(Written by Christopher)
Last night, I packed everything in my new hiking bag instead of using a luggage because I thought this would be easier to get around and I would pretend that I was out camping instead of traveling like a tourist. I packed some basic clothes: 1 nice khaki pant, 4 different shirts, 7 days worth of socks and underwear. I also packed the basic hygiene items: shampoo, soap, toothbrush and toothpaste, and a roll of toilet paper. I left work early this morning to get ready for the flight at 12:50pm. I was impatient and paced around the house before Stephen's roommate could give both of us a ride to the airport. My housemate saw me about to leave and wished me lot of fun in Guatemala. She told me that I did not have to get her anything but if I could, get grasses or something small. A little weird of a request but everyone has their own collecting interest. I don't have anything that I am interested in collecting at the moment.
To my surprise, it was Andrew K. who stopped by to give us a ride. Stephen's roommate was stuck in a meeting and could not come. Bummer! I was anticipating in riding in her monster car with the huge tires. Andrew gave Stephen a mobile videophone (MVP) by HOVRS to try out in Guatemala. I thought it would be impossible to have the device work in Guatemala but who knows, we will try it out. This MVP will be the first to leave the country and be tested through Guatemala's Wi-Fi environment.
We arrived at the Rochester International airport and both of us thanked Andrew for the speedy ride in his hybrid car. There wasn't any wait at the lines with Continental airline. We just went right in and got our tickets. We had a quick subway sandwiches for lunch and boarded a small jet to Newark, NJ. Stephen had the window seat to himself while I had the aisle seat. Lucky him! I had to share a seat next a fragile old Indian lady who didn't obey the flight attendant to put away her purse under the seat. The large flight attendant had to bend down over me and push the purse in under for her. I could not move back in my seat and felt something (double watermelons) that I did not expected to be brushed by when she shoved that purse in. A shocking move coming from a flight attendant.
A quick nap later, we arrived at the Newark-Liberty Airport in New Jersey and connected to our next flight to Houston, Texas. We boarded a larger aircraft. For the first time, I have never seen the touch screen display at every seat. Stephen and I played several games on our own touch screen display. I was fascinated with the Berlitz Word Traveler, a foreign language stimulated learning game, and I attempted at learning Arabic. I could have taken the time to learn Spanish but I craved learning Arabic when growing up, both written and spoken, and this language is very tough to master as a deaf person. Some basic words for you to know are: "Alekom el salam" = Hello, "Laban" = Milk, "Momken takhodlena soura" = Could you take a picture of us?, and "Anwa hakhod ka'as hebi'it" = Yes, I would like a glass of wine. The lady who sat next to me by the window was watching us sign and started a conversation with us. She was from Columbia and worked for a chemical company in Georgia. She recently took her CPA test for accounting and anticipating in finishing four more parts of the test. One of her goals is to go to Germany for two years as part of her work experience. She enjoys traveling, especially as part of her job. She surprised me with her basic knowledge of the alphabet in Columbia Sign Language. She said that she learned it from school in Columbia. We had a nice conversation and she advises both of us to be careful in Guatemala. She wrote on my paper "Don't talk to everybody unless you know them. You both look very American & that can be attractive to bad people." Stephen asked her "How can we look less American?" She replied, "Get some tanning." I chuckled and knew that she was going to say that. We arrived to Houston, Texas and we departed our ways. She was a very nice woman, wished I've asked for her name.
We boarded our next flight on a regular aircraft. Bummer! No touch screen displays on this flight. We had chicken sandwich and salad for dinner. Then we took a nap during the flight. Good thing that Stephen recommended that neck pillow. I bought one from Wal-Mart and it helped me rest a bit without using my hand or other people's arm. Before we arrived to Guatemala, we were given out immigration forms to fill out.
We arrived in Guatemala City at night and I could see that we were flying over a handful of skyscrapers close to the plane. We landed very quickly and arrived to our gate. In the airport, it looked almost empty and the stores were locked up because of the late evening time. We quickly went toward the baggage claim to get our bags and gave the security the immigration form. Lucky we weren't asked to have our bags turned in for inspections and went straight out the exit doors. Outside of the exit door are street barriers to keep the taxi drivers from coming in. Many people were holding signs offering different cities for a ride to. One tall old man with an overall jean wore round glasses on with a neatly trimmed mustache held a sign with 'Stephen Persinger' written on it. We went to him for a ride to our hostel.
About 5 minutes drive from the airport, we entered a suburban area to Hostel Hermano Pedro. It was a house used as a hostel and we entered through the garage. We met with a short lady who has been corresponding with Stephen for the reservation. Stephen paid her the nightly rent of $15 (USD) for each of us and she showed us to our room. The room was flamingo pink with light pink bed sheets. Stephen sat on his bed by the window and I slept in my bed by the bathroom. It was around 11pm and we were told to rest early and we could have breakfast as early as 6 AM. Stephen and I chatted briefly about what to do in the morning and then went to bed after this long day in the sky.
