¡Pase adelante!

I’ve been slacking in the writing a bit, but only because before I felt there wasn’t enough information to fill a whole entry (an interesting entry at least), but now I think I have collected enough juicy tidbits to keep you reading.

So the weekend before this last one, not much was really done as we were tired and Ryan was kind of sick. We stuck around Xela for the most part. I went to two poetry readings with a girl named Sofie from Quebec who lives in the house as well. (Maybe I’ll get to practice my French too.) It was pretty fun. The poets weren’t half-bad either, and really rather friendly. I hope similar events are on the horizon.

Last week was another fairly typical week: volunteering for Trama, teaching the three students English who sometimes show up and sometimes don’t, and translating here and there. My last student of each day, Alicia, makes me laugh. She thinks her English is really bad, but in reality, hers is the best of all three of my students. She let me borrow a CD of music she likes in a style she calls “bachata.” Anyway, it’s pretty lousy, and maybe I can make her see the error of her ways? Doubtful, but worth a shot. Maybe I’ll make her a CD under the guise of “this will help you learn English”, when really it will help her music tastes… ha.

The last week also contained Carnaval on Tuesday, what in New Orleans would be called “Mardi Gras”. It’s kind of sad that I lived in New Orleans for a while but never even got to experience a Mardi Gras, but oh well. This fair has been set up next to el Parque Calvario in my neighborhood for the past two weeks or so, for Catholic-fueled party purposes, I think. So we went down last Tuesday to see what all the fuss was about. It was full of people and seemed like it would really be quite fun. Music in the air, street food, homemade traditional candies, even a ferris wheel! But of course, it couldn’t be that fun that easily. No. Soon we started seeing groups of adolescent boys going around throwing handfuls of flour at nervous passerbys. And of course I was lucky enough to be on the receiving end of said flour attacks at least three times. My sweater and head were splattered with white (yes, even moreso than my hair usually is), and needless to say, I didn’t want to stay long. I just have this hang-up where I don’t enjoy things being thrown in my face.. call me crazy. It felt like escaping from a war, as we hurried through the crowds to get back onto the street towards the house. On a happier note, some of the homemade candies are quite tasty. In fact, I think I’ll eat one now. Mmm.

With the week behind us, Ryan and I decided it was high time to take off again, our destination this time being Lake Atitlán. I had wanted to visit the Lake for quite some time, so I was pretty excited. It’s supposed to be one of the most beautiful lakes in the world, and it definitely lived up to its reputation. We took off Friday morning, having to take several buses to get close to the lake, as I’m guessing a direct one wasn’t available at the time we left (there is not bus schedule posted anywhere…). Since the bus stopped off in the traditional town of Sololá, and as it was their market day, we decided to check it out a little. It was huge and quite a sight. If we had been feeling more up to it, we would have spent more time there, but as we were anxious to get to the Lake, we hopped on another bus,--this time for Panajachel. This is where I caught my first glimpse of the lake, on our descent down the hills into town. I had seen plenty of pictures of it before, but still its beauty took me by surprise. Pictures don’t do it justice.

We soon arrived in Pana, a city we had been warned to avoid spending much time in by at least several people due to its strong touristy vibe, but still came to anyway. For one thing, buses from Xela get to the lake either through Panajachel or San Pedro La Laguna, and we figured the western side of the lake would be for our next visit. So while Pana was much more touristy than most parts of Guatemala we’ve seen so far and even rather obnoxious at times, it was still something to be seen, occasionally amusing, and overlooking the most beautiful body of water I have ever seen, so for now it’s forgiven.




We ambled through the streets of Panajachel, eventually finding a place to eat lunch. One of the nice things about Pana, was that there was a fair amount of good places to eat. We happily took advantage of this, eating at a Uruguayan restaurant, a little crepe place, and a place that had good pita sandwiches (not all at the same time of course). We joked that going to the lake was our vacation away from Guatemala. Many tourists walked around wearing their big khaki floppy hats and cameras around their necks. This was the first time I saw a fair amount of families on vacation in this country, wearing their Mayan-woven scarves and Tikal Petén t-shirts they picked up from street vendors.

