardens. The city itself has approx 35000 inhabitants and is located in a valley surrounded by lush hills and a huge volcano. Today it is very popular for backpackers and people wanting to learn Spanish, and this has set its mark on the city. There are McDonalds, Subway and Dunkin’ Donuts here, several American pubs, and at the pharmacy I was able to get precisely the same shampoo and toothpaste as I’m using back home. Some of the people I have met have told me that Antigua is not like most places in Latin-America, but I think it’s okay that there are some similarities to home. After all, I went here to get a soft start. The language school I’m going to, Don Pedro de Alvarado Spanish School, is a very nice place. The tutoring is one on one, which means that each student has a teacher of their own. During classes we sit at tables in this gallery surrounding a lovely garden. I’ve had Spanish for a few years at school, but that’s a long time ago, and that the time I wasn’t really keen on learning much. As a result, I knew a lot of words and frases when I got here, but verbs and other stuff, not so much. I’ve learnt a lot this week though, so now I’m able to have small conversations in Spanish. I’m probably not using all the verbs correctly, but at least people understand what I’m saying. And yesterday, when we went to a coffee plantation, I understood pretty much everything that the guide was said. That made me feel really smart, haha. These last few months have been really irregular, and I haven’t had any routines whatsoever. So far, it has been totally different down here. Breakfast is at seven, and classes start at eight. I currently have “class” from eight to twelve, but starting next week I’ll study from eight to one, because that is when lunch is served. Some people have classes in the afternoon as well, but I prefer joining the school’s many activities. There is something happening every day, and this week there’s been a movie about Guatemalas history, a couple of trips to some churches and a tour of a nearby coffee plantation. In addition, there’s a weekly dinner. The dinner is for all the students, and afterwards there are free salsa lessons and drinks. As they say down here; me gusta mucho! I’ll tell you more about everything later, but now I got to go. To sum up; first week in Guatemala has been a bit colder than I expected, but otherwise awesome. Nice places, nice people, nice food, nice everything really. I have taken loads of pictures, but Im not able to post them yet. They’ll come soon, promise! - Magnus out PS; I don’t have my Norwegian simcard here, so you won’t be able to get in touch with me by phone. Here in Antigua I’ll have internet connection more or less every day, so the best way is to send me an email or facebook message if there’s anything.

Travellin'

I usually like travelling, especially flying, but now I've once again found out that "less is more". The three hour flight to Paris and the four hour layover there wEnt perfectly fine. The flight to LA also went well, at least in the beginning. After take-off, we got a glass of champagne. Then there was dinner consisting of an appetizer and an entree followed by cheese and fruit, all wrapped up with coffee and pastries. You hear a lot of things regarding the French, but you can’t deny that they are good with food, even flight meals. Anyways, after the meal I watched a couple of movies, and thus the first five hours flied by, literally. The next seven? Not so much. First of all; I was sitting by one of the aisles right behind one of the two islands containing restrooms and galleys. This meant that approximately 125 of the 500 passengers had to walk right by me in order to get to the bathroom, and It's kinda hard to sleep when people keep bumping into you. It was especially this one guy, a rather large fellow, who posed a problem. He obviously had some stomach problems, so he went at least once every hour, and he nudged my seat every single time. That’s a bit annoying when you're on a twelve hour flight… To make things worse, the ladies sitting next to me decided to change their kids' diapers in their seats. I understand that they need to change them from time to time, but I found it a bit unnessesary to do it while they were sitting in their seat. Despite these small problems, the flight went without major problems. The border control in LA took quite a while, but at least the American government now know that my finger prints are the same as they were a couple of years ago. The last leg of the journey, LA-Guatemala, went surprisingly fast, and around 06:00 (local time), I sat my foot in Latin-America for the first time. The airport looked like any other airport, but as soon as I left the terminal, I realized that I was in another world. The people, the language, the smells, everything. Everything was new. The only things that weren’t were the cars. The drive to my host family was with an ancient mini-van which would never have passed the EU-control back home. It struggled a bit up hill, but we made it there in an hour or so. As this has been my first day I’ve only met the mother, Margarita, but she was very nice. The rest of the day I’ve just been resting and taking a brief trip in the city. I’ve also been to a restaurant with Terry, an American who’s living in the room next to me. Classes begin at 08:00 tomorrow morning, so I think I’ll go to bed now. Its early, but as I’ve been travelling for more than 24 hours, I think its okay. Hasta luego!

I don't have anything to wear!

As you might understand, this post is about packing. The title might be a bit misleading, though. The problem isn't that I haven't got anything to wear, it's the opposite! I have way too much clothes and gear to bring everything, and the most difficult thing so far has been to decide what to bring. I could bring my largest backpack and fill it to the brim, but since I have to carry everything around for several months, I figured I'd be better off with a bit less.

 Experienced backpackers might do with a 30- or 40l backpack, but since I never have done anything like this before, I thought Ì'd play it safe and bring a large bag, my Norrøna 80l. This is quite large when backpacking, but its comfortable to carry, and easy to tighten to reduce the volume. Besides, I have to check it in when flying anyways, and it's always nice to have room for some souvenirs.

