Me Gusta Xela...

Our fourth and final week in Xela was bittersweet.   We will always miss the walk to and from school, the stray dogs who seemed to know their way around town better than the people, the chocolateria, the tortilleria, our host family, and especially the amazing new friends we've made.  However, it was definitely time to move on and we'll always have the memories (and e-mail, and blogspot and facebook).  

One night we went to the Estadio Mario Camposeco to see the Club Social y Deportivo Xelajú Mario Camposeco.  This is the local soccer team, more commonly referred to as the Xela Superchivos.  No rules at these games (for the fans, that is).  We sat in Rincon del Diablo (Spanish for "Devil's End", or "Devil's Corner"), which has a reputation similar to that of the 700 level of Veteran's Stadium in Philly.  Fans were on their feet the entire game, singing, dancing, shooting off homemade fireworks (from the stands onto the field and onto other fans) and otherwise whooping it up (Spanish for "whooping it up").  No snowballs thrown at Santa, though.  Wimps.



Blending in: that's Dave on the end, Elliot from the UK, Jon from Minneapolis and Alex from Germany



concessions





Xelaju!!!



Albina, our host Madre, and her family were so cool to us we can't even say it properly in English.  The boys were a big help with our language lessons and she continued to whip up tasty typical Guatemalan meals, including whiskiel, a Guatemalan veggie similar to eggplant.  Good stuff. 




Whiskiel's hard to beat...



We graduated from Spanish school on April 8th.  Julie gave a speech (in Spanish!) and our friends Jon and Megan from Boulder came to visit.  They did a similar year-long adventure back in 2007 and have been a huge help to us: sharing stories, advice and ideas from their own trials and tribulations of the road.  After accepting our diplomas we bounced around Xela for our last night in town.    



Jon and Megan join us for graduation before their own week of Spanish class and a trip up thru Belize and Mexico





Waiting for the bus outta town...