Dangriga and Punta Gorda

Sorry it’s taken so long to write a new post, things have been really hectic here lately. I’ll start with last Thursday. I woke up to find that the entire town had no water, so nobody could shower, flush, do laundry (it was laundry day) or do anything until about 8 that night. Our internet was also completely down, so I couldn’t check e-mail or download my homework assignments/readings. It’s definitely an inconvenience when these things happen, which more often than not they do. The power has also gone out several times here and I’ve had to finish my homework with a flashlight. The showers also are not the greatest either. I’m pretty used to the constant switching back and forth of freezing cold and burning hot by now, but on the bright side, I don’t take long showers anymore and am more water efficient.

Friday, we all got up at 6 to eat and leave for Dangriga, which is South of San Ignacio. It was at least a 3 and a half hour bus ride to our destination with several stops on the way on an old imported school bus from the U.S. It’s weird being back on a regular school bus like in high school every day. One of the Belizeans, Leon, sat next to me and was basically my own personal tour guide for the ride, since he knew the area. On the way, we passed patches of a sea of green, beautiful landscapes, and even saw a waterfall on top of one of the mountains from afar.


View from the bus of GREEN

Our first stop was the Garifuna Gulisi Museum. There, we had a guided tour through the museum, while taking notes. The only bad part about this weekend was that we had to take notes on all the presentations and write a paper at the end of the trip. The museum itself was pretty cool and we learned a lot about the Garifuna culture and their struggle for their existence. There were a bunch of kids running around outside, so a bunch of us decided to play with them and chase them around. They loved playing with us and it made me so happy to be able to make them happy.





Next, we headed to the Pelican Bay Beach Resort, which was amazing. The food itself was alright, but the view of the beach, palm trees, hammocks, and the ocean was breathtaking. I was told that this area isn’t even the nice area, so I can’t even imagine what the “real” beach looks like. A group of about 6 of us, the ones that didn’t go to the beach with everyone the other weekend, decided to eat really quickly, change on the bus, and jump in the ocean before we had to leave. The water wasn’t even freezing and the taste of salt water was so nice. We found several sand dollars, but let them be and just continued to swim around for about 45 minutes while everyone else was just lying on the dock.



After lunch, we headed to our last destination for the night, the Cockscomb basin and jaguar reserve, along with the Maya center. When we first pulled into the reserve, all you could see were trees, plants, and shrubs for miles. I was so excited that we were there. We then proceeded to drive another 20 minutes into the forest before we got to the cabins where we would be staying for the night. All the girls stayed in one section, while the guys were all split up into different “rustic cabins”. We had about an hour to do whatever we wanted before dinner and orientation, so Meg, Alex, and I decided to go explore a little and found a hike that led to a waterfall. On the way up, we saw many leaf cutter ants holding leaves on their backs as they made trails through the forest, buttress trees, huge ferns, squirrels, insects, and birds. When we finally got to the waterfall, it was already past time for dinner, so we couldn’t jump in and had to head back, but it was at least a 3mile walk each way and we were sweating beyond belief by the time we met up with everyone else.




Since we got to dinner late, there was practically no food left for us and we just ate cole slaw and some burnt rice for dinner…yum. The entire weekend was basically a big mayo fest. For some reason, Belizeans love mayo on and in everything. After dinner, we had orientation for our night walk through the jungle. They told us to wear long pants and shirts, bring a flashlight if you have one (which I forgot my headlamp and was very disappointed, but had a flashlight), and not to wear bug spray because the animals can smell it and it drives them away. We all received that memo a little too late and were all doused in 100 deet bug spray.

Despite me being covered in bug spray and long pants, socks, sneakers, and two shirts, I still managed to get eaten by some kind of bot fly everywhere. Bot flies are common here, but only one kind of bot is really bothersome. If one of these bot flies land on you, they basically crawl in you somehow, stay dormant for up to two weeks and then poke holes in your skin to breathe. They then have to be removed somehow by squeezing them out or using tweezers, etc. I really hope none of us get one, but many people who we have met here have said they have gotten one before and its not that big of a deal.


