Today we were lucky enough to be given the opportunity to visit the girls orphanage in Chalchuapa. It was a very emotional morning. We spent the first part of the morning making bracelettes and colouring with the girls. Then it was time for the piñata! So we hung Hello Kitty and the girls took turns trying to knock the candy out of her. The piñata was very well made… the stick we were using to try to break it open broke in two before the piñata did. When Otto finally got tired of holding that fat cat up, he took one of the sticks and popped a hole in it. The kids went crazy! There was a huge dog pile and when Otto pulled the string to bring the piñata up again, only the top half made it up… It was quite amusing. After the piñata we were all treated with pizza. One of the girls, Myra, who was only six, managed to eat four slices of pizza! Then came the time we were all dreading: time to go. We stalled for as long as possible, saying our goodbyes with tears in our eyes – we wouldn´t be seeing then again on Friday this time. After about fifteen minutes, somehow Ligia managed to usher us onto the bus – after all we had a schedule to keep…

From the orphanage we went to the Casa Blanca archaeological site. We would have found it genuinely interesting had our thoughts been what was happening in the present and not the past. As the tour continued however, we started to focus. We learned how shirts are dyed with indigo and I tried to dye my finger as a free souvenir (I being Katie). We also went to see some sacrificial pyramids. At one of the pyramids our guide said that they had found 26 skulls of women and children that had been sacrificed for the Gods. Don´t forget that this is a different culture, so don´t judge these people, and that in those days it was considered an honour to die to please the Gods and you’re your people. We were also given a glimpse of their latest site. Our guide also showed us a cocoa bean tree. Just so everyone knows, the chocolate that we eat does not grow on trees. At first it´s poisonous. So now that you´re all disgusted, I´m going to tell you about supper!

After some of us had taken showers, others had to wait until the water was turned back on because it died. I was one of those poor, unfortunate people who were left stranded without water… So after we were all squeaky clean, we went to an outdoor mall. We had an hour to shop before meeting at the fountain in the middle. For supper we met up with some of the Interactors and went to Villa Maria, a Mexican restaurant, for supper. The food was fantastic! And it was real Mexican food, not the Old El Paso stuff you buy in a box (not that there´s anything wrong with Old El Paso because I love those tacos). One of the funniest moments of the night was when three men came to serenade us. We got them to sing Happy Birthday to Jen for the umpteenth time since we got here. Just when she thought it was over…

We arrived back at our hotel between 10:30 and 11:00, and had to go straight to bed because we had an early morning the next day that we would really need strength and energy for.

Amor para todos

Room two

Katie, Jillian and Jess