When packing for a trip like this, there's one golden rule; "find everything that you think you need, and bring half of it". This I did, but it was rather hard. If I had been going to Asia to spend the months surfing and chillin' at the beach it would have been okay, but I'm not. On this trip I'm going to do quite a lot of different stuff, everything from hiking in the mountains 3- 4000m above sea level , to dive in the Carribbean. I made it easier for myself by not going to Peru and the Andes, but I still need clothes for many situations. Some things are easily bought locally, but not everything. After a lot of thinking, trying and failing,  I ended up with a half full, 12kg backpack containing the following items:

- 1 80l backpack - 1 20l daypack - transport net for the backpack - 1 pair of trekking shoes - 1 pair of sandals - 3 t-shirts - 1 long sleeved shirt - 2 pair of shorts - 1 pair of light pants - 1 pair of swimming trunks - 4 pairs of underwear and socks - 1 fleece - 1 super light rainjacket - 1 caps

- Toileteries, sunscreen ++ - small first-aid kit - multitool - mosquito-net - silk-sleeper - microfiber towel - guide book / spanish dictionary - map - passport and important documents - sunglasses  - water bottle - a padlock - money belt - Ipod - Kindle - Camera - Tablet

 I know I could have skipped a couple of things more as well, the tablet for example, but I figured that the pros outweighs the cons. With the tablet I'll be able to blog, skype and buy tickets much easier, and I'll be able to watch movies, store pictures and stuff as well.

Most of the stuff I already had, and some I got for christmas. Still, I had to buy quite a few things, so this last week I've been all over the place comparing prices, buying stuff and despairing on how much money I had to spend. The insurance was partly covered by my student account in the bank, but I still had to pay almost 3000kr for the last two months. . It's a bit depressing knowing I've spent almost 20% of my budget on the plane ticket to Guatemala, gear, vaccines and insurance, but It's necessary. After all, it would suck if I got malaria just because I didn't pay for the pills. And the next time I'm going on a trip like this, I will know more what to bring and what not.

Anyways, now I'm finally done with all the packing and all the preparations, so now I'm off to get some sleep. Tomorrow is going to be a looong day.

Ciao!

(if you think the images are small, just click on them, and you'll enter "slideshow-mode"')

What I'll be wearing for the next five months....

My clothes after being packed.

All of my cables and adapters

Before...

and after. All ready to go!

Here we go again!

Oh yes, it's travel-time again! The last time I went away for a long time was in 2010 when I went to New York with my parents. I will not be away for that long this time, but I will spend the next few months in Latin-America. As in New York, I will write a blog, this time in English. I'm a bit rusty after almost two years without any conversation in English, but I'll manage, I hope.

The title of this blog is "Letters from Latin-America". A bit cheesy, I know, but I didn't want to name it "Heltnes travel blog" or something like that. That's so ordinary. And for those of you who've noticed, yes,  this is the same blog as in NY. I thought it would be nice with the same address, so I've just changed the layout and header a  bit. I've also added a fancy like-button. Feel free to browse through the old posts.

Anyways,

As most of you know, I decided to take a gap year after I graduated high school in June. These last few months I've spent working at the local supermarket saving money for this trip. Unfortunately, I got sick in September and remained ill untill December, so I haven't been able to work as much as I had planned. Despite this I've been at work for over 600hrs, so I've managed to save up a decent amount. The only thing that sucks is that I had to spend so much of it on gear, insurance, vaccines and stuff.

Many people have asked "why Latin-America?". The only thing I knew when graduating was that I wanted to do something different before college. I wanted to travel, see the world, experience something new, and all that stuff. I spent countless hours browsing the web and considering my options, and in the end, I chose Central-America. Its exotic, got loads of things to do and see, and its not your typical charter-destination. For a history geek like myself, its kinda like heaven with ruins and ancient civilizations everywhere. In addition, it's pretty much as far away from Norway as its possible to get, and that isn't such a bad thing either. Not to mention the awesome tan I'll be getting.

As for my plans; I haven't booked any tickets except for Oslo-Guatemala. The only thing I do know for certain is that I will spend the first 6-8 weeks learning Spanish in Antigua, Guatemala. I will also be doing some volunteer work.  After that I don't know precisely where I'm going, but as of now, my plan is to spend a couple of weeks in Mexico before travelling south through Central-America and ending up in Colombia.   I first planned on doing South-America as well, but I realized that I don't have enough time and money to see it all, so that will have to wait for another trip. My ETA in Norway is sometime in May, but I haven't booked any return tickets yet.

Regarding my blog, I will try to update it at least once a week. I will probably have rather good internet access when in Antigua, after that it might not be so regulary. It there is more than a week without any lifesigns, either here or on facebook, there's three possibilities;

1: I'm in the middle of nowhere with no wifi (quite possible)
2: I do have an internet connection, but I'm too busy having fun (this might happen, but its not very likely.)
3: I got kidnapped by geriljas or drug lords. (probably not, but in the unlikely event, please pay any ransom notes. I'll pay you back (i hope))


All jokes aside; I know that I'm going to a rather turbulent region, and I will be careful. No showing off my tablet or anything, no getting wasted with sketchy locals, and no chasing after girls into dark alleys. As for my health, I've taken all the necessary vaccines,, and I've got plenty of malaria pills. I think I will be allright, as long as I'm careful and use common sense.

Departure is at 13:00 on saturday, but I will try to write another post before that. If not, wish me luck!

Planning, planning, plannig