lessons learned, namely HUMILITY

when i went to guatemala one of my primary objectives was to come back humble. i was amazed at how humble i came back (that sounds pretty boastful, no?). but truly, the sights that you see in a third-world country leave you overwhelmingly grateful and humble for the abudance of blessings you have.

below are some of the sights i saw around town that helped in creating this sense of gratitude within me.

this is a view of some local mayan women walking in the town we stayed in (patcizia). look at those balancing skills! our director told us that once she tried to lift one of those pans and they weighed around 60-70 pounds.


a typical home in pahute, a small village that's up in the mountains near patzicia. you can see that it's mud put in between sticks for the body of the house. notice to the left the concrete structure. that's called a pilla. the middle section has water and this is where you wash your dishes/clothes/etc.



as we were walking back we saw this little boy. he can't go to school as he works all day in the field helping his family. we asked where he was going and he was going to harvest.



so many of these children can't afford to go to school and so they are out in the streets playing most of the day. we walked down and came across these girls. notice their traditional mayan outfits that are beautiful. not pictured is their friend who was around eight or nine and she was carrying her little one-year-old brother on her back wrapped up in a tied blanket. it's no wonder these people aren't taller. they kill their backs at young ages and don't allow their kids to walk around and grow by keeping them in these blankets on their backs.


the bathroom at the first place i stayed. you'll notice a trash can next to the toilet. you don't flush toilet paper in most places in guatemala (unless it's a really nice place like a hotel).