Reflecting on the Past Nine Months

The gap year trip that I can’t find the words to describe has finally come to a close. It was everything everyone wanted it to be and so much more. The volunteers left just over a week ago but I didn’t have the time to type this up until now. Plus, it also hadn’t really hit me that this trip was over and that the people that I had been with for nine months had gone home until I sat down to type this. I really didn’t notice until after they had left how big a bond you can make with people that you see almost every day during the course of nine months and it was a sad goodbye because we knew that some of us wouldn’t be seeing each other for a very long time.

What brought everyone even closer were all the great experiences that we shared. I know I, as the rest of the group, will never forget the Taj Mahal and it’s breathtaking beauty or the Himalayas, a place where we found peace. Peace with nature, with others, and peace with ourselves. I will never forget Semuc Champey and being completely awestruck by nature’s beauty in our world. Or Tikal where we could still feel the presence of the great Mayan civilization even though they’d been gone for a thousand years. I will never forget Corcovado and Tortuguero and their natural beauty that will always be a reminder that we can’t keep living the way we’re living. I don’t know how I, as I know others of the group too, could bear it if those precious trees that give us life were cut down and all those animals were chased from their home.

I will also always remember events like the hygiene campaign or the opening of the Elephant Village school or our small though important environmental campaign in Guatemala. I will never forget building the recycling center in Costa Rica and teaching kids English while at the same time teaching them how to live sustainably and take better care of our world. All these events have been even more moving than the amazing places we visited and I will forever remember the impact that we made on so many communities around the world.

What will be engraved in my memory even more than all those life-changing experiences were the even more life-impacting people we met. I know I just said that I wouldn’t forget the impact we made on the people but at times I think their impact on us was greater. I don’t think anyone in our group will ever stop thinking about Radhika and Arun, or Elmer and Mariano, or any of the kids that we have met on this trip that have taught us all so much. From Radhika I learned to always be strong and never give up hope. From Arun I learned to always be open to everything and never underestimate. From Elmer I have learned to simply be happy even when the situation is hard and maybe even dreadful. From Mariano I learned to always keep trying and view every little victory as a great victory.

From all these kids I have learned to help people with all these resources at our disposal that some people are battling daily to have. We shouldn’t be sad or guilty or think that life is unfair, but instead look on the positive side of things and fight just like all those people we’ve met around the world who keep fighting and never see the negative side of things. Before, I would never have imagined learning so much from kids under the age of 10 without them even knowing it, but now I wonder how I ever could have doubted. I will be forever grateful for this trip and all it has done for me and I know I couldn’t even come close to expressing to you how much I appreciate it. Even though the gap year is over, I still have more than a month left in Costa Rica and Guatemala, and I intend to make the most of it. 

Appreciating Nature and Wrapping Up Our Volunteer Work

Who knew that nestled deep in the small crevices of the world, protected from mankind, nature could have so many treasures. Corcovado was yet another of the many gems of the planet we have seen on this trip. It has 3% of all the biodiversity of the world and 60% of the biodiversity of Costa Rica. We saw more there than any other place we have been so far. I think that in the three countries of this trip, we have seen works of nature that I wouldn't have imagined seeing in my life. For example, the Himalayas in India,  Lago Atitlan and Semuc Champey in Guatemala and Tortugeuro and Corcovado here in Costa Rica. All of them were different but all of them took my breath away. Corcovado was much like Tortuguero with its vast rainforest at the edge of the ocean, even though they were on different sides of the country. As we were arriving, when I barely had a glimpse of it, I could tell it was a very special place. We had to get there by boat, just like in Tortuguero but this time we didn't just go in a river. The river opened up to the Pacific Ocean and we rode with the waves for a while. Corcovado is the name of the national park but we stayed in a little town called Drake Bay. The name of the region was Osa Peninsula. The ride on the ocean was amazing. We saw green as far as we could see in one direction and blue as far as we could see in the other. When we first got to Drake Bay we settled into our hotel and then went to the ocean. Like Tortuguero, Drake Bay isn't known for its beaches, but it was still fun to play by the waves.

