Continuation of last post

Andrew was called on stage second and none of us knew he was doing anything besides being in the fashion show. He read a poem he wrote, about love, in which he compared it to things like a sumo wrestler. The whole UVM group was hysterical while listening to his poem, but everyone else didn’t really react much. At the end, we all congratulated him and were really proud of him for getting up there and reading a poem. During the first half of the show, some people played guitars, a little girl played the keyboard and flute, and a teacher sang.

The second half of the show was definitely the best. It started out with the fashion show, in which Andrew, Kourtney, Emily, Chris, Mr. Ford, and a few others were involved. All the girls were dressed really nicely. Mr. Ford was the first of the guys to strut his stuff and he came out wearing a woman’s spaghetti strap shirt that was way too tight, a headband, and a skirt. Everybody got a kick out of him, especially the Belizeans. Andrew would have crossed dressed, but he wasn’t sure how Belizeans would have reacted to that, since their culture is a bit different here. Andrew then came out wearing a nice shirt and purple biker spandex shorts with black shades on and no shoes. Once he reached the stage, he stripped off his nice shirt, revealing the crazy Japanese shirt and looked like Tom Cruise. He got really into it and was posing better than the girls did. Chris followed as the last model. He reached the front and then took off his normal shirt and his belt and shorts to reveal a really well put together superman costume. Everybody in the audience was dying of laughter at this point.


Andrew stripping

The rest of the show went really well. A few people sang, a band came on to play, our friend Kaela and her friend Jam did fire dancing (and won second place), and a few people danced. The first girl to dance was on the stage by herself doing, I guess you could say authentic cultural dances. By this I mean club music was the soundtrack and she shook her hips and every other part of her body in a way that made you feel like a horrible person for watching her. She even was on the floor at one point doing her thing. We were all laughing really hard and didn’t really know how else to react to what we were watching. I felt like I was back at the strip club, except with a girl stripper.

The second dance was performed by Ashanti, Ms. Rhondine’s daughter and one of my classmates. She had been practicing for the talent show for months, so we were all really excited to see what she would do. The song, Halo by Beyonce came on and from the moment she started dancing, I was captivated. She has taken ballet lessons since she was really young and combined ballet and modern dance in her routine. The routine was choreographed by one of the staff members at Martha’s, which was really cool. She danced so eloquently and I could not take my eyes off of her. At the end when they announced the prizes, she had won first place and we all were so excited for her.

After the talent show, we all went out to the culture club to dance and catch some live music. Not that many people were there though and we only ended up dancing for a short amount of time, since it was extremely hot and nobody seemed to be really into it. We walked outside to get some fresh air and I met a few guys who proceeded to try and get me to go to Orangewalk with them one weekend and another guy who talked to me about how he lost all his pets and wants to get another one. I was ready to call it a night, so me, Katie, and Andrew gathered together and left.

Saturday – Katie had slept in my room, since my 2 roommates were gone for the weekend and the three other people who live at the guesthouse with her were also gone. We woke up at 8 to eat breakfast and find out where we could go on a day trip cheaply. By the time we were all ready to go, however, it was already around 10-1030 and the two places where you can book a tour in town had nothing to offer us. We wanted to go to Mountain Pine Ridge, which has a series of waterfalls and is described in one of the Belize books as looking like Vermont. The first place told us it would cost $60 U.S. and the tour had already left really early that morning. It is also not a place where you can just get dropped of at and hike on your own, since the waterfalls are miles apart from each other. We decided to try our luck with the taxi drivers. They told us they could take us for $175 BZE, but we would not have time to see the whole area since it was so late already. The price immediately deterred us away from this idea, so we asked about going to Bullet Tree, another swimming spot. They told us it would be $20 each way for a ride there, so we went there instead.

Bullet Tree is a town about 15 minutes outside of San Ignacio and since we did not want to get dropped off right in town, we had the taxi driver drop us off closer to the river. When we got there, he told us he’s charging us an extra $5 for driving further and that if we wanted to be guaranteed to be picked up, we have to pay him all the money right then. We did so, since we didn’t really have a choice and just hoped that he actually would come back in a few hours to get us.

We walked down the path to the river and jumped right in. There were tiny rapids in the middle, which if you swam in the middle, it would take you pretty far down the river without you doing any swimming. We all had fun with this, but got a few bruises from hitting rocks along the way. We stayed at Bullet Tree for about two hours and then the taxi driver showed up to take us back. Since it was only 1:30 when we got back, I was determined to get some work done. Andrew, however, walked into my room about 10 minutes after getting back and turned on the tv, which sucked me right into tv and movie watching all day/night. The only other thing I did that day was play the guitar for a bit, since Kaela’s boyfriend had bought a cheap one here and left it for her when he went home. Since Kaela can’t play, she said I could hold onto it, so I have yet another distraction from getting work done besides the heat slowing me down.


River at Bullet Tree

The following Tuesday – we had a field trip to Black Rock River Lodge for Ecology. We took two vans to get there, in which it was the hottest day thus far in Belize and none of the vans, cars, buses have air conditioning here so we were all sweating beyond belief. We traveled down a really narrow road with lots of turns for about a half hour, passing trees, cows, and horses along the way. When we arrived, we had to cross the river by canoe to get to the other side where we would be hiking. The hike normally takes about 45 minutes if you are young and do not stop along the way. We stopped numerous times to talk about the plant species we saw and how the forest survives. The hike was pretty much straight up and just seemed like it went on forever.


Canoeing to the other side

We went right in the middle of the day as well and I don’t think I have sweat so much in my life. We found out later that it was 98 degrees in the shade, which meant it was over 100 degrees outside where we were, not even considering humidity. It is supposed to stay this way for the rest of the summer and get even warmer here, which I can’t even fathom right now.


We hiked to the very top of this mountain

Every time we stopped, I was out of breath and could barely drink my water because I needed to rest for a while first. When we finally reached the top, we were all thankful, but there wasn’t even a view from the very top, only trees. About 5 minutes before you reach the top, however, the view is amazing and you can see the oxbow shape of the river through the mountains.