The next day we woke up fairly early to catch a lancha (little boat) across the lake to the town of Santiago Atitlán. I’d read a fair amount about Santiago, so I was all geared up. While Santiago is a much more traditional town than Panajachel, there were also many tourists, and lamentably a fair amount of the villagers play to this. We got into town around 8 AM, and we did not go unnoticed, as a man wearing the traditional Santiago shorts sauntered up to us and badgered us about staying at some hotel, and proceeded to follow us for several minutes after we’d said, “No, Gracias” and other discouraging things at least 10 times. Some of these people would make fantastic telemarketers, I’m telling you. I think he was particularly persistent because we must have been the first gringos of the day. Hah.

We wandered around the town, eventually finding the old church. Inside were statues of saints wearing various gowns and really gaudy scarves. We had read in my guidebook that if you go down to dock you could rent a canoe and go out to this nature reserve close by. We decided to investigate this. The second you get even close to the dock various workers approach you and say, “Pana? San Pedro?” thinking you want to catch a lancha to one of those towns. But, no. This other really eager man in a cowboy hat, purple shirt, and traditional Santiago shorts kept asking us things in broken Spanish, saying he would take us in his canoe to some place we couldn’t understand. He was more persistent than the first guy, if that’s believable. We finally told him we wanted to rent a canoe, and that we wanted to go alone. He agreed on my lowered price and we lightly stepped into the reed-strewn wooden boat. With one paddle in each of our hands, we set out, away from the dock, or at least we tried. I think I’d only been in a canoe once before, when I was maybe 11 on a school field trip in 5th grade, so I was a bit out of sorts. We finally got the hang of it, and awkwardly maneuvered further from the shore. Many strange looks were shot our way from villagers in other canoes, and one man looked at me and laughed, “lanchera!” meaning it was funny to see a woman rowing. The old woman in the canoe then pointed and laughed and said something in what I’m guessing was Tz’utujil.



Then as we curved around the bend, our friendly Santiago Atitlán helper appeared amongst some reeds. He shouted something intelligible that sounded like “Ixca!” I have no idea. We paddled closer to figure out what he was talking about. We had wanted to see this weaving museum earlier, and it had been closed, so I think he was talking about there being a museum and it was open now, but I don’t think it was the same one. Basically, I think he was trying to get his canoe back early.. not so fast, buddy. So we just thanked him for telling us and said we wanted to stay in the canoe more, though. He skipped away towards the dock again, hunting for more gringos.

We eventually got a handle on the rowing, but still the canoe would occasionally turn in circles. Tourists passing in lanchas took our pictures as we struggled towards what we thought was the little nature reserve. By the time we got close to it, nearly two hours had already passed, and there didn’t really seem to be much to see, so we began our trip back to the dock. The scenery was absolutely stunning: crystal blue water, volcanoes looming immediately ahead of us, surrounded by mountains on all sides.




The trip back was also difficult because by now our muscles were starting to get quite sore. My butt hurt from sitting on a coke crate, my arms from constantly shoving a paddle into the water. In between moans I would shout, “left!” “right!” “no, left!” And we felt like shipwrecked sailors disbelievingly rowing with frantic energy when the dock appeared in sight again. The wind and constant presence of the lanchas skimming across the water made it more of a fight, but doggonit if we didn’t make it back alive. Quite shaky and sore—but alive.

The crazy guide popped out of nowhere again and helped us steady the canoe onto land as we hobbled out. He then got in the canoe immediately with a little boy and they began rowing away to who knows where.

Feeling like conquering heroes, Ryan and I followed the road back into town where we stopped in the tiny weaving museum that was now open. It was pretty tiny but interesting nonetheless. Further up the road, all the stalls were set up with the folks from Santiago Atitlán getting ready to sell things to hordes of tourists, who had finally arrived. Every little stall you pass by you are tempted with the phrase, “Pase adelante!” (Come in!) as if it’s some sort of spell they cast to will people into their stores. Meanwhile young men stroll past you playing the same few notes on a wooden flute before saying, “flauuuuta.” (flute)

We decided that we finally needed to start buying gifts for people, and maybe some wall hangings for ourselves?—knowing that we can’t buy anything too bulky since we have to think about bag space. I’ll probably be getting rid of lots of unecessary possessions to make room for my new purchases. So after a while of climbing up and down a hill, being tourists, and figuring out what we were interested in, I bartered with a woman for a pretty woven wall hanging. (Ryan later put on a great show and bought one from San Catarina for a good price in Panajachel.) Satisfied, we caught the next lancha back to Pana, as there was more assortment of lodging over there. (our room for the night ended up costing us only 25 quetzales each—that’s about $3.00!)