The next two days were really what we were looking forward to. We woke up really early to get on an hour boat ride further into the rainforest and Corcovado National Park. It was huge, way bigger than Tortuguero. We hiked all morning even though it was raining. Then we had lunch on the edge of the forest where it meets the beach. On our hike, we saw the usual (the animals that by now we had seem many times like sloths and howler monkeys) and then we saw so much more. We saw another kind of monkey, called the Titi monkey, which was tiny, the smallest in Costa Rica. We saw a big rodent type thing that in Spanish they call a Paca. We saw a bunch of piglike creatures without tails that smelled really, really bad. We saw some birds that looked like big turkeys in trees. One species had a red face and another species had a yellow face. We saw a koati which is an animal like a raccoon with a long striped tail that sticks straight up. We also saw a ton of cool plants and trees that I've never seen before. Even though we saw so many animals and plants, the coolest thing we saw, that we spent almost an hour out in the rain looking for, was a Danta, or in English, Tapir. I think one of the only ways to describe it is like a small elephant. It's pretty big, probably 500 or more pounds and has a small trunk. When we first found it it was sleeping but then it woke up and we saw it was pretty tall. The Tapir is really rare, few people see it so it was really special. It was cool to see all of this in its natural habitat instead of a zoo. Who knew that in just a small chunk of a huge rainforest, we could find so much? I wonder what else is in there.

As the volunteering starts to come to a close here in Costa Rica, we're wrapping up all the projects, naturally. As I said in my first blog in Costa Rica, the recycling center was our most important project and now it's pretty much done! We finished making the eco-bricks, that formed the walls, which were then painted several times. The recycling center is now a bluish-gray and the wooden poles that support it are a dark brown. We cleared the space leading up to it from the road and we even laid down some cement to make it even easier for trucks to back in to pick up the recyclables. It's been amazing to see how much it has taken form since when we arrived. It started as a bunch of dirt and now it's a structure that will help Providencia make the best use of its trash. This week we are finishing up the trails for the reserve and pretty soon it'll be ready for student groups to study the changes happening in the forest. We also made some progress on the organic coffee farm and it looks pretty good, even though you can never really finish that project. The other project has been to teach environmental education and English to the elementary school kids. Originally, the volunteers were going to be teaching the kids for only about two weeks, but that isn't enough time to teach somebody English. So now it's been four weeks and I feel that the kids have a basic English vocabulary including vocabulary about nature and understand basically what sustainable development is. We've accomplished so much here in Costa Rica, as much as in the other countries but it seems like more since we can clearly see the final product.

My Journey through Tortuguero and the Providencia Sports Field

I have a new place to add to my list of favorite places. Tortuguero was amazing. Not everybody gets to go to a Caribbean rain forest where you have to take a boat over an hour to be able to get there. There was so much nature there. It was like seeing how a lot of the world was before we humans came and built cities over it. We saw so many animals, even more than in Manuel  Antonio. We saw toucans, macaws, sloths, monkeys, spiders, bats, lizards, basilisks and caimans. My favorite part of the trip was the first day, when we did a tour in a boat of a lot of the forest around the town. We saw a caiman on that trip and that was really, really cool. Caimans are like small crocodiles and if they bite they can bite off a few fingers or even a hand. We got super close but it didn't react. It probably saw us but it acted like it didn’t even notice us. When we kept going we got to see a spectacular show. Some white faced monkeys were moving from one side of the river to the other and we got to see them leaping from branch to branch. There were a lot on the ground too and I thought that was really interesting because I had never seen a monkey on the ground before. They’re the only kind of monkeys that go on the ground. The capuchin monkeys were jumping right over us about 20 yards! It was really amazing to see the monkeys in their natural habitat doing things that they would have done, humans or not. We were there about fifteen minutes and my favorite part was when we saw a monkey chasing a basilisk. Basilisks are bright green lizards that can run on water. I don’t know if they were playing or if the monkey was trying to attack the basilisk but either way, it was pretty cool to see. Unfortunately the basilisk didn’t run on water even though we cheered it on. The hotel where we stayed was really cool too, especially the pool because we could see a bunch of monkeys and tropical birds. The next day we had a walking tour of the little town. The town is very small, like 1200 people, and it’s really nice. It’s an island in between a huge river and the Caribbean. The ocean was beautiful. I mean, it’s a Caribbean Sea, but we really didn’t spend that much time there because the current was so strong and the waves so big and choppy. The whole trip was one of my favorites so far. Being in a Caribbean rainforest was amazing.

