A salty and slimy comparison.

slug in my old house.


my little snail friend at my new house.

Anniversario.

6 months in Guatemala.

I am currently reading The Alchemist in Spanish.


Here's to more months abroad, more reflections, and the longing/missing of friends and family back in the states.

Fotos al azar.

A "chicken bus" (see previous entry) prior to being filled and prior to departure. This one happens to have the interior decor only of a few signs in the front that you can barely see. To really get the flavor of this, imagine it with 3 people per seat plus a random array of people and things filling all other available and unimaginable spaces.



Hello, Xela. This is the big round thing in Parque Central. You may have even received a postcard of it. The central park is sort of the heart of the city and is about one block wide and three blocks long. And on the north end of it, there's this lovely thing, which is a popular place to sit and hang out and popular for activities such as: sitting and whiling away the time; watching street dogs have gang fights or courting sessions; getting approached/approaching people for money; getting hit on or hitting on someone; whistling or hissing at strangers; giggling at lost foreigners; reveling in the ability to drink a beer in the open; seeing teenagers feel cool as they smoke, and so on and so forth.



This is the street corner one block up from the part, looking toward the cross street, 3a Calle, where Trama, the women's weaving cooperative/my old volunteer job (and the same street that around the corner past the people, a few doors down, my old house) is located.



Job #1: This the view looking into Trama's store, where I spent a hell of a lot of time folding stuff, translating for customers who wanted to ask the women questions, putting tags on random items, and chasing Oralia's kids around. But, in short, here are all the pretty textile things I was surrounded with...



...And, here are all the textiley things before they are made into textiley things! This is the thread store where I bought most of my thread that I have woven with/ where Trama buys its threads for its big orders.



And, me, looking like an idiot, setting up one of my weavings in the office at Trama.



Job #2: This is "El Cuartito" (the little room), the bar/cafe where I work. Pictured are various friends and coworkers at the despedida (goodbye party) for my friend Maja who just went back to Denmark.



A view of El Cuartito looking back from the opposite side of the table of where the first picture was taken. Through the doorway behind everyone is where one goes to find the next picture...



This is my El Cuartito dwelling place, ie working behind the bar. From left to right is my manager, Daniel; the owner, Osman (who bought the cafe from the original owners in May); and of course, me, with a bewildered smile on my face.


So, in sum, a partial illustration of the previous post, a snapshot of Xela, and my old (well, in the case of El Cuartito, soon to be old...as of September 3rd) places of employment.

My rendering of the "Chicken Bus"

Check out any text for tourists on Guatemala and you're bound to find a description (and sometimes horribly racist so) of the buses in Guatemala. The most common forms of transport across the country are old schoolbuses, usually from the states or Canada, that are brought down and given a whole new life in Guatemala. They're always painted different colors (I've never seen a yellow one), usually bright blues, reds, oranges, and/or greens, and all have names - sometimes depending on the busline, sometimes on the tastes of the operators. On the front top, where it would normally say SCHOOL BUS, it says the route of the bus. The little boy or man who shouts the destination and takes your fare helps throw your stuff on top of the bus, and sometimes hopefully secure it. Inside, there are always racks attached to the ceiling running the length of the bus over the two aisles of seats for you to shove your stuff in, and there is nearly always a rail also running along the ceiling to hold to (very much needed) like in a subway.

As for the decor, well....it's always a treat. One standard is that there will always be some sort of blessing or statement about god, a la "que Dios te bendiga" (may god bless you) or "¡cuando tienes un problema, no se lo digas a Dios tan grande tu problema, pero dile a tu problem tan grande es tu Dios!" (that's not exactly what it said in Spanish, but close...and saying...."when you have a problem, don't complain to god about how big your problem is, but tell your problem how grand God is"), which also may or may not be painted over the back or sides of the bus as well. The bendictions are always terriffic when contrasted with say, plastic hot rod chick stickers, or, playbunny type stickers, or Calvin pissing stickers, or, weird Disney stickers. Sometimes, all of the old signs from when it was a school bus further north (like if you misbehave on the bus we'll tell your principal), in English, are still there. Sometimes, there will be the weirdest decorations on the walls/ceiling ever (painted ceiling +Tweety bird stickers + Dios te ama (god loves you) stickers + fuzzy dice + some sort of weird portrait of a patron saint and Jesus on the cross + speakers that may fall on you at any moment blaring either Banda or Reggaeton music + (this was the best I've seen...) a full out mini tv strapped into the front of the bus playing music videos or poorly copied dvds of movies...).

