Lago Atitlan

Steph and I did go to Lake Atitlan this weekend, which was beautiful! We left Saturday morning on a chicken bus that was supposed to be direct. Our hotel was in Santiago, but the other, more touristy town is called Panajachel and is across the lake. After about 2 hours on the chicken bus, the driver told us that it was our stop and we would need to take another bus to Santiago. So, we got off in what looked like the middle of nowhere, and there was a 15 passenger van across the road. The guy told us that it was headed to Santiago, so we got on and waited for it to fill up with other people (mostly indiginous). It dropped everyone off in a small village, so we were looking around for another bus to take to Santiago. One friendly street vendor told us we would need to either take a bus or a pick-up to another town, where we would find the bus that would actually take us to Santiago. We jumped in the back of a pick-up (which are used a lot for public transportation) with about 7 other people and took a 40 minute ride through the moutains. It was SO much fun, definitely my favorite part of the transportation. We saw our first view of the lake from the truck, which was gorgeous. One guy in the truck said that he was going to Santiago and would help us find the final bus. The bus was exxxtremely full, but we finally made it, and safely! We got off in Santiago and took a tuctuc (little red things that are used like taxis) to our hotel.
We wanted to call the other students, but realized that we didn´t have their phone number like we thought. After we checked into our hotel, we literally walked a block and ran into them. We hung out with them most of the afternoon and heard about their first week of service. The people who live in that area are mostly indiginous. The woman all wear traditional dress, and most of them speak indiginous languages. The other students said their host families are all indiginous, and some of the family members are not fluent in Spanish, but the others can translate into Spanish. Two of the students are working in a clinic (and have seen some deliveries!), two are doing health teaching in schools, and two are teaching English at a special ed school.
The rest of the day Steph and I shopped in the markets. The next day, Sunday, we took a boat across the lake to Panajachel. There is a main street lined with vendors there. In the afternoon we found a direct bus back to the City, which was a little less eventful :)
I can´t believe we have less than 2 weeks left! It took a couple weeks to get adjusted, but these last few weeks have been flying by. I have been loving every new experience and getting to understand the culture a little bit. The more I think about going home, the more excited I am, but I am still definitely enjoying it.
I just tried to upload pictures of the weekend, but it´s not letting me for some reason. I´ll try to do that tomorrow.