One of my favorite things to do here in Costa Rica is go to the plaza, a huge soccer field in Providencia, to play sports. We go at least three times a week either with the Young Dreamers or the younger kids from the school. I don’t think I’ve mentioned this before but Providencia is split into two parts, well technically three. There’s a top part (the main section of town), a bottom part and a middle part. There’s a road connecting the bottom and the top and at the middle of the road there’s a split that goes to the third part. The top is where most people live, where the school is, where the recycling center is and where the plaza is. The bottom part is where my family lives. Several families live down there, and there's a restaurant, which is also our house. The restaurant is one of the only ones in town and when tourist groups come they usually eat there. The middle part is where the adventure zipline park is and where a few families live. Back to the plaza. Most days we go up to the plaza and play soccer or baseball (because we taught them how to play last year), but once a week all the host families go and bring hot chocolate (well, for me juice). Here I’ve been playing a lot more soccer and it’s been great because it’s one of my favorite things to do. It’s also great exercise because the hill to the plaza is really steep, not even mentioning the sports we play when we get to the top. Sometimes we even go up there in the morning to specifically do exercise. And now I can actually run up from the bottom to the top (25-30 minute walk and 10-15 minute run), but it’s really hard since it’s so steep. That’s one of my favorite things to do here because, besides all the fun of playing sports, we get to spend good time with the people of Providencia. 

Trail Blazing in the Cloud Forest

Last week we did work that was pretty different from the work we've done before. We worked in a forest reserve, which is basically all the area around the adventure park where we went ziplining last month. We created trails for groups of students and volunteers that will study the area for the climate change impact. They're going to try to figure out what all the environmental changes are and why they're happening. The trail making was hard physical work and even though we did hard work on the farm, this time we were right smack in the middle of the forest. Taking out all the roots and branches to make a trail is really hard. It was all fun, though, at least for me. One thing that was not so fun were all the bugs but hey, siempre tiene que haber un pelo en la comida (a spanish saying that means "there always has to be a hair in the food"). We basically had to bathe ourselves in bug spray. Although it was fun sometimes the feeling of destroying parts of nature kind took hold of us. I think it helped to focus on the fact that we were mainly taking out small roots and leaves to make a narrow trail for a much bigger project. I really liked the work we did and I thought it was awesome to swing a hoe in the middle of a cloud forest.

My Grandparents, the Rain Forest and Sloths

A few weeks ago my grandparents came to Costa Rica. My grandparents live in Iowa so I only see them a few times a year, but this time I hadn't seen them for over a year, so I had really missed them. Even though I don't see them as much as people that live in California it's been amazing to actually see someone from home here in Costa Rica. The feeling was really really awesome because it completely removed all the homesickness I had, at least temporarily and I also feel like it reminded me that home still exists, that everybody is still there. It made me really look forward to going back home in a few months. Other than finally seeing someone from home I've had a really good time with them. We've played a lot of games, gone on some hikes and really just had some quality time together.