View from above


Everyone at the top of the mountain

Once we hiked back down the mountain, we were served lunch and lots of water and juice. I think I had at least 15 cups of water/juice with lunch because I felt so dehydrated. Our lunch was also really good…we didn’t have rice and beans for once! They served us spaghetti with real red meat sauce and Parmesan cheese. It was delicious.

This weekend I am going to Caye Caulker to do some volunteer work with a high school there by helping paint and build things for them. I’m excited to go away again for a weekend, since I haven’t in a while. Yay, beach!

Service-learning, Galen’s Variety Show, and Rivers

This past week I worked mostly on my service-learning project, since our projects are shortly coming to an end and my group still had a lot of work to do. Our rough draft of our final report is due today and since I was the one who put together and edited the literature review, I am the one to do the same for the report. I also finally finished editing and creating two different brochures for adults on the Humane Society and proper pet care, while Kourtney in my group is working on the children’s brochure. I also created flyers that could be posted around town about the objectives of the San Ignacio Humane Society.

Our biggest challenge, however, was designing and giving a presentation suited for 7 and 8 year olds. We each wrote our own sections and then I put the power point together, came up with an activity to play with them about the essential things pets needs (food, water, shelter, pet doctors), and found a picture of a dog that they could take home and color. We gave the presentation today and I think it went really well. I took some pictures of the kids and they seemed to really love the activity, but not so much the power point. When we quizzed them at the end, they all knew the basic things their pet needs and were really excited by the coloring page. We decided at the spur of the moment to have them bring the coloring pages back by the end of the week and we would hand out prizes to all of them for coloring and listing four things their pet needs on the back. We decided animal crackers and m&ms would be appropriate…and even got to snag some for ourselves.


The kids playing our game

Monday – This was the first official day where it felt like true summer. From that day on, it has been smothering hot and humid, even at night. I now wear shorts to school and am not cold like I used to be from the air conditioning because it is just so hot outside. After taking a shower and feeling clean, you start sweating about 5 minutes later. I can’t even imagine staying here for all of May, June, July, and August. People must not come out during the day because it gets so hot.

Tuesday - I went to Branch Mouth, or Green Iguana Park, to go swimming in the river with a few people. It was about a 20 minute walk down to the river and then I had to cross a really old bridge that was swaying back and forth like it was going to snap at any moment. We crossed the bridge successfully and were greeted by several really large, dirty pigs wallowing in the mud by the river. There was a huge fig tree to the right of the bridge and a string with a branch attached to it for swinging into the river. After about 10 minutes of trying to grab the string from the hanging tree so we could swing on it, we each took turns swinging into the river. We soon found out, however, that the water was not deep at all and several of us came back with scrapes and bruises from hitting rocks at the bottom of the river.

Since our field trip to Gales Point Manatee Reserve was canceled once again for the weekend, some people went to Tikal, Guatemala, while others went to Chetumal, Mexico. Most of us, however, stayed back in San Ignacio for the weekend.

Friday – I woke up early to catch the Galen bus to school to go talk to Ms. Shaw, the teacher of the students we would be giving the presentation for our service-learning project to, and to see if I could take out a projector for the presentation. I got to the bus stop at 10:05, since the bus normally comes at 10:15. I stood outside in the blistering heat until 10:40 and no bus was in sight. Two other public buses passed through, but I had never taken the public bus by myself before and wasn’t sure which one to get on. Plus, the public bus is always an adventure with many people standing because there are never enough seats for everyone and it gets extremely hot on the buses.

At that point, I walked back to the guesthouse to figure out the correct bus schedule and found out that the Galen bus wasn’t coming until 12:45, so I had to take the public bus. I knocked on Meg and Jay’s door, our group leaders, and talked to Meg about which bus to take. She told me it would cost one dollar and to get on the Belmopan/Belize City bus. I headed back to the bus waiting area downtown and as soon as the right bus pulled up, a horde of people scrambled towards the bus to increase their chances of getting a seat. I followed the crowd and managed to squeeze myself towards the front of the crowd and got a seat right in front with a woman who refused to move into the seat, but I didn’t mind. The guy collects your money about 5 minutes into the bus ride and depending on how far you’re traveling is how much it costs. There are no specific stops either. When you want to get off, you have to stand up and walk towards the front and yell stop so the driver knows to stop. As soon as one seat vacates, someone standing must sit down. I was only on the bus for about 20 minutes and during that time I had about 5 different people sit next to me. I’m also pretty sure I was the only white person on the bus. It’s still bizarre to me being the minority all the time here.

I got off the bus and went upstairs to talk to Ms. Rhondine, who OKed me signing out a projector for that following Monday. I then walked over to the children’s school to talk to Ms. Shaw, who is the sweetest woman I’ve ever met. She was completely fine with us giving the presentation whenever we wanted at whatever time we wanted. I waited for the Galen bus to take me home and then when I came home, the power was out, again, so I couldn’t work on my project since my battery on my computer is dead and I can only use it when it’s plugged in.

I lied on my bed like a star fish for quite some time, just trying to cool off, since I couldn’t turn the air conditioning on either, until Andrew came in and wanted to go to the river. Alex, Andrew, and I went to branch mouth, since Alex had never been there and cooled off for a bit. When we got back, Andrew had to go find an outfit for the talent show that night, since they asked him to model in it, along with several other girls and two other guys. We walked to an “American exchange” store and the door was already halfway shut, since they were going to close in 15 minutes. A couple kids came out with hula hoops and told us we could still go in if we wanted, so we ducked under the door (the doors are like garage doors here or something you would see at a mall) and looked around. Andrew found a banging t-shirt that looked Japanese with designs that looked like hello kitty to wear. Before we got a chance to look some more, the kids told us they were closing as we had to leave, so we crossed the bridge over to Santa Elena and went into one of the thrift stores.

A few people had gone to some of the thrift stores before and each one came back with a piece of cheap American nice clothing. We spent about 15 minutes looking, in which I found one top I really liked, but refrained from buying it since I don’t really need it. Andrew found something else for the talent show, but I didn’t see what it was before he bought it and wore it to the show.