The Group at the Jaguar Reserve

Since they were low on tour guides, we all had to go as one giant group of at least 30 people, when in reality, a night walk should only be 2 or 3 people at a time if you expect to see any animals. Being a huge group, we probably sounded like a stampede walking through the rainforest even though we were as silent as we could be. Although no jaguars were seen, we saw a crocodile in the water, heard lots of strange noises, which I think were howler monkeys, and saw a small paw print of some kind of cat in the mud, which meant the animal had passed the tracks some point right before we got there. It was too small to be a jaguar print, but it could have been an oselot or another smaller cat. I’m still completely blown away that I was actually IN the jungle, no boundaries or fences or anything on the reserve. The animals just roam through the forest as they wish…the reserve is 124,000 acres so they have plenty of space to roam about and hide away. There are also so many species of bats here that love to swoop just inches from our heads.

When we came back from the night walk, a bunch of us decided to make a small fire and just sit around for a while. We told ghost stories and learned about Belize myths, etc. from the Belizeans. The stars were also amazing that night and were so clear at the basin. In San Ignacio, you can barely see any stars, so it was great being able to just stare up at the sky for a while and admire them.

Since we had to get up early the next morning, we all went to bed at a decent hour and then woke up at 6 again for breakfast. After breakfast, we all went for a hike up Ben’s Bluff, an extremely “rigorous” hike that goes about 6.5 miles into the forest. It was pretty much straight uphill at times, but getting to the top of the mountain and looking over all the trees and entire forest was such a wonderful feeling. We even got rewarded on the way down by being able to stop at the waterfall I had passed the day before and jump in for a swim before we left the reserve.


View from Ben's Bluff



Waterfall

After we left the reserve, we stopped at the Maya center, which was on the way out of the reserve. The Maya center is a Mopan Mayan Community that was established in 1976 when Belize decided to create the jaguar reserve and move all the indigenous people off their land to do so. Everybody in the indigenous perspectives class, including myself, was to break off in groups of 3 and meet with a Mayan family and have them cook a traditional Mayan lunch for us. I was extremely nervous about this activity at first because I really do not know that much about the Maya yet and didn’t know how they would act, if they could talk English, or if I would even be able to relate to them.

I got to my Mayan family and was instantly greeted by 2 extremely friendly dogs and the father of the family. The mother was out back with her 3 children, ages 5,8, and 11…the oldest a son and the two others girls…cooking corn tortillas for us and preparing other food on a fire hearth. While the mother cooked, we continued to talk to the father about his jobs, schooling, and how the community has changed over the years. It’s pretty amazing that they all pretty much do subsistence agriculture and grow their own food and follow all the old ways, but at the same time they now have adopted cell phones, tv’s, and listen to American music on a daily basis. The father had built his house by himself over 30 years ago and not only farms/grows his own food, but also works at the jaguar reserve fixing and setting up cameras to watch the animals through the forest 24/7, and takes people on hikes up to Victoria’s peak…about a 3 day hike to get to the top and very rigorous as well. When the food was finally ready, the mother just placed everything on the table and the father ate with us, while the mother sat in the corner and ate alone. I knew from our orientation before meeting with the families that the Maya women were shy, but I did not know to what extent. I wish I could have gotten the chance to talk to the mother more.

While we were all eating lunch with our Mayan families, they people not in the indigenous perspectives class got to visit the women’s arts and crafts center. Since we all wanted to go there as well, we ended up coming back to Dangriga on Sunday to look around for a bit and I bought a bracelet of beads shaped like a gecko…I love it : )

After we officially left the Maya center, we made our way to Punta Gorda. When we first got there, we had a presentation on the land dispute between the Maya and the government. Basically, the government has been taking land away from the Maya, but technically the Maya were here first and have a right to their land and shouldn’t be kicked off of it. It was a really interesting presentation and I think it was my favorite one. We were served dinner right after the presentation and then had about 45 minutes to go check in at the hotel and get settled in before we came back to the same place to watch some Garifuna drumming!


A glimpse at Punta Gorda


The Group

The drumming was really amazing and we all got up at the end and were trying to “punta” to the drumming. The punta is the national dance of Belize and kind of looks like Hula dancing, but more intense and really hard to do. I tried and failed to do it right. However, later that night, almost all of us, including our teachers, went to a bar and started dancing the entire night. The Belizean who I had sat next to on the bus, Leon, taught me how to salsa and do a couple other dances…although I honestly had no idea what I was doing and probably could not repeat the moves again without someone leading me.


