Two weeks after being back in North America, the jeans are finally clean. Other than the first time I had my clothes washed in a real machine in San Marcos in Guatemala, I chose to do the “handwashing” thing. Most everything fared well but the jeans just didn’t come clean. By the time I got home, I wondered if they ever would. Finally after 3 washings, they are looking good!

It has been a fascinating two weeks settling back into a North American routine. I love my new computer and the sheer joy of having a printer has been beyond ecstacy. The simple things of life for an entrepreneur.

It’s wonderful to have hot showers with some ooomph and to sleep in a super comfortable bed with a pillowtop. The luxuries of life I definitely enjoy.

On the other hand, I miss terribly the social connections of traveling. As a solopreneur, it can be easy to spend a day hardly talking to anybody. Hours can pass before you move away from your desk. I feel the isolation and lack of emotional stimulation at a level that is surprising even me. Never mind, missing the great food enjoyed eating out at super low prices, the constant sunshine and the wonderful people who were always so gracious.

Thankfully, today is the first day since my return that the weather has been cloudy and rainy. I arrived back to daffodils, cherry blossoms out in their full glory and even the rhododendrums starting to bloom. Spring is very early here on the west coast of Canada and I am relishing it!

The research for the new book is coming along well. The team is being lined up for a very busy summer and a late September/early October release. I am beyond excited which thankfully makes all sacrifices worthwhile.

There are pros and cons to every situation and as I describe in my book, Getting Off the Merry-Go-Round, we can make every situation a positive. So I am focusing on the blessings of life here in North America and enjoying it fully. I will be on Vancouver Island until the end of May. I’ll keep you posted!

This little girl´s mother died giving birth to her

One night while having dinner in San Marcos, I noticed an older Caucasian woman with a young Guatemalan child. Nosy me was trying to figure out the relationship, as there didn´t seem to be a mother present and this woman was either babysitting or a guardian. Finally, I just asked and wow – what a story.

While this little girl´s mother was giving birth to her, the mother died. The father, unable to take care of the new baby or the older brother, relinquished guardianship of the brother to a grandmother and gave this Caucasian woman who happened to be in the room for the birth, legal guardianship of the new baby.

Talk about an instant change in one´s plans. Unfortunately, because of the woman´s age, the Guatemalan government won´t let her officially the little girl which means she´s either staying in Guatemala for a long time or she will have to relinquish guardianship of the child.

As one of the tenants at Pasajcap on the lake was a midwife from the States, I learned a little bit about maternal mortality here in Guatemala from her, and it isn´t pretty. She had attended two Guatemalan births – one the mother died, the other, the baby died. Legally she wasn´t allowed to assist, but was simply an observer in the room. She felt that both deaths could have been prevented with better supplies and training. Hemorraghing is a major issue as many women are already anemic and midwives are apparently being urged by “modern doctors” to hurry up the delivery of the babies. Babies and mothers are not adapting well to this new method of a process as old as life itself.

From my research online, I learned that the maternal mortality rate in Guatemala remains the highest in all of Central America at 190 deaths per 100,000 live births. On the other hand, in the US, the maternal death rate was 11 maternal deaths per 100,000 live births in 2005

Child mortality in Guatemala ranked the highest of all Central American countries in 1995, with 51 out of every 1,000 dying before the age of five. However, in the past seven years, this number has decreased to 45 out of every 1,000 so we are headed in the right direction, mostly due to the work of many NGOs (non-governmental organizations) in the country.

On one of our last boat trips on Lake Atitlan, I sat beside a young mother with a little boy 3 years old and a young baby of about 6 months. It was nearing dark but she told me that they would have to walk 1 ½ hours home up the mountain to their village home. Dangerous – yes. Isolated – definitely. This problem is one of the reasons for high maternal mortality.

The book “Too far to walk: Maternal mortality in context” explains that isolation and then lack of proper staff and equipment is a problem in the Guatemalan highlands.

It´s one of the reasons that I can only applaud and support the amazing work I have continually witnessed over the last few months. Incredible dedication coupled with a wonderful commitment to helping the Guatemalans has meant that real progress is being made on many fronts.