We watched the sun set over the lake and ate some pie in the street. At 5 AM we were woken up by what sounded like 34 roosters practicing for their choir ensemble recital later that day. God bless them. Every one.

So-the next day, we got up pretty early (remember, the roosters), and headed down to lake one last time. We finally found the public beach of sorts. I was surprised to not really see any foreign tourists around, but instead many Guatemalans, and even a class practicing swimming. Close to the shore was a group of people singing songs about Jesus while a band played. The water was too icy cold for my liking, so I just sat and watched Ryan shiver in the water for a bit. There were really only two other boys swimming. Maybe it got warmer later.



We then soaked up our remaining few hours in Panajachel with a desayuno típico and more window shopping. The bus back to Xela was rather painless and fast considering others we’ve taken… And that about wraps it up. Next time we go to the lake (and there will be a next time) I think we’ll hit up the western side more around San Pedro, San Juan, and San Marcos. Yes.

Until next time.

Diversiones con volcanes y otros cuentos

This past weekend Ryan and I decided that we would just stay in Xela and take a day trip or two. So on Saturday we set out for destination Laguna Chicabal, which is a lake inside of a crater of an old volcano. Interesting, eh? It’s also a very spiritual place for the Maya people, and there are often altars and ceremonies taking place on the shores of the laguna. It wasn’t until we would attempt the hike itself that I would realize how painfully out of shape I am. The hike also reminded that me that I do in fact have asthma.

First things first, we made our way to the ole Minerva bus terminal and were ushered to a bus that would supposedly take us to San Martín Sacetepéquez. This bus didn’t seem right from the beginning. It was already practically full by the time we got on it, and people were saving seats for other people, which I’ve never seen happen before. Then the bus sat for at least half an hour, when these buses claim to leave every 15 minutes.. hmm.. We finally got on the road, already sitting three to a seat with people standing in the aisles. This didn’t bode well. On account of our hardly being able to see out of the windows and the simple fact that the driver never announced stops or where we were, we missed our stop in San Martín. I began to get suspicious when I had seen some sign saying “Laguna Chicabal” and the vegetation greeting my gazes through the windows was becoming increasingly more tropical in appearance. If we hadn’t gotten off we would have probably ended up at the Pacific coast in several hours. And I didn’t have my bug spray.

We asked our seat neighbors and they verified that we had in fact missed our stop and told us to get off the bus and catch one going the other way. They helped us shout to the driver to stop. So with everyone on the bus staring at us, we squeezed past them all (and I mean squeezed) and waited by the side of the road bordering a family’s small house and farm (where roosters were crowing and chickens were clucking) to wait for the next bus.

When the next bus picked us up, the money collector told us it was 10Q each to the laguna which didn’t make much sense cause we’d only paid 5Q from Xela and it was probably the same distance. I was too annoyed and confused to argue though, so the scoundrel wrangled an extra 10Q from us. I hope he feels proud.

This time we didn’t miss our stop and got off at the sign I had originally seen. We started our trek through a village within San Martín. A little child holding a ball looked at me and said very deliberately “Tu tienes gafas!” (You have glasses) I just said “Sí.” There wasn’t much else to say.

We continued on past women doing their weekly wash, more chickens, and watermelons. The views of the mountainous countryside were quite breathtaking at times, but unfortunately the clouds later obscured them. We had to stop and sit down several times so I could catch my breath. The hike was much steeper than I thought it would be for some reason… you would think that the word “volcano” would have triggered some kind of clue, but I guess not. I’m thinking I won’t be lining up to climb Volcán Santa María anytime soon.

After an hour and a half or so, (I couldn’t keep track of the time), we reached the actual entrance to the park where we had to pay our entrance fee. There were bathrooms, some little cabins, a soccer field, and what we thought was a comedor. It turns out it was just some little kitchen that a bunch of Australians were using, though. Go figure. There are many Australians in Guatemala. I find this interesting.

