Xela, Guatemala

Hi all, well after a week or so of John’s computer crashing its back in action and we’re here to give you and update on the last few weeks. We have decided that since we are now stationed in Xela for the next few months we will only be updating the blog with a weekly summary rather than a daily play by play. We will be sure to highlight any major events or exciting adventures that occur while we are here.
After leaving San Pedro we headed towards the town of Quetzaltenango, or the original Xelaju, Xela (pronounced SHEALAHU or SHEALA). Our traveling companions were able to contact a nice young man living with his family in the city, once again through couch surfing. We had originally planned on making our own contact in Xela but when we arrived all together at Fernando’s house, he and his family insisted they had plenty of room for all of us and a safe place for us to park the truck. It was a very generous offer and we accepted.




The house was split into to two, two level houses connected via the shared garage. One side was occupied by Fernando, and his parents and the other side by his grandparents and Aunt Freda who was visiting from Canada. During this week we did some exploring of Xela and a few of the surrounding towns. Fernando took us for a hike up a nearby inactive volcano called Chicoban, where at the top the crater of the volcano is now a lake around which Mayan locals still perform ceremonies and sacrifices. While there we learned that aside from Spanish, some of the Mayans living here still speak the languages Citchkee and Mam. On this day we were unable to see much of the lake due to the thick fog that collects around the top of the volcano.



The climate in Xela is notably different than anywhere we have been thus far, because of the altitude; it is chilly at night and rains almost every afternoon for a few hours. Sometimes it comes down so quickly, and in great quantities there are flash floods. Sometimes the water flows under the doors into the homes w/out notice. All of the houses we have seen here in town are constructed of brick and concrete w/ tile or concrete floors. Another day trip we took was to a nearby natural hot spring called Fuentes Georgians.



Fernando’s Aunt Freda took us; we spent the day first visiting a small to see the idol San Sebastian. This was quite odd, when we arrived in the town where the idol was being “housed” we walked down a series of small alleyways until reaching a small room where at least 50 to 100 people were waiting in line to make offerings and pray to the mannequin representing the alleged prophet. What was odd about the whole thing was the offerings themselves, the typical items to bring to the idol are small bottles of the local distilled alcohol and cigarettes! The people actually pour the liquor on the idol and light the cigarettes and putt them in his “mouth”. It was a rather eerie scene with overtones of religion gone bad and a hint of witch craft. Needless to say we didn’t spend much time hanging around and headed to the hot springs. It was a very nice setting up in the mountains and the pools were very hot. Since arriving in Xela we have been browsing through the local classifieds looking for help wanted adds, and were able to find a couple of places looking for workers. While staying with Fernando, we went and checked in w/ a bakery that is need of a baker in the mornings. John interviewed for the job and even though the day manager speaks no English and John’s Spanish is slim to none he received a call back two day’s later that he got the job! It doesn’t start until the end of the month so we still had some time to look for temporary jobs. We spent the rest of the week at Fernando’s place, looking for places to live during the day and going out a few nights for coffee. This would be the last place we would stay together w/ our caravan companions, Aviv and Itai. They decided to head back north and towards the Honduran boarder on Friday and we all said goodbye. They are wonderful people and great traveling companions, we hope we will be able to visit them some day in Israel and that they can come and see us in the States, thanks for everything you two, safe travels, you are in our thoughts and prayers!! After staying Fernando’s house for a week we thought it would be good to move on and not over stay our welcome. We did some more couch surfing and a nice fellow named Edy invited us to come and stay w/ him on the other side of town.


During this week we were able to find a good place to park the truck for the month and pay a flat rate. It’s a gated lot, which has an attendant there 24 hours a day and we even get a key to the gate in case we need to get into the truck on a day they are closed or in the evening.


Edy is also a Spanish teacher during the day and offered to give Kindra and John private lessons. So while we stayed at his house we also did some Spanish study in evenings. During this week we were still looking for a place to share or a room to rent so we could have our own place. Our acquaintance from San Pedro, Josh got a hold of us and invited us over for dinner one night, while there he offered a room in his house that would be available if we were interested. The room is actually two rooms connected to each other with one of the walls being all windows facing out into an open air, courtyard.



