A long time ago, I blogged about why we didn’t change the boys’ names (except to give them our last name, of course).  BOY am I glad we didn’t.

After some run-around with U.S.C.I.S. (and some procrastination on my part), I have FINALLY acquired the boys’ official adoption paperwork, as submitted when we entered this country nearly five years ago.

And we thought we had photocopies of all the important stuff.

We didn’t.

Pushing past an initial brush-off from our nation’s immigration department, I filed again this past September, loading them up with all the past history of my attempts to acquire our sons’s original adoption paperwork.

And this time, it worked.  And not only do we have pictures of them and of their other mama that we never had before, we now have the names of their maternal grandparents!

The boys were ecstatic!  ”We have 3 grandmoms and 3 granddads!” (They have “known” for years that they have four sets… but the 3rd one just became more real because they have names!]

But the best news?  One of them shares his first name and middle initial with their grandfather.  We know why he has his name!

It’s something birth parents take for granted – the rationale behind a child’s name.  And we were just able to give that to him this week.  He’s seven.

We’re so far behind.  But how grateful are we that we were given the good sense to keep their names?

Their names are their story.  And we just got a little piece more of it this week.

The boys are huge fans of the You Wouldn’t Want to… book series. 

For those of you who have some how MISSED these gems, they include such greats as You Wouldn’t Want to Be a World War II Pilot: Air Battles You Might Not Survive (currently on our shelf), You Wouldn’t Want to Be an 18th Century Convict: A Trip to Australia You’d Rather Not Take (No offense to my Australian readers – ie. Von.), and You Wouldn’t Want to Be Mary Queen of Scots: A Ruler Who Really Lost Her Head.

Check your local library.  They’re awesome.  Especially for boys.

But anyway.  Fred and I – but especially I, ’cause I’m prone to such things as extensive geneological researching, and also spend nearly all my time with said children —  have been very conscious of the fact that giving them a thorough connection to their own roots is very important. 

And that that means doing some extra research.  Because their roots are not our roots (though they’re welcome to partake in all our Euro-straight-to-U.S.-American fun-and-games, of course!)

So we’ve read about Guatemala, TRAVELED back to Guatemala, read about the Maya, CLIMBED their pyramids, studied Spanish… I’m still looking for a socially acceptable way of asking some of the Latino men I know just what it is that they’re wearing that smells so good, so I can buy it to put on the boys (who frequently smell like sweat and “tootle”)… but I digress… Read the rest of this entry

I just linked to Tracy’s Folk Salvadoran art post on Saturday in my The Week’s Links and must have sent Fred psychic signals or something because he wrote one very similar about our own dining room over on our home improvement blog.

Pop on over and check it out: “Central American Art – Guatemalan and Salvadoran Artwork“ and let me know what you think when you get back!

I wrote, over a year ago, about how our kids’ adoptions have changed our decorating tastes.  It becomes increasingly the case as time passes.  The plaid couch in my old post is long gone, and our latest purchase (from Chichicastenango in September) is equal in length but nothing like it:

There was a pleasant surprise for OUR family in the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade lineup this year: the parade’s first-ever Latin American band to participate.  And Guatemalan at that!

The band, “Pedro Molina,” hails from the town of Coatepeque in the department of Quetzaltenango, Guatemala.  The 270 members – musicians and dancers – range from 12 to 25 years of age and are either current students or graduates of the school for which the band is named.  They’ve won four Central American championships since their founding in 1982, and this is their second appearance here in the U.S.  They performed in the Rose Bowl parade back in January.

In February, following their Rose Bowl appearance, the band applied to be in the 2011 Macy’s parade, since Macy’s requires application submission one year in advance. Read the rest of this entry

During our stay-cation this past weekend, Fred and I did some just-driving-around; and I decided to take him by the first house I lived in.  It’s a little far-flung from our usual stomping grounds which is why he’d never seen it before.  In the 9 years we’ve known each other.  Ah well.

But anyway, we hit the end of the street and there it was:

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Sunday, we traveled across the Guatemalan highlands to one of the largest open-air markets in the country in a town called Santo Tomás Chichicastenango.  Saint Thomas is the town’s patron saint, and many of the boys’ are given Tomás as a first name.  The rest of the town’s name is Mayan and means “the place of the Chichicaste plant.”  Chichicaste being a poisonous hedge ivy with tiny hairs on its leaves that cause intense itching when touched.

We didn’t touch any, so we can’t speak to that aspect.  But we did love the town.  It’s one of the two sites Fred and I got to see 3 1/2 years ago, and he wanted to be sure we brought the boys to see it this time, too.

A number of tourism groups take buses to Chichicastenango, so if you’re looking for a well-traveled road, a place to barter for some great authentic (or tourist-y) souveniers, and a place that’s accustomed to (and eager to host!) foreigners, this is the one for you.  Market days are Sunday and Thursday every week.

Scenes from Chichicastenango: Read the rest of this entry

The four of us completed our most extreme-adventure-type activity of the week this morning.  Climbing to the summit of Volcan Pacaya – one of at least four volcanoes close to Guatemala City.

It was an early morning.  Our driver and guide picked us up at 6 a.m.  By 9:30 we had climbed to the top and were eating roasted marshmallows near an active lava-flow. 

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After two fairly intense days in the jungle, and with a volcano climb ahead of us tomorrow, we decided to make today a light one.  We relaxed at the hotel most of the day, then headed downtown to the Aurora Park Zoo, Guatemala’s national zoo and the most attractively set-up one Fred and I have ever seen.

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Writing a little out of order today. We just returned to Guatemala City from a 2-day trip to the northern departamento (like a state in the U.S.) of Petén to see the Maya ruins at Tikal and the rainforest and ruins at Yaxhá. The hotel at which we stayed in Tikal State Park had electricity for exactly 6 hours a day – 6:30-8:30 a.m. and 6-10 p.m., provided by generators. It was also hot, humid, and we made good use of our mosquito repellent. Aside from those rustic elements, it was a pretty nice place to stay.

Needless to say, no wi-fi in the rooms, though, so I’m behind on posting. But since that experience is fresh in my mind, I’ll come back to the days I’ve missed later. Read the rest of this entry

The Overview:  For this first day of hard-core tourism, we hit the city of Antigua, Guatemala and the surrounding Maya towns.  Brace yourselves for a lot of pictures because I find it’s easier to show than to try to explain what it’s like traveling around Guatemala.

Common Sights:

1) Cathedrals – the Spaniards were busy folks (unfortunately enslaving the local Maya people as part of the process) back in the 15th-16th century!  Ever pueblo (village) we visited had a major cathedral in its town square.  Antigua itself has dozens of churches, many of them major cathedrals, too.

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