Garifuna Drumming

The next morning, we woke up yet again around 6 and started the morning off with a presentation by an environmental ed. officer from the marine reserve. After breakfast and the presentation, we headed to the Ya ‘ axche’ conservation trust-field center. This is a private protected area of about 15,000 acres whose mission focuses on sustainable development. We were given a power point presentation and then shown around the nursery of plants and given lunch.


Flower in the forest

Our last stop before heading back to San Ignacio was another Mayan community. Here, we walked around the community and was given a talk on the way their system runs as compared to the Maya center of families. We then boarded the bus and headed home…another successful weekend to put in the books.


The perfect sunset to a perfect weekend

Cahal Pech

This week has been pretty relaxing, besides the papers and reading. Although I definitely have more work and reading than I was expecting, I still have more time overall to relax for a little. I had my first pop quiz in Adventure and Ecotourism and my teacher was going to give us a pop quiz in Ecology of a Tropical Rainforest, but we all had terrified looks on our faces, so he decided to move it to Monday…The same teacher teaches both those classes back to back and almost all of us are taking both classes, so he gave us a break. Also, I am officially working on the San Ignacio Humane Society project with three other people and I am so psyched that I was assigned this project. I’m not entirely sure what it entails yet, but I can’t wait to start working on it.

The only class I’m really worried about is my Indigenous perspectives class. We have so much to read for each class and it is impossible to get it all done. It’s also impossible to download the readings (they’re all online) when not on campus, and even when on campus it doesn’t always work. In class, I have absolutely no idea what is going on…we were talking about economic theories and all these things I have never learned before, nor have I ever taken an economics/political science/philosophy class before. About half the class dropped out already and many people have complained. The teacher in response to everyone coming up to him asking for a signature to drop the class, talked to us on Wednesday and said he will slow down and cut down the readings into smaller pieces, so I really hope he follows through.

In more exciting news…Fridays I don’t have classes, so a few of us decided to go to Cahal Pech in the pouring rain. Most of our group went to Caye Caulker this weekend…which is a place to vacation at the beach…so only 8 of us were left here this weekend. Cahal Pech, besides being the hotel and resort where we go swimming, is the oldest Mayan ruin, is extremely important culturally to Belize and only a 25-30 minute walk to get there. The six of us who went made the hike up the hills to the top, paid $10 to get in and were just blown away by its size and all the artifacts they have found here. We are learning about Cahal Pech in my Maya Archaeology class, so it was really great being able to put the information he has told us together by actually being there. I think my Maya class might be my favorite class here.



When we first walked outside, I was expecting one small little ruin. What I saw was nothing like I imagined and pictures can’t justify the magnificence of it. There were at least six different ruins and we were having so much fun climbing up all the steps and exploring the ruins. There were so many different rooms we could walk into, tons of steps to climb, and we found a couple bats and giant moths living in some rooms. The only bad part was that it was raining, so the ruins were really wet and slippery, on top of the moss growing on them, so it was scary at times climbing up and down the ruins. I was basically on my hands and knees, using the roots from the ground to make it safely up and back down. The climb was definitely worth it though to get to the top. It amazes me to think that I was standing where the ancient Maya once were and probably slept, ate, and/or performed rituals right where I was standing. Spooky.



Saturday was the ultimate lazy day. Woke up around 10:30, sat around for an hour or two, went out to breakfast, which took almost two hours in itself (the service here is extremely slow), went to the market and various other places to buy food, then came back and took a nap. Since there were only eight of us, we decided to each buy something and make pizza and salsa together. We made three different kinds of pizza…vegetable, cheese and tomato, and pineapple. We bought all fresh fruits, made our own sauce, and bought the dough from a local restaurant. It was probably one of the best meals I’ve had here so far.

After dinner, a few other people were back already from their mini vacation and we all just hung out and watched tv/movies. We found the soap net channel and they have Indian soap operas, which are really entertaining. Our favorite channel, however, is the game show network. My roommate, Meg, loves any type of game and is obsessed with the game “Chain Reaction”. Whenever we’re bored or waiting for food, we just start playing it by ourselves. We also randomly quote “Friends” in our daily lives. I love it.