We were interested and Josh said we could move in a week. We spent the rest of the week at Edy’s place studying Spanish, doing yoga and making a few trips into town for groceries and produce. We moved most of the stuff that we needed out the truck, piece by piece and are now pretty much all moved in to the house. We have 2 roommates, Josh and Claudia…well 4 actually because Josh has a dog, named hippy and Claudia has a cat named Prince. We are one big happy familia, John, Kindra, Josh, Claudia, Hippy, Prince, and Wallito!



John found a temporary position at a nearby coffee shop waiting tables and doing dishes and Kindra the same at a different Café, both just a 5 min walk away from the house. Also to supplement our income at our jobs Kindra has been working hard to sell our caramels around town. She has done a great job of making some nice containers to put the candy in so we can leave them at a few different businesses. Kindra has also been brushing up on her Thai Massage and hopes to start advertising and doing sessions out of the Café where she is serving called En Finito. En Finito is a sweet little café restaurant that is run by two Dj’s. John is working in the evening at a little coffee shop/bar called El Cuartito. They have live music most nights of the week and the crowd is quite eclectic with a mix of locals and visiting tourist/out of town visitors. We are both getting along well and really like it here in Xela. We will post again soon with more pictures of our work places and the surrounding areas here in Xela. Love you all and miss ya,
Peace,
Kindra and John

Loving Xela!

Introduction to Quazaltanango

 (or Xelaju as the local Mayans call it)

June 15^th-21^st

 

Day 86-90, Mon.-Fri.: Xela, Fernando’s house

We left from San Pedro early in the morning to try and avoid the many vendors that set up stands near or in the street. I guess we didn’t leave early enough. Some of the turns were so tight and sharp that the locals were having to momentarily move their produce baskets off of the road. I am sure they are use to it with the big buses the come in and out of these tiny streets… the only difference is is that the bus drivers know the good detours to get through town! The Colonel chugged along up the steep and winding road out of the volcanic valley. We turned on our walkie talkies and had Avivguide us on the corners. They were such sharp and narrow turns that if another vehicle was coming the other direction we’d be toast. Of course we could just take very wide turns, but we found out on our way down the hill the day before that the truck is so big that we would have to reverse every time we did that. So, about every 100 ft or so Aviv would say ‘car’ or ‘clear’ over the walkie talkies. A few times they sounded alike because of the static and we would just go back and forth: “c*&r”… “what was that, clear?”… “yep clear, over!”… “thanks got it, over”. Kindra’s grandpa would be proud! After a few breaks up the hill (because we kept overheating) we finally made it over the top and got on the highway toward Quezaltanango. It was only a few hours away so we got there pretty quick. For some reason I thought Xela was a small town, which made me very confused when I navigated us to a city. It is by no means near the size of Guatemala City or even what most of us would consider a city, but I was shocked to see so many stores, cars and smog. I even asked someone where Xela was because I thought we got lost and they looked at me kind of funny because we were in Xela. He pointed me to the center of town thinking that is what I meant. We stopped at an Esso gas station and Itah and Aviv called their couch surfing contact, Fernando. We figured he would know a good place for us to camp around town. We followed him to his place in Zone 3 (yeah it is big enough that it has zones!) and he invited us all in. He introduced us to his mother and aunt Frida (who was visiting from Canada) and they fed us some warm soup and tortillas. Not only did he feed us, but he invited John and I to stay at their house on top of Itah and Aviv. Wow how nice of them! Fernando’s grandparents lived in the attached house and they had 3 spare bedrooms that we were welcome too. Later we discovered Fernando’s girlfriend was staying a few nights there as well, in the grandparent’s house that is! Most of the youth here typically live at home until they get married. We still had some daylight left so Fernando took us on a small tour of Xela.We went to a look point and were able to see the whole city… my goodness I figured I would never be able to navigate through town, especially because most streets are only one way. Afterwards we went to the local outdoor produce market and got some fresh fruits and veggies. Aviv and Itah cooked some delicious food for the whole family and guests too (about 11 of us altogether); what a delight! We found a safe place to park the truck for a few nights and went back to the house with full bellies and peace of mind.

