blue layers & San Cristóbal

Have you ever heard of Chiapas? Chiapas is the southern-most state of Mexico. I had the blessing of being able to visit Mexico for the first time this past June, and such a beautiful area of it. If you ever have the opportunity to go, don't hesitate. To get there, either go from Guatemala by shuttle, or fly to the Mexico City airport and then connect to Tuxtla, Chiapas. From there a vibrant and buoyant town, San Cristóbal de las Casas, is a 45 minute drive. What I remember upon first entering the town in the evening was the flattery of the perfectly lit town, comprising of warm, cream-colored buildings, against the carrying blue layers of twilight.

I learned of this area from my earlier visits to Antigua, Guatemala from helping to run mobile women's health camps there with Humanity First. Travel excursion offices frequently advertised shuttle rides to this beautiful city. After Humanity First Guatemala began making contacts there, through confirmation of some local socially active women, we soon realized the same women's health problems exist in Chiapas, too.

Chiapas has a very similar culture to Guatemala and is unique from the rest of Mexico--it was even annexed from Mexico for a year. It has a complex history filled with brilliant civilizations, war, and oppression. Chiapas had a long history of pre-Mayan civilizations, and this society had even developed a calendar hundreds of years before the Mayan people. The Mayan people then settled there and built a successful empire. After the decline of the Mayan empire, the rule changed between many different groups. Notably, Spanish colonists violently conquested the indigenous population through constant warfare and disease. The Tzotzil group were among the most resistant bur eventually succumbed forming the town that I visited.

The natives there still speak Tzotzil today, as we saw in our Women's Health Camp. This was the reason for my visit. After we conducted several successful women's health camps in central Guatemala, we decided we were ready to initiate these women's health initiatives in Chiapas, Mexico. Like in Guatemala, we provided preventative health services along with medicinal treatment, as needed. We provided cervical cancer screens, topics on preventative health education, and collected research to better customize to the needs of this population, all while using Tzotzil to Spanish and Spanish to English translators. We found new cultural barriers that we had not previously experienced in Guatemala from the Tzotzil culture. It's an ancient and fascinating culture, and we hope to understand it accurately in order to progress in an educated and sensitive way.

Culturally, Chiapas has contributed richly. Jaimes Sabines is a Mexican poet from Chiapas who is regarded as the "sniper of literature" and one of the greatest contemporary poets.

After learning more about this area and seeing images of this magnetic place with similar looks of my beloved city of Antigua, Guatemala, I had no doubt that I would be there soon. I had complete certainty that I would love it at first sight. I did.

My first photo on the drive from the airport in Tuxtla, Chiapas.

A couple of photos from the first Women's Health Camp by Humanity First Guatemala-USA

Morning walks in the beautiful San Cristobal de las Casas

Some main sights around central San Cristobal.

A lemonade and parque central morning in San Cristobal. Sigh. 

"What are you looking at, though?" Little boy playing in a very impoverished rural area of Chiapas.

Breakfasts in San Cristobal de las Casas

PS: Carajillo Cafe is a requirement for anyone who appreciates coffee.

Also, if you love chocolate, you will love Cacao Nativa, a charming and ADORABLE Mexican chocolatier.

"No es que muera de amor, muero de ti. 
Muero de ti, amor, de amor de ti..." 
Jaime Sabines

-AB

For more information on women's health efforts abroad with Humanity First and/or to volunteer, please email womenshealth@humanityfirst.gt

indígena & color

Strangely, I rarely buy things when I come to Guatemala, a country popular with markets filled with skilled local handicraft. I do always go to the markets, mostly to bring new people to shop, but I just enjoy looking. I've bought the odd thing here and there (a light-blue and white wool blanket, a hammock, a purple cloth notebook, etc) but nothing related to personal style. Then, this last trip in March, a dear friend bought this lovely handmade bag for me from one of the markets in Antigua. The leather is a very soft higher-quality leather and the body of the bag is a typical material and design that many indigenous women have on their shirts. As a person that generally is wary of too much color, I loved this instantly. It is a piece that is not abundantly versatile, but when it works, I think it works well. I also receive more compliments on this bag then anything I have ever worn in my life, so basically, it gives me an excuse to talk about Guatemala all of the time.