Sunday, everybody who is a “paddler” for La Ruta Maya, had practice from 1-6, so the rest of us just spent the day catching up on homework and studying. We had another group meeting and ate dinner at the South Indian Restaurant (the place where I have been buying the fruit shakes that are absolutely amazing) and had very delicious chicken curry.

I was finally able to upload my pictures onto photobucket. I have made a section in the upper right-hand corner of my blog for links to the pictures. Feel free to check them out.

Next weekend we are going on a three day field trip to the Cockscomb Basin and Jaguar Reserve, Punta Gorda, Dangriga, and a couple other short stops. More stories to come soon…

Market Day, Martin’s Birthday, and Sun

Saturday was market day…envision tons of low hanging tents selling fresh fruits, vegetables, clothes, jewelry, animals, you name it. I have to admit, I was definitely a little overwhelmed when I got there. However, all the fruits and vegetables are so fresh and come straight from in town, so you know they’re good and are being sold at the right price. One banana is 10 cents Belizean (BZE), which is only 5 cents U.S. The cheap prices are all becoming relative now, since we only get an allowance of so much each week, but I’m still amazed by it. I didn’t take many pictures of the market, since I’m trying really hard to not look like a complete tourist…even though my ghost white skin, red hair, and not talking creole are pretty much a dead giveaway, but here's an overview...



When I came back from the market, I had a pleasant surprise. The sun came out!! Needless to say, I just wanted to soak it all up, since I hadn’t seen the sun yet since being here, so three of the guys and I went to the park and played some football (soccer in the U.S). Two younger Belizean boys were watching us, so they joined in and we played a 3–on-3 game. Even though they’re young, don’t be fooled…they were pushing me over and running their little hearts out to get the ball from us. It was actually really entertaining and tiring all at once to play with them. By the end of the game, which only lasted about a half hour, I was ready to collapse from the heat and running so much. I guess I’ll have to whip myself into shape if I want to play with the Belizeans.

Football/Soccer Field

When I got back to my room, it was time to prepare the salsa and fruit salad for later that night. Our new Belizean friend, Martin, was turning 19 and we were all invited to his “surprise” birthday party. He lives about a half hour away from San Ignacio, so a few people hitched rides from a friend, while the rest of us took the local bus.

When we got off the bus, we were about 5 minutes away from his house, but couldn’t walk over yet, since our entire group was not present. About 14 of us took the bus and were stranded essentially on the side of the road while we waited for Martin’s girlfriend, Kari, to show up. About 10 minutes into waiting, it started to rain…shocker. Only some of us had raincoats, while the rest of us, including myself, were getting pretty wet. Since we were standing in front of somebody’s house for almost an hour, the woman living in the house came out and offered for us to stand on her porch. We kindly took her up on her offer, but about 5 minutes later, Martin’s girlfriend and the rest of our group showed up. We all started to hurry off the porch, but it was dark and raining and I was afraid I was going to slip and fall down the steps. I took 2 steps, then BAM, I fell right on my butt down the rest of the stairs. I quickly jumped back up and luckily got away with only a scrape on my ankle.

We then all ran over to his house and met the rest of his friends and family. At first we were all just standing around, talking amongst one another, not knowing what to do, but about an hour and a half into it, a major dance party broke out and we danced all night, literally. I can’t remember the last time I danced so much. The Belizeans are all pretty sexual dancers, so the 5 guys in our group sometimes pretend they’re married or are our boyfriends, so the Belizeans don’t propose to us or dance with us if we don’t want them to…which has happened before.

There was one bedroom for 18 of us originally with two beds. Luckily, I was able to snag the futon with Andrew, one of my housemates, and we had so much room to ourselves while everyone else was stuck in the room together. About an hour later, his roommate Alex came out and asked if he could join us, since he couldn’t sleep in the room with his head essentially underneath the bed since he was on the floor. I said ok, which was fine since we really did have a lot of room, although then I was stuck in the middle on the crease where the couch folds and couldn’t really move the rest of the night without kicking one of them. I slept maybe a total of a half hour that night, but as soon as we made it back to our rooms the next morning, we all went back to sleep and I didn’t get up until about 1 in the afternoon.

