Thought your commute was bad? It might pale in comparison to the typical commute in Guatemala’s capital.
“The transportation systems and traffic in Guatemala City are terrible, and any Guatemalan will tell you that,” said student Eli Ours, recounting his experiences from a spring intercultural trip to the Central American country. “It’s crowded, it’s hot, you’re often standing with an armpit in your face, you’re inhaling black diesel fumes, and it can take an hour to go five miles. While living with host families for eight weeks, myself along with the others experienced this on a daily basis while commuting to Spanish classes.”
“Over half of the group had an hour-and-a-half bus ride each way, which meant a total of at least three hours of bus time every day,” he said. “But again, remember, this is the reality for many Guatemalans.”
As the members of his intercultural group grew more comfortable with their commutes, they began competing to see who could get to school or home the quickest.
“This led to things like sprinting to catch a bus, getting on the wrong bus, or getting off the bus to walk the last mile home,” Ours said.
Ours, along with 16 other EMU students, shared stories from their semester-long intercultural trip to Guatemala and Cuba during Convocation on Wednesday morning. They returned to the U.S. and to campus this week with a deeper understanding of trauma awareness and resilience and a spirited desire to share about the lives of those they encountered on their trip.
The students lived with host families in Guatemala City for eight weeks. Each morning, said student Kate Krabill, they attended four hours of Spanish classes with an afternoon activity that helped them understand the rich history and culture of Guatemala.
“In class, we read books, cooked traditional Guatemalan foods, sang Spanish songs and played games of memory,” Krabill said.
The group also spent five weeks traveling to other parts of the country. They spent the last two weeks of the semester in Cuba, splitting time between Havana and three other towns: Cienaga de Zapata, Santa Clara and Varadero. They were led by group leaders Elaine Zook Barge and Nathan Barge.
Miranda Beidler, who said a highlight of her trip was the time spent with host families, shared a poem she wrote for them:
“…I found a home in rice and beans and tortillas, dogs barking around the clock, chickens waking me up, bucket showers, talks on the patio, laughing at the dinner table, and the sounds of La Brigada. … Thank you for expanding my world, for patiently listening to my Spanish, for teaching me your culture, for your open hearts, and most of all, for showing me to love and to be loved in ways that I never could have imagined.”
Throughout the semester, students learned about the role and history of religion in the two countries. From witnessing a Mayan ceremony in a cave to experiencing the bustling streets of Antigua Guatemala during Holy Week, as Allysen Welty Peachey shared, they learned about how deeply rooted religion is in society.
Students in the group spoke about Guatemala’s incredible natural beauty — they climbed a volcano, explored the ancient Mayan city of Tikal and visited a lush cloud forest — as well as its destruction and exploitation. They talked about the access to education and health care in the two countries and the difficulty in obtaining medication in Cuba due to the U.S. embargo against it. And, students reflected on the impact of the tourism industry and migration on Guatemala and Cuba.
Watch a recording of the Intercultural Convocation here.
Joshua Stucky spoke about the United States’ involvement in both countries. In 1954, the CIA successfully carried out a plot in Guatemala to overthrow the democratically elected President Jacobo Árbenz, who passed policy that favored the people instead of the United Fruit Company, Stucky said.
“What followed was a genocide of the Mayan people across Guatemala, made possible only by U.S.-supplied arms and intelligence,” he said.
In Cuba, for more than 60 years, the U.S. government has continued to “enforce a repressive blockade that makes life there exceptionally difficult,” he added.
“If I were a Guatemalan or a Cuban, I would hate us,” Stucky said. “I would hate every American citizen for their complacency and the oppression of my people, for allowing their money to be used to buy the bullet that killed my son, for their comfortable lives of ignorant bliss, and for the power that we Americans have to better the lives of others that we do not use. And yet, at the end of every talk, every organization visit, every Coke I buy from the tienda on the corner, they thank us for being there, and ask us not to forget them. Not forgetting is the least we can do.”
Students on the trip included: Mana Acosta, Sophia Armato, Leah Beachy, Miranda Beidler, Ella Brubaker, Lane Burkholder, Kate Krabill, Naomi Kratzer, Nathan Lehman, Maria Longenecker, Arelys Martinez Fabian, Hollyn Miller, Eli Ours, Marianne Short, Marie Spaulding, Joshua Stucky and Allysen Welty Peachey.
Read journal entries written by the students during their trip on the EMU intercultural blog.
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