¡Está Bien! – June 2, 2017


Today we went to a school over an hour away up in the mountains. To welcome us they had a program prepared for us that consisted of original dances and poems. One dance that stuck out the most was the very first dance. It began with some fire and ended with the burning of candles. However, the interesting part in the middle was these 11 year old school kids sacrificing a roster over the fire. It was shocking to say the least. Then we began to realize this is was just another side of their traditional Mayan culture. After their program our group shared two songs with them and then we gave the program’s winners soccer balls. After lunch five of us played soccer with the children in the courtyard. The rest of the group went to go see a tree nursery that the school has helped make as part of their agroforestry program. The soccer game was fun, competitive, and full of laughs. The sound system that was set up for the program was play music for the game. One song I remember playing was “1000 years” and was interesting because I though it seemed pretty out of place for an intense soccer game. After the game we went back down the mountain and to the hotel. Then the two students under the Doctora decided they wanted to shave their heads. So being a kind group not only did we encourage and enable, but I personally gave them both buzz cuts with Adam’s beard trimmer. They both turned out great not to toot my own horn but **toot-toot**. That said, today wasn’t as labor intensive as past day but I think I can say that everyone had a lot of laughs and a lot of fun, except for maybe the roster.

-Stewart Craig

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