Well, it’s been a week of hard work. I spent over 8 hours on Saturday catching up on summary indexes for interviews – I’ve been doing about 2 interviews per day. I also briefly interviewed 3 classrooms of kids to ask them who helps them with their homework. The plan is to get the scores for the last exams and compare their grades (academic performance) with whether they get help on their homework. I’d also like the compare the exam scores with whether or not their parents came to the last parent-teacher conference a couple weeks ago. I got to sit in on 2 of those sessions (with my translator, luckily… they were entirely in K’iche’, so I only caught a little bit of what they were saying). One teacher has given me exam scores so far, and there is a drastic difference (about 15%) in exam scores between kids whose parents come to parent-teacher meetings and those whose parents don’t. The difference between kids who don’t get any help at all on their homework versus those whose parents (rather than friends, neighbors, siblings, etc.) help them is about 30%. We’ll see if the gap is that big in other classes – I don’t know how typical this class is. The great thing about ethnography is that I also get to interview parents on both sides and find out what factors contribute to their children’s success (or lack thereof…).

Last week for the conference some professors came from the US to give us feedback on our projects. One of them was in charge of the program at BYU up until this year (he handed the reigns over to the University of Texas), and he’s been in Guatemala off and on for over 30 years. He took us to see a friend of his who is a Maya priest. The priest gave us a blessing on Sunday afternoon. The ceremony lasted about 2 ½ hours. I wish I spoke K’iche’ so I could know what he was saying – he chanted almost the whole time while we sat on chairs and watched. He set up some candles representing spirits of saints, spirits of the earth and the mountains, and spirits of ancestors and also made a fire of sacred incense that he fed with more incense and sugar for the length of the ceremony. It was beautiful. Again, I wish I understood more of what went on, especially what some of the elements present symbolized (like the bottle of Pepsi and the bag of rye he asked us to bring...). The blessing was for health for the rest of our time here and for a safe trip home. By the end of the ceremony our nostrils were black from breathing heavy incense smoke indoors. I could beat the pants off any girl at girls’ camp in a black booger contest...

Well, by the time I get a chance to post again I’ll have less than a week before arriving at home. I ain’t gonna lie – I’m ready to come home. There are a lot of things I think I’ll miss about Guatemala. But I’m really excited to see family and friends again (and to bathe more than twice a week). Beloveds, I’ll see you soon (unless you aren’t in Utah, in which case… I’ll… um… post from the States soon…).

con cariño (affectionately),
AlPop