Summer Reading

With the end of summer also comes an end of me actually finishing novels. During the school year I usually spend my reading time just trying to keep up with our barrage of magazines. But in the summer, and particularly if I travel, I read a lot. And on my trip I got caught up with a whole bunch of books I've been meaning to finish for a while. Below are quotes from ones I read. Please comment on any you have an opinion on, or just share a particularly good book your read this summer.

Saul Bellow: The Victim "'I say you're entirely to blame, Levanthal.'"

Robert Rosenberg: this is not civilization "The idea of using porn films to encourage dairy cows to breed was a poor one."

John Fante: Ask The Dust "Don't call me a son of a bitch! I am Bandini, Arturo Bandini!"

Ismail Kadare: Broken April "Half an hour later, they brought the man's body. Following the custom, they had him on a litter made of four beet branches. Some still hoped that he was not dead. The victim's father waited at the door of his house. When the men bearing his son were forty paces off, he called: 'What have you brought me? A wound or a death?'"

Jonathan Lethem: The Fortress of Solitude "His skully boards were straight and clean, the four corners numbered elegantly, one, two, three, four, the winner's zone in the center embellished with a double circle, his own innovation. This, like his choice of slate, became institutional, so much that one day Lonnie and Marilla scoffingly insisted it had always been that way, and Dylan's authorship of the double-ringed winner's circle was permanently obscured."

Copan

Guatemala fun fact #3: There are over 20 Mayan languages still spoken in Guatemala...

But our last stop left us right over the border in the Hunduran town of Copan. Copan, not to be confused with the Guatemalan jungle town Coban or the popular beach spot Copaniquestravista, was our favorite city on the trip. The draw there is the Mayan ruins and they are known in particular for their killer stellae (see right photo). And, as was repeated numerous times in various books and displys, Tikal and Chichi(rodriguez)nista might have the bigger buildings, but Copan had the better artists.; Tikal was the New York to Copan's bohemian Paris. Take that Tikal! You want some! It also was very uncrowded, which might be damning praise, but made it very nice. Strolling and climbing through ruins is much cooler when there are very few people around. The town itself was great as well, small and relaxed and beautiful.

But one kind of funny things happened to me. I would like to preface this story by saying that normally I have a great sense of direction while traveling. One reason Marsha and I travel well together is that we have a very clear division of labor. I am in charge of money, directions, and opening unlocked doors. Marsha is in charge of communication. We're still in conflict over who should be master of the camera, as we are kind of lazy picture takers with strong artistic sensibilities ("That picture would be totally enhanced if taken on a diagonal, Marsha. Isn't it obvious!"). Anyway, on our first night's dinner, Marsha was still recovering from Pizza Utz (which means Pizza Parasite in Mayan) and left dinner early. I finished up about an hour later, picked up our laundry, and started to walk home.

Now I don 't what it is that confounded me so about Copan. I mean, granted it had no street signs and various curving dirt roads, but the town was tiny and I was only 5 minutes from home. So, I guess what happened was that I thought I missed my dirt turn off and then tried to compensate by taking a later dirt turn-off and back tracking and ended up totally lost. After floundering around a bit, I decided to head back to town and start over. It was, comically, exactly at the this moment when the power in the entire town went out and I could literally not see 2 feet in front of me. The Copanians themselves were fully unfazed, and I could see off in the distance various people flicking on flashlights. For me movement was much trickier. I either waited for a car to drive by, and then ran in the wake of its lights for a little while or waited for the lightning. The lightning proved much more consistent than the cars, but also reminded me that in all likelihood it would be raining on my lost laundry carrying ass any minute. I began calling out to random people for help, but I didn't exactly remember the name of the hotel, maybe Cafe something or other, and kept on being directed in the only direction I knew was wrong. Alas, my guardian angel finally decided to show up, a local carrying a candle who answered my question of, "I need help finding my hotel," with, "Oh, La Case Del Cafe?" She pointed me in the right way and I made it home.

On different note, one thing that was nice about Honduras was the safety. On our first night we ran through the normal batter of safety questions we had and instead of answers like, "You can go that way, but I'd leave my valuables at home," or, "There hasn't been an attack there in 4 months," the hotel manager just kept repeating that we had nothing to worry about. So as I wandered through mud puddles on my way home I at least didn't have to worry about having my laundry being jacked.

And then we came home...

Lake Atitlan

Guatemala Fun Fact #2: The CIA declassified documents admitting to being behind the 1945 coup, funding a military dictatorship, and training the Guatemelan army in psychological warfare. But still, much was blacked out. What could they have done that was any worse?

After Anitgua we set out for Lake Atitlan. lake Atitlan is a crater that was created by a volcanic eruption some 85,000 years ago. The blast was so big, that magma reached Panama and Florida. Fortunately for tourists today, so much earth was shot out that the ground nearbye collapsed, creating a huge crater that eventually filled up with water. Lake Atitlan is extremely beautiful. During the 60´s and 70´s it not only drew toruists, but a huge hippy contingent who claimed to be drawn by the killer vortex of the lake. The 80´s Civil War dampered the free love feel, but Lake Atitlan is back. Besides the numerous new hotels, many more were in the process of being built all around the lake.