By the time we got back, we only had about a half hour until the show started. I quickly made myself dinner and packed it to take with me and then headed over to Hode’s, a restaurant where it was being held. It was $5 to get in and was supposed to start at 6:30, but of course that’s in Belize time and the show didn’t actually start until after 7. The group of us that went got seats towards the front for prime viewing. After waiting about 45 minutes for the show to start, a man got on stage and announced the start of the show. What I then witnessed in the show I will never forget.

See next post for the rest of the story…

Horse-back riding, Twilight, Xunantunich and more

Last weekend, the weekend after la Ruta Maya, I decided to take it easy and catch up on sleep. Some of our group went to the beach, but we had 2 midterms, a paper and 2 presentations to give that Monday and Tuesday, so most of us thought it would be best to just chill and hang around town.

The circus has been in town for about 3 weeks now so almost everyone in the group went except me. The stories I heard from them were enough to know I made the right decision by not going. I was told it started out with acrobats, followed by a camel that was made to walk on its knees around the circle and a tiger that jumped through a hoop of fire. There were also lions backstage, but they were never actually in the circus. There was a rumor flying around that the circus was giving people $25 for every stray dog someone brought to feed to the lions. I’m pretty sure it is just a rumor, but it made me feel really uneasy about the circus.

The best part of the circus was when the Guatemalan clowns took a volunteer from the audience. Tommy, one of the international students studying at Galen with us, was chosen and went down to the ring. They then proceeded to put a bag over his head and handcuff his hands to a door. The stunt was to pretend to throw knives at Tommy into the door, while a guy behind the door actually just stuck the knives in himself and no knives were thrown. The last part of the stunt involved sticking a knife into a balloon that was placed between Tommy’s legs. However, when the guy behind the door went to do so, he missed the balloon and the knife swiped Tommy in his leg. Some blood could be seen, so the clowns took him offstage still handcuffed to the door. Tommy came back into the audience about 15 minutes later with a huge gash in his leg. The cut from the knife was a lot larger than the audience could see. After sitting in the audience for about 5 minutes, Tommy decided to go get some real medical attention. We found out later that weekend that he needed several stitches and was trying to sue the circus.

The end of the circus was even stranger. Mickey and Minnie Mouse came out and started slow dancing in the center of the ring. Other Disney characters also emerged.

That Monday, my ecotourism exam was moved to the following Monday, I took my Tropical Rainforest exam, and gave a group presentation on development. The next day I gave a presentation on my progress thus far for our service-learning project. Both presentations went well and I think the exam also went well.

Friday morning I woke up at 8 to sign up for horse-back riding for Saturday and then just hung out getting work done until around 7 when Twilight was playing at the only movie theater in Cayo, and probably only one of two total in Belize. Twilight was definitely one of the strangest movies I have ever seen, but the movie theater was pretty nice with leather seats and stadium seating. It’s only $4 to get in and if you have a group of 10 or more, its only $20 total for everyone. It was like a little taste of home for the night.

Saturday I woke up at 8 to get ready for horse-back riding at 9. I went with Katie, Katherine, and Andrew. Only Katie and I knew how to ride, while Katherine had only been on a horse a few times and Andrew had never been on a horse before. It was $60 BZ ($30 U.S) to ride and they paid for transportation to the place and back. We were picked up by a taxi and driven about 10 minutes outside of town to Easy Rider, the place that runs the tours. We were then given a crash lesson on balance and riding in general and signed some papers saying we cannot sue the place if something were to happen. She also gave us hats and bike helmets to wear. My bike helmet was too large for my head and every time my horse got into a fast trot, it would hit me really hard, so I tried posting for a while even though it was western saddle.


Riding in the rainforest

After our crash course, the woman assigned us horses. My horse’s name was Niña, meaning girl in Spanish. She was white with tiny spots of black on her. She ended up being the slowest walker in the group and I was constantly behind the rest of the group, but that allowed me to have more time trotting and cantering to catch up to the group. The woman took us into the rainforest on a tiny trail with lots of hills. I do not know how old my horse was, but she was definitely having difficulty getting up some of the hills and was out of breath every time. I tried to stand up and take weight off of her back for a while to see if that would help. She also had a bit of an attitude problem when first starting out and with the other horses, but the worst she did was back up, turn around and make a fuss. As long as she didn’t buck I didn’t mind.

As we were on the trail, the woman was telling us stories about the maya, since we were right behind Cahal Pech and what all the plants that we were passing were. About halfway into the forest, we stopped, got off our horses, tied them to trees, and she talked to us more about the Maya and the sacrifices they made. She then took us to a cave/tunnel where excavations have been done and they found a tomb there. There was also a pile of dirt in the cave with pieces of ceramics still buried in it and alongside the walls. Andrew found a piece and gave it to me to hold on to, so now I have a little ancient artifact from the Maya world.


In the cave

After the cave, we got back on our horses and got to trot and canter back to the campsite. When we got off, we then fed our horses a banana each and the woman drove us home. Andrew is allergic to many plants and animals so before horse-back riding, he took some allergy medication. Apparently he didn’t take enough and by the end of riding, he couldn’t really breathe fully and couldn’t wait to come back and shower. When we got back we discovered the Inn had no water whatsoever and we couldn’t shower, wash the horse smell off our hands, or do anything of the sort.

After realizing this, Andrew and I decided to go down to the river to wash off and cool down. We went to a spot about 20 minutes away where there’s a rock you can jump off of. To get there, you have to cut through and make your own trail in the 5 feet high grass. There was also a separation of land in the middle made of dirt that was quite steep. Once we got to the river, there were some Belizeans already there swimming. We stuck around and swam for about 15 minutes then decided to head back because dark clouds were approaching.

