Vacation in Guatemala

I'm on vacation in Guatemala and have two extra travelers with me. To prepare for my trip, the After-School Academy and the Library/Bookstore began studying about Guatemala and then read Flat Stanley. If you have kids, are a teacher, or just like to read books for yourself, you've either read Flat Stanley or may want to to get your kids interested and connected with people all over the world.

For those of you who haven't and don't have a desire to (spoiler alert!!), Flat Stanley became flat because a bulletin board fell on him one night and completely flattened him. He and his parents found there were advantages to being flat...like being able to save money on a plane ticket because they could put him in an envelope and send him to his cousin's house instead.

So, we have done the same. We have created two flat people--Flat LaMarcus and Flat Tytiana, who are traveling with me this entire trip. It was fun to watch the excitement, laughter, and questions as the kids wanted to read more Flat Stanley and learn more about Guatemala. To keep the excitement going, I am blogging, video blogging, and taking pictures of things the kids have asked about, things I figure the kids might want/need to know about travel, and documenting the things LaMarcus and Tytiana see while here. Since I probably won't do much from my own blog, you can keep up with me through the ASA blog at: www.ourasafamily.blogspot.com.

I am here visiting a college friend so we were able to make it home early enough tonight to Skype with the kids in the After-School Academy. Though Skyping in itself was priceless, I was absolutely amazed at the way the ASA kids greeted Laura, Esteban, and Natalia (my friends' kids here in Guatemala)...and was even more impressed that they were really working hard on the Spanish they never knew before today. "Hola! Me amo es Trinity... Me amo is Kwane... Me amo is Niesha." After getting the tour of my friends house (you've really gotta love technology like Skype!!), Niesha took over and gave the tour of the ASA using as much Spanish as she could gather from Miss Tameshia. To Natalia's question, "What do you guys do?" Niesha answered, "Colore (color), tareja (homework), jugare (games), etc." I was so impressed!

I hope you'll keep up through the ASA blog, it's really cute seeing the videos the kids (and others) have helped me make...and it's fun watching the places LaMarcus and Tytiana are getting to experience. Through technology, we get to close the literal and figurative distance between the cultures. Thanks, technology!