What I liked most about the lake was it´s remoteness, you mostly went by boat taxi, and I think that caused each town to feel particularly different. There was Panahachel, where you arrived, and had a little bit of a Tijuana feel, but also was oddly likable. San Pedro, where the hippies made their home. San Marcos, home of the New Age pyramid hotel that offered Moon classes. And Santiago Atitlan, which was extremely traditional and the men wore clam digger pants with pin stripes on them.

We stayed in Jabilito, a tiny town with an incredible hotel that was perched right on the side of a mountain looking into the lake. During the day we went on hikes, visited the other islands, and even kayaked once. At night there were family style dinners where we met some other travelers. The only downside was the flipside to the remoteness, it was kind of hard to go anywhere else. Boat taxi is not a fast way to get anywhere and it rained, pretty hard, virtually every afternoon. We tried for 3 days to eat somewhere else for dinner and were continuosly thwarted by the elements. On the last day we bit the bullet and hiked to another town in the dark during a rain storm adorned in our garbage bag like ponchos. We swiftly ate our dinner (well I did, Marsha threw hers up, but that´s another story involving a parasite she got at Pizza Utz (Pizza Good)) and hopped the last taxi back to our hotel.

Anway, overall a very enjoyable time in possibly the best hotel I´ve ever stayed at (Casa Del Mundo). And those moon courses are to die for!

Antigua

First, fun fact #1 about Guatemala!

Guatemala gets its name from a Spanish bastardization of what their Mexican allies called the capital of the Kaqchikel´s land. And so through this linguistic telephone game Iximche becomes Guatemala.

Upon Marsha´s arrival, we motored down to Antigua for a few nights. Although they switched their capital about multiple times due to earthquakes, Antigua was the capital of Spain´s Central American empire from 1543-1776. The city was abandoned because of, guess what, an earthquake and the Spanish bigwigs moved to Guatemala City, but most of the colonial architecture remains. Antigua is very nice. It has cobblestone streets, beautiful buildings, and a lot of restaurants. It might be a little too nice though. Not to sound like xtreme backpacker man, who is only satisfied when surrounded by local people in full suffering, but you kind of feel like you could be anywhere.

The best thing we did was go with a group up a live volcano. It was about a 3 hour hike to the top and there, yes, we did see actual lava flowing. Pretty fucking cool (although the pictures didn´t turn out so you´re going to have to take my word for it). Still, I don´t want to give the impression that we were looking over a ridge into a pool of bubbling lava, which is what I always imagined when people shared similar experiences. But at one point the guide did take us up the side to an area that was fairly hot and had a little cavity that was shooting up steam with a little lava. He told us to not spend much time because it was dangerous. As we descended down some slippery scree on our way back down, I had this image in my head that someone at the top would yell, "She blew!!!!! Lava´s coming!!!!!!.¨ And then we would all scamper our way to the bottom with our melting peers ´screams in the background.

Later in the trip, we came through Antugua again for a stop over night and enjoyed it more. Maybe it was the familiarity or the fun of being back in a busyesque city. Or maybe we just were able to appreciate it more after we´d been traveling for a little. What I do know is that waiting outside for the shuttle to pick us up at 4 am the next day with the wet cobblestones shimmering in the street lamp light was DAMN SEXY!

Quetzaltenango

Most often referred to by it´s pre-conquered name Xela (Shayla), this is where I studied Spanish for 2 weeks. It is the second biggest city in Guatemala, but feels like a big town. It is in the highlands and fairly cold which gives it a very tranquilo atmosphere. I liked Xela a lot. The tour books say their is very little to see there and I guess that´s true in terms of pure attractions, but I found it very liveable. It has scattered colonial buildings, but what I mostly liked was the numerous brightly painted houses, the many things being sold on the street, and the 3 tiendas per block. The people were friendly, spoke only Spanish to me, and were definitely more indigenous looking than in Guatemala City


Nearbye there were some places to visit. I went with a group at my school to Momostenango. It is known for its wool alfombras and a pretty good market. Ironically, although I reluctantly went with my school, it ended up being great because they had us go on a tour of one guy's house who makes the blankets. He took us through the whole process and had us do a few of the parts, like spooling the wool and making one row of a quilt. A cool thing also was he used all natural items to dye the wool, including plants for the gree, some berries for the purple, and bugs from Honduras for the red.

There was also some hot springs and a volcano I never got around to nearbye as well. In the end I think my favorite part was just walking around. One of my least favorite parts was this tradition they had in the town that seemed very Latino. Every morning between 6 and 7 someone set off at least one round of fireworks. I found out this was done to commerate a birthday in the town. Now, this is a town of some 300,000 people. I also learned that they did it first thing in the morning so you would awake knowing it was so and so's birthday. Thanks! Overall though I thought it was great place to do a language school.