As soon as I got out and started drying off, it started to drizzle. About 5 minutes later, it was pouring. I thought this was supposed to be the dry season! Of course I wore my jelly-like flip-flops, the most slippery pair I own and definitely not good in the rain. All the dirt turned into mud in minutes and I was dirtier than before going to the river. Of course by the time we made it into town it had stopped raining, but there was still no sun in sight. We got back to the Inn and still had no water and since I was soaking wet and filthy, I didn’t want to enter my room. Instead, I sat on my porch for about 2 hours trying to dry off and wait while some of the staff here was hammering at the pipe to fix the water. They originally told us it would be back in 15 minutes, but it took about 3 hours in reality.

Andrew and I had gone to costless the day before and splurged on a 72 oz bag of chocolate chips for $30, so while waiting to dry we made ourselves some peanut butter and chocolate chip cookie snacks. It definitely made my day about 5x better having chocolate and peanut better, two of my favorite things. We then watched Enchanted, since it was on tv. By the time the movie ended, the water was finally back on and I could shower. For the rest of the night, I just hung out and went to bed early.

Sunday morning I woke up at 8 again to go to Xunantunich, another Maya ruin site. The biggest temple there is known as Clay Mountain or Castillo (str. A-6) and is the second tallest ruin in Belize (Caana at Caracol being the largest). We were picked up by our professor Dr. Jaime Awe, Chris’s dad, and half of us rode in the back of his pick-up truck. We do that a lot here…ride in the back of people’s trucks. It’s not illegal here and pretty much everyone does it. It’s just weird that we’re allowed to get in our professors’ trucks but not in the car with our program leaders.


Castillo


View from the top of Castillo

On the ride back, it started raining on us, so everyone in the back of the truck got wet. We were all starving, so Jaime dropped us off at Hannah’s Restaurant and we ate there, even though the power was still out and it took a long time for our food to be ready. I then came back and took a 2 hour nap, watched chick flicks with my roommates and then studied for my ecotourism exam tomorrow.


Being Sun Gods on Castillo

The internet and electricity have been very poor lately and we pretty much lose power at least once a day. My computer battery officially died, so now my laptop only works if it’s plugged into the wall, which is fine, I just can’t do work outside anymore. I’m going to wait to buy a new battery because I don’t trust buying one here. I’m also starting to freak out a little bit about how little time I have left here. We only have about 5 weeks left and there’s still so much I want to see and do before leaving and definitely not enough time to do so. I guess that means I’ll just have to come back to Belize again!

La Ruta Maya

Thursday afternoon I went to the market and purchased 300 bananas, 6 watermelon, 9 cantelope, and 6 papaya for the weekend. I then went to Galen to help load the bus for the weekend. I thought this would only take about an hour to do, since how much stuff could everyone really have anyway? It ended up taking almost 4 hours to organize and load everything onto the bus. We had to load all the backpacks, sleeping bags, tents, tarp, tables, chairs, poles, food, etc. for the weekend for about 50 people. This process of loading and unloading was done every morning for 4 more days, since we had to set up camp at a different location each day. Luckily, it did not take 4 hours every time and by the last day, I felt like a pro with setting up/tearing down tents.

Thursday night, the night before la Ruta Maya, San Ignacio held a festival to celebrate the beginnings of the race. Since the race starts right in town, the streets were filled with people from all over the world. There was a marching band that played, speeches were given, and hundreds of people roaming around. I had never seen so many people in San Ignacio before. Emily had heard that it was ladies night at Bonkers, a local bar, so a bunch of us decided to check it out. It turned out that when they say ladies night, it means male strippers. We got there and were immediately served free chicken, tortilla chips, and a shot of the nastiest liquor. About ten minutes later, the first male Belizean stripper came out and I don’t think I can walk into that bar ever again without having the images of what I saw that night engraved in my mind. I stayed for a total of three different strippers and then couldn’t handle any more. The strippers would take random women from the audience, lift them up and place them in a chair on stage and then continue to give them a very sensual lap dance. Apparently in Belize touching is not only allowed, but strongly encouraged. Every time one of them ventured into the audience, I would quickly position my chair so I could not be reached or touched. It was a great time, but I definitely could never handle being up on a stage getting a lap dance from a guy in just a skimpy thong.

Friday morning I had to be down by the river by 6 a.m., since the race started at 7 and we had to find a good viewing spot. Of course it was pouring when we woke up, but the rain stopped just in time for the race to start. Galen University, my school, had 5 teams total in the race, although only 1 of them was in the competitive league, while the others were “pleasure crafts” in the intramural league against other colleges. There were 7 UVM students participating – Eli, Ben, and Jimmy as one team, and Andrew, Alex, Gisele, and Svetlana as the other team. Since you are only supposed to have 3 members on a team, they had to combine Gisele’s and Svetlana’s name to Gislana on the registration forms and each one of them got a day off to rest during the 4 days of paddling. Watching all the canoes line up and see everyone scramble at the start to get ahead of one another and through the bridge without capsizing was quite a sight. I actually got really nervous for our teams and started screaming at them to paddle as loud as I could. Many of the canoes did not make it through the bridge without tipping over, while all the serious racing canoes paddled ahead. As soon as the last canoe was through the bridge, the support crew boarded the bus and headed on our way to the first campsite.


All the canoes lining up

It took about an hour to reach our first destination. When we got there, however, there was a dispute between the Belizean girls and us UVM students on where to set up camp. All the Belizeans on the trip were there because they are in a business class that is helping to run the event and they receive credit for being there. We were all there to volunteer. I’ve learned from being around the Belizeans that they typically do not camp out or like to be outdoors or away from their homes at night. All the girls, and even many of the boys, complained of being dirty, the bugs, and having to sleep on the ground with no real bathroom. I was perfectly content with going to the bathroom in the woods, since it smells better than a porter potty anyway, and I have pretty much mastered the art of it by now from all the times I’ve had to do it here. Some of the Belizeans did in fact go home to shower the first night, only to come back to sleep in a tent and get dirty again the rest of the weekend. I preferred to use the river as my shower and felt surprisingly very clean and refreshed after I did so.


