Quinceañeras, June 15, 2013

Quinceañeras, or the celebration of a girls 15th birthday, was a vibrant experience. 

We celebrated with 9 beautiful girls. It would be hard to throw a party for each quinceñara considering we have over 60 girls in the house. So we throw one big party. 

The day started out with mass at 2:30, followed by a fancy waltz the kids had been practicing for months. After the waltz we had a special dinner with a band, a DJ and dancing to follow. 

It was amazing how the day came together, each department was in charge of putting together a part of the big event. My department, for example, was in charge of the center pieces of each table. "Each table" turned out to be over 50 center pieces. The dresses, shoes, flowers, hair, make-up and more were all donations by local businesses and giving padrinos. 

The girls shining in their gowns. 

The hansom escorts.

The entrance!

The volunteers even dressed up! What a good looking group :)

Silly volunteers. 

My boys from San Jose, so cute!

Quinceañeras was special for me because one of my students turned 15, here's Delmi looking beautiful! She sparkled confidence. I shed a couple tears watching her dance. 

San Cristóbal de las Casas, Mexico!

San Cristóbal de las Casas, Mexico, felt like an upper class Antigua, Guatemala. The streets, buildings, churches and parks looked more sophisticated.  In total, it took us 12 hours to travel from Guatemala to Mexico, including boarder crossing. The ride was easy, just long, and when Liz and I got to Mexico we were wiped. For the first night, we ended up finding a beautiful hotel for 150 pesos a night, it had wifi, TV, queen beds, and our own bathroom... we were in heaven!  The next morning we ended up switching hotels because it was too pricey, but well worth one night. 

We spent a lot of time wondering the streets, churches, museums and markets of San Cristóbal. The prices were a lot cheaper in Mexico from what we are use to in Guatemala, the exchange rate was also in our favor.

Cathedral, 

City hall, 

Iglesia de Guadlupe, 

Museum, Instituto Nacional De Antropologia e Historia, 

Iglesia de San Cristóbal, 

Liz and I ended up taking a tour of Misol Ha, Agua Azul, and Palenque all in one day. We left our hotel at 6:00 a.m. and headed to each location. In Misol Ha we had one hour to visit the wet waterfall, 2 hours to visit Agua Azul and 2 hours to visit Palenque. We didn't return until 9:00p.m. and we were exhausted.

Misol Ha Waterfall,

Agua Azul,

Palenque, 

Palenque is one of the coolest places I've ever seen. We could walk straight up the stairs and go through the old Mayan buildings. We would be walking through the buildings, surrounded my the jungle, and be able to hear the monkey's screaming.

The buildings and views were incredible. 

"Xela," Guatemala!

Quetzaltenango, or Xela (shay-lah), is one of the largest cities in Guatemala. We were right next to the central park, which made things easy to get around, we mostly walked and took advantage of public transport. We enjoyed the warm days and cold nights with a little rain in between.

We stayed at the "Black Cat Hostel," which was located near the central park. The food was DELICIOUS, maybe I'm just deprived, and the rooms were okay.

Nona and I ended up having our own room, with a shared bathroom for 160Q a night. The beds weren't horrible but the walls were very thin.   

The bar/restaurant area.

The balcony outside of the rooms. 

Central Park! In Guatemala it's the rain season, which means it was mostly gloomy during our visit to Xela. The park had a lot of fun structures to see and a lot of space to sit and relax. We even got to see ballerinas preforming in the park.   

Pasaje Enrique en el Parque Central. This building was beautiful, there were restaurants, bars and travel agencies when you passed under the arch. 

Museum of Natural History

The view of the Central Park and churches form the Museum of Natural History. 

Main Cathedral, Park Central.

Inside the church.

Exploring the city with Nona.

We even visited the local cemetery in Xela, it was just as big and colorful as we imagined.

This was one of the "smaller" structures.

The hot springs of Fuentes Georginas, in Zunil! A wonderful place to relax and enjoy the hot water baths. 

The market in Xela was enormous. With its own colorful charm, vendors were fighting for your attention, people were walking in every direction and animals were running around, it was just like the markets in Antigua.