Britta's Trip to Guatemala 

This is San Lucas Toliman, Guatemala.  My home for two weeks.  It is surrounded by volcanoes and the shore of the incredibly large Lake Atitlan laps at the city's edge.

    

  Briana and I try on some of the colorful woven works of a local woman.  She demonstrated the backstrap loom for us.  

This is a coffee plant.  We picked coffee for the mission.  The coffee beans are inside bright red berries.  I can't usually drink coffee black, but the coffee at the mission was superb!

    
  This is some of our crazy Guatemalan gang.  Pictured are some siblings and new friends from the University of Illinois.  (L to R: Krista, Zach, Husein, Leannie, Mela, Lauren, Anita, Susan)  click on the picture to enlarge  

We did manage to do some work.  Here Mom, Lauren and Garrett pose outside the mission's school's gate.  We painted and did new construction to the school.  This was the first time in the history of the school that it was ready before the teachers came.

    
  Transportation is an adventure in Guatemala.  Pictured here is a "chicken" bus.  People, goats and chickens all ride together.  Luggage is stored on top by the helper who will position and secure it even as the bus is moving.  This bus is coming in to San Lucas for the market.  

This man is paddling his dugout canoe around Lake Atitlan in search of fish.  We were unable to drink any water or eat fish due to the high level of lake pollution.

    
  The views were breathtaking.  I captured this "God beam" breaking through the clouds and between the volcanoes through a van window as we traveled from ChiChi back to San Lucas.   
This is my young friend friend John. He was a very persistent salesman. He tried to sell me three different goods on three different days in two cities which are quite some distance from one another.  When we saw each other the third time, we both laughed and posed for a picture.    
  The people of Guatemala were so warm, friendly and colorful.  Here you see a woman and her two children carrying many burdens.  Almost every woman has a child in a sling as pictured here.  They also balance impossible loads as they walk everywhere.  

Come back again sometime.  I hope to add some journal excerpts and more thorough perceptions of my time in Guatemala.  I hope to go back again soon.  Click on any picture above to enlarge it.  Email me with your thoughts.