Anyway, now we began the actual hike towards the laguna—cause it was only make-believe before. We later realized that a microbus would take you from San Martín up to this entrance, but oh well. As we began the second leg of our hike, a little puppy started to follow us, which of course gave me great joy. I fed it two of my little tortino limón chips so he would be my friend forever, but alas, he eventually dashed off the trail into the woods. I guess he had better things to do.



We struggled up the path, (well I was doing most of the struggling), the steep, steep dirth path, past hikers on their way back down and little boys herding sheep and carrying wood on their backs. In spite of the beautiful lush plant life surrounding us, I was beginning to make my own pacts with the Mayan gods, if they would only find it in their hearts to make the path level off, just a little. Somehow, eventually, it did just that—before I even had to do any sacrifical bloodletting.



The rest of the hike was actually steeply downhill, which I knew would not be too fun on the return trip. As we finally saw the lake in the distance, and then landed upon the shores, it felt like some bad scene in a movie when the wanderer in the desert finally finds an oasis. I’m glad it wasn’t a mirage. We basked in the beauty and tranquility of the lake, finding ourselves a little picnic table near its shores where we could finally enjoy our little lunch. Since it was already about 3:00 pm at this point, there weren’t many people at the lake anymore. It was eerily quiet except for the sound of birds.

Here you can see a few pictures of the laguna, the mist settling over it from time to time, Mayan religious offerings in the form of flowers:








Unfortunately, we couldn’t linger at the lake long, because the park would be closing soon, and we had to catch us a bus back to Xela. As expected, the return hike began painfully as well, since what was downhill the first way, was now uphill. That soon passed, though, and the remainder of the trip was overwhelmingly downhill. We got back to the road in nearly half the time, but not before a little boy turned to us and said “Hola”, an then looked at Ryan and said, “Jari Póter.” Yes, even small isolated Guatemalan indigenous children think Ryan looks like Harry Potter. Ugh.

We waited by the side of the road for the damn bus again. When we saw it coming down the road towards us, we hailed it, but the driver just waved and kept driving! It was that same company as the other two buses we’d had problems with earlier in the day. We didn’t have too long to be annoyed or frustrated, however, because immediately after the bus left us in the dust, quite literally, a toyoto pick-up truck, (or picop as the Guatemalans would say), pulled over and asked us if we needed a ride to Xela. !!! The woman looked pretty trustworthy, so without allowing ourselves too much time to think it over, we hopped in the back of the picop, next to a strange plant and two other men trying to get somewhere—and that’s how I hitchhiked for the first time in my life. I felt just like Jack Kerouac, except in Guatemala and without the drinking problem… or maybe like Sissie Hankshaw but without the oversized thumbs and a love of cowgirls. Right, you get the idea.

It was amazing how much more visibility of our surroundings we had, sitting in the open air of the truck, flying down the road. It wasn’t too uncomfortable, and it was even better when the first two men left and we were able to take their spots.



We were back to Xela in no time. We hopped out of the truck, and asked the woman how much we owed her, to which she replied, nothing. Dumbstruck, we relayed our thanks, and they zoomed back down the road. It was reaffirming to encounter such kind folks after the rudeness we were met with from the likes of the Xelaju bus company.

After the long, strenuous day, we decided to indulge in a pizza. Ryan had found some coupon that claimed to give you one free medium pizza at pizza hut. We tried it out, but the employee informed us that all it was good for was one specialty pizza, and instead of the regular 104Q price it would be 94Q… We didn’t see how that made any sense, so we just left, and got a cheaper pizza at the Dominoes in the mall. Take that. It even came with free brownies.

And that concludes the story of how for the first time in my life I climbed a volcano, hitchhiked, and ate lime flavored tortino corn chips in the same day. (Okay that last thing isn’t that important, but I needed a third thing.)

Everything else has been going fine, for the most part. We have been meeting a few other people who live in this house, one who is a girl from Quebec who is pretty nice and has her own juicer, and the other is a guy from Toronto who has been for a year, making enough to live on by playing online poker for a few hours a day. Incredible.