Andrew, Gisele, and Alex paddling


Tent city

At the first site, we started setting up camp down by the river where other groups had already started unloading, so the paddlers would not have to walk far after paddling for 39 miles the first day. We had most of the tents set up and the big tent that required a hammer and many large nails set up as well when the manager of the support crew arrived and told us that we set up right where the porter potties are going to be placed. With that news in mind, we decided to move camp up the road onto the grass and away from that area. Instead of tearing down the tents, we just carried them up the hill and relocated everything. The only tent that had to be redone completely was the huge one that required the hammer. While hammering in the stakes for this tent at the new location, we hit a water pipe in the ground and the entire area flooded. Thus, we had to move camp once again and nobody could then camp in that area since it was soaked. The third move was the last move for the day and after we were finally done setting up, we all napped and took a swim in the river while waiting for the canoes to arrive.


Helping carry their stuff

Around 5 p.m., all but one of the canoes from Galen was back and I started setting up to serve dinner to everyone, since I was on the food and beverage support crew. To heat the food, we had chafers, but it took at least 20 minutes for the food to warm up and many of the people were impatient and just wanted to eat and go to bed. Once dinner was served, we had to clean up and cut fruit and make sandwiches for the next morning. I did this routine every night and even gave a few back massages to the paddlers.

The next morning, we were all woken up around 4:30 a.m. to the generator that was turned on to heat the coffee for the paddlers. The race started at 6 that day, so I had to get up anyway to help serve breakfast. As soon as the race started again, we packed up and moved onto our next destination. Since we were ahead of schedule, we stopped at a really nice coffee shop with real couches and a bathroom and it was so nice to sit on something soft for a while.

Our second camping site was in the backyard of the Community Baboon Sanctuary, since one of our professor’s parents runs the place. Here, it was much quieter and easier to set up camp, but there was one big problem – fire ants! They were everywhere…around the food area, our tents, etc. Everybody was getting bitten even with socks and pants on. We tried lighting the ground on fire to kill some of them, but that method didn’t seem to work and people were basically hopping around all day/night trying not to stay in one place for too long.


Killing the fire ants

Once camp was set up, we all changed into our bathing suits and headed towards the river, since we were extremely overheated and needed to cool down. We found a spot away from most people (mostly Belizean guys we were worried about watching us strip down to our bikinis, since they like to comment and stare here) and jumped in. A couple people brought shampoo with them, so we all washed our hair in the river and it felt wonderful. After our swim, we sat on the bank patiently waiting for our paddlers, so we could help them get their canoes out and carry their things for them. That day it was also one of the paddlers’ birthdays, so somebody went out and bought a cake and we all celebrated.

Day 3 we camped in the backyard of a resort and it was by far the best place to camp. We had real bathrooms and showers available to us and there were no rocks or pastures with horse droppings to avoid like the other places. There was even a little dock we could sit on, so we had easy access to the river. Once again, however, we had issues finding the best place to set up the tents and went back and forth between different areas several times. Once camp was finally set up, I stayed the majority of the day at the main area where the rest of the people were cheering on their paddlers. Every site had more and more people every day. We set up camp away from most of the noise every day, but it was basically one giant party with people drinking, dancing, and just celebrating at the main areas.


Andrew and I

Once three of our teams came in, I went back and showered, which felt really nice although the water was freezing and I could only stay in there for about 5 minutes before somebody else started banging on the door for me to hurry up. At dinner, Chris had bought some dishes of iguana, turtle, and iguana eggs for us to try. I tasted them all, since I figured I'm in Belize and when am I going to get another opportunity to do so. Iguana is known as bamboo chicken and I liked it (from the small taste I had), but the eggs were a very strange texture and I had to spit it out. Turtle was also pretty good, but I don't think I would ever order either of these dishes just to eat them. Later that night, they set up a slide show of all the pictures that were taken from the race thus far. In the midst of this slide show, we were informed that someone just saw a few guys in our tent area run off with some things. We all sprinted to our camping area, since all our valuables and bags were in our tents. Everything in my tent was still there, wallet included, but one of the paddlers’ tents was missing two paddles. This caused complete mayhem, since you can’t paddle missing 2 paddles. Luckily, our manager found some spare paddles and that was the most damage that was done.

The last day was the shortest miles wise, but the most intense for the paddlers, since there was a lot of wind and every team was pushing as hard as they could to beat the other teams around them. We had most of the bus packed up by the start of the race, so we could get on the bus right away and follow them along the river. The last destination, Belize City, was only about 20 more minutes by car, but still took over 3 hours to paddle. About halfway through driving, we stopped by the river to cheer on our teams. We all got out, climbed on top of the bus, and waited until the first canoe appeared from behind the mangroves. As soon as our competitive team was spotted, we all started yelling and cheering as loud as we could to the guys. We all then hurried back on the bus and moved maybe 100 feet to go cheer them on some more. We did this several times…each time, I felt more and more like I was on a girls gone wild video, with the Belizeans going absolutely insane banging on the windows, cheering, and taunting the University of Belize, their rival.


Watching from the top of the bus

When we finally made it into Belize City, Ernesto parked the bus in an abandoned gas station and we headed towards the river. Our first spot was literally right on the river bank and had an amazing view, but if we stayed there, the paddlers would have a hard time getting out at the end on the bank, so we moved the trunks to load the canoes and ourselves to across the bridge on the other side where hundreds of people were gathered. We watched people paddle in from above on the bridge and as soon as one team arrived, I would run down to where they unload and help carry all their belongings out of the canoe. I also helped carry 3 of the canoes to the truck, in which all of them were extremely heavy and only 1 of the Belizeans offered to help. The Belizeans act like princes and princesses here when it comes to doing work. I don’t know if it’s because they know that us Americans will get the job done and want to coast off of that, or they just have a different work ethic than us, but the entire weekend I felt as if us UVMers were doing most of the work, while the Belizeans sat around and watched us from a distance.