The next day (Tuesday) Fernando had some time to take us on a hike to a lake formed in the creator of a volcano. It is a very sacred place to the Mayans where they have ceremonies and do sacrifices (chickens and the such). There was a lot of fog and we could barely see the lake… it had a sort of “Blare Witch” ambiance to it, but without the eeriness. On the shore of the lake through the fog you could make out dried flowers protruding out of the water and overturned candles that were left by the Mayans from their last ceremony. It was a muddy hike on the way up and no less on the way down. Wallace had a great time being let free and running around… until he discovered that sheep like to head butt you if you get too close. It was our turn to make dinner so we whipped up some sopa de fideo and bought some fresh bread. Dinner in Guatemala here is not very big (their lunch is the biggest meal) so we didn’t need to fix very much food. Fernando’s grandparents are so old and cute, the grandpa kept showing us all of his little tools and trinkets that people have given him over the years. And oh how they adored Wallace!

On Wednesday Fernando had some schoolwork to do so his aunt Frida took us out for the day. First we went to the town… where they worship the ……. Kindrea had reas about him in one of her books, but had no idea that this is who we where going to see, why you might ask… well every year he is moved to a different house in the town so unless you know where he is or you ask someone you may never find him. Well, Frida did all of the asking and we found the house that he was at. Since it was father’s day in Guatemala there where many locals visiting him and paying honor to him. We squeezed through the narrow pathway to the house and knew where it was because of all of the people outside the door and the live band playing in the house next door. We drew a lot of attention with Wallace there in addition to us being gringos. We stood on our tippy toes to get a peak of him (John was taller than everyone there so he didn’t have too). We decided that he reminded us of Michael Jackson and it was a bit creepy. Frida said that the town’s women are also known for their witchcraft. We then went to the hot springs, which were wonderful. It reminded us a bit of being back in Colorado where the take a natural environment and build pools, stairs and sitting areas out of stone and wood. A bit manicured, but still enjoyable. It was very hot so we couldn’t stay in for very long. There were some locals who where in too long and one of them fainted. We were very hungry on the way backed and stopped in for some Chinese food… huge plates of food for very cheap! Today it was Father’s Day here in Guatemala and we ate cake and drank tea and coffee to celebrate.

Thur: We have been making a pros and cons list of where we intend to stay for a length of time… basically it has been a toss up between Panajachel and Xela. Since we have only been doing fun stuff since we have been in Xela we decided to walk around town and do some exploring. We wanted to find a bakery called Bab’s House because Kindra had found an ad online mentioning something about a job. We found the place and aquired within. The guy working there currently, Matt, said that he will be leaving in August and that his position should be opening up. We got a hold of Anne Marie, the owner, and we set up a time to meet for the next day. There was also a room opening up behind the bakery that we thought of possibly renting out. Hmmm all the posibilites and so close to eachother! We decided to go to the big outdoor market to get some veggies for dinner. We decided that even though Xela looks so big, it is actually very easy to walk everywhere. John made some delicious pasta for dinner and we ended our night feeling pretty good about wanting to stay in Xela.

Friday: Today our travel buddies, Itah and Aviv, packed up their things and kept on trekking. We said our goodbyes… to The Itahs! We couldn’t stay long because we had to meet with Anne Marie at the bakery to talk about the position. She basically told John that the position was his if Chaioto, the Guatemalan supervisor, agreed as well. So we set up a time to meet with her too. The only thing we thought might be a problem is that she speaks no English and John is still learning Spanish. We shall see! We met with another couch surfer, Edy, in the central park and planned on staying at his place the next night.

Sat. & Sund, Day 91 &92                                                                                                                           So, on just about every street corner there are these flat metal rods that are formed around the corner of the sidewalk. I guess cars hit the corners and the sidewalk crumbles, so they put them there to either deter people from getting to close or so the sidewalk stays in one piece. Either way John happened to make direct contact with one of the little buggers and got a flat; this time it wasn’t reparable. We put the spare on (okay, John did) and we said our goodbyes and gratitude to Fernando’s family. Before going over to Edys we stopped by the big Hiper Paiz (owned by Walmart) to try and get a few items that we haven’t been able to find, such as: peanut butter, Maya-ik (hot sauce), cheese (not from the outdoor market!), etc… It was getting late by the time we arrived at Edy’s and we weren’t sure where we would be parking the truck because as we have heard it just isn’t smart parking on the street. Later that night after we ate dinner at our friend Josh’s place we found a parking lot behind the bar called Kings and Queens. They typically don’t have people park there over night, but she was very accommodating. She even gave us the key to the lock because she wanted to sleep in and said for us just to hide the key the next morning. We stayed out pretty late… listening to live music and dancing!

