Naturally Flowmatic

Carpe Diem is the name of our group.
Crammin 25 in a 14 seater, as if were in a coop.
Going nation to nation,on the road agin to a fresh destination.
Bags packed, domes in tacked, onwards in our adventure yo, no hesitation.
Were naturally nomatic,scratch that flomatic, no static, on the road wreaking havoc.
Back at it cause were a traveling addict.
Just left Jam bamboo, all night long played teh drums with you.
Were one dope ass crew, don´t stress we like you too.
We don´t have to have the same state of mind,
Be sure to squeeze in some peace and love and we´ll all be fine,
Fantastic, Camtastic, pleae don´t burn you´re plastic.
Travel the worl with our third eye open,
You can catch me in the free world hoppin, to bring a liitle light to a dark place,
To put a smile on a sad looking face.
Max on the guitar, us three on the lyrics,
Don´t go far you know you wanna here this.
We don´t get caught up and we don´t stress beef,
You can´t set trip you´re rollin with me.
Although this adventures in diapers, it´s just a baby,
Weve learned allot and that´s no maybe.
Chillen in the cloud forest, so dense and so green green,
Bro we moved more mud then you eva seen seen.
Boots so slopped up, we be stuck in a lean.
We comin to yoru city, whatcha gunna do?
the CAM Crew comin through bringing good vibes to you.
Scrambalin for the scrilla on a lard pole in Poptun.
Jugamos con pelotas and singing Bob Marley´s tune.
¿Yo estoy caliente y tu?
Pullin Spanish bloopers, giggling, smiling, lovin all of you.
dan´s the man with the plan in his hand.
A thankful G, a positive light he never seases to see.
He provides some dope beats,
When he smiles your heart leaps.
Oh Celia, you´re making my heart, you´re building my confidence baby.
You know it´s true,you be fallin right into my heart,
Slippen every where what´s new?
She´s giving and loving, digs el musica de espanol and also likes hugging.
Mucho gusto, me llamo Andya,
He´s wittier then any fool you eva senna.
He´s one of the leaders of the pack,
Rock climbin, Spanich speaking, his juggling skills are just wick, wick, wack.
His knowledge and insight will take your mind fora flight,
Soarin, never borein, big balla, atcha boy give a halla.
Mr. Bobble-O-Seven intellect and cleverness you´re always reppin.
You´re a deep bro fo sho, a water rhino.
When it comes to el agua there´s no testin, hands down you gave Alex his lesson.
Kaise my brotha you´re one cool cat.
crackin jokes all the time adn reppin the Jamaican hat.
Always goin with the flow and gettin hit on the chicks, fo sho.
the boys are a little jelouse but how we all love you so.
My Dead Head friend, you know who you are.
With you´re guitar and you´re voice, you´re our group star.
There´s no one like you near nor far,
Your humour and your doodles, we all have love for you in oodles.
And last but not least, smallest but with a pick axe one hot beast.
We´ve got Kare Bear, the lovely bubbly you share is rare.
supportive, self-exported, smile loaded.
One´s tempted to hoard it
But like you we´ll share adn while doing so a smile we´ll wear.
Alex what´s left?
I guess it´s just you and me.
What can I say were some funky MCs.
Keepin it fresh and unique
And to think we havn´t even reached the peak.
Reminice a month ago we were prparing to deploy
And remember the earth is our mother not a toy,
So always appreciate her, BOI!
- Heidi
Flow written by Heidi, Alex and Max!

Xela who? No, Xelaju!

