At the beginning of our journey, our goal was to help people in need whenever we could. So we started immediately in Antigua, our first station in Guatemala. On the streets of the former colonial city children and women are selling fruits and vegetables. Above all, we noticed many children, many people with disabilities and many needy people. That’s because guatemalan families have no money for contraceptives or medicine due to the lack of economy, we were told.
Whenever possible we tried to give some change to a begging person. For us it´s not much but for them it could be a small meal at the evening. We never met a person who was not thankful for the support. Especially we remember an old lady sitting on the side of the road. While we were passing by Franz gave her our last change – the smile in her face was priceless. In general all people we met in Antigua or all over Guatemala were very friendly, greeted us at any time of the day and are worth the support.
Besides this we had the opportunity to support a local family by staying at a homestay organized though our Spanish language school (Mundo Spanish School). For a week of private teaching we paid per person 1050 GTQ (~124 €). We can definatly recommend this school. We both had an own teacher, who cared about our special learning needs for 4 hours per day and compared to the other spanish school this one was cheap.
In addition to this we payed 765 GTQ (~90€) per person per week for staying at our homestay. For both of us together was it 180€ per week for the family. We thought that all this money went straight to the family but when we asked the school if the family get all of this money, we got only an insufficient answer that a the price includes a small amount of commission for the school. Franz was upset about that and wanted to now how much money really receive the family. Therefore we asked our host mother and found out that the school keeps 1/3 of the money as commission. We talked about it for a long time. She said that this is the system in Guatemala „the big step on the small“. If we would have known that before, we would have booked the second week homestay private and give all the money to the family. Now we are wiser for the future.
Also we asked what else we could do for her or the family, she began to cry. Later she gave us a note that for her the most beautiful gift is that we care about it and care about the family. Through the conversation with our mom we learned that they are more happy about small things with support than giving them a lot of money. And so we decided to help the family not with money, but with heart. Here and there we bought a mango, pineapple or avocado for dinner, helped the children with their homework or with little things in the household. All because we wanted it.
We also spent the last sunday with the family. First we cooked for them. We made burritos with all the delicious ingredients that Franz could find together with our papa while helping him with the weekly shopping on the market. It was so much that it was enough for two days and the kids couldn’t get enough from it (Samuel picture).
At the afternoon we visited the exhibition of the Berlin Bears and took many nice family photos. We then had these printed out as a farewell gift. Especially the little Samuel (4 years) was very proud of his Hulk picture (Franz edit the little Hulk fan a green skin color on a picture). The more beautiful the time was, the harder it was to say goodbye. In our travel book they wrote very nice words and pasted in typical guatemalan dolls to remove bad dreams.
All in all we can definatly recommend the Mondo Spanish school, but when you are looking for a homestay try to look for a private one, for example with the lovely Family Armas Lopez in Antigua. We are very happy that we got to know this family and would like to thank them for every typical meal, for helping us to learn Spanish and for every laugh with a special mention in our blog. So if you would like to travel to Guatemala and stay with a loving family in Antigua, you can contact Felix and Arely Armas Lopez via WhatsApp.
Contact datas of our beautiful Family Armas Lopez:
Felix Armas +50249797131
Arely López +50231154369
All in all we can definatly recommend the Mondo Spanish school, but when you are looking for a homestay try to look for a private one, for example with the lovely Family Armas Lopez in Antigua. We are very happy that we got to know this family and would like to thank them for every typical meal, for helping us to learn Spanish and for every laugh with a special mention in our blog. So if you would like to travel to Guatemala and stay with a loving family in Antigua, you can contact Felix and Arely Armas Lopez via WhatsApp.
Contact datas of our beautiful Family Armas Lopez:
Felix Armas +50249797131
Arely López +50231154369
Das hört sich nach einer super Erfahrung an. Ja, leider kommt das Geld nicht immer da an, wo es sollte – und oftmals erfährt man das gar nicht. Dennoch habt ihr das Beste daraus gemacht und der Familie viel gegeben!