On Sunday we were going to take another day trip but we too worn out from the hike to do much. We instead saw El ultimo rey de Escocia (The last king of Scotland) It was good but sad.

For Trama, I’m doing more research and I might start interviewing women in some of the villages that make up the cooperative, which I’m excited about.

I teach three English classes a day now from 4-7, and I’m hoping to pick up another one at 3. We’ll see. My level one student didn’t show up yesterday, and I wouldn’t be too sad if he didn’t come back, as teaching him is quite a struggle. He’s either not trying or just really slow. I like my other two students, though.

I’m missing everyone a lot, as is inevitable, and I hope everyone is doing well. Come visit me?

My legs still hurt from the hike.

Dos Quetzalitos no es Caro

Well, things are on a roll down here in the Guatemala. Ryan and I moved into a new room last Thursday within the same guesthouse. While this one is a little more expensive, it has a private bathroom, which is much nicer. The water in the shower was actually almost too hot last night. How things change…

When we first moved in, however, the toilet wasn’t flushing, there was no shower curtain, and I woke up with what I assume were tiny bug bites on my arms, thumb, and legs. Since then, all of these things have been remedied for the most part. We have been washing our clothes by hand here. And it’s not so bad, but the cold water is piercing to my hands in the morning. I’m not sure how thoroughly clean everything is getting... I’ll have to look up washing clothes by hand on the internet, I suppose. How funny.

Oh also, this special picture hangs on our wall:



As far as our daily tasks, teaching English has been getting a little easier, although I still feel slightly inept. The students don’t seem to notice or at least don’t demonstrate noticing thus far. Starting today we have four different classes (all consisting of one student), so we’re going to see what splitting up the classes is like. Ryan will take the ones in the morning, and I’ll take the afternoon ones for now. More classes might be on the way, as well.

I’m enjoying the volunteering with Trama Textiles. Ola, the volunteer coordinator, gave me a giant coffee table-like book to read called The Maya Textile Tradition. It’s full of gorgeous photographs and has been really interesting so far. The more I read about Mayan history, and the history of this country in general, the more disgusted I am to read how the people have been treated, exploited, etc. for centuries, basically since the arrival of the Spanish up to the CIA-backed coup, the civil war that followed, and the present-day situation where indigenous people are generally poor and the majority of the land is owned by a wealthy 2% of the country. Then again, I’m also fascinated and reassured by the fact that their traditions and ways of life have stood up against all that for so long; that they haven’t gone out the same way that most Native Americans in the US have. Their weavings are a great example of this, and I’m really eager to learn more about it all.

And as a bonus, here you can see the view from the Trama balcony:




Last weekend Ryan and I decided to take a trip up north. It looks like on most weekends we’ll be doing some kind of traveling, whether leaving altogether or just taking little daytrips. So this time we headed up to the Cuchumatanes mountains. We mainly wanted to go to Todos Santos Cuchumatán, but in order to that, you first have to take a bus from Xela to Huehuetenango, (called simple Huehue by most), which is a good 2.5 hour ride. The ride to Todos Santos is an additional 2-2.5 hours. And since we couldn’t leave til around 1 pm due to an English class at 11 am, we decided to just stay the night in Huehuetenango and then head out to Todos Santos in the morning. Mistake.

The bus ride was mostly unmemorable compared to other rides we’ve had. I fell asleep through part of it, and this little brat wearing a Barney hat, (yes), sat down next to us for a while, taking up the majority of the seat.

We found Huehue fairly unlikeable. It made me appreciate Xela that much more and thank the high heavens that we are not living in Huehue. It was unbelievably traffic-filled with the sound of car horns ever-present. The one redeeming part of the city was its semi-attractive main plaza/park/church. We ate in a restaurant that was not half-bad either. They specialized in steaks and Chinese food. I was sold by the fact that they had ceviche, which I had not yet formally tried. It was quite tasty and you can see a picture of it below.. mmm.. along with the “café con leche” that Ryan and I ordered, which was really more like milk with a slight coffee flavor added.. ?



