Some Things I Learned in Guatemala

My roommate Cristi and I found roundtrip last minute tickets to Guatemala for $357. So we bought them and a week later we were on a plane bound for one of the most homicidal countries in the western hemisphere. We packed a backpack a piece and were ready for adventure.

Here are some things I learned....

Lava is hot

Guatemala is covered with volcanoes.
There is one that is still active right outside Guatemala City. We climbed it on Tuesday and learned that Guatemala is not at all interested in ensuring your safety. You are kind of responsible for that yourself. And as it turns out, most people who travel to Guatemala these days with the crime rates being what they are, are not really “safety” type people. We payed for some maniac to drive us on a huge bus up a rather questionable mountain hill and then hike straight up a volcano to roast hot dogs over flowing lava.
Lava rocks are sharp when they are cool and lava when they are hot, so neither option is really welcoming you to take a spill. As you walk on the rocks you look down and can see hot lava under the cooler lava on top and you can feel the heat pulsing through the cracks in the rocks. If you stay still for very long it feels like your legs are going to melt off along with the rubber on your tennis shoes, but it is MOLTEN LAVA, so how can you possibly NOT hike it.

Guatemalan buses are scarier than skydiving

After going to six flags last month I thought skydiving had ruined my ability to feel scared by risky situations. The crazy Guatemalan bus drivers took that challenge and managed to scare the pants off of me (that is just a figure of speech, rest assured I stayed fully clothed). The buses were all school buses from the united states that look like they got in a fight with the guys from MTV’s Pimp My Ride and lost. Comforting to know that the buses that had been rejected by the strapped for cash public school system for being unfit to drive over well paved flat roads were now being used to scale steep unpaved mountains slopes. There are a few types of buses in Guatemala. The shuttles are run by tourist agencies and cost like $20 - $30 and are Toyota minivans. Then there are the chicken buses. Appropriately named for the chance that you might be sharing your seat with a chicken. These buses are packed with locals. On one such occasion a kind person offered to let us sit on a bucket between the rows of seats rather than standing for the 2 hours on the bumpy road.
A holy place is wherever you can feel the spirit

We went to Lake Atitlan, which is rumored by several mormon scholars to be The Waters of Mormon talked about in Mosiah. It was absolutely breathtaking. We decided to set logic and healthy skepticism aside and believe that we were actually on the waters of Mormon. We took a boat out to a little pueblo called San Marcos. It was very quiet and small and there was no electricity the first night. We bought flashlights and went and sat on the pier and watched the moon over the silent lake. Then the next morning we decided to do our scripture study on the pier and watch the sunrise. We read from the verses in Mosiah that talk about the waters of mormon and tried to feel what they must have felt. In Mosiah 18: 30 it says,

; yea, the place of Mormon, the waters of Mormon, the forest of Mormon, how beautiful are they to the eyes of them who there came to the knowledge of their Redeemer

It is amazing to think that the already gorgeous backdrop for their conversion, was improved upon by an intimate communion with the spirit. I think I will always think of Ricks college as beautiful for that reason.A mormon with a Book of Mormon, on the waters of mormon at the edge of the forest of mormon. Overall a very mormon morning.