Raph, Liz, Me, Katie, Emily

After all our teams were in, they looked exhausted and ready to collapse. They had paddled a total of around 170 miles, with this last day being the toughest. Chris Awe, who always drives us around and does us favors, was in charge of running the cash bar all weekend for our group. On the last day, we still had some beers left over, so he decided to sell them to people outside our group. This apparently is not allowed, especially since he does not have a license to do so, and they arrested him. Because of his arrest, we waited several extra hours in Belize City, since they wouldn’t let him leave the jail. There was also a ceremony for the paddlers in which awards were given out. Our competitive team just barely missed being in the top 40. Eli, Ben, and Jimmy, did however win for the intramural competition. There were 8 teams total in this league and they were able to paddle faster than them all. We were very proud of them. Everyone received wooden medals and went home exhausted. It was an early night for all.


Ben, Eli, and Jimmy after finishing La Ruta Maya!

La Ruta Maya was in some ways similar to what I expected in the number of people that participated and the excitement it generated. However, I had no idea how hard it would be to be on the support crew. It’s not that it was hard mentally or even that physically, since we were not the ones paddling, but trying to organize a group of 50 people and get everyone to agree on one thing was very hard to do. It was also exhausting setting up camp every day only to tear it down the next day and start all over again. Sunday morning, everyone on the support crew was in low spirits, felt ill, and wanted to go home. Renee, our friend from school and leader of the food and beverage crew, had amoebas in her stomach and had to go home a day early, leaving Katie, Liz, and I in charge of the food and organizing everything. Several other girls also went home with stomach pains and other ailments.

Being in charge of the food, I had to make sure everyone was fed and that people took the right portions. I made sandwiches every day for everyone and cut up fruit. Although this was a fun job and I truly enjoyed helping out, there were times where I felt like I’d rather be on the water and now cleaning up after everyone else. I would definitely participate in la Ruta Maya again, but maybe next time as a photographer or even maybe paddle if I had the money and training beforehand. I definitely recommend to other people that if you can be involved in some way, you should just go for it. It was a very rewarding experience being there to follow the race and help the paddlers along the way. The camping aspect was also awesome, since I had not gone camping before this weekend in a long time and love being outdoors.


Support Crew

Caracol

This past week I spent most of it writing papers and getting work done. I have a few midterms coming up, so things are a little hectic.

Thursday – I went back to Cahal Pech ruins, this time with my professor. He is basically the expert in Maya archaeology for the entire world and has excavated Cahal Pech and most of the ruins here himself. The ruins were even better than I remembered. I discovered even more secret rooms and passageways and hearing all the stories about the Maya while being there made it so much better. Afterward, we stopped at Cayo Twist for ice cream again.

Friday - we officially switched living situations. I am now living at the Inn, as opposed to the guesthouse. My two new roommates are Becky and Kate. The room is definitely very different than what I am used to, but I think I will get used to it fast. We have a mini kitchen in our room with a small fridge and microwave, which is nice, but we hardly get any light in our room and the beds are basically a slab of concrete. I have not seen any ants yet, but this room is also known for having an infestation of ants, especially around my bed, so I’m just going to hope for the best.


My new bed

Saturday – around 6pm, my roommates, Emily, Kourtney, and I decided to go to Caracol for the weekend with our friend Renee, Greg, and four Belizeans. One of the Belizeans is Chris Awe, son of Jaime Awe, our Maya archaeology professor, who knows all the roads and information we would need to know. One of the other Belizeans is Raph, who had worked at Caracol for 4 years and knew the site well. Caracol is another Mayan ruin site, with one of their temples, Caana, being the tallest in Belize (and tallest building in Belize as well…over 160 feet tall). We took 3 different cars and Chris brought along two tents, some blankets, and a few foam pads to sleep on. We all chipped in for gas and then stopped at the store to buy pasta, sauce, eggs, hotdogs, etc. for dinner and breakfast and then we were off.

The drive takes about two hours and requires you going along extremely narrow, rocky, bumpy roads. Of course it was dark as we were driving, so it was hard to see and we all find it really hard to trust the other Belizean drivers that are on the road, so anytime we go anywhere, it’s always a little stressful. Once we got to the checkpoint before entering the site of Caracol, we had to convince the security there that it was ok for us to spend the night. It is a huge security issue because Guatemala is only about 6 miles away from Caracol and they have been known to attack Belizeans and tourists (Belizeans and Guatemalans typically do not get along). The people at the checkpoint started telling us stories of how people have been stopped while driving by Guatemalans and that there are snakes, jaguars, and other animals that lurk about. After hearing all this, we were all a little hesitant, but Chris and Raph, since they know Caracol so well, were finally able to convince the other guys that we were students doing some research and archaeology work, which is why we had to go and we were safe with them and did not need an escort with a gun. This debate took about 45 minutes, and then took another half hour drive to actually get to the site.

At the site, there is an empty building with a ramp that is going to eventually become the new welcome center, but we were able to use it to set up camp and sleep there for the night. We drove all 3 cars right into the building, since it’s all open, and used the headlights on the cars to see. Once the tents were all set up, a few of the guys went over to the cooking area and starting cooking pasta and chili for us, while Chris took everyone else on a night walk. On our way, we met the site dog, Blanca, who is the most friendly, soft, playful dog I’ve seen here so far. We also ran into/almost stepped on a fer-de-lance snake, about 6 feet long and the most poisonous snake in Central and South America. I personally did not see it, since I was in the back of the group, but Eddie, one of the other guys who came with us, was only a couple inches from the snake and could have easily been attacked.


Our camp for the night

Chris took us to Caana, the tallest temple, and we climbed to the top, although it was pitch dark and nobody could tell how high we actually were or how many steps we actually climbed. All we knew is that there were three different platforms while climbing, and every time we thought we were at the top, there were even more steps. When we finally made it to the top, the view of the stars was amazing. We were so high off the ground that it felt like we could touch the clouds and stars. Chris told us stories about the Maya and their beliefs, and then we hiked back down to see if dinner was ready.