On Friday we went on a hike through the cloud forest, then the rain forest for about an hour and a half to see a huge waterfall. The hike was really fun, as all hikes are when you're surrounded by so much vegetation. At one point we had to take off our shoes to get across a river, or in my case, jump from rock to rock. The waterfall itself is beautiful, or better said, was beautiful. It's a huge waterfall that's about 300 feet high. When we went last time (when I was here last July) there was a ton of water and it was an actual waterfall but this time it was just a tiny tiny little trickle of water where you would have to stand under it for 10 minutes to finally get wet. It really reminds you that we have a shortage of water on our hands, even in Costa Rica. Last time we were there we saw some puma tracks when we were heading back. The guide had some clay that you put in the tracks to make a mold of them. After we waited for them to dry I went back to check on them and there were some new tracks right by the old ones. A puma had passed by just minutes after we had been there! We also found some beaver tracks but I don't think those were nearly as cool as the puma tracks. This time around, we did not see animal tracks. Still, it was a memorable walk. The waterfall is incredible and I'm lucky to have seen it twice. On this trip, I've really come to appreciate all nature has for us to see and all that it has for us to learn. 

2 weeks ago we went to Manuel Antonio National Park. The drive was about three hours from Providencia, pretty close but completely different landscapes and environments. The whole area is on the Pacific Coast, but the actual national park is a rain forest. We went on a half hour hike through the forest to get to a little beach. My favorite part was the hike because we saw so many awesome things. Our guide was amazing at spotting all different kinds of plants and animals and he was also just really good at his job, we really learned a lot. We saw sloths, bats, birds, deer, scorpions, spiders and monkeys. I think the sloths were really the highlight. We saw six in total, of both kinds, two toed and three toed! Two toed sloths are mean and aggressive, and we didn't really see them up close. On the other hand three toed sloths are gentle and peaceful so we got to see them up close. We even got to see a baby that was less than a week old! Now I can tell you from personal experience that they really are as slow as everybody says they are. My favorite bird that we saw was one that was super, super camouflaged. It looked exactly like a crumpled leaf but you could see its big brown eye that was the only thing that would give away its position. We saw a bunch of white-faced monkeys that put on a a show of taking people's food and throwing it. The beach itself was amazing too, it was like what you would see in pictures of a paradise beach, with the jungle right up against it. The water was calm and it felt perfect, although it was burning hot outside. After the beach we went to our hotel that was in a town called Dominical. The hotel was amazing with a fun pool, and I wish we could have stayed there longer than one night. The next morning most of the group went surfing but I couldn't go because I had an ear infection. That Sunday we said goodbye to my grandparents which was sad but it helped to know that I will see them not long after I get back. It was all around, an awesome Easter weekend!

Next week we visit Tortuguero, which is a completely different part of the country on the Caribbean side. That should be interesting.

Sand, Waves, Ziplines and a Giant Red Diaper

I love the beach. Over the weekend we went to a beach town called Tamarindo in Northwestern Costa Rica. Tamarindo is a super touristy spot with a lot of stores everywhere. It's about an eight hour drive from Providencia and a completely different landscape than the cloudforest. We went from mountains to beaches. The beaches here have white sand, unlike Monterrico in Guatemala. In Tamarindo, we got away from the stores and visited different beaches. My favorite beach was Playa Negra. It's called that not because of black sand but because of the rocks that line the coast. Almost everywhere you can see black rock, in a few places there's sand so it's safe to go in but it's mostly rock. It's really cool when the waves, that were quite big, smash against the rocks. Costa Rica has a lot of beaches, but this one was especially awesome because of the wide space, fun waves and perfect water temperature. The whole trip in general was really nice, and we got to have a couple days relaxing just playing in the ocean.

