My name is Kevin Roth, and this was my day in Guatemala. I woke up at 0600 to get ready for the day. At about 0645, some of the group started to walk to Violeta’s for breakfast, but since my battle buddy (AKA OB) wasn’t ready, I stayed behind to wait for him.  You can’t leave a man behind. We started our walk over, and once we arrived, everyone had already finished half of their plates of French toast with papaya and watermelon. Once we had finished our breakfast, we chatted with Violeta until our mentor, Helen, came to pick us up. 

Once she arrived, we set out for the chicken bus terminal.  Usually, we’d have to wait about five minutes or so for our bus to arrive, but today our bus was ready and waiting. So far, our bus has never really packed.  There’s always an open seat. The ride today was bumpier than usual, but we prevailed and made it to Escuela de los Niños in Jocotenango.  The second we got there, we had to grab three wheelbarrows (carretillas in español) and walk about 500 yards to pick up some dirt so we could start laying pavers. I thought we only had to do it once, but our supervisor at the worksite, Rodolfo, said doce and my heart dropped. The distance doesn’t seem like a lot, but the roads were all bumpy, and we had to go over speed bumps and up a step with a wheelbarrow full of dirt. It was tiring work to say the least. We laid the dirt and then had to level it with a two-by-four before we could start placing the pavers. After about 2 hours of laying pavers, it was time to clock out and head off to the chicken bus for our return to Antigua. We got onto the bus, and the driver was playing some amazing music even though I didn’t know any of the words. I thought it was good enough to pull out Shazam and get the song name. The second we hopped off the bus, you could smell the fragrant street food, and I’m not going to lie, it was very tempting to buy some, but we resisted temptation and walked to Violeta’s for lunch. 

For lunch, we had chicken, rice, potatoes, and carrots. It was served with a broth, which made everything so good once you had mixed it all together. After finishing our meal, we said our thanks and goodbyes to Violeta and went back to the hostel, where we took advantage of our free time for a post-lunch tan session. I definitely got a little burnt. Our Spanish class across the street at the Ixchel Language School followed, and for most of the class, I learned the names of fruits and vegetables as well as some verbs. After an hour and a half, everyone headed up to the school’s roof for a fruit activity. The instructors showed us Guatemalan fruits and described them. After the activity, my instructor and I formed a group with OB and his instructor, and we played a game where we had to name the antonym of a word shown on a card. After class, we walked back across the street to the hostel for our debrief with Captain Lennon and Prof. Cadwalader. After the meeting, we headed to Puerta Once (Door Eleven) for two-for-one wings. Overall, I rank the day a ten out of ten.