Comfortable mohair mix sweater: boohoo.com cage leather flats: Steve Madden "Ditaa"

Also, I love much of what this writer writes. I really value this thought, because it is difficult for me to understand why people use the idea of destiny as an excuse to not take charge of one's life. We have the ability to make decisions for a reason and we have the opportunity to control the outcome of our lives with our way to pray, our way to see, our way to treat others, our way to carry ourselves, our way to speak, and our way to love.

I can control my destiny, but not my fate. Destiny means there are opportunities to turn right or left, but fate is a one-way street. I believe we all have the choice as to whether we fulfill our destiny, but our fate is sealed.

P. Coelho 

-AB

smoke & coffee

the marked first memory I have of Antigua is the minute we drive  from the airport in Guate city into the small town. It smells of fire with the scent of a familiar clean, wooden smoke. It is dark, in the way American cities will never be. The streets are beautifully lit with soft, yellow street lights and small fires in the corners illuminating only its intimate vicinity. The darkness keeps the surrounding scenes well hidden in the night. The next morning we wake early, not per our usual leisurely traveler schedule to explore the town as much as possible in the daylight. Our first mission is as it has been in every city and every country - finding good coffee and breakfast. Luckily, we are told that there is homemade pancakes, plantains, and beans where we are staying and our roots would never let us stray from this. We eat breakfast on the rooftop and it would have been worth the entire trip to have only seen the views from that rooftop. There are volcanoes to the north, monumental in their stature and Mayan ruins to the east and surrounded by mountains behind us. We are shattered, hearts soft, and eyes once again humbled by the inexhaustible beauty of the creations in this world.

I'll limit this post largely to pictures of the rest of our trip, for in situations such as this, words will undoubtedly fall short of capturing such grandiosity. 

view every morning. Its a surprise we did anything else beyond sitting here all day 

this much romance in just a breakfast

Rooftop views of volcanos and ruins

rainy stone streets of Antigua

Town square, stone streets of Antigua 

you could never fatigue of the amount of color

plantación de café 

If you're not tired of hearing this yet, it still bears repeating...Lake Atitlan is quite possibly one of the most beautiful places Anila or I have ever been to. It is one of those dangerously beautiful places, one in which you could completely lose yourself, in all your senses while at the same time remembering your place in this massive expanse of the world. There is the giant and magnanimous San Pedro Volcano in the middle and it is surrounded by water. The lake is dotted with villages around it and each village boasts a slightly different personality, some renown to be a haven for artists and craftsmen while others have preserved the most indigenous culture of Guatemala. 

To stand at the foot of a 10,000 ft volcán and to look up is to have an experiential knowing of God. 

Arriving in one of the many villages surrounding Lake Atitlan

Drove around the village of Santa Cruz in tuk-tuks of course

Village of Santa Cruz - where a carnival of some sort was ongoing. The entire village was on the streets eating, walking around, and dancing. 

Santa Cruz still has much of the original Mayan traditions, beliefs, customs in practice

 “Lake Como, it seems to me, touches on the limit of permissibly picturesque, but Lake Atitlán is Como with additional embellishments of several immense volcanoes. It really is too much of a good thing.” Aldous Huxley on Lake Atitlan

que te vaya bien, 

besos.

cappuccinos & cobblestone

This blog is about all attributes of life that we find beautiful. Besides the obvious beauty in this world, we think human beings themselves and the highest abilities of their hearts and souls are undeniably among the most magnificent. To love them is to love ourselves, to trust in humanity is to trust in ourselves.

God: Dhul-Jalali wal-Ikram, the lord of majesty and bounty, and Al-Badi', the incomparable creator. He created this world only for us, for our benefit and for our enjoyment, to be appreciated and to flourish in it. I have been allowed to see a drop of the abundance of this temporary earth and and its people in the last several years of my youth. 