When I woke up, I looked outside and there was more sun again!! I immediately got up and went into our kitchen area to see what everyone else was up to. My roommate had already left and went for a walk, so the guys, Andrew and Alex, and I decided to make the hike up to the pool (Cahal Pech). When I say hike, there are about 5 or 6 different steep hills you have to walk to get to the top where the pool is located. Every time you think it’s the last hill, but nope, there’s another. We made it to the top and we all jumped into the pool right away. The sun was only out for about 15 minutes before a giant dark cloud covered it and then the sun was gone. It was definitely still worth it to climb to the top and lay there, even if the sun wasn’t directly out. I’m just hoping it stays this way from now on.

On the walk back down, we stopped at Cayo Twist to get some ice cream, and then went to our group meeting and group dinner. The rest of the night was spent doing homework.

Cahal Pech

Ok guys, I just want to thank you for taking the time to read this. I really do appreciate it. Stay warm wherever you are!!

Classes and Food

Five days have passed and I think I am finally starting to settle in here. I get free breakfast every morning at Martha’s, which is probably the best breakfast food I’ve ever had. The bus schedule to get to Galen University is a little strange and only comes at certain times, so even though I do not have class until 1 on Mondays and Wednesdays, I still have to get up at 9 in order to shower and have enough time to eat breakfast before the bus comes. I am also still trying to figure out when is the best time to take my anti-malarial pills. The past two days I have gotten sick about a half hour after taking it, so really the pill isn’t even doing anything, since I just keep getting rid of it every time I get sick. Tomorrow I’m going to try and take it after eating instead of before, but if I still get sick after trying this, I may just stop taking the pills. It’s a horrible feeling.

Classes itself are definitely different than what I’m used to at UVM. All my teachers talk in an accent, but it’s not too hard to understand them. So far I really like all my classes, except for my Indigenous Perspectives class. My other classes are Maya culture and archaeology of Belize, applications of sustainable development, Adventure and Ecotourism, Ecology of a Tropical Rainforest, and Maximizing your Belize Experience. All of them are and hour and a half-two hours long, so it’s hard to sit still sometimes. Other than that, I signed up for soccer, the environmental club, and I’m going to be on the support team for La Ruta Maya. La Ruta Maya is the second longest canoe race in the world and people come from all over to race. About half my group is signed up to compete and they have to practice paddling every Sunday for about 6 hours. It’s also pretty dangerous. People flip over all the time in the freezing water and get their legs broken. The race lasts 4 days and everyone camps out for that time. I am very excited to be a part of it in some way.

Food-wise, everything has been delicious. Besides the amazing breakfasts, the dinners are also great and cheap here. My favorite, however, are the fruit shakes. Unfortunately, mango is out of season, but the pineapple and banana ones are very tasty. Tomorrow, Saturday, is market day, so I’ll be going in the morning to get some fresh fruits and vegetables. The four of us that live in the guesthouse went to Costless today, which is a mini supermarket essentially and did some community shopping. Tomorrow we are going to make salsa and stuffed peppers, yum. We’re trying to eat and buy everything local and stay away from American food. However, I think next time I go, I may have to buy some cereal or chocolate :0

Belize Zoo

I am currently on the plane and expected to arrive within 40 minutes or so. Ted, a taxi driver is scheduled to pick me up from the airport and take me to San Ignacio...I only hope my luggage arrives when I do…

So I arrived in San Ignacio around 11:45, then proceeded to go through customs and pick up my luggage (which was all there and nothing was stolen, yay!) As soon as the plane doors had opened, a wave of heat immediately came through the plane and I was hot. I was told that a taxi driver named Ted with a long black ponytail was going to pick me up. As I walked outside with my 3 bags of luggage, I saw a whole row of Belizean taxi drivers that ALL had long black hair. Luckily, Ted was near the front holding a sign with my name on it and I was able to pick him out of the crowd. We shook hands and then we were off on our way to San Ignacio…about a 2 hour drive away from the Belize City airport. He has been in the taxi driving industry in Belize for about 7 years and knows the areas of Belize well. The entire time, he talked to me and told me about the different places we were passing and the history behind Belize. On the way, we passed numerous horses just tied to trees and tons of stray dogs. He also offered to take me to the Belize zoo, which I kindly accepted.