After reading this blog families, friends, and loved ones will understand why it has been such a long time since our last post. Today is our first full day in the lovely metropolis of Quetzaltenango aka Xela, but before i delve too much into our current activities let me inform you all of what our group has been doing the past several days. The last post we shared that we were about to embark on a small journey to Tikal. We arrived at the national park around 3 or so. After placing our bags in our respective tents who entered the park for a three hour tour. If you know anything about Tikal you understand 3 hours is analogous with a speed date. Fortunately, we were able to spend the next morning either making it to places in the park that we werent able to see or spend more time in the locations that we had seen the previous day. Tikal is a fascinating place which reeks with hundreds of years of culture, and we were happy to have spent time there. After a brief, final lunch in San Andres we set sail for Coban and the hostel Casa Luna for a single night. The trip totaled around seven hours in which we all either read books, held conversations, sang and/or listened to music, or like Alex slept. The drive into the highlands was very beautiful and the terrain which is a combination of jungle and mountains was unlike anything that i have ever experienced. Arriving in Coban to the tune of Bohemian Rhapsody put smiles on all of our faces. We welcomed the cooler climate that the mountains provided and some even adorned sweatshirts and long pants (Dan and Bobby were looking too handsome in our new Mayan Calender tank tops to change). The next morning we took a public bus basically the size of a school bus and a smaller van to the village of San Lucas Chicacnab. The van made to seat 12 was filled with twice as many living, breathing humans (not counted were the Guatemalans who were hanging on to the roof) which is the norm for public transportation in the great country of Guatemala. Our journey was not yet complete after reaching San Lucas. We had a 2 1/2 hour hike uphill in the jungle between us and our destination, Chicacnab. After minor struggles and playing some word association games to pass the time, we made it to this remote jungle village high up in the mountains. Living here was basically the furthest thing from the life that most, if not all, of us were accustomed to. The village of Chicacnab consisted of 32 families who all had the same goals in mind; to stop deforestation in their village and to continue to live their relatively comfortable lives. Hardly any women spoke spanish, which made those of us less adept in spanish conversation feel a little better about ourselves. Q`Eqchi, one of 23 Myan dialects, was the first language that all inhabitants learned to speak. Our accomodations were simple, but at least they had a building that all nine of us could share. Interstingly enough, a Carpe Diem group had previously helped build the structure called "The Hotel" that we rested our heads under. The floor was dirt and we didnt have any electricty but this had little to no effect on the group morale. Sharing a space together and again eating our meals with one another were nice perks that our time spent in Chicacnab afforded us. Our service project was to dig into the side of a small hill behind The Hotel and level the area so they could build an adjacent kitchen could be built. If anyone out their reading this has ever tried to dig into the side of a hill and build a structure from scratch you would know that 5 days is far too few to complete such a task. Undetered, we took our picks and hoes (this allowed for a nauseating ammount of jokes) and started our project. One of our fearless Leaders, Karen, was in short a piking fiend which the lot of us struggled to keep pace with. During our third day of work we experienced rain throughout the entire day and were forced to stop labor. This did not stop us from having a good time however. Bobby, Alex, and Dan had a mud fight for the ages and will not soon be forgotten. Celia and Heidi learned from a 14 year old girl how to weave during one afternoon. The mud fight entailed a shower for those who participated, while bathing we witnessed something that will remain with us for a while. A group of villagers had taken a pregnant, sick woman to the nearest hospital several hours away. We witnessed her return; she was strapped to a chair which in turn was being lugged on the back of a grown man. Our jaws immediately dropped and we all exchanged words of appreciation for the proximity of hospitals in each of our home towns. The last night of our stay the villagers held a celebration for us decked out with a Marimba, chocolate drinks, and plenty of dancing. We all enjoyed the final night very much and it was nice to feel a sense of appreciation and accomplishment. The next morning we departed with hugs and handshakes, made our way down the mountain, and waited for our bus to civilization and Coban. While waiting for our bus we started a geography word association game which Andy ended up winning 6 hours later. Once in Coban we all ate a short lunch and departed for the hostel named "Jam Bamboo" which is in walking distance from Semuc Champey. The hostel had a Italian menu and we all ate pizzas, pastas, and salads the two nights we were there. The first night one could feel the pleasant, warm, and welcoming aura of the hostel. Andy, Max, Alex, and Dan helped us all feel the aura by joining in on a drum circle with those who worked at the hostel. The following morning we anxiously hiked down to Semuc Champey, meaning Sacred Waters in a Mayan dialect. The landmark is aply named. It begins with a river rushing into an underground cave, all the while several small trees feed the numerous tranquil pools on top loaded with bathers. I can speak for everyone when I say that it improved all of our moods dramatically. After an action packed day at the lovely Semuc Champey we sluggishly returned to Jam Bamboo in groups of two. Upon return Max and Bobby made sweet music with Kaise and Celia as their audience while the other group trekked up a hill to get a bird´s eye view of all of Semuc Champey. The night was rather mellow with all of us enjoying pizza and good conversation. The next morning we made an eleven hour journey to the second largest city in all of Guatemala named Quetzaltenango (Xela). Xela has a population of around 150,000 and is our home for the next 3 weeks. Last night we met our new homestay families (these families are also our last homestay experience on the trip). We look forward to above average living conditions and building a meaningful relationship with each of our families all the while enhancing our spanish skills in a nice and comfortable environment. As i had previously mentioned, today is our first full day in Xela and also the first day of classes. We expect the blogging to pick up in frequency seeing as how we now have 12 computers at our disposal at Casa Xelaju, our spanish school. We all send our love and think about you all a lot. Staying with one family for an extended period of time will undoubtedly make me miss my family back in Loomis, CA a whole ton more. Let me again speak for all of us when I say that we are supremely thankful for this opportunity and look forward to personal growth and further insight into what it means to be a responsible adult. I believe now you can understand why you all have experienced a dry spell of information regarding your young travelers. Also, I fully blame any spelling and grammar errors due to the increasing pain in my rump left our from our 11 hour bus ride.