The hotel really just topped the evening off. Granted, it was dirt cheap, (around US $4 each), but the room was the size of a tiny cubicle, with only a little more space allotted in addition to that used for the bed itself. And the bed felt like sleeping on a wooden panel with an irregular bump in the middle… Needless to say, we were ready to wake up early and catch a bus to Todos Santos.

We were unsure of the bus times, so we woke up around 6 and first tried to find a bus or microbus that would take us to the crazy Huehue bus terminal. After waiting for 10 minutes on a corner and realizing we were in fact waiting for a bus to come the other way down a one-way street, we found where the buses actually pass and hopped on. Once we got to the bus station, we were dismayed to learn that the next bus to Todos Santos didn’t leave until 10:30 AM. At this point it wasn’t even quite 7. So…we took yet another bus back to the city and wandered about, eventually getting quite the large breakfast at a little restaurant called El Jardin. Eventually, we took another bus back to the good ole bus terminal, purchased our bus ticket, and just sat on the bus. Todos Santos really isn’t that far from Huehue, but it takes several hours due to the unpaved-ness of the road that leads up into the Cuchumatanes. This time we thankfully had one seat to ourselves, and were amused/embarrassed by an older American couple sitting in a seat one row up. The man somehow didn’t even realize where they were headed. He exclaimed, “So, we headed to the border today?” To which his wife responded, “No, that’s tomorrow! Today we’re going to To-dos Saaantos. It’s in the book. It must be important.” Unbelievable. She also put her hands over her ears towards the end of trip for who knows what reason and stared back at several children on the bus, giving them big goofy over the top grins. God bless America indeed.

After several hours we found ourselves in the lovely little Mam-speaking town of Todos Santos. The scenery was gorgeous. As the day went on, the weather got rather chilly, which was most unfortunate as the day before I had accidentally left my sweater in a bus. Oops. We started to explore the city, stopping in a little weaving co-op where I bought a lovely woven purse on sale. It was a nice shop as all the money from sales went directly to the women who made the weavings. I liked how each item had a little sticker on it with the name of the women who had made it.

We then wandered around some more, catching the tail end of the market, and strolling into the plaza where the inevitable church sat, a friendly reminder of Spanish colonization. We watched the men and women in their traditional dress, while many stray dogs ran around searching for food. The men all wore jackets with stripes with differently woven collars adorning each. Their pants were striped vertically with red and white, and atop their heads sat hats with brims, with a studded band around the middle, covered with strips of blue felt. It was interesting to see men all wearing traditional dress for once, since nowadays in the majority of Guatemala, that is quite rare. It is very common for women, but I have read that men often receive harassment if they were the traditional dress in certain areas. Todos Santos is unique in some ways however, as it was more or less isolated until the 1960s, and thus the people of the village have been able to retain their traditions easier.





Deciding to take the book’s advice, we followed this one cobblestone road up, past women washing their clothes and roosters and turkeys, and kids kicking soccer balls in the street. At the end of the road, was an old site where some Mayan rituals are still performed. There were several grass mounds, crosses, and fires burning. Once we reached the top, it really started to dawn on me how much I was enjoying the town of Todos Santos. It had such a tranquil feel to it. From up at the top of this hill, we could look across and see the entire town sitting down below in the valley, surrounded by the Cuchumatanes.







We began our descent down a smaller path, passing more turkeys on the way.



We decided to get a little snack of street food, before getting dinner later, as we hadn’t eaten since our giant breakfast. We went up to a stand that said Huehueburger and ordered one “hot dog pequeño.” Little did we know what this would entail. We were in for the surprise of a lifetime! The good man proceeded to split a hot dog in two and throw it on the grill. Then! He took out some tomatoes and onions and threw them in as well. Wow. But wait, there’s more. To our befuddled amazement, he then laid a hot dog bun on the grill to toast it. And and and! Then!—he spread something that we think was like 1000 island dressing on the bun itself! Following this, hot dog, tomatoes, and onions were all scooped into said bun in a single swoop. That’s it, you ask? No, I’m not done. The good sir then squirted something resembling ketchup, a green chile sauce, and mayonnaise on this smothered piece of meat. Ok, now I’m done. The verdict? Delicious—no, life-changing. Get yourself one of these succulent little babies today.