Here in Providencia they have built an adventure park, which is basically an amusement park of cables wrapped around trees in the forest. It’s mostly made up of zipline and rope-swing type activities. The first one we went on was Jungle Fly. In Jungle Fly they strap you up in a huge, red “diaper” and then everybody else pulls on a rope to hoist you up. Once you’re pretty high they release you and you go flying through the jungle. I love the feeling of falling and swinging up and down with the wind in your face and birds chirping all around you. The next one we did is my favorite one, the Hollow Tree Climb. You can probably get what it’s about by the name but I’ll explain better. You have to climb up the inside of a hollowed out tree that’s 35 meters high (115 feet). I have an absolute obsession with climbing trees so you can understand why this one was my favorite. I climbed the tree in two minutes and thirty nine seconds. After the Tree Climb came a traditional zipline. This zipline was only like twenty seconds, not nearly as long as the one we did in Guatemala, but still fun. When we landed after the zipline we were on a platform and the only way down was to do the Tarzan Swing. The Tarzan Swing was kind of like Jungle Fly but instead of you being pulled up and let go, you have to jump off of the platform yourself since you’re already up high. I did it upside down and it was super fun to feel both the wind and my blood rushing to my face. After we were on the ground we went across the Monkey Bridge, the last activity. The Monkey Bridge is a cable that you have to walk on. There are also ropes hanging down from above that you can swing from, hence, the Monkey Bridge. The whole park is super super fun and I had a great time. With all the work we've been doing, and my new school (with loads of homework), I was ready for some fun. Costa Rica has so many options! My grandparents come for a visit this weekend, and I can't wait to show them around.

Arriving in Paradise

We’re in Costa Rica! We arrived here in Providencia (the town where we’ll live for three months) late afternoon last Tuesday, Feb 23. Providencia is in the middle of the cloud forest, basically in the middle of nowhere. The nearest town is more than an hour drive so it’s completely isolated. Providencia is one of my favorite places on earth, probably the number one. When we first got here it was dark and and cloudy so we couldn’t see much but the next day, I woke up and immediately was amazed by Providencia’s beauty. There’s nothing but nature all around and it’s in the middle of the mountains with an incredible view. There are also a lot of rivers all around, including the cleanest river in Central America (Rio Savegre), so you can always hear the rush of the water. In a place like Providencia, it’s impossible not to feel relaxed. Anybody who’s ever been here can back me up. Here in Costa Rica we’ll be going on some awesome trips and doing some really fun things so I’m super excited for what’s to come. Since the first time I came to Costa Rica four years ago I have absolutely fallen in love with it and even though I was sad to leave Guatemala, I’m so glad to be back in this incredible place.

Carlos and I are going to school here in Providencia! Even though school just started here 2 weeks ago, we entered the grades that we’ve been in since India, 6th and 2nd. I know that some kids will think I’m crazy for saying this, but I really like school and I’ve really missed going to class with other students. Now whenever I go I don’t want to stop. I want to go all day. In Costa Rica, like in a lot of other countries, they wear uniforms to school. We had to buy uniforms and whenever I put it on to go to school I feel super formal and official. Another thing that’s different here, that is true only for Providencia, is that there aren’t many kids at the school. At my school in California, there’s about 30 kids per class and 150 per grade. Here, there are 25 kids in the entire school and about five per grade. There are only 3 in Carlos’ class.

I’ve loved being in a class with other kids, receiving instruction from a teacher up front. Even though the  work is a bit easy, I’ve liked every bit of it. Although we’re going to the local school, here we’re still keeping up with our homeschool program. That’s why this blog is late. With school in the morning, then homework, then homeschool work I’ve been pretty busy. It’s been a great experience so far to attend school here because we get to see what it’s like to be a normal kid in Costa Rica.

In India and Guatemala the volunteering was mainly teaching kids, but here in Costa Rica we’re mostly volunteering with environmental projects. We’re doing organic farming, finishing the construction of a recycling center out of eco-bricks, and a little teaching of the local kids at the school about sustainable development and the environment. You might be wondering what organic farming is, or sustainable development, and you’re probably saying to yourself, what in the world are eco-bricks? Organic farming is what it’s called when farmers use organic materials instead of chemicals. Since pretty much everyone in Providencia is a farmer, when they use chemicals, it’s a lot of damage to the ground and the rivers. This is really important work and I’m learning a lot about what we need to do to fix our planet.

This weekend we’re going zip-lining! I’ll tell you all about it next week.

