San Lucas Toliman

I've just gotten back from a few days at the Lake Atitlan, which some have dubbed the most the most beautiful lake in the world. It is quite beautiful, probably most unique because it is surrounded by volcanoes, and about 365 meters deep. I went to go and visit a friend, who was working in a small town around the lake. A med student, she is doing a four week rotation at the clinic. The town, San Lucas Toliman, is not a tourist town. Most guidebooks specifically state not to go there, because there is little to see. For the most part this is true, but since I wanted to learn more about the work she was doing, at the San Lucas Mission, I didn't need the town to offer a whole lot (which turned out to be a good thing).

The San Lucas Mission is a pretty incredible project and has a powerful presence in the activities of the town. A Catholic Project, the Mission was vital the town's survival during the Civil War in the 1980's. It provided stability for the residents, as well as a safe place for orphaned children and families. Today the Mission has a variety of projects that both give work to the people in the town, but are run by San Lucas residents, empowering them to rebuild their community and take ownership of the Mission's work. These include: a reforestation project, a coffee plantation (the Mission bought land and then redistributed to the San Lucas residents. The Mission pays the coffee farmers to produce the coffee and then it's sold to visitors and people in the US.), a clinic and a hospital, health education, and a school.

I went to San Lucas with a friend from language school, Brittany. After a bus, boat and pick-up ride we made it to San Lucas around dinner time. The first day our Med Student friends were giving a presentation to the Health Promoters on TB and we decided to tag along. I think the cultural experience of the meeting was more interesting then the actual presentation. The meeting, which was supposed to be from 9-11am, ended up being something like this:

9 - 9:45: Wait for people to show up
9:45 - 10:30: Introductions (name, where you come from and your favorite food)
10:30 - 11: "We should take a break now, verdad?"
11 - 12:30: A discussion on ground rules, with lots of odd silent pauses. The best part was during the discussion on turning off cell phones during the class, the leader of the discussion's phone rings. He proceeds to answer it and talk for a min. When he comes back, he changes the rule from "Turn off cell phones" to "Put on vibrate and limit calls to 1 min."

12:30 - 1: Stacy and Jason finally start the presentation
1 - 2: "We should eat now, verdad?"
2 - 3: The end of the presentation.

It was interesting, to say the least.

The following days we worked on some of the Mission's projects and spent some time down by the lake. We sorted coffee (not as much fun as it sounds) and broke concrete so that they could plant a garden. Breaking concrete was fun, we essentially were given a large nail, hammer, and then told to go at it. I had a good time.

In honor of Valentine's day, and 3 out of 4 of us being apart from our significant others, we decided that we should have wine, bread, cheese and chocolate. This also provided a reason for us to wander aimlessly around town in and out of shops. For wine, we found the grocery store that sold non-boxed wine. We agreed upon a bottle of Chilean Merlot, that unfortunately tasted like someone had poured the box into a bottle and then sold it. For chocolate, we couldn't find anything that wasn't in a Milky Way or Snickers bar. We did though find a bar of chocolate that is used to make hot chocolate. Figuring it was our best bet, we bought it. While it was better than nothing, I wouldn't recommend it if you have a chocolate craving in San Lucas. It has the texture of compressed cocoa powder with lots of sugar and cinnamon. The grains kinda come apart in your mouth, although it is much better if you eat it with bread. For the final two components, we took bread and cheese from the Mission (where I was also eating all my meals.) For a San Lucas V-day, and our final night on the lake, I wouldn't have wanted it any other way.

Look at these crazy colored chicks at the Market!