Whoo, ok. Now that I got that out, Ryan and I wandered into this Spanish school across from the little hotel we were staying at, to see if they had any information about bus times for the following morning. Well they didn’t really. But the girl who worked at the school was quite nice and American as well, and ended up showing us a documentary made partly in the late 70s and then the 80s about Todos Santos. It was most informative and at times quite startling and depressing to watch—mostly the second part which dealt more with the situation in the town during the Civil War years when the guerillas and army would both come into the town and tear them apart. It’s really sad, and though this essentially over now, the fear still remains somewhat. To this day it seems like people do not want to talk about what or express an opinion about what happened, out of a fear that they will be killed.

After watching the documentary, we were again hungry. (Though the hot dog pequeño was in fact delicious, it did not fill us up completely.) We stopped in the comedor Martita nearby, and sat at a table with some Todosanteños. We ordered some pollo frito and were soon joined by another couple who had just watched the documentary as well. We had an enjoyable enough conversation and then went back to the hotel.

And that about sums it up for our time in Todos Santos. The hotel room was much nicer than the night before… we did spend 10 quetzales more on it, though.. (about a $1.00) so maybe that has something to do with it.

The next day we again woke up early and caught a bus right away back to the dreaded Huehuetenango. This time however, we prepared. (Actually I don’t know what I mean by that. It sounded like the thing to say, though.) Before catching a bus back to Xela, we decided we might as well see these so-called Mayan ruins nearby called Zaculeu. We first picked up some slices of pizza from a stand called Pizza Movil so that we could have a little picnic at the ruins. Well, we caught the bus that we thought went to the ruins. (You know, when you hear someone shouting “Zaculeu, ruinas” you think they’re going to the ruins… huh) We told the driver that we were going to “las ruinas” so eventually the driver just stopped the bus and shouted “ruinas” which was our clue to get off. As we were getting off the bus, various passengers just sort of stared at us and we were not sure why. Well, we soon realized that we were not at the ruins. We followed the road up and asked a woman where they were. She said we just had to follow the road. So… we walked for about 10 minutes and realized we had just gotten the lazy bus or something because other buses went right up to the ruins. Eventually we reached our destination.

We were greeted by a man in uniform who asked us what country we were from. We later realized that this was because that on Sundays, Guatemalans get in for free. This would also explain why there was a fair amount of people visiting the ruins that day. While apparently Zaculeu are not some of the most impressive of the Mayan ruins comparatively, they were the first ones I’ve ever seen, so I was an easy sell. Plus, we figure it’s best to start at the bottom and work our way up to Copan (maybe), Tikal, and Chichen Itzá (maybe). Zaculeu was partially restored by the United Fruit Company some years ago, which means they went through and basically covered the ruins with plaster. So, this isn’t so cool since you can no longer see any original engravings on the ruins, but I guess it does give you more of the exact shape the ruins would have originally have had. Anyway, below you can see a picture of the ruins:



After the Zaculeu trip, we went back to the Huehue bus terminal for the last time and caught a bus back to Xela. The same man boarded the bus twice to try and sell people the newspaper “Nuestro Diairo.” We was very insistent and said things like “Dos quetzalitos no es caro!” (2 little quetzals aren’t expensive.) It was funny. Just me? Ok. This bus ride was strange in that the bus driver began by driving very very slowly. We still don’t know why. Then after maybe 10-15 minutes, his energy drink must have kicked in, because he began zooming down the road, going faster than I’ve ever seen a bus go before. It was a bit frightening. I just tried not to look at the road and stared into the Su Doku puzzle in my lap. He would also just lean on the horn as he spun around the curves of the road—I guess warning everyone who might be coming around the bend that he was on the way, and insane. Somehow we made it back alive. And in record time! Hey.



That’s the gist for now. Time is going by fast as expected. I’ve also begun doing some translating work from English to Spanish for another volunteer organization called AMA (Asociacion de las Mujeres del Altiplano). I’m not sure if I’m going to keep up with it or not though.

Teaching English is still going okay. One of my students is very young and doesn’t know any English though, so I’m basically teaching him from scratch, which is a bit of a challenge. Maybe he’s not as young as I thought though, cause his cell phone has gone off in class.. hmm.

Also—Thai food in Guatemala: not bad.

I leave you with that.