At dinner, all the guys who work at the site were there eating with us and talking with us. Since there were only about 3 bowls, we took turns eating and cleaning the dishes. For the rest of the night, we all just hung out and talked. I was exhausted and practically asleep standing up, so as soon as one person said they were going back to camp, I jumped at the chance to go back and go to sleep. About 10 minutes later, everyone else came back and went to sleep as well. Since we were surrounded by forest, we could hear howler monkeys, which sound like jaguars, and other strange animals all night. Somehow, we all still managed to sleep until around 9 and then cooked eggs, hotdogs, and toast for breakfast.


Cooking area

After breakfast, we went on a tour of Caracol with Chris and Raph as our personal tour guides. There are so many different plazas of temples, it’s insane. Each temple and area has its own story. I could have spent another day there and still felt like there was more to explore. The best part by far was definitely seeing Caana in the daylight. Staring at it from the ground, you can’t even see the top of it. It looks like it ends there, but there’s actually even more stairs behind it that go higher with several other small temples on top. Only the very elite would live and get to climb to the top of this temple. The peasants and servants were made to bring the rulers whatever they needed, so the rulers never had to set foot climbing up or down the temple. The rooms people slept in are built into the temple and we found lots of hidden rooms and places where tombs could have been and actually were found.


Caana


temple across from Caana

We also got to see an excavation site underway. None of the men were currently working on it, so most of it was covered with tarp, but you could tell in some of the enclosed areas where stairs are under the ground and how big the temple will be once they are done. Its amazing how much still has yet to be discovered here in Belize. Uncovering that one temple will take years and there are so many other mounds that have to be excavated still, but not enough men or the resources/money to do so yet. If anyone is interested in Maya archaeology, Central America is definitely the place to be.


climbing into a small tunnel

Next weekend is la ruta maya…more camping out for 4 days straight with no sleeping bag…should be an experience!

South Water Caye Paradise

Last week, nothing exciting happened besides writing some papers and getting work done before the weekend trip to the beach. I did, however, receive my Ecology exam back and got the highest grade in the class…that pretty much made my week and I celebrated by going out to dinner at Serendib, a Sri Lankan restaurant. Most places here do not offer dessert of any sort, but this place had cheesecake and it was so incredibly delicious. I would go back there just for the dessert.

The weekend…

Friday morning we woke up around 7:30 to eat breakfast before we headed to South Water Caye until Sunday afternoon. Instead of traveling on the Galen school bus, we rented a van for the trip there and back, which had air conditioning and were told we would have more space. However, there were 22 of us in total going all having to fit in this van, with our bags, and it was quite snug. The van ride was about 2 hours, where he dropped us off at a dock in Dangriga. From there, we were to take a water taxi (boat) to the small island.


Van ride


Boat ride there

We rented one boat just to take our luggage there, then had two other boats for all of us to fit. The boat I was in held 18 people and 4 people were in my row, with me being closest to the water on the left-hand side. The ride there was nothing like I’ve ever experienced. We started off very slow and I thought to myself that it was going to be very relaxing and I could take in some sun, since the ride was about 45 minutes to the island. As soon as we hit deep water, however, the boat took off and I’m pretty sure the driver of the boat was purposely flying and hitting as many waves as he could to get us wet. The people on the middle rows stayed pretty dry. Even the people on the outer right-hand side of the boat did not get hit that bad. My side, however, was being destroyed. It was fun for a while getting soaked (luckily I wore a bathing suit under my clothes and put on my rain coat), but then the salt water really started to bother my eyes and I didn’t have my sunglasses on me, since they were packed in my bag in the other boat. By the time we arrived at the island, it didn’t really matter if I was wearing a raincoat or not because the water had soaked through the coat and my clothes.

We got off the boat and were then shown where we would all be sleeping and the rules of the Island. All the girls slept in one room…bunk beds, with two toilets and two showers. The boys slept in the room next to us and shared the bathroom with us. Since it’s an Island meant for environmentally conscious people, everything is powered by wind generators and solar radiation for electricity. The water used for the showers all comes from them collecting rain from the rainy season. Since there is only a limited supply of water, you must take quick showers and only turn the water on when needed. The water itself will not stay on by itself. You must hold the handle down when you want it and then it turns off when you let go. All the dishes and silverware are washable to limit pollution and even at the bar, everything is given as glass, since many people are careless about plastic bottles and they tend to end up flying away into the ocean. They cooked all 3 meals a day for us and would ring a bell to let everyone on the island know that the food was ready.


Our tropical paradise

As soon as our orientation was done, we all went down to the beach and swam and relaxed all day. Lying outside for about 10 minutes was all it took for you to be overheated and have to jump in the ocean. I used up 2 full bottles of sunscreen on this trip, and yet still got burned slightly on my back, insane. The ocean was nothing like I was used to. The water was crystal clear when you first walked in and looked like fresh water. It was perfect shades of blue and turquoise and the temperature was just right. Our program leaders had brought their own snorkel gear and decided to share with us, so I went snorkeling for the first time and it was so much more than I was expecting. The fish are so colorful and vibrant and some even the size of me. The coral reef is also awe-inspiring. Belize has the second longest barrier reef in the world and it was truly amazing to get to see all of it. I felt like I was actually in the movie, Finding Nemo, and would follow some schools of fish as if I were part of their group.


Snorkeling

After snorkeling and playing in the water for a while, I started reading and just relaxed in a hammock on the beach. We then all played volleyball before dinner and watched the sunset. After dinner, we all just hung out, since you can’t leave the Island and there is not much to do there. A group of us played scrabble, while others played pictionary and charades. We then realized that you could actually see the stars outside on the Island, and all ran to the dock and laid there for a while just looking for shooting stars. I then walked to the beach to get an even better view and was able to walk pretty far into the ocean due to the sandbar that extended outward at least 50 feet. Every time I took a step, there was some bio-luminescence that lit up in the water. It was like a show of fireworks for my feet. I then moved to one of the hammocks and laid there for a while and lost track of time. I had fallen asleep for about an hour and woke up due to it getting windy and cooler outside. I then walked back and went to bed.