A March for the Earth and Saying Goodbye to Guatemala

**This blog is late on purpose because I wanted to get the very end of our time here in Guatemala.  

I’ve been forgetting to update you on our projects with the Young Dreamers. Our main focus was the community clean-up campaign.  We had the march and rally last Sunday! We did it in both Vuelta Grande and El Hato. In Vuelta Grande we started the march in the school. Almost all of the young dreamers (33) went to the march so when we started off we immediately started with quite a bit of noise. We also had a microphone and a megaphone to make even more noise and attract more people. We walked from the school to the soccer field (45 minutes) screaming and yelling chants and slogans. We attracted a crowd with our noise, which was our intention because we wanted to teach as many people as we could about helping the environment. When we got to the soccer field we talked a little bit about what we were doing and why we were doing it. On the way back to the school we walked, still chanting, while picking up trash. A lot of the kids of the village helped too. When we got to the school some of the Young Dreamers talked about putting trash in its place, recycling, and the consequences of polluting our planet. After the speeches we had the skits. The skits also touched on recycling and the consequences of throwing trash in the street. I think the project turned out great. Especially, of course, the rally. Everyone was super happy and joyous. I think I never stopped smiling during the whole march. When you’re in that kind of environment it’s almost like you’re a magnet for joyful feelings. It was a success all around and I think we really managed to get across the message.

On Friday we said goodbye to the Young Dreamers, who are no longer acquaintances, but friends. We had our last gender specific meetings where we passed over the reins to some of the Young Dreamers so they could continue planning and executing them on their own. After that, we all got together to say our goodbyes... well after us boys had one last soccer match. We had some mini performances where some of the Young Dreamers danced and sang. People got up to say some parting words, both gap year volunteers and Young Dreamers alike. Everybody was sad that our time together had to come to a close, as all things do, but I think it was also a happy reunion where we recognized everything we did and accomplished together. Just yesterday we said goodbye to the school kids in Vuelta Grande. We started off by playing with all the kids, we did games and relays. I think that the last day was the best day where we really could have fun and connect with all the kids. The games lasted for a while and then it was time for a formal goodbye. All the teachers said thank you and bye as well as the principal of the school. We each got certificates and little cards from the kids. When we were done with that it was time for us to leave the kids and leave the beautiful school that we’d been working at for the past three months. Everybody who had gotten close over that time said goodbye promising to see each other again. We were especially sad to leave the school but we knew that of course it wasn’t goodbye, but so long.

We’ve wrapped up the second leg of our 9-month journey here in Guatemala and in just a couple of hours we’ll commence the third leg in Costa Rica. Guatemala has been amazing, from going through a cave full of water, to building classrooms, to visiting Mayan ruins, to having Spanish classes. It’s been a huge variety of great experiences where I’ve learned a ton. Here in Guatemala we’ve been on some awesome trips around the country. My favorite one was Semuc Champey where we got to explore both dry caves and water caves. We also got to go in the seven natural pools that make Semuc Champey famous. Even though that was my favorite trip, all the other ones were great too. Like a few where I could really learn more about the Mayan culture. In addition to the sightseeing that we did we also have some awesome memories of volunteering up in Vuelta Grande and El Hato. The first half of the trip we were volunteering alongside the Young Dreamers working on beautifying the school. When we were beautifying the school it involved a lot of hard physical work, but it was super fun when we wanted it to be. I learned a lot in that time about how to be a hard worker and to really believe we could do any project we wanted, from painting murals, to building a classroom. I also really got to get to know all the Young Dreamers really well for the first time because whenever we come for a week it isn’t enough to build friendships with them. The second half of the volunteering was a whole lot different than the first. We weren’t working with the Young Dreamers, but with the kids of the school since classes started on January 15. The volunteers were tutoring some of the kids that needed it. Instead of the physical labor we did mental labor to teach the kids language arts and math. I don’t think I told you this before, but my mom was actually teaching all of kindergarten pretty much since the first day of school. The real kinder teacher was pregnant so she had to take a couple of months off after only one week of school. In Vuelta Grande, there’s no substitute system, so my mom took over. We all took turns helping her and my cousin (who was staying with us for a while) with the kids. From this volunteering I learned that no matter how young or how old you are, you’ll always have something to learn and to teach. Guatemala has been truly special and amazing for me this time because I really got to delve deep in all of its complex layers. Goodbye Guatemala, thank you for everything you’ve done for me, I’ll be back soon. Bring on Costa Rica!

