Guatemala Life and Culture

As I look out my kitchen window this early morning, my neighbor, wife of the gerente or manager, walks across the grass toward her one-room building - which is home to at least four people - carrying the morning’s bread, fresh from a local bakery. She does this every morning, usually accompanied by one or more of her grandchildren, the youngest of whom always lives with her. She then cleans one of the other houses, several times a week, does her family’s wash by hand in the pila of the house across from me, and keeps her own home spotless, as I learned once when I had to use their gas stove to heat water because the electricity at my house was off. Her older children visit often, one bringing her two grandchildren with her, and the women sit in the area they’ve created adjacent to the building, just recently roofing it with corrugated plastic, and creating a foundation, so it has become a room with two walls, the other two open to the garden. This is where the family spends its daytimes and sometimes evenings. And this is her life. She rarely leaves the “compound,” though she sometimes goes with her grandchildren out into the plazuela in front of our houses to look on at an event. She seems to have no friends in the community, or at least none visit and she doesn’t spend time anywhere else. My friend Katrina complained that a woman she has come to know here has a similar life, working all day in a small hotel, and going home to her own home with her son at night; nothing else. But Maria’s life looks okay to me. Her children and grandchildren adore her and are very affectionate with her. Her son evidently studies hard, and is playful and good with the little children. Her husband, who looks quite a bit older, is a sweet, loving and hard-working man. They have created a life, as managers of this little compound, that is better than that of many people in the community. What more does one really need?

Yesterday a funeral, and later a carnival for the kids and some sort of dancing in the evening – from the distance of my house it looked like those figures with big comic heads. And of course bombas – the big ones, going off from time to time. Today there is a barrage of 80 million firecrackers going on down the alley past my house, following a play of some sort which was held in front of the church, with figures costumed as kings, queens, and knights, with play sword-fighting and much shouting; now a band consisting of several horns and a tuba just went walking thru the pine needle alfombra on the street and past my house, down the alley, followed by 50 or so people from the village. There is a statue of the crowned Virgin up in front of the church, but I have no idea what it’s all about. I don’t see Maria and her kids in the yard, perhaps they are in that crowd. Tono just came back all dressed nicely and with his hair combed back. Usually he is in the yard with his pants rolled up and his hair every which-a-way. I moved here to be part of a community…..but I don’t take part, really. Primarily because I have noone to go out on the plaza with. I should get the phone number of another volunteer who lives down the street next to the store, so I can see if she wants to attend with me, the next time something’s going on. Don’t know why I think I need that, but I always feel I stick out like a sore thumb. Probably I’m un-noticed. I have been out there of course – once for a good futbol game, twice with our clowns, once or twice for music or some other event, and of course I used to work with our teachers in this school. But no mucho. 

I went with our young teachers on a bus to Alotenango today. I expected to find it a small pueblo on the side of that volcano, like Santa Maria is on Agua, but instead it is a fairly large, probably once colonial town, like Ciudad Vieja (the first Spanish capital) down in the valley some distance from the foot of the volcano of the same name, which can be seen from the streets in Antigua, companion to Fuego. In this town streets are paved with interlocking cement blocks, like so many. There are some large stately buildings, most in disrepair, some half-destroyed. This pueblo is also dominated by Volcan Agua and probably received some of the brunt of that deluge. Their cemetery is one of the grandest I’ve seen, with figures on top of the omnipresent cement biers, possibly these were internments in colonial times, although at a quick glance I thought I saw flowers on those graves. The people of the town, as in Santa Maria, are more indigenous than in Antigua…..browner faces, shorter bodies, more traditional traje. But there are also a few young women in pants suits….maybe teachers from other towns...and young t-shirted girls on bicycles. The school is quite large, grey, dirty, ill-lit but spacious. The teachers all looked friendly. No kids in class, yet. The sub-directora was hospitable and seemed intent on introducing the idea of our program to her teachers at a meeting tomorrow. It seems word of the program has been spread there by a teacher who took the training and used the exercises. That’s nice to hear. Coming back, I was glad to have time to do some grocery shopping before my Spanish class at home this afternoon. Carrying my groceries home, stopping at the internet shop to email family and friends, it suddenly seemed awfully nice just to be here. I have always been so set on accomplishing something, being of use, being valuable to others, on having a purpose in what I do…so Capricornian, really most of the time, although if I have a Grand purpose then I am comfortable fooling around on my “off-hours.” But for this moment it just seemed nice to be in THIS town, even at this juncture (although modernization continues creeping in,) to be seeing these faces, and expressions of this culture (which, as soon as I had decided the other day that it was becoming overly modern, seemed to show me one face or another of its traditional activities – the procession, WITHOUT a motorized carrier for the large religious figure, the band very slow and traditional….drum and out-of-tune horns., all these somber people in black, walking and chanting. Lovely, really. ) That it was nice to live here, regardless of how productive or helpful I’m actually being. Just that I like living in this town and this culture. Although as usual it’s hard for me to say that without quickly saying…..of course I’d rather live in the country. Yesterday an older man (well maybe my age) made the rounds of the plazuela, trying to get people to write letters complaining about the noise. His wife is ill, he said, and the noise makes it impossible to sleep. Well, I told him, I understand completely, although at times I rather like the music, but I don’t want to write letters complaining, because I’m a visitor here. This is their pueblo. If I don’t like it, I can move. He explained that he and his wife have rented a house here for some years, since moving from the house they own in Panjachel. He’d like me to come visit his wife, as she has no social outlets. After telling him about my volunteer work, he said, well you could consider it a deed much-needed. He is originally from Trinidad and has lived in the U.S. and Europe. His wife lived in Argentina at one time (and danced Tango, he said when I asked) during the Eva Peron era. The gentleman told me that the factory behind his house, of which I see the East gate from my house, and the employees at lunch break in the calle North of me, is owned by an American and makes rugs which he imports somewhere. Well there’s what I railed at in my political days…..American jobs going overseas to take advantage of the low wages and no benefits. But in this town this is the ONLY industry, and except for the many vendors and few cabinetmakers, etc., the only job in town. What a huge difference these jobs make for the people of Santa Ana. The other face of CAFTA. 

