"What are you grateful for?"

"What are you grateful for?" 

Mr. Brinkley asked as we rode for an hour down a broken road in a very old school buss. 

Passing fields and tiny houses. Some made from the trees found nearby, and some from tin scraps. We were on our way to the Lamanai, a Mayan archaeological site in Belize. 

Just because it was "in Belize" didn't mean it was close by. 

An hour boat ride from San Pedro to a small village, which actually just acquired electricity last week! 

Next, an hour buss ride to another village in Belize, which then lead us to another hour boat ride up the New River to the Lamanai site. 

The Jordan Hall history lesson of the Mayan & ,Lamanai goes something like this. 

The Mayans supposedly originated from Asia. During the last ice age, polar ice caps made it so you could walk between Siberia and Alaska, this being called the "Bering Strait Theory". 

The reason the Maya people are called the Mayans is because when the Spaniards came by boat and approached the people on land, who we now call the Mayans, the Mayan people had no clue what the Spaniards were saying because of the language barrier. They responded to the Spaniards with "Mayan". So the Spaniards then went back and began telling people that they had now found the "Mayan" people. 

The Mayan civilization collapsed in the late 18th century for unknown reasons. Some say disease, some say natural disaster, but the most common known theory is over population. Archaeologist assume around this time that there were over 1 million Mayans living in these ancient cities. 

Our tour guide pointed out something about every single tree or plant as we walked about a mile to visit each ruin. It was Kayla who then noticed something amazing about the forest. There was a use for every single plant or tree that we had passed. The Mayan people found cures for everything they ever suffered from, just by using what the forest had given them. 

As the day progressed I thought back to what Mr. Brinkley had said to us hours before on our bumpy buss ride. 

I am grateful for Elmer's glue, Otherwise I would have to go outside, climb a tree to find a cakletin plant, bring it back down from the tree, open it, and then begin gluing. 

I am grateful for North American septic systems, so that I may flush my toilet paper down the toilet. 

I am grateful for free water at restaurants, air conditioned classrooms, and completely paved roads.  

I am grateful for so much more than what I can even wrap my head around. 

Just because someone doesn't have something that you do, doesn't make them any lesser. We are given so much from the very day we are born. The people here are grateful for everything that they do have, and don't spend time wishing they had what they don't.