Today was a strange day. I got up at my standard 6am… because that’s what I do now… and had a nice calm morning working on blogs (yep… a fair number are on their way) and stuff on my computer. Around 9:30, I walked to the Mall stopping to talk to my orange juice lady friend and a few random street vendors and kids. Then, I met Madian, my eldest former host sister, and we went to the Cine to watch Kung Fu Panda 2 for her birthday. It’s a funny movie, at least in Spanish, I recommend it!
Sitting in the movies, I was just shocked. It cost 25Q per person to go (that’s just over $3) but it was just like the ones in the States. Minus the Spanish and snack break in the middle (refracion is very important here), I could have easily been in the WW or GH movie theaters.
After the movie, we stepped out into the Mall. Yes, a Mall. I’ve been there before and am always weirded out, but the weird factor was increased when coming directly from a movie theater. We went upstairs to the food court and ate some Burger King. Wow. While eating our fries and ice cream, we had a conversation so incredibly similar to countless conversations I’ve had with preteens about the struggles of growing older and wanting to know things and frustrations with families and not understanding the world around us. The only difference was, once again, the conversation was in Spanish.
Then, we met the rest of their family and they went on their way. I headed to Quick Foto to print out a picture (another very USish thing to do) and then to WalMart. Yes, WalMart. Weird? Yes. I bought a portable hard drive because I’ve officially become paranoid of losing all my pictures and files and then walked around the store completely weirded out. “Am in College Place? Minnesota? Another place with WalMart?” The only thing Guatemalan that I could see was that the meat was sitting out on a table not packaged nor refrigerated. That’s it. I ended up leaving with a premade coffee drink, Hanson’s Soda, and Chex Mix… and a lot of confusion about where I am and how I’m not going to be here in 5 weeks and how weird that will be.
As I walked home drinking my Hanson’s, eating my Chex Mix, and ignoring the cat calls from sketchy men while stepping over the unusually large amount of men passed out on the sidewalks (all before 2pm), I was awed by how small our world is, how similar we all are, and the power of globalization.
We are so linked: we all go through the struggles of adolescence, drink the same cane sugar soda, share the same chips, and all need portable hard drives. Even more so, we are linked politically. The past few weeks, I’ve had a lot of conversations about drugs. They are an ever growing crisis here; the gangs are getting more and more dangerous (especially in Guatemala City and the areas near Mexico… still safe and healthy, moms and dads of my life!) and it’s a huge topic of conversation with our upcoming elections. The drugs are trying to make it to the US (and doing a mighty good job) but they’re destroying many of the people and much of the economy of Central America in the process. So then, people are trying to immigrate or migrate or simply relocate so they can find food to feed themselves and their family. This affects the US and their drug problem, the immigration issues that surround politics there, the political system here, the families here, and each and every one of my students. I’ve had conversations this week with people at school and people in my host family about tales of parents who left for the States so they could have money, kids who left for the States because either their parents sent them there or they fell off the face of the planet into drugland and the remaining family needed money, kids who have disappeared into gangs, and kids who have become orphans because their parents were assassinated… They all make me want to cry.
Today was a strange mix where I saw a glimpse of the life of commercialism and commodities I will be returning to yet how it is so linked to the rest of the world. I hope that my 30 minutes in WalMart is something that I remember in 2 months and even 2 years when I walk into a stateside WalMart and I let it remind me how this world is bigger than what I am just seeing there.
I don’t know how to help the world, especially my students. My heart yearns to stay here and to be with them and love on them and adopt them, but for political, economical, racial, and health reasons, that’s not very practical for now. So, I guess I’ll just have to spend the next 5 weeks pouring my heart and soul into these kids, making them know they’re loved, and then pray that I never forget to pray for them and look for opportunities to help things that are bigger than myself.
We are linked; I can never forget that.
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