Sunday: Spanish, Spanish, Spanish! Our day was pretty much studying and relaxing at Edy’s. Funny thing, we invited Fernando over to Edy’s place and Fernando recognized it because it used to be his mother’s cousin’s place. Well, not used to be… it still was, but now his nephew lives there. So Fernando and Edy are cousins and they had never even met each other! Crazy!

ciao ciao

 

 

 

 

 

 

Week Twelve, Guatemalan Mountains

Week 12

Guatemala’s Highlands

June 8^th- 14^th, 2009

Day 79-81, Mon-Wed: Antigua, Guatemala

In the morning we (the caravan) headed out early on our way to Antigua. The drive was a long one and we would have to pass through Guatemala City. We weren’t able to find GPS city maps for Guatemala, so before getting too far down the road we all stopped at an internet café to research some alternate routes around the city. We found a few maps and some cryptic directions that Kindra had to actually reverse because we were coming from the opposite direction that they were written in. The Colonel led the way with John at the wheel and Kindra navigating for him (this is the standard travel procedure up to this point). Things were going great as we headed up through the mountains on a nice paved road until we came upon a long line of stand still traffic. There was a “demonstration” going on up ahead at a crucial junction in the highway and the thousand or so protesters had completely blocked traffic. This is quite common here in Central American and Mexico, but we had never experienced it before. The wait lasted about 3 hours or so until some law enforcement with their riot gear showed up to separate and clear the way for traffic. These are the things that you just cannot plan for on trips like this one. Our next setback came about 45 min. later when we again came upon a long line of hardly moving traffic. A hillside had collapsed up ahead and the traffic was being poorly directed through the one lane of passage on the dirt covered road. Finally we made it to Guatemala City and braced ourselves for the unknown! Thankfully Kindra took the directions she had found online and magically reversed them, taking us through the city with grace and ease!!!! The trip actually went amazingly smooth (aside from the traffic/demonstration hold ups) and the whole group made it through Guatemala city and into Antigua with just enough daylight to find a hostel and safe places to park the vehicles for the night. The name of the hostel we stayed at was called the Ummagumma, and the guarded parking “fortress” was right around the corner. The hostel was very nice… especially for letting us have Wallace. We would recommend it to anyone traveling to or through Antigua. They have private rooms, bathrooms in some w/showers, a communal kitchen, laundry, TV, and free Wifi…NICE. Aviv and Itai cooked dinner in their room that night for us and we all enjoyed our own beds after a long semi stressful day of travel.

Antigua is a charming old city w/ cobble stone roads and old historic church ruins around every corner. John woke up early to get the truck out of the parking lot before 8 (they charge by the hour after that). Then he and Wallace walked down to the market store for some coffee and to buy breakfast items. So up to this point internet had been really scarce and to have a good, free, wireless connecition was a bit of a treat. We spent the day doing stuff online, in the upper open air rooftop area of the hostel. Later in the afternoon we went to the town center and to the market. While doing some produce shoping we had lunch at a little comedor (eatery) in the back of the market. Most open air markets have these little places to eat where you can get a simple traditional meal for less than or the same as what you would pay to cook for yourself. Itai and John had pollo con cebollas y aroz (chicken with onion and rice) and the girls had a vegetarian dish. It was very simple and super delicious. While checking out the town and meeting up with our couch surfing connection Mauricio in the courtyard, John spotted a young Guatemalan boy heading his way with flyers. He looked a lot like the little tour guide from Lanquin and Samuc. John thought, ‘geez all these little Guatemalans sure look the alike’… he looked just like Crisanto! Remember we are now 4 hours away from where we first met this little guy (only 11 years old) and never expected to see him again, but it was him and we had a happy little reunion, Kindra even exchanged our cell # with him!! ! We met Mauricio and after chatting awhile, we decided to follow him back to his place to stay for the night. His place was about 15 minutes outside of the city in a very nice gated community where he had a room and bed for us to stay. He was kind to cook dinner for us (his roommate and roommate’s girlfriend were there as well) and we all relaxed and chated before they all went into the city for the evening, leaving the house to us.