It was $10 to get in, but definitely worth every penny. Unlike the zoos in the US, this zoo is all based around the animals’ natural habitat and the fences are not cages or anything like you would see normally. I got to pet a wild white-tailed deer and a toucan! I saw lots of birds, howler monkeys, spider monkeys, a tapir (Belize’s national animal), wild hogs, a jaguar, puma, other small cats, a kinkajou, and much more! While at the zoo, it also would rain for about 5 minutes, stop, then continue again. Very strange. Here are a few pictures from the zoo...



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After the zoo, I was driven straight to San Ignacio, since I was already missing my first two classes of the day. Meg, my program leader, was waiting patiently for me to arrive and helped me get settled into my new home. I was given a cell phone, keys, and lots of papers to look through. I then showered and started to unpack before being driven to Galen University for my class at 6:30.

Jay, my other program leader, drove me to Galen about an hour before my class began to show me around. It takes about 15 minutes by bus/car to get to the university. When I arrived, I was slightly taken aback by the size of the school. There are only 3 buildings…there are only 3 classrooms and they are all in one building. The other buildings are the library and the student center. As soon as I walked in, I met up with several of my fellow UVM classmates and signed up for several clubs/sports. I then hung out with everyone until class began.

After class, we all headed back to Martha’s Inn/Guesthouse to hang out. I hadn’t seen my roommate, Margaret, yet since she has a different class schedule than I do, so I was ready to come back and talk to her. I walked over to the Inn with the two guys in my group that live in the room next door and the entire group just hung out and had some drinks. The best part though was when our new friend Tony brought over his cousin Roger who has a 2 month old pit bull mix!! For the rest of the night, that puppy, Jade, had my attention and I got to hold her and play with her for several hours. I was in heaven. Around 1, I called it quits and Alex, one of the guys next door, walked back with me and we went to bed.


Our breakfast nook

Beginning my travels

After sleeping over Lindsay’s grandparents’ house the night before, Lindsay and I headed to Newark Airport to begin my adventure. The line to check bags was unbelievably long, but luckily we stopped a very accommodating security guard, who proceeded to take us to the front of the line, no questions asked. A man who was next in line discovered that I was “cutting” everybody else and started to raise his voice to Lindsay, but Lindsay simply said I am at the front of the line because I am traveling alone and I was going to miss my flight (which was partly true). I checked my two bags with no problems then proceeded to the security checkpoint, where I had to say good-bye to Lindsay. Once getting through the security checkpoint, I was home free…or so I thought. My flight was not delayed when I arrived at the airport and everybody boarded on time. However, we then proceeded to sit on the runway for another 2.5 hours while they de-iced all the wings of the planes. This caused me to miss my connecting flight in Houston, but there was nothing I could even do at that point on the plane.

I finally arrived in Houston and after talking to several different people, customer service told me there were no more flights to Belize that day and that I would have to fly out tomorrow. They paid for and put me up in the Baymont Inn hotel only 10 minutes away from the airport and also gave me an $8 voucher for food and a bag containing a toothbrush (now I have 4 different toothbrushes with me), toothpaste, hair spray, shampoo, a comb, a razor, and shaving cream. I called the hotel and a free shuttle picked me up from the airport. My hotel room was decent size and contained a King size bed. I then made all my phone calls, showered, and got settled for the night. In the shuttle to the hotel, I had met a young man that was on my flight and in the same situation. We got to talking and I found out he was born in Belize and is going back to visit his family for a couple days. He currently lives in Korea and works as a Kindergarten teacher, but plans on moving to Melbourne, Australia by the end of February. When we checked in at the hotel, he asked me if I wanted to do dinner, so we decided to meet at the hotel restaurant at 7.

Once it was dinner time, I met him outside and we proceeded into the restaurant together and had a cheap, but nice meal. We just talked about traveling and places we’ve been. He grew up in San Ignacio, where I will be staying, and was letting me in on all the things I should know about Belize. I also found out he is 30 years old and he did not know I was only 20 either. Nonetheless, we had a good chat and after dinner, proceeded to our own rooms to retire for the night. After making all my phone calls for the night, I washed up, set my alarm, and went to sleep in my gigantic bed…better travels tomorrow.