The example of this little girl who is being so lovingly cared for by a foreigner in her time of need is a perfect example. I´ll be letting you know soon how you can help make a difference. There is lots of work to do here and if we all do a little, it will add up to a lot!

In front of the restaurant overlooking the bay in Santiago

It turned out to be a busy weekend as I continued to explore the lake area. On Saturday morning I headed down to the dock to catch a water taxi to San Pedro where I would catch a second boat over to Santiago. My landlord Pierre, had his boat loaded with cartons of baskets he had designed, had made here in Guatemala and were being sent to a Japanese customer.

Pierre is a designer from Paris and has quite the repertoire of talent. He offered to give me a lift to Panajachel first where he would be dropping off the cartons and then continuing on to Santiago. As it would probably not make any difference in my travel time, I decided to have the adventure of crossing the lake in his small speedboat.

It´s an interesting experience to have the wind in your hair, the spray in your face and be bouncing along the waves with not a life jacket in sight. However, we made it safely to Panajachel where the cartons were picked up by a broker for their journey to Japan. He then warned me that the crossing to Santiago could be scary. Although it doesn´t look dangerous, apparently the entry to the bay is notorious for the high waves and precarious conditions.

Needless to say, I was hanging on but Pierre has been doing this trip for years and handled the big waves well in his small boat. However, I very much appreciated his warning to be sure and take a big boat back to San Pedro. I wouldn´t have known that last year 4 people died coming out of the bay when the captain panicked and tried to turn back in the high waves. It´s certainly not written in the guidebooks or talked about at the docks.

In Santiago I visited Maximon, the rum drinking, cigar smoking idol that has quite the reputation. It was definitely a different experience. I will have some photos posted to my Facebook fan page later this week so watch for those. Then after some wandering through town I headed out by tuktuk to a wonderful restaurant called El Bambu. Right on the bay, I had a front row seat to a beautiful view, great food and even had my first glass of wine for the year. Maybe it was a bit of the nervousness about the boat trip back that prompted the desire. It turned out to be wonderfully relaxing. Then I was off to find the “big” boat to get me safely to San Pedro. Am I ever glad for Pierre´s admonition as we did rock most of the way to San Pedro.

Sunday morning I headed back to San Pedro for market day. I had such a blast as I tried green (unripe)mango and bought another new vegetable I have yet to cook. People love educating me and it helps that I can speak the language fluently enough to get a real conversation going. I talked to old people who had to have my Spanish translated into their native tongue, I carried on conversations with young children and I was taught by the very wise women at the market. It was a wonderful morning.

For those of you familiar with Sacred Gifts, you are probably smiling as you know which of the Sacred Gifts is showing up when I write that. Many of my Sacred Gifts are present when I travel but this one is what makes traveling for me so very special. It´s also why doing a formalized tour is so unappealing. I need to be getting into the lives of the local people, not driving by in a sterilized bus full of other foreigners.

From there I took a tuktuk because my bag of vegetables and fruit must have weighed about 20 pounds. I headed to Zoolas where I had more amazing food and sat and relaxed, reading my book for a couple of hours as I drank wonderful hot chocolate, ate fabulous Israeli food and topped it off with a chocolate and ice cream dessert to live for. I figured that I would be burning off a few calories hauling my groceries up the hundreds of steps to my apartment.

Monday morning I experienced a most incredible body work session in San Marcos where Paul, an English fellow, did things to my body that I have never had done. Wow! He has worked on celebrities, Olympic athletes and high level military personnel just to name a few. Whatever he did, I feel like a new woman. It was almost ridiculous paying him $30 for close to 2 hours of amazing work. Then off for a wonderful lunch at one of my favorite restaurants in San Marcos called Fe.

Today our internet is back to where it should be as we were on and off the fair usage system since last Wednesday. Someone in the building was inadvertently downloading the news off of a little itouch and creating the havoc. At least that´s what it looks like, so hopefully we have resolved the problem and we are back to full speed (at least full speed Guatemala style!). Consequently, I have alot of work to catch up on but there´s blue sky, sun and a fridge full of amazing food to be enjoyed today while I work.