Much Love,
Bobby Fleming and the Carpe Diem CAM Family

A Curandera, a Slaughter and Some Jaguars!

We are wrapping it up here in San Andres, spending some time with our families and preparing some thankyou gifts. We have been emmersed into some of the historical Myan beliefs of San Andres, including a visit to a Curandera(a shamanistic herbal healer.)At the Curandera we learned about some of the common sicknesses amongest children and ways of healing them. One of the illnesses is caused from the transfer of heat, from someone who has recently been working or is drunk, to a baby, causing fever. Curing it involves an egg, a lemon, a duck, a local grown herb, some other goodies and some ancient orations. Karen has visited the Curandera since then and has had a facinating experience. Aside from this, these last couple of days have been mello and relaxing, as far as activities go. We have managed to fit in allot of swimming and time with group.
Last night Dan, Celia, Robert, Max and Alex had an experience that will forever change there outlook on what it is to eat meat. Dan´s family are butchers and the group mentioned before, had the opportunity to watch them kill a pig. This raw experience has brought more appreciation for the meats eaten here as well as respect for the locals interactions with the animals. The animals here live a life untainted from inhuman treatment. We are thankful for the culture we have been exposed to and are pumped to continue on our journy.
The excitment continues to bubble up in us as we prepare to head our for our first visit to a Myan ruin site, in Tikal. We will be camping out over night at the Jaguar Inn near the Tikal jungle. Hopefully none of us will wake up to find ourselves in a jaguar cuddle puddle, for there are Jaguars in the area, thus the name. Dan, Alex and Kaise arranged our stay in Tikal as well as the transportation there. Thanks Boys!
All of us here send our love and are thinking of ya (you know who you are)!
The Cam Crew
- Heidi

Quetzales in the Bank, Shawty Whatch Drank

Its our third day at our second homestay, in San Andres. We apologize for the lack of blogs thus far. We thourghly enjoiyed ourselves in Poptuon and were fortunate enough to have participated in the local Guatemalan Independence Day festivities. These festivities included, sack races, music, a compatition with horses and a scramble up a 30 foot tall, lard covered log. Alex and Robert were champs and participated in the human ladder to get to the top of the lard pole. Although Alex got pantsed infront of everybody and a little aftermath of sore backs, it remains a once in a life time experience. We explored the city of Poptun with a fun scavanger hunt, put togeather by Celia and did our first service project at La Escuela. Our service project included filling a large planter box with soil and putting up the fence. We spent alot of time at the school aside from our service project. There, we were greeted with lots of smiles and many invitations to play soccer and basketball. The children were very friendly and we became immediate friends with many of them.
We were spoiled with the wonderful meals made for us and ate togeather as a group. Most of the meat we ate was once crusing around in our backyards, including tamales made with a cerro, pig, from Heidis house. With a mixture of excitement and a little sadness we moved on in our adventure, never to forget the family and freinds we made in Poptun.
We took an hour long bus ride form poptun, which gave Andy the first hand experience of what a sardine in a can may feel like. To our ammusment he was accompanied by a man who basically sat on his lap the whole way, yelling for more passangers out the window. We were thankful to arrive in Florez where we took a great boat ride across the lake, Peten, and arrived where we now reside. Yesterday we had a great field day. Max, Andy and Heidi went to an organic farm , where they gathered fruit, habeneros and saw the national tree of Guatemela, a Ceida. Karen, Celia, Robert, Kaise, Alex and Dan went to an animal rehibilitation where they saw the beautiful Occelots and experienced how crazy Spider Monkeys can be,
Big Love from The Cam Crew!
- Heid, Robert and Max!

We made it!