On Wednesday we decided to book a tour up to the local active volcano (Pacaya) that left in the afternoon out of Antigua. We all packed a snack and had lunch before leaving. The tour bus left in the afternoon and was an hour and half bus ride up to the site where we had to hike another hour and a half before reaching the lava flow. We had heard from other people that it was hot enough to actually roast marshmallows at the top. We had no idea what we were in for though. After the bus ride up the mountain we were greeted by 30 or so young local children offering walking sticks for the hike up the volcano. They approached and ran along side the van yelling… “Stick for you, stick for you!?” Amusing and a little sad at the same time; we didn’t buy a stick. Our tour guide (not Crisanto) led us up the misty side of the volcano through the dense forest. We passed by locals gathering and carrying wood down the mountain for their heating and cooking stoves. Some young boys offered “taxi” services on their horses for those unable to make the climb. Our whole crew was more than able and made the hike with no problems. Nearly there we could see smoke and steam coming out of the top of the crater! The site we were going to was just below this and when we arrive we were amazed to see a thick 2 to 3 meter wide flow of molten lava streaming out of and down the hillside. We took out our marshmallows and with our 6 foot long roasting sticks proceeded to feast on our sugary puffs of earth roasted goodness… yum! A few silly English types brought a pan and some eggs with the hopes of frying them up. Unfortunately, they broke most of them on the way up the mountain and realized they had forgotten a spatula and their pan had no handle… silly English kaaaniggets!!! The hike down was much quicker and when we reached the bottom all the little children who were originally selling the stick were now screaming… “Stick for me, stick for me?!!” they wanted their sticks back to sell to the next group of tourists. Some of the little buggers actually tore the sticks right out of the hiker’s hands!!!

Getting back into Antigua we had planed to stay at Mauricio’s that evening, but were unable to make plans with him and had to stay in the Antigua. The parking lot just around the corner from the hostel said we could camp for one night for the cost of parking 50q (around 4 dollars US). So we lucked out with a safe place to camp and park…nice.

Day 82-84, Thur-Sat: Panajachel, Guatemala

Thursday The Itais (Itah and Aviv) and the Stinkarellas (Kindra and John’s nick name from Itai) met early in front of the Ummagumma hostel. Before leaving John did a little shopping at the near by Super store. We were on our way to Lake Atlilan… destination: Panajachel. Some have said that Lake Atitlan is the most beautiful place in the world. Of course any definite like that is left solely to an individual’s perspective and personal experience…although it is pretty darn magnificent! The lake is amazing and said to be the crater of an ancient volcano. It’s surrounded by three other volcanoes and several other small cities whose lights can be seen across the lake at night. Coming into town we had to descend a mountain and to get into the crater of the lake. The road into Panajachel was lined with waterfalls and beautiful views of the town and lake. Arriving in a small unfamiliar town is always a chore, especially in the truck. The streets here in Guatemala are very small and there a lot of one ways. Kindra had made some connections with couch surfers in Panajachel, while in Antigua, and being the studious little one that she is, got us hooked up with a super cool guy named Chocolate Bob. We split with the caravan after getting into town because The Itais had a couch surfing place of their own, but we stayed in touch via cell phone, (that’s right we caved and purchased a sim-card for our international phone) texting, and walki talkies. After talking to and getting directions from Bob on the phone we headed up to his house on a hillside just outside of town which overlooked the lake. His house keeper/assistant was waiting for us at the end of the driveway to guide us in to his gated parking area. Obispo (the assistants name) then led us down a steep cobblestone path to “La casa de Bob”. As we walked though the entryway we were convinced that we had just been invited to stay on one of the sweetest spots on Lake Atitlan. Bobs house has the most wonderful view of the lake and has a charm all to itself. Bob is an artist who has been living in Guatemala on and off for the last 25 years or so, making his way as an entrepreneur. He at one point had his own chocolate making business as well as glass bead making operation. He currently is getting ready to get back into the chocolate making scene. After a nice chat and “get to know” John, Kindra and Wallace got settled in and unpacked a few things from the camper. That night John, Kindra and Bob all had a curry dinner together.