A Young Dreamer's Life and Tikal

            Lately we’ve been doing a project that involves filming some of the Young Dreamers and their daily routines. A week ago I tagged along to see the morning routine of Juan Jose, a 14 year-old Young Dreamer in Vuelta Grande. My dad and me, one of the volunteers, the assistant director, and a video production team went up to Vuelta Grande at 4:00 in the morning to see Juan Jose waking up and getting ready to go to school. When we got to his house he was already awake since he gets up at 4:30. Let me tell you that at 5:00 it gets very, very cold in Vuelta Grande. Juan Jose usually gets up and takes a shower. Before he takes a shower he has to heat up some water on the stove since there is no shower with warm water. Imagine having to take a bucket shower outside in the freezing cold at 5:00 in the morning. Once you imagine it you would think, I wouldn’t like to do that every day. After the shower he changes into his school uniform. A lot of times Juan Jose doesn’t have breakfast and if he does it’s usually a piece of bread and coffee. A lot of the families there don’t have tables or chairs so they either eat standing or sitting on the dirt floor. After breakfast he brushes his teeth and gets all his school supplies into his backpack (he does his homework the day before.) At 5:45 am he heads down a hill to wait for the bus to pick him up. I think that this was a great experience for me to delve deeper into the Young Dreamers lifestyle and the culture of Vuelta Grande. I hope you guys also understand more about the Young Dreamers life and that you’re learning as much as I am to be grateful, very grateful, for what we have.

            Last weekend  we went to Tikal! For those of you that don’t know what Tikal is, it was one of the biggest cities of the Mayans in the Classic Era, built in the middle of the jungle. A few weeks ago I talked about some ruins called Iximche. Tikal is much much, much bigger. It is estimated that only 30% of the whole city has been uncovered. The other 70% is covered by jungle. A lot of times you’ll walk by some huge hills that don’t seem to fit in with the rest of the jungle and you’ll immediately guess that it is some building that hasn’t been excavated yet. Tikal is huge so I won’t be able to tell you about all of it, (you’ll have to look it up) but I will explain to you some of the most important places. First of all, there’s the Grand Plaza, home to temples 1 and 2, a palace, and several houses. The most important buildings in the great plaza are the two pyramids, both were built by Ha Sawa Chaan-K'awil who brought Tikal’s rise to power. Because he had brought Tikal back to its position of power after a war with Calakmul that resulted in a hiatus in Tikal’s power for 130 years he built the new temples to add to the image that Tikal was powerful again. Ha Sawa Chaan-K’awil was actually buried under Temple 2. Another really cool place in Tikal is what they call the Lost World. The Lost World is believed to have been built in 500 BC and was the main part of Tikal before the Grand Plaza. The Lost World has some different style pyramids because when it was being built Tikal had an alliance with some Mayans in Mexico and the Mexicans showed them their architecture. I think the Grand Plaza and the Lost World were my two favorite plazas in Tikal because you could really see the Maya buildings. Not far from the Lost World is Temple 4. Temple 4 is by far the tallest temple and when you climb to the top you have an amazing view of all the temples and a lot of the rainforest. I think that on top of Temple 4, having a magnificent view of all of Tikal, is my favorite spot. The whole time I was on the trip I was wondering how the Mayans could have lived so long ago, been so advanced, and then suddenly disappeared. I'm really fascinated by the fact that a huge civilization could have fallen so quickly.