Man Down...time.

Much has occurred since my last entry; yet again, not much at all. Since Friday, we have remained at the monastery for a majority of the past week. Justin has since gotten quite sick with amoebas, parasites, and Guardia, and only today has he started feeling better. So, with him resting, sleeping, and generally experiencing a trip to Hell and back, I have been left to my own devices. While I've definitely managed to keep myself busy, some preparatory work has seemed like downtime in comparison to a trip to an aldea. The good news about this: 1. We will be amply prepared for our next aldea trips; 2. This blog entry need not be too long!

9/3 Saturday
A lazy Saturday after an exhausting week felt great. I woke recalling that Justin had gotten up an estimated 16 times during the night to a sudden onslaught of illness. Justin looked like he had been hit by a train. Fr. Bernie and I took Justin's product in a lab for any semblance of sickness. While waiting, Fr. Bernie and I purchased a slew of snacks and beer for the big Notre Dame game that afternoon.
We returned with the results, notifying Justin of his stool's status and giving him the proper medication from "la farmacia." For the rest of the afternoon, Justin rested while we watched our beloved Fighting Irish get stopped by the infamous Southern Florida Bulls. Similar to the game in South Bend, the day was raddled with thunder and heavy rain. Nevertheless, we received our Notre Dame game via Fr. Bernie's cool "Slingbox" program, which receives all the main channels from Minnesota. Later on, Fr. Bernie's friend Raul enjoyed whiskey drinks with us as we tried to explain to him what was going on in the appalling Notre Dame showdown.

9/4 Sunday
Didn't think a day could get lazier, but Sunday proved to top Saturday. Slept in late, played guitar, read a book in the hammock, I did whatever I could to relax and live the passive Guatemalan lifestyle. I was beginning to think the day was lost to laziness, yet I was wrong!
Fr. Bernie had recently ordered about 60 computers (monitors, CPU's, "mice," keyboards, the works) donated to the monastery. The computers will go to any Aldea that has access electricity. Justin and I will be assisting the people of the aldeas in learning the way of the computer and how to utilize it for educational programs. Today, Bernie got news that the truck had arrived in Coban. Time to start unloading!
The truck was huge, and even with 6 sturdy hombres, we managed to unload the whole load in 2 hours. In the process, I met Oscar and Alberto, both frequent workers of the monastery. After talking with them for a bit, I realized two things: 1) I would be spending a lot of time working with these two fine gentlemen, and 2) I spoke pure spanish for about 2 hours long! I didn't even realize it, but I had gotten very comfortable with using my broken Spanish. While it still needs work, I am proud that I was able to carry conversation. I shared about 4 beers with these guys (after I brought down a few of my own "Budweiser," Oscar insisted on continuing to go down to a local "tienda" and purchase the native "Gallo" beer for everyone to drink.
That night, I got the great hour of dining at Chilio and Maria's house, also friends of Fr. Bernie. Chilio and Maria live on a small piece of farmland in a neighboring pueblo. They have a thin, tall son Alexanjro who is 15, and a very pretty daughter Ines who is 17. During the whole dinner (which was outside under a white tent overlooking beautiful Guatemalan farm landscape) Ines was all over her boyfriend, Tavo, who was 23. Dinner included the best steak I've ever had, the best chips and guacamole I've ever had, and lots of whiskey. I was a happy man. After some liquid confidence, I began to try and put some personality into my Spanish. It worked; I ended up swapping numbers with Tavo (college student), who said that he would call me about a party a week from this Friday. I hope I can work my Spanish up enough for that one!

9/5 Monday

Organizing Wet Photos on Deck

Couldn't make it to 6:00a.m. prayer today for gulping whiskey like a sailor on Sunday; Justin couldn't make it as he was still sick as a sailor. After breakfast, I spent my morning sifting through old monastery photos which had been subject rainwater from a large crack in the darkroom. Unfortunately, many of the photographs were not salvageable. While this work wasn't necessary pro-altruistic, I know the importance of old photos and recognized the immediacy of the issue. Lunch and mid-day prayer came and went, and I soon found myself stuck in the hammock after siesta time. My hammock snooze turned into an all afternoon nap as rain drizzled in patterns of intensity on the deck roof. Evening prayer, dinner, bed.

Painting Screens for Projectors

9/6 Tuesday
Justin, either getting better or being too sick of the room, decided to get back at it today. We finished our paint job from last Friday (see rightt), and spent the afternoon trying to pick up a few necessities at the supermarket (to no avail- both of our debit cards failed to withdraw money from the ATM due to logisitcal mix-ups. I care not to bore my readers with this, but know that for possibly the next week I am without money in a different country. Whoops!). This, by the way, was my second solo trip with the Suzuki Jeep. Aside from a pretty much worthless drive to-and-from the supermarket, a didn't stall out the car to embarrassment this time! I just couldn't put the damn thing in reverse when trying to leave the monastery... Justin and I had to kick it in neutral and back it up manually :/. Dinner was a typical black bean and tortilla extravaganza. This called for the only snack we had: microwave popcorn. This, along with glass-bottled Coke and "The Untouchables" concluded our Tuesday.

9/7 Wednesday
Today was almost a full day, and I have just realized that my readers don't know what a "full day" is in the monastery. Check this schedule out:

6:00a.m. Morning Prayer
7:00a.m. Breakfast
8:00a.m. Morning Work Period Begins
12:30p.m. Mid-Day Prayer
12:45p.m. Lunch
1:00p.m. - 2:30p.m. Siesta
2:30p.m. Afternoon Work Period Begins
5:30p.m. Evening Prayer (Vespers)
6:00p.m. Mass
7:00p.m. Dinner
7:30p.m. - 8:15p.m. Vigil Prayer

A bit o' structure, huh? Its taken some getting used to, and by no means are Justin and I required to attend all of these events. It is expected (as it well should) that we participate in the community. Thus, I've configured a schedule to keep myself sane (I am, after all, not at all considering vows or whatnot). An hour for God is sufficient, and if I'm around, I'll go. Thus, Today, I went to Morning, Mid-day, and Evening Prayer, and chose to skip Mass to figure out my bank situation and blog. It may take longer to continue and figure out what is comfortable for me, but I am wary not to structure myself out too much. I need a bit o' time as well, ya know!

The whole day was spent testing the donated computers in the Faith Formation Buildings. We've only cycled through the monitors. Of 60 monitors donated, 50 worked. I was impressed with this figure, but Fr. Bernie seemed quite disappointed. We'll see what the CPU's, keyboards, etc. bring for the rest of the week. See Photos below...

Organizing Donated Computers

Does it work?

We would have much rather been visiting with locals or aldeas, but Justin and I reflected upon the fact that preparation time for these computers was necessary in order to benefit the people of the aldeas, even if we weren't seeing them face-to-face immediately.

One other point: one of the monks, Rolando, offered to take us this weekend on a trip to Puerto Barrio, a beautiful Port town on the Atlantic Ocean! He has business up there, and offered the opportunity for us to join him. Justin and I were overjoyed. After a week of feeling isolation inside the monastery walls, we were elated to hear that we would be on an another adventure by 8:00a.m. Friday. Get ready for some great photos... Puerto Barrio looks beautiful!