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.