Watch for my newsletter coming out later this week. I think you´ll be surprised at a decision I´ve made. In the meantime, go create your amazing life. It starts with getting clear what it looks like. I was clear that this is what I wanted this year and it´s happening just as I envisioned. Actually even better than I envisioned. You can do the same! So go do it!

I am learning to expect the unexpected here in Guatemala. Nothing has been what I have expected.

The internet is far better than in Mexico, and the Skype lines so far have been clearer than the phone lines in North America. Then Thursday evening I was invited to a “cocktail party” at the owner´s house next door to my suite. I expected a glass of wine and an hour of touristy chitchat. Three hours later, and several bottles of wine later, the group of foreigners staying at the place had discussed everything from energy vortexes, criminal justice in developing countries to the psychic healers in San Marcos. It turned out to be a fascinating evening.

Yesterday I walked into San Marcos, the little town beside me. I have never seen anything quite like it. There is one main road that is the road I had traveled late on Tuesday evening. It hadn´t looked very impressive – a very typical developing country road with little stores, houses and dogs everywhere and I mean everywhere.

However, yesterday as I investigated, there is a complete maze of pathways through the jungle down to the lake that were like something out of Alice in Wonderland. It was remarkable how you could meander down a path and find crystal healers, massage therapists, fabulous restaurants alongside the local people selling their vegetables or sitting and weaving.

It was an unexpected combination of many foreigners and a very local flavor. I had lunch at a restaurant owned by a British couple who gave up making their fortune in Spain with the economic crisis and came with their 3 children to Guatemala. The kids, age 8, 11 and 13 love their life here and are receiving a fabulous education in a private school that rivals what would have cost them a fortune in Europe.

While at the restaurant, a Guatemalan man and his young 10 year old daughter Joanna entered selling nuts. A beautiful selection of macadamia, cashews, pistachios, almonds and peanuts were wonderfully displayed. We conversed for awhile as I tested the produce and then made my purchases. You can see the pictures of them on my Facebook Fan Page. I had no idea Guatemala had such a beautiful selection of nuts. I am in for a treat these next few months.

Last night a storm hit the lake and it was full on with thunder, lightning and heavy rain. Storms at this time of year are not expected and so it came as a complete surprise as we are in the dry season. Well, it was anything but dry last night. The storm lasted almost 2 hours during which time we lost power. Thankfully I had followed the instructions given and had purchased a flashlight just before leaving Mexico. I had my laptop on battery and listening to a recording of a teleclass I had missed as I watched the storm in the dark. It was almost surreal. Thankfully the power came back on as the storm ended.

This morning, my second scorpion showed up in my kitchen sink. This time, unlike the first night when I had one in my bathroom sink, I grabbed the camera before I grabbed my shoe to kill it.

Tomorrow I am planning to head into Panajachel for the Sunday market. It is the largest town on the lake and will be about a 40 minute boat trip from here. It should be an interesting experience. I´ll let you know. I am sure it will be nothing that I expect.

“Are you out of your frickin mind Jan?” No, nobody was asking me that question…except myself. At 9:30 last night, exhausted and cold, having traveled all day and now on the last leg of the journey to the remote area of San Marcos in Guatemala, I was thinking I was absolutely nuts. At 10:30 when I killed the scorpion in my bathroom sink and went straight to bed without even washing my face, I wondered if I had gone too far.

However, this morning when I awoke to this view out of my new home for the next three months, I knew that I was going to be okay. I got unpacked, had a tour of the place with the manager and got on the water taxi that stopped at our private dock and went to San Pedro, a small village across the lake.

Although I had been picked up at the airport by a private driver who took me to the equivalent of Costco and another supermarket to pick up my groceries, I had been able to use my debit Visa to make all the purchases. I now needed local currency.

San Pedro has the closest ATM machine which thankfully dispensed 1000 quetzales (about $120 US). After a fabulous lunch of a falafel sandwich that was amazing and another shopping spree in a tiny store that boasted a better selection of Oriental food than the Safeway in Sedona, it was back home for a swing in the hammock and some sun.

Look forward to sharing with you over the next few months. Don´t forget that there is still an opportunity to support a fabulous charity that does great work here in Guatemala and get the best selling book Overcomers Inc. True Stories of Hope, Courage and Inspiration. Make a difference this Christmas while being inspired yourself.