Having met the group after months of only knowing them over the internet has made this whole journey become real. It started as we sat in a circle on the ground in the airport playing games and getting to know eachother. After a 6 hourt flight to El Salvador and another half hour to Guatemala City we hopped on a 7 hour bus ride to Finca Ixobel. Alex managed to get the most sleep on the bus in the most uncomfortable awkward positions while everyone else struggled to get any sleep. After 7 hours we were shown around the beautiful Finca Ixobel grounds and to our rooms. Bobby, Dan, Max, Alex, and Kaise were all in the same dormitory while Celia and Heidi slept two doors down next to Andy and Karen. The boys were welcomed by a half foot long spider and a bat flying in their room. After eating a great dinner we ended the night with a few games of scattergories and after a long day of traveling for everyone and lots of heat and humidity everybody fell asleep with no problems. The next day was filled with activities, orientation, and group agreements to make these next 3 months go smoothly. In between group meetings some people decided to swim in the lagoon while other people relaxed and did what they wanted. We were lucky to have a ping pong table which everyone managed to spend plenty of time on throughout our stay there. Everyone decided to get a early nights sleep to prepare for a long and exciting day of caving and swimming. Everybody woke up ready to go except for Celia and Dan who unforunately came down with a slight stomach illness. Andy graciously stayed behind to make sure things went well for both of our sick companions (including but not limited too providing ginger ale). As for the remaining six, we enjoyed our breakfast, packed lunches and flashlights, applied sunscreen, filled up our water, and began our two hour trek through the Guatemalan jungle. Our guide Pilar, although not practiced in English was very experienced in navagating the jungle and got us to our destination with only a minor hiccup. Pilar and most of us heard a gun shot while no more than 100 yards from the cave entrance. Erring on the side of caution, the students sat and waited for Pilar and Karen to go ahead and examine the noise further. Our anxiety was for nothing, after seeing three jovial hunters walking towards us. The cave at first sight was a lot like many others, but upon further inspection it was rather unique. Flying bats and cool deep waters put smiles on all of our faces. The stark contrast between the heat of the jungle and the refreshing pools of the cave was welcomed by all. One of the many features inside the cave was a 20 foot jump which had the bravest of us showing signs of trepidation. Once out of the cave we enjoyed the quick lunch that we packed and scrambled back to Finca Ixobel as fast as the terrain would allow.
Betweem the great meals, plush accomodations, and some heated games of ping-pong, Finca Ixobel was a great place. We left it for the town of Poptun for our first homestays. Everyone seems to like their families so far, though most of us can´t tell what they´re saying. I am excited to be forced to improve my Spanish, because progress has been slow so far. Tuesday is Guatemalan Independence Day, and being part of the celebrations should be a great experience for all. Until next time, much love from Dan, Celia, Max, Heidi, Kaise, Bobby, Andy and Karen. Paz!

Let the Journey Begin!

I just spoke to our intrepid leaders, Andy and Karen, and they've got the entire group together and are heading through SFO airport security as we speak! I have to admit this is an auspicious beginning to the semester as everything seems to be going quite smoothly thus far ... and I'm sure the semester will continue accordingly!

So, stay tuned for fairly regular blogs from the students on a roughly weekly basis. Until then, this is Ethan, signing off.

Cannot wait for CAM!!!!

Hola Los Amigos: Alex, Celia, Dan, Heidi, Kaise, Max, y Robert,

This is our blog-site in which all of your friends and family will be vicariously living through. Once a week one of you will be a "blogger"/author who will describe all the juicy details of our amazing, twisting, bumpy and winding roads that we travel along during the next three months. We encourage you to peruse past blogs to get an idea of what they might, might look like. Also, please inform your family and friends of this site, and show them how to log in, so they will know what an amazing and authentic experience we are having.

In addition to gaining responsibility of the blog, we will have other job titles assigned and rotated once every 1-2 weeks. They are described below. Contemplate which one you are most enthused to take charge of for the first couple weeks of the semester.

Cribs: Organizes any sleeping accommodations we need. ie: hotel/hostel/camping

Hotwheels:
Coordinates our transportation to and from cities, activities, caves...

Director of Fun:
Scopes out and arranges fun activities. ie: Hiking volcanoes, reiki classes, salsa lessons...

El Cap:
The leader of our team who makes sure everything runs according to date, corresponds with budget and is plainly doing their job. Yeah, crack that whip... ;)

Slacker:
Actually one of the most important roles. The slacker picks up the slack we all drag behind. If we are messy, you help clean up and delegate us to pick up our poop. The slacker may also write appreciation letters to those in communities helping us have an amazing experience and may deliver flowers and chocolate... you get the idea.

Appreciator:
This person compliments the slacker. He/she tags people throughout the week with stickers or ribbons as he/she catches them performing acts of kindness, growing in a special way, recognizes strong effort, pushing comfort zones, etc.

Clark Kent: The news reporter who finds out current events in local communities, U.S. happenings and any other cultural information we should be aware us as we travel.

Spanish Spiller: provides us with a word of the day and encourages us to use it until we are blue in the face. ie: "VACA" "Tengo un vaca en mi camiseta." Yes, we just wrote that.

We are pupped for our upcoming endeavors as we get ready for this place called Central America, and hope you are too. Spend lots of time with your family and friends, eat lots of American food and listen to a lot of Latino music. We'll See you sooner than later!

PAZ,

Karen and Andy