Personal Journal: In Guatemala, an M-A student discovers true lives, true beauty Personal Journal: In Guatemala, an M-A student discovers true lives, true beauty (October 19, 2005)

By Nick Peters

Junior, M-A High School

The village of Cerro de Nino, Guatemala, in mountains breathtakingly lush and green, seems like a postcard. But following a steep path up the hillside, I see the true lives of the Guatemalan people.

Their one-room houses consist of cinder blocks and tin roofs. Mangy dogs wander in and out of the brush. Trash is everywhere. Running water is minimal.

It's June 2005, and I have journeyed to Guatemala with 16 students and three teachers from Menlo-Atherton High School.

We are there for two weeks to plant trees and help build a school, as part of a community service program sponsored by Global Visionaries, a nonprofit co-founded by M-A's Student Activities Director Joe Fontana.

In this rural village, one woman has a blood clot in her leg and no money for medical attention. Another man is so sick that he needs a stretcher to leave his house.

Yet the village people seem happy. Kids play soccer on a makeshift field. People offer us a share of their meager portions. Shy smiles greet us from every face.

Everyone works hard. "Hard" as in backbreaking. "Hard" as in carrying 12 cinder blocks on your back up a hill to build a school so your kids can get the education you missed. "Hard" is all the people know, and I ask myself, "how can this possibly be fair?"

I've read stories about the poor but haven't felt the reality until now. I am glad that some of these villagers will be able to go to school -- if they can afford to leave their jobs.

We work each morning, take a brief siesta, then study three or four hours. Because I have taken some form of Spanish since kindergarten, my hours at school consist of conversations. Students and tutors study verbs and nouns, but also take time to play Spanish Scrabble.

Our trip concludes with a few days of tourism. The small, out-of-the-way town of Chichicastenango seems nondescript until Thursdays and Saturdays, when it erupts. That's when people come down from the mountains with wares on their backs and set up shop in a sprawling open-air market.

A riot of color, aroma and noise assaults every sense, from every direction. People shout and barter and buy and sell ... belts, watermelons, machetes, wooden carvings. After two hours of shopping, one is thoroughly exhausted. It's incredible, and unlike anything in the United States.

Finally there is Tikal, one of the great Mayan cities. Tikal once had more than 3,000 buildings, though the jungle has absorbed many. Like those of Egypt, the Mayan pyramids are a wonder to behold. Some stand 22 stories high.

Sitting atop a pyramid, with the jungle extending to the horizon, I think back to the people who built these monuments. They laid the foundation for more than just pyramids; they created a country unique and beautiful, a masterpiece. I will never forget what I experienced there.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Nick Peters, 16, a junior at Menlo-Atherton High School, lives in Portola Valley. He's on the varsity lacrosse team, plays jazz guitar for the school band, and is president and founder of the M-A Finance Club and vice president of the M-A Outdoors Club.

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