Saturday – I woke up probably around 7 (nobody knew what time it was all weekend, since our phones did not work in the middle of nowhere and nobody brought watches either) and got ready for the beach right away while the cooking staff was preparing breakfast for us. After breakfast, a few of us headed to the beach to read. I ended up spending almost the entire day outside, but it felt so nice to just lay on sand not worrying about anything. In the afternoon, our group leaders arranged an official snorkeling session in which they took us all out on a boat further in the ocean. There, I saw even more amazing fish and even a barracuda, which was really cool but scary at the same time. My favorite part, however, was when I saw two squid. They were purple and blue in color and were just so magnificent to watch swim by.



That night, I went back on the beach for a while to my spot and then a few of us decided we wanted to sleep on the beach, so we could continue to watch the stars and wake up and see the sunrise. Only Andrew and I actually ended up going through with it, but some other people slept on the dock, with their mattresses and pillows. I simply slept on a beach towel in the sand, since the hammock could only keep me comfortable for so long. I also wore about 4 different layers of shirts (all I brought, basically), pants, and had two towels, and yet I still ended up being cold. Although I did not sleep that well that night, it was worth it to watch the sunrise on the beach.





Right after I watched the sunrise, I had to run to the other side of the Island to catch the boat that was leaving for fishing, at 6:30 a.m. I signed up for the early shift, since I figured I would be up anyway and it would be cooler in the morning for sitting on a boat for 3 hours. I ended up catching 4 fish!! Whatever fish we did catch was to be used for lunch, although I am not particularly fond of fish and did not eat it. Three out of the four fish I caught I threw back, since the guy told me they were too small, but I was just really excited to catch one in the first place.


Fish!

After fishing, we had a few hours to get our last sun rays on the beach before we headed back to Cayo. A group of about 8 of us took another boat before we left for the Smithsonian, a research field station on the Island directly across from South Water Caye. At the Smithsonian, we were introduced to some researchers studying crabs, shrimp, and other sea life. We got to hold hermit crabs, starfish, brittlefish, sea urchins, and shrimp. These people live on the Island while researching and basically just eat, take pictures of new species, and record the data all day on this beautiful Island. It made me think that I should switch to marine biology and just live the life of a beach bum while researching really amazing creatures.


Shrimp!

Once we got back, it was time for lunch and then we were on our way back home. This trip was probably one of the highlights of Belize thus far and I would love to go back there one day. If anyone comes to Belize and wants a quiet destination not meant for mass tourism and cares about the environment, South Water Caye is definitely the place to go.


Ben, Gisele, and I reading on the dock

Soccer and Valentine's Day

Monday, I took my Ecology of a Tropical Rainforest test and although I was one of the last people to finish, as usual, I felt really confident that I did well. On Wednesday, we had a soccer/football scrimmage against Sacred Heart, the team we played last week and although we beat them last time, we did not have as much luck this time around. The score was 2 to 1 and was a really close game, but many of our good players got injured.

Friday night, Meg, Andrew, Raf (a Belizean friend), and I all went to Cayo Twist for some ice cream and then stopped at a bar on the way back to play some darts. Andrew and I were on a team and we won the first two games thanks to me. I even scored a bulls eye!



On Saturday, we went to Dangriga for Regionals. We all woke up at 6 to catch the bus at 6:15 to be there around 8. There was only one real field, which the boys used, while the girls were put on a smaller field. The boys’ field was normal, but ours was more the garbage dump…the grass was not cut, there were clumps of mud, rocks, and other materials that should not be on a field. None of us were happy about this, especially because we were all tripping on the ground and it made it much harder to keep the ball going. We also didn’t have enough shin guards and cleats to go around, since many of us didn’t own these things ourselves. As a result, we had to borrow from the boys and/or from other teams. We lost our first game, 1:0 and our second game we also lost 2:1. The boys also lost their 2 games. They changed the halves to 20 minutes since the heat was unbearable and we were all extremely grateful. I was ready to collapse at half time in both games. The combination of the heat, being out of shape, and not really knowing what I was doing didn’t really work well. Since we lost the first two games, we didn’t even play our third game because most of the team was too beat up to play and the third team was just Sacred Heart…the team we played the past two times…who also lost their first two games, so neither of us could technically make it to Nationals. I did have a lot of fun though.


Our rugged field


Horses grazing on the beach

Since Dangriga is surrounded by the ocean, a bunch of us jumped in the ocean in just our sports bra’s and underwear after the second game and it felt glorious. There were even people on horses cantering up and down the beach and I was so jealous. Although we will not be going to Nationals next weekend, we can now go to South Water Caye instead. South Water Caye is an extremely nice beach, where we’ll get to go snorkeling and just relax for the weekend and since it’s a school trip, we also don’t have to pay for anything but lunches and drinks at the bar.


My footsteps to the ocean

Last week, one of the girls in our group came up with the idea of having a “secret person”, like “secret santa”. We gathered up enough empty yogurt bowls for everyone, picked names out of a jar, and have to buy/make something for our secret person every once in a while. Since Valentines Day was Saturday, I went out and bought my person chocolate and other Valentines goodies. Andrew and I were feeling creative, so we decided to make anonymous valentines cards for everyone, including our program leaders. Most of them rhymed, some were actual love notes, and others were just plain funny. Since we weren’t going to be around Saturday because of the tournament, we woke up extra early Friday and slipped each card under everyone’s door. I think everybody appreciated our gesture and it was just fun overall to make them.

Thursday night was the school Valentine’s Day Dance. It was a dance at a resort hotel from 10-3 a.m. Since we knew when they say 10 here, it really means 12, we didn’t show up until then and basically as soon as we started dancing, everyone else joined in. I had a ton of fun and even made some new friends that night.

On Sunday, the power was down throughout the district all morning and was in and out all day. We all had papers due the next day, which made it very difficult to accomplish when there was no internet to do the research. By late afternoon, the power was back and we were all able to get some work done, but it was scary for a while thinking that I wasn’t going to be able to get my paper done on time.

Other than that, everything is going well. I can’t believe my time here is almost halfway over. I feel like I just got here and the weeks go by so quickly, it’s insane!