The astral few hours I spent in Essaouria, Morocco still haunt me, like I knew it would. I stared fervently, like how you try to memorize a dream you know will escape you in another half of a breath, at the North African translation of the Atlantic sea.  I stared at the shadowy image of old-world ships in the distance lingering near the white-washed fortress from Prophet Muhammad's time, said to be a previous visitor. Subhanallah (Glory to God) is the only word that my heart and lips and eyes kept whispering. Skinny sun-tanned silhouettes of boys playing in the water. French and Arabic half-shouts getting caught by the perfect wind. Maybe I had a tear or two. Yes, it really was that intense of a moment for me, but I will allow the reader to move on. You are welcome. 

Anyway, mostly by happenstance, I have ended up in many situations in different parts of the world with my family and friends--always marvelous, always with too little money (Let's eat fifty cent döner kebabs everyday in Turkey!), always expecting nothing (well, not nothing, maybe some free tea & coffee, free meals every now and again, and meeting some interesting characters here and there), but gaining much. Hospitality is personified in every step of my travels, whether in Puerto Rico or in Turkey, on land or on water.

The guiding reason, since entering adolescence of my choices in my education and career path, for both of us, has been to extend our skills and knowledge as far as we can to all in need and without borders. Finally, I got a chance to take my first medical mission trip in March of 2014 with Humanity First, and returned again in May (thank you co-workers for covering me) and after a failed plan to Europe, in June with a few best friends. Are three trips in four months excessive? No. Just look at the photos.

Church ruins in Antigua--my first few hours of the first trip

Beautiful wild vegetation everywhere

Antigua at night

Young indigenous Guatemalan girl waiting for her mother to be seen

Patients waiting for the doctor after getting their vital signs taken

Student volunteers from Michigan at the end of another good day seeing 600 patients!

Guatemalan tweens getting embarrassed.

Some sights around the camp in Alotenango.

Mi amor, Wilmer, mischievous but loving child who would hang out with my friend and I some days

Sweet girls

Boys after school

One of the student volunteers playing with a baby at the end of the day

Last few dentist patients of the day

Boys outside of the nearby church

A typical outdoor wood stove many of the poor indigenous people use to cook

Ain't she beautiful

Girls who received a water well to have easy access of clean drinking water in their backyard a year ago 

Extremely poor living conditions

A version of happiness

For the first trip, you can read a glimpse of my experience here, as well as from other volunteers. In summary, it was flippin' lovely. I highly encourage anyone who is able to go. Anyone can help, medical or otherwise! It is not something to be missed.

The following photos are from my second visit, which was just as wonderful in different ways. In this visit, there was a chance to see more of the beautiful country and I was with new and old friends. I also took my little brother, who thoroughly enjoyed it. Before we visited, a few of us worked on a maternal health program. Maternal health is an area that needs more attention in Guatemala, and being a worker in this field, I was very excited to help work on it. We took one day and invited thirty Guatemalan midwives to gather some research from them and to present an educational PowerPoint discussion. We learned a lot from each other and gained a better understanding of their needs. I'm smiling just thinking about it.

My little brother Adeel and I waiting for our shuttle boat at Lake Atitlan. He wants to return to Guatemala just to see this lake again. No filter.

At a dock in one of the villages.

Adeel loved the women's co-op. They showed us how they make thread and dye it.

My newly married friend and I just wandering around the Spanish Embassy.

Holding on for my dear life. 

Introducing ourselves at the start of the Maternal Research/Education Day in Sumpango, Guatemala

First we did research questionnaires

 The second part of the day was more of a teaching/comparing session.

The midwives :)

We ended the day with Pollo Campero, of course.

Soneto LXV

Matilde, dónde estás? Noté, hacia abajo, 

entre corbata y corazón, arriba, 

cierta melancolía intercostal: 

era que tú de pronto eras ausente. 

Matilde, where are you? Down here I noticed,

under my necktie and just above my heart,

a certain pang of grief between the ribs,

you were gone that quickly.

Pablo Neruda

-AB