Friday: After taking more than a week off from daily yoga, John and Itai decided to get together early for some practice. Itai picked John up at Bob’s house and they went down to the bank of the lake for a 2 hour session. Afterwards the whole group drove up the road to check out the Sololá market, which had a reputation for being quite impressive. It was really something, maybe not the most enjoyable but wow, what a place. From the outside it looked very similar to many other markets we had been to, but upon entering the mass of fruit stand and vendors we could barley navigate through all the barely 5ft tall Mayans. It became a chore and task just to manage our way through the people pushing and shoving each other to keep the flow of traffic moving. Having little Wallace with us did not help either and at one point John had to put Wallace up on his shoulder to keep him from getting trampled on. You think we get funny looks when Wallace is on the ground on a leash… you should see the looks we get when he’s up on our shoulders!!! Supposedly this was a market known for pick pocketing, a local Mayan even warned us as we passed her fruit stand. We made it out of the massive crowd of people though. We bought some fruit and sat in the shade to eat it; fresh mangos, bananas, strawberries, pineapple and papaya. Everywhere we go people are amazed and thoroughly amused by Wallace. Most people down here have never seen a dog like him, especially the children. They seem to gravitate and crowd around the little guy. Wallace is a good sport though and will do his little trick routine, as long as we have some treats for him. After the market we headed back towards Panajachel for another comidora style lunch. Again it was very simple, delicious, and cheap… the best combo for a budget-eer’s meal. When we got back to el casa de Bob, we headed out to do a little tour of the town and Bob’s shop and kitchen. Bob introduced us to his little workshop and shared with us his experience in glass bead and jewelry making over the last decade living in Guatemala. He then took us to a local coffee shop where we had a nice cup of afternoon java and picked up some delicious looking sweets for dessert. Sushi was on the menu for dinner, veggie for Kindra and for Bob and John some smoked salmon and cooked halibut. It was yummy! We savored our first sushi of the trip and cleaned our plates. We relaxed out on the porch after dinner and chatted about traveling though Mexico, Belize, Guatemala and future plans.

On Saturday morning John tried to write as much of the previous week’s blog while Kindra packed the truck and camper, with anticipation of perhaps heading towards San Pedro that afternoon. John then helped Bob do some much needed re arranging and shelf building in his kitchen. Then the three went into town to make a batch of caramels, but when we arrived at Bob’s kitchen we were missing some utensils for cooking the caramels correctly, so we all headed back up to the house and made the sweets at Bob’s house in the newly “renovated” kitchen. We hung around Bob’s place that evening and had leftovers for dinner and transferred about 100 or so DVD’s and a bunch of music from Bob’s massive collection. We decided to stay another night in Panajachel with Bob and head towards San Pedro the next morning.

Day 85, Sun: San Pedro, Guatemala

We decided to meet up at Bob’s place around 10am to leave for San Pedro, but not before Bob made some of the best coffee with a machineta (the small percolator looking devices that goes right on the stove; John now wants and is currently looking to purchase one). The drive down into San Pedro was again like Panajachel: breathtaking! We could see the entire town from the steep descent and went miles down into the crater of the lake. After some tight maneuvers around the thin city streets we found the one of the docks in the town where ferries from across the lake bring people on day trips and workers into town. After walking into the town center on a little trail that runs behind town, we returned to the truck and inquired as to whether or not it was safe to sleep in the truck, parked by the dock. The tienda owner across the street said it was safe and we were reassured by a couple of travelers in a 70’s VW van that had camped there the previous evenings. John went for a walk up into town to search for tortillas. With no tortillarias in sight he decided to ask a girl and her grandmother where he could find one. The girl explained she sold tortillas and promptly asked how many he wanted then ran up the hill and returned with a bag of fresh tortillas (how do they do that?) We didn’t have much of a plan for San Pedro and we’re a little disappointed in the town over all. We were sad to see a major distinction between the ‘tourist’ center and the real town where the locals lived. Also, the amount of incapacitated and completely drunken men on and in the gutters was a bit disturbing. Alcohol apparently is a new substance to the natives and there ability to metabolize and process the toxin is slim to none… so a very small amount can turn a totally sober man/woman into blistering fall down drunk (especially with the moonshine that they make here. Anyway it was an experience and not all our stops will be pleasant ones. We were however able to meet a fellow living in Xela, our next destination, who offered to let us stay at his place if we needed to. Kindra and John made dinner in the camper this night while the local kids played football and chased each other after dark. It’s comforting to see and hear the children playing and laughing at night.

Our second week in Guatemala comes to an end. The time seems to be going faster than we can write our blogs. We hope to decide on a place to stay for awhile, now that we have reached Xela. Love you all, Peace

John, Kindra n nuestros pobrecito, wallito