I never thought I would ever study abroad. It simply was not in my educational plan and not something that I was really interested in. Yet here I am, almost two months into my semester abroad in Antigua, Guatemala.
While my semester here will come to an end in six weeks, I can’t imagine having filled this time with anything else. Antigua is a United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) World Heritage site and rich in its history of colonial Guatemala. It is a large tourist site, so while the city does not represent the majority of poor villages in Guatemala, its culture is still very different from that of the United States.
It is slow-paced and beautiful. I live in what they call “the land of eternal spring” and run on “Guatemalan time.” I don’t walk into a room without saying “Hola, buenos días,” or whatever greeting is appropriate for the time of day. It is common to eat everything – even pasta – with a tortilla.
Last weekend, I climbed and camped on a 13,000-foot volcano. Volcán Acatenango was amazing, and it was located right next to Volcán de Fuego, which is an active stratovolcano. I woke up in the middle of the night, looked outside my tent and saw lava coming from Fuego, stars lighting up the sky, clouds and city lights below me.
I have the opportunity to experience awe-inspiring things like this almost every week.
This semester has been wonderful and taught me more than I ever thought it would.
I would now agree that everyone should travel, but I would take it one step further and say everyone should try living in an area they’re not used to, even if it is just for a short amount of time.
If I never had lived in Guatemala, I would’ve never learned so much about the culture. I wouldn’t have seen how hard it is for children here to be educated; many don’t even make it to high school. I wouldn’t have experienced the country’s patriarchal way of life or how women can’t even wear shorts or dresses above the knee without being harassed.
I wouldn’t have learned that there really are places in the world where people don’t worry so much about body image. It’s nice to live in a country where people focus on being healthy and there isn’t so much pressure to look like the “perfect” woman.
I have found a new sense of being self-aware. For instance, I can no longer refer to myself as American, because I still live in America down in Guatemala. It may sound trivial, but people look at me funny down here if I say I am from America.
When you travel somewhere, you see the tourist sites and take a few snapshots of the place, but you don’t see truly the way life works there.
Another reason I believe everyone should live somewhere new for a while instead of just traveling is because settling down allows you to really give back to the community. Tourism is huge in Antigua; without tourists, the city would not be as nice as it is. But only the most popular places in Antigua benefit substantially from the work of tourists. Living here has allowed me to search around for areas that could truly benefit from help.
I have been volunteering at an organization for more than a month now. This organization, Common Hope, started because people from the United States were going on mission trips in Guatemala and realized they could do more if they actually lived here. One week was not enough.
Now the organization sponsors more than 3,000 kids to help keep them in school, builds houses for poor families and provides a primary care clinic, among so much more.
Most of the students I am living with down here volunteer somewhere, too. Guatemala has given us so much, and we want to show our appreciation by the way in which we give back while we are here.
As a social work student, I came here to expand my worldview. Cultural diversity is highly valued in my field. However, now I believe that being culturally diverse is something every single person should value.
It is not the norm for people, especially college students, in the United States to travel, but maybe it is time that it was. You can read about the rest of the world all you want, but you will never know what it is really like until you go and live in it.