Now, on to the experience of a "chicken bus". First of all, both entrances are game (ie, front door and back emergency exit door), and not all things that appear bound to the floor or ceiling are not actually as they seem, although you very much need them to be. Anyways, Guatemala, as you hopefully may know, is a MOUNTAINOUS country. And the highways - which are really for the most part double lane roads - cut curve and climb the mountains. Every road is a creative interpretation of the beautiful landscape that you consequently feel in your stomach. Anyways, due to the hilly nature, there are random speed bumps (and not particularly well made ones) everywhere, usually coinciding with something we more or less would think of as bus stops. However, it seems like anyone, anywhere on the road in Guatemala is pretty much fair game to be a potential passenger or to call a bus over and board. So, we have the 'dále dále' or 'guate guate' men/boys mentioned earlier. Their job is to hang outside the door or climb all over the bus screaming the destination and some major intermediate stops so that aforementioned passengers-to-be or unwitting people walking along the side of the street, know exactly where that bus is barreling towards. They also are the ones who haul your luggage (backpack, basket, giant sack of vegetables, livestock, bicycle, whatever) on top of the bus so as to be (hopefully) transported with you, and charge your fare inside of the bus.

But, really, their primary role is to get the bus to optimal capacity. And when I say optimal, I mean holy-shit-I-didn't-think-another-person-could-fit-in-here nevertheless-5-more-plus-some-chickens capacity. Buses where the seats would normally fit two adults are nearly always packed to three plus either one or two seated leaners - ie those that are in the aisle with their ass marginally associated with a bus seat, leaning across the aisle using their shoulders or whatever body part to brace themselves against the nearest person, making themselves in the end in to some sort of human keystone linking the arc of people from one side of the bus to the other. If there are no seated leaners, then we have the standing passengers, also filling up the entire length of the aisle. They are encouraged to stand in whichever way will allow more people to enter, regardless of such essential factors as...balance, items carried in hand, babies strapped to backs, people that need to get off the bus, chickenes stuffed in baskets that are about to fall out of the overhead bins to hold possessions, getting your passage fare from you through the sea of people to the man collecting it, or butts and crotches in the faces of seated passengers. So, needless to say, it becomes a, em, tight situation. Always.

But, this would almost be fine, if it weren't for the aforementioned problems: Guatemala is not flat, nor straight. And neither are the surfaces and contours of the road, by any means. So, as you try and fit yourself between a woman with a small child on her back taking up the space of nearly 2 people but trying to pretend it's one, and the man whose face inevitably, because you're standing next to him, is at boob level, you have the additional joy of being subjected to the most ridiculous hairpin turns taken at lightning quick speeds. I stand by what I said to myself cerca 5 months ago: aside from futbol (soccer), the next national sport is passing as quickly as possible on blind curves. And I mean, blind. And fast.

And that, my friends, is my brief portrait of the "chicken bus", called so, because of foreigners shock at the livestock that is often transported along with humans. In reality, they're called "camionetas" which just means bus. But, the hysterical crowdedness, ridiculous speeds, and interesting choices of transportation are just one and all a part of what you do. And, as I get more and more used to riding public transportation that is actually affordable and reliable to get around here, I sometimes forget to take note or explain the humor in those things that I have now taken as commonplace but are not exactly what I am accustomed to in the states.

As I get more accustomed...

....to living here... I forget to take note of the little differences around me. The trash piles that no one gives a second thought; the way that men and women in the market prop themselves up on a blanket to sit for long periods of time; the incredible diversity of color, dress, and language that surrounds me when I go anywhere; the act of going to a market to procure anything and everything for consumption; the routine packing of 12 person vans to 20; the diversity of salutations on the street; the whistling, hissing, or ch-ch-ing that every other man does on the street to a woman and gets away with it; the entire set of reggaeton songs that I know and can sort of mumble along to but fall under a genre and scene of music that I would NEVER know in the states; the firecrackers and fireworks at all times of day and night, all week along - for there is always a reason to set them off; the confusing hand gesture that to foreigners at first means "go away!" but actually means "hurry up, you or come here"; the number of 6-14 year old children I pass on the street that should clearly be in school but are instead helping their parents or just aren't forced to go; the 6-10 year old boys that work and are the strongholds of micro-bus and chicken bus** entry management - ie, those that scream the destination of whatever moving vehicle half hanging out of the window and/or open door and skillfully (and dare I say it...even...gracefully) help shove more people into said vehicle than thought humanly possible; strangers on the street actually looking you in the eye just to greet you; and, of course, speaking Spanish everyday.

**I realize that in my short and very lacking narrative of my experience in Guatemala, I have managed to leave out an explanation of the "chicken bus". This will follow shortly (tomorrow).