Elyse O'C: life after MKE: Madison, MU, and MSOE - Lots of gringo ingenieros in Xoy! Not to mention FERIA

Still nice and busy with the past week (or so) full of lots of events - here are a few, and (again) sorry for the length, but as you'll see, I've been a bit preoccupied recently...

Abel (the AWESOME muni driver) was giving Waleska a ride part of the way home after the Madison crew left, so I hopped in the car to get to Chichi for the Sunday market to grab some things for the MU EWB silent auction coming up this fall

This meant another lovely night at Hotel el Mashito and some food, beverages, and wifi at the Mayan Inn
I got a huipil blanket and backpack

Right when I hopped off the chicken bus in Joyabaj I headed into the big alcalde auxiliares meeting at the muni building

This is a meeting that happens once a month and consists of auxiliary mayors for each of the 120+ communities in the municipality as well as Cocode members (essentially committees for larger groupings of communities that focus on and help coordinate development initiatives and projects), and depending on the size of a community, there will be 1-10 auxiliares and 5-10 Cocode members, so the meeting hall was full of about 500 people (at least that's what it felt like...)
Being the giant gringa that I am, as soon as I came into the back of the room to listen in, I was waved up onto stage by one of the main muni guys I work with, Hector, from the planificación office
Once I made it up and onto the stage, I was informed that I would be "presenting myself" to the group so they would know who I was and what I was working on
I ended up being the last person to speak, but despite how antsy everyone was to leave the 3hr+ meeting, watching a gringa talk on stage was well worth the wait, so with Florencio (the Alcalde's) help, I was able to keep everyone's attention and get my message out - a little frightening, but it went well!

The rest of the week was spent in various meetings prepping for the start of my mapping work and tracking data on the filter/water system from Alejandro's info - the data shows some interesting and concerning social trends (looks like there's a lot of leaks/perpetually open taps throughout the system), but he's super happy and excited about the quality of the water these days, so I'm excited to keep working with him to figure out how to make this system sustainable and consistent! (yikes)
The Guatemala City Rotarians came for a visit

they plan on helping with health and hygiene trainings to support the education component of the EWB filter as well as generally to help with the ongoing hygiene education that Lauren and the Hospital/Margaret and the schools do on a regular basis
they've also contributed to projects in the area, so Mincho and I took them on a little tour of projects - this tour included a stop at a roadside vendor of cusha (Guatemalan cane sugar moonshine)...

Spent an extensive amount of time chatting with Mincho's daughter, July (who works for Hector in the planificación office), mainly working to update documents of data/info collected by my Aunt Janet when she was doing work like this 14 years ago (her maps are still the only maps of the muni). We also discussed a plan of attack for the map-making process such as developing a one-page survey for each community (again based on my aunt's previous work)
Made a day trip with Mincho out to Nueva Providencia to adjust/tighten up some cables along the pipeline - while it was a long day (4am - 8pm), it was nice to get those items taken care of and to chat with the community some more

They were mostly interested in when we would be returning after the completion of the project so they could throw a party for us

Enjoyed some solid bonding time with the PCVs here in Xoy, Lauren and Margaret, over some vino, cooking of chepes (made out of masa, fresh black beans, onions, and cheese and cooked in dried corn husks), Modern Family episodes, and Enneagrams (Margaret has actually taken the test, but Lauren and I tried to self-identify, which is quite difficult...)
MU arrived for their pedestrian bridge site assessment!

had a lovely time in a beautiful place helping them assess and take data for their senior design project
Mark carted down a TON of stuff from my mom - yummy yummy food stuffs that the PCVs and I are quite excited to get into as well as gifts for just about anyone and everyone I've encountered since being here - needless to say, it was a lovely package to open!
Had my first community meeting as the solo interpreter for the group, so that was exhilarating and went quite well if I do say so!

We had a few nice dinners including the big one last night with the MU group, PCVs, Waleska, and Doug Stahl (MSOE faculty mentor) who has been in Xela for the past week taking Spanish classes with his HS-age daughter and her friends
OH and FERIA has been happening

this is the 10 day festival here in Joyabaj that is a pretty standard festival (almost every muni has one), but differentiates itself because it is one of the few that still has the Micos performing around the palo (guys who dress up like monkeys, climb to the top of a ~70ft pole, and swing down it (pictures below - hard to describe...)
I missed most of the big events making site visits with the MU group, but definitely got to see the parvulos (kindergartner/preschool) parade on Saturday morning - SO CUTE

Waleska, Doug, and the girls will be here a few more days for some other site visits and meetings, then I will probably head out to another bridge site for the weekend with Mincho and some engineers from Guatemala City, then next week should be "normal" with Feria over, the groups out of Xoy, and me roaming around the campo making the map!

PICTURES

Visit from the Rotarians in the hospital cafeteria to talk about health and hygiene classes and how they can help - I'm on the left, Lauren in the pink, and Dorian (Lauren's counterpart) on the far right

Carlos, the Rotarian who planned the event, explaining to all of us how much 1/4 of a liter of cusha is in terms of drinks (given that it is almost pure alcohol...)

Explaining the filter system to the Rotarians - picture courtesy of Mincho

Visiting the Chiquiate ped bridge

Early morning on our way around the lake to NP

The lovely little comedor "Volver Volver" where we stopped for breakfast and lunch

Fresh concrete patches made by the community - only a few little spots needed some extra concrete and I'm happy to report they are now fixed!

Nice and tight hangers!

MU surveying!

Digging test pits for the geotech analysis at the bridge site - a little puppy came to help

Community meeting - Mincho leading the way on explaining the preliminary Memorandum of Understanding to the community

Group photo with the Alcalde Auxiliare (right)

FERIA

There is a parvulos beauty contest wherein each school votes its prettiest girl to ride in the parade and be judged against other 3-5 year old girls - this makes me a bit uncomfortable, but it's their tradition (and honestly appeared more tame than what is portrayed on "Toddlers in Tiaras")