I start my first day on the farm with Shad killing one of his goats for thanksgiving dinner. I tried going up at 5am to see him but as I got lost I came up with someone who tried to give me directions before. I can’t actually remember the guys name unfortunately. He was a really nice guy though. I get shown where the farm is but the goat slaughter already took place. It wasn’t a pretty one apparently. Shad had to bash the goat 3 times before it stopped moving. Though when he had to slit the throat the animal started convulsing which meant it wasn’t dead before. The other volunteers were either helping shad cut the meat or helping skin the hide.

I stood by and chatted to everyone about general stuff. By now it was 7:30 or so and we decided to go back to the hostel for breakfast. We walk down the rocky road and stop by a tienda to buy eggs, bananas and potatoes to make hash brown type thing.

We talk for about stuff and we establish that I probably won’t be making a website and that everyone is a little tired of working on the farm and living in the hostel which has basically nothing.

This is where I really regret signing up for woofing. My high expectations and hopes where brought down to reality. Sometimes an advert on a website might not explain everything in real terms, such as the state of the hostel or whats type of work you’ll actually be doing. I suppose its not Shads fault but its something I will take with a pinch of salt in the future.

We’re expected back on the farm at 5pm or so as Shad is having thanksgiving with his friends and the employees on his farm and will celebrate with the volunteers later.

I find that the guy who lead me upto the farm is a chef and has bought food to cook for us to eat. So we spend the next few hours peeling potatoes, sweet potatoes, dicing garlic and generally assisting the chef to prepare the food. I’ve never had thanks giving food before and we make mash potato, sweet potato mash with marshmallows, runner beans with mushroom gravy soup and vegetable gravy.

It come to 4pm and we start to take the food up to the farm. When I get there, Shad’s guests are all pretty drunk and there are leftovers from their first thanksgiving dinner. There really isn’t any electricity so we have to use candles and torches to see what we’re doing. We warm the food we prepared in Shad’s oven and have our dinner. Shad made sausages from the goat intestine and meat, and it tasted pretty good! A few of the volunteers have brought instruments to play for everyone and all the Americans have a sing along. I’m not too versed in their music so I just enjoy the ambience.

I felt quite out of place while having dinner. So I decide that I wanna leave the very next day, to go to Panachel and then to where else I pick. It was a little fun celebrating with the Americans but as they’re all tired of working on the farm, I saw little point in staying any longer.

Some you win, some you lose. In this event, I lost money and gained a few days as I was supposed to be here for a week.

The next day we just chill out at the hostel and sun bathe. This is when I receive my “local” tan colour. The sun in that area was hooot. But not too hot that its not tolerable. In the afternoon I tell everyone I’m leaving and pack my things in preparation to travel.

After the hot springs, reality comes back and hits us as he needs to plan his flight back. He’d been researching prices for flights home for a while and waited til last minute to book. A few days earlier he booked a flight but it was removed because he couldn’t verify his purchase as he didn’t have his phone on him to receive a call from his bank.

In the end, I used my debit card to buy his ticket as I told my bank I was using my card overseas. This took a while to do aond it wasn’t til the late afternoon where we left the hostel for some food. We found a cheap as chips burger place. There were some locals in there already so it couldn’t be bad. 2 burgers for only Q20! Thats £2 for 2 double burgers! I saw another deal for 3 chorizo burgers for Q20! We got them and chips and we were stuffed. So much so I coulsdnt finish my 3rd burger. There was one thing about the burgers, they didn’t seem to have been cooked properly. Like the meat was a little pink inside. The patty was thin but it seemed, ‘normal’. We left the burger place and went to purchase Naz’ shuttle bus to Mexico. A homeless guy was outside so I have him my burger. After Naz’ bought the ticket we went outside and the home guy was still there. He didn’t finish the burger! A mouthful was left! Maybe even he knew it was a bad burger!

Naz leaving hit me quite hard. Partner in crime, best bud leaving me to venture central america on my own. I know this trip was supposed to be mine, but it was more enjoyable with him along. We’ve done south east Asia together and 4 weeks of Mexico and Guatemala. I didn’t really want him to go, but ‘you gotta do what you gotta do’. We all have our own agendas and it is a pity he had ton leave early.

It is very true that I will meet other travellers, but having someone you know so well travel with you and share experiences is awesome. Its like when you’re back home and you go out for drinks. You wanna share the experience with your friends. Likewise I wanted to share the future experiences with him too. The reason why you share your photos is to show people who couldn’t be there what you were doing. ‘Wish you were here’ means you want that person there with you, sharing the moment.

Still, now I’m back to what I originally planned on doing: travelling round central america on my own, being uncomfortable, learning from my mistakes and showing the world that travelling makes you a good human being. That’s the most important aspect of this trip. Proving that by going to foreign lands you find patience, humility and respect to others, that make you a better human being than if you stayed at home. Someone I know has travelled the world, yet is the total opposite of what I thought they would have become. I’m here to prove that travelling makes you a better person. To prove her wrong.