Guatemala City

So far I´ve been to Guatemal City twice, on the night I arrived and the night before Marsha arrived. I´ll probably go there one more time, to leave. Poor poor Guatemala City. It has a very bad reputation and seems to just be an annoyance for travelers. But is it as bad as advertized? From my very brief time there and my conversations with people, it seems Guatemala City is pretty peligroso. At my first hotel I arrived hungry and walked a couple of blocks to get food. Before I left, the manager quickly ran and got a girl who had also been interested in eating. She had been to Guatemala about 4 different times and as we walked the barren streets she told me how this was really a bad idea. You want to tell me that on the way home maybe? Before my second time there, all the Guatemalans from the town I was in made me promise to get a cab upon my arrival. And after my second time, I got into a conversation with a local who said, "Guatemala City is not so bad. I just make sure I´m inside by six so I don´t end up as a posting in the newspaper."

All that being said, it seemed fine during the day. Both times I went on meandering walks to the Parque Centrale and people paid me little to no mind. There were a few old colonial buildings and an incredible post office (seriously). As a reminder though of the high incidence of crime, there were numerous armed guards. I found myself playing a new version of Where´s Waldo called Where´s The Guy With The Shot Gun. The problem with this game was that it was too easy. Every block had at least one armed guy and they didn´t only guard banks. As I waited for my bus I noticed 3 guys, one guarding a toy store and two guarding a paint store.

Which, in my endless compulsive need to quantify, leads me to the question, where does Guatemala City rank with the worst capitals in the world? From the places I've been I would rank it third behind Bucharest (which was fascinatingly currupt) and Lima (where my opinion might be skewed by the kids on glue we met).

Like a Vecino

Well tomorrow is my last day of Spanish school. ¡Muy Triste! It´s been good, although pretty fast. I am just starting to understand my family and the lessons really picked up this week. Nevertheless, I am very excited to see mi esposa and travel for two weeks.

One interesting thing of note, is that last night I got to be vigilante! As discussed in the lower blog, the father of my house is part of a vigilante group called "Los Vecinos" who stand on corners with clubs and try to keep the street clean of ladrones.

Well, last night they invited me to come! So at 9 I left the house with the father and his 4 sons and went to a corner to stand watch. I don´t want to exagerate the danger. There were kids out with their dads and the whole event seemed to be much more about socializing than fighting crime. We stood at the first corner for a 1/2 hour and then walked down the block to visit other vigilante gangs. At about 10 the whole group went to the park and hung out there for a while. My favorite part was at the end. You might wonder, "What does a vecino do after a tough night of vigilanteeism?" Well, have chicken soup of course. The night ended with us going down an alley to where some women were serving chicken noodle soup in styrofoam cups. There were about 40 vigilantes and 4 policeman there. After that, the father turned to me, shrugged, said, "Muy Tranquilo", and we went home.

Overall a very tame evening. Although I guess when they do see a crook they chase him down the street and beat him with their clubs. Glad I wasn´t there for that. I think a key to this being a positive event was that there was no beer involved. A few cigarrettes here and there, but not a vigilante was drinking. I´d hate to see what would happen with 40 drunk men of various ages with clubs...

Los Vecinos

Greetings and saltutations from Quetzaltenango (aka Shayla). I just finished my first week of school and things are going well. It is really fun being in a foreign town and not being a tourist (not to mention being fed three meals a day). The classes are good and intense (5 hours a day) and my family is very nice (although me not being able to understand anything they say seems to be getting in the way of our bonding).

I felt a little funny just living in their house at first, but am starting to feel more comfortable. I am certainly not their first tourist (I´m not even the first from Portland) and about 20 people in various levels of relation come in and out of the house each day. I don´t think my presence even phases them. If anything, I wonder if I measure up. Was the student from Australia funnier? The Isreali more interesting?

Although I am failing in one of goals at the moment by being on the internet, I have been very good about avoiding all conversations in English. My program offers all these actividades to do with the other students and I think I am getting a reputation as the Gringo grouch by declining all of them. I haven´t felt moved at all to do the traveler talk, which I usually get into. Instead, I just sit around my family as they talk and watch TV and attempt to learn Spanish through Chaos Theory. I´m sure one of these days it is all going to click... During a futbol game I did learn the word for corner kick (esquina something or other) and yellow card (tarjeta amarilla). ¡Yahoo for TV!

One interesting thing about my familia is that the father is part of a vigilante group called "Los Vecinos¨(The neighbors) who stand on corners at night wearing masks and brandishing clubs. Kind of like the Guatemalan version of neighborhood watch. The police are totally in support of them, acknowledging there´s not enough police and give them credit for slowing down crime. What I´ve found particularly surprising is how proud the father is of being in it. He´s a fairly quiet man, but talks about it all the time and is always showing people the newspaper article about them. I guess it´s not too odd, I´d probably be excitedly talking to people too before heading out into the night with a club. But I guess I just expected vigilantes to be more secretive.

I hope all is well in the US. I´ve felt some subtle break throughs in Spanish, but then I talk to my family who slurs whole paragraphs into a palabra largo and I wonder if 2 weeks is even close to enough for me. Either way, Adios Amigos!!!! (and yes, this is instead of a postcard- lo siento)