Special Education Class

Today Linda and I visited the Special Education Class that Transitions conducts. It's located in a small classroom on the grounds of a private school in San Antonio Agua Calientes. Although the school is operated by an evangelical church, the class is only located on the grounds, not actually part of the main school.

Special education is not very common in Guatemala, where most non-developmentally disabled children fail to even complete the sixth grade. For a program like this to exist in a Guatemalan village is both unique and a definite blessing to the children it serves.

After being introduced to the nine children in the class, ranging in age from 8 to 22 years of age, I sat down to help Lourdes with her math. She was doing a series of addition and subtraction problems using pop bottle caps to count with.

Marty, a graduate of the University of North Texas, worked with Osiel, who is 22 years old.

All the children seemed to enjoy being in school. In most cases in Guatemala, that would not be the case.

Occasionally, Edson, the head teacher, has to take time to provide Rodney with some basic physical therapy.

Before long it was time for refacción, i.e. snack time. The other school children were playing outside, with some playing futbol (soccer).

Osiel, our goalie, worked real hard to prevent any scoring,

but Rodney and I were able to sneak two goals past the goalie.

Soon it's time to go back to class, but first the students brush their teeth.

Leaving the school to return to Antigua, we looked up to see the twin peaks of Volcán Acatenango (dormant) on the right and the solitary peak of Volcán Fuego (active) on the left.


After lunch at the Ochenta, I returned to the funding proposal I had started the day before. In less than two hours, I had finished what I could without information I needed to get from others. Not wanting to start something new so late in the day, I took off early and Linda and I returned to our casita. Chris, the communications director who shares our casita, walked home with us and we learned about some of his experiences in Latin America.


Once home, we unloaded my computer and we walked towards downtown Antigua. We wanted to pick up a pot to use as a popcorn popper at the Bodegona, along with some other items, and also attend a lecture at the Rainbow Cafe on current conditions in Guatemala that was presented by a former U.S. Foreign Service Officer, who now heads a Guatemalan nonprofit.


On the way to the Bodegona, we decided that we were hungry and took a chance on a restaurant we had heard about, but never eaten at. What drew us in was a banner on the front door advertising a hamburger special, with papas fritas (french fries) and a Coke for less than Q20 (less than $2.50). Now, this was a fancy sit-down type of restaurant with cloth napkins, a lilly in a vase on each table and a menu full of expensive steak dinners. We ordered the special, but were quickly informed that they didn´t have any papas fritas ready and would we accept a salad as a substitute. We did and were surprised at how good the food and the service was. Of course, since we had a lecture scheduled at 5:30 p.m., we were eating rather early. After looking over the menu, we´ve decided to return for a more upscale mean, just as soon as I get my first paycheck, actually my first living stipend check.


Heading over to the Bodegona, we found our pot, four hand towels we'd forgotten to pack and some other items. We arrived at the Rainbow Cafe to discover that the place was packed, but a helpful waiter found chairs for us and a place to put them.


On the way back to the casita following the lecture, I took these photos of the church next to the Hermano Pedro Hospital.

I couldn't decide which I like better, so I used both of them.