I am sending ideas to my two friends who are planning to visit here in February. It is wonderful to remember all the trips I’ve taken and the lovely or interesting places I’ve been, and would like to take them to, and of course we will see some new areas, as well. I have been dying to get to the jungle – having a fantasy about listening to the night sounds – for some time, and we will go to Tikal. My wireless internet at home has not been functioning since the first days of the electrical blackouts, which happened daily for a week or so, about the same time every evening. That was during our coldest days (maybe 48 degrees F) so perhaps lots of people had electric heaters turned on. But the phone in the house across from me ceased functioning, and that is my internet connection. And then nobody did anything about it, since those young volunteers come and go. You’d think connection with home in Belgium would prompt some action, but no. I finally had to call repair service – which came the following day to my amazement. But internet still doesn’t work. So tonight I called Julio – a smiling family man who has a small shop in the front of his house ½ mile closer to town. I had recently taken my thumb drive to him, when it developed a virus and wouldn’t open. As I walked there, I caught him in the doorway of his shop with his arm around his 10 year old boy. There is now an internet shop next door to him; perhaps he has expanded. He fixed my thumb drive with no charge and a big smile. 

Yesterday about 5 pm, as I accompanied my Spanish teacher to my gate when she was leaving, there were cacophonous noises from the church nearby. We stood for a moment with the manager of this place to see what would emerge. My teacher surprised me by asking the manager’s age. He said he is 73 and that the tiny girl with him is his daughter, not granddaughter as I had thought. He also said his wife, who looks perhaps 40, is only a few years younger. So none of this adds up, but perhaps is the story they tell this little girl. At that moment a large anda began to emerge from the church, carried on the shoulders of about 25 people. My teacher and the manager surprised me by instantly dropping to their knees, though we were 100 yards away, and making the sign of the cross, then kissing the tip of their joined thumb and fingers, as people do here. They remained kneeling for another few moments. The figure on the anda looked black, from my vantage point, and I asked if it was the Christo Negro. I had heard that his figure, famous in Esquipulas, some several hours distant from here, and that people came there to worship from Mexico, Nicaragua, and so forth. My teacher told me there are numerous copies of this figure, and evidently one here. The musicians following the anda were the worst I’ve ever heard, the cacophonous quality of a 6th grade band of horns and a single booming drum. Yet somehow the primitive quality of the music was appealing. About 60 people walked in front, beside, and following this anda with its brightly illuminated Christo, wearing head coverings and carrying candles. The group stopped some 20 feet from where I stood, taking photos (after asking my manager if it weren’t rude,) and lowered the anda to arm's height for a few minutes, then shouldered it again and proceeded. The usual firecracker explosions followed along with them. I want to learn more about these various figures, because far more are celebrated than fits the schedule of each village having its saint’s day.

Personal Musings, and Volunteering

My 70th birthday party in Berkeley in 2006 marked the beginning of my trip to Guatemala. I gave myself a party last year with 15 people, mostly from the writers' group, in attendance; this year my “boss” convinced me to have a party at his house. It was lovely. Most of our teachers and the coordinator from the project and my Spanish teacher and the teacher I worked with in San Pedro all came, the latter two ladies brought their teenage daughters. Many people from Fred’s hotel came and two of my gringa women friends from writers’ group. 21 people in all….and we had entertainment by the great clowns that are staying in that hotel and are collaborating with Fred's Payasos Educadores clown project, with whom there were also great connections afterwards for the training the French Canadian clown is giving. 

A month or so ago, Fred offered me the (volunteer) position as his coordinator for the young women teachers. I said “No, what I really want to do is work with women and children.” And then pissing and moaning to myself a few nights later about not having been able to find a position doing that, I suddenly thought, “Of course I will be his coordinator. I can continue to improve my Spanish, and eventually I’ll be able to do counseling, etc, but I can’t, now, anyway.” I think it’s about looking at what’s being offered in front of you – not what you want to reach for. So I have started by looking for funding for his project, and have a couple of good leads and one Letter of Inquiry in. Fred has also started considering doing Early Childhood Education training for teachers, expanding our Pedagogia Basic training plan. Well ECE is what I consulted in for 15 years, and I do feel passionately that children need good initial school experiences (if not totally good experiences) so I am happy to help out with that. I have developed a plan for HOW to do that, using the ECCERS, and have written away for materials. So I feel productive and energized about that. I have been attending a training by a professor from Canada on the topic, and contributing somewhat….trying actually to keep my mouth shut because of course I always think that I have ideas better than almost anyone I listen to. Which is silly, really; I have many ideas to contribute on the topic and they have others. Collaboration is the key. So that has been interesting. She will speak about behavior management this week; there I will really have