Earthquakes, Kites, and Bodypaint

Oops.  I meant to be really good about blogging more often, but I've been a little short on internet café funds/time, and there was an earthquake, and I saw something shiny...

Anyways... I ate fiambre on November 1st, the Day of the Dead/Dia de los Muertos/Dia de los Difuntos/Día de Todos los Santos/All Saints' Day.  So that was cool.  But the big awesome party I didn't go to was in Sumpango and Santiago, Sacatepéquez, where they have a yearly giant kite festival.  Apparently, the kite-makers begin construction in July, and pretty much don't sleep much until November 1.  They all have other jobs, and use all their free time (and sleeping time) to make beautiful images out of tiny pieces of tissue paper.  It's intense.  And super impressive.  You can read more about it here.

Eek!  I'm running out of internet time!  I only have 2.50Q on me!

We had a pretty big earthquake the other day.  Apparently it was a 7.4 off the coast of Reu.  It was really bad in some places closer to the coast.  A few people died.  Here in Xela, everything was fine though.  Maybe I'm dumb and I don't realize how close to death I was or something, but I feel like a lot of people freaked out unnecessarily.  Hmm...

And in case you didn't believe me about feeling awesome about my bod now:

Who's that hottie?  Oh yeah.  It's me.  My rugby team's doing another calendar this year, and they want a "Once a Rhino, Always a Rhino" page of alumni.  Since there happens to be another Rhino alum in Xela, and since I happen to be friends with some really talented artists...

:-)

OK... I'm gunna go find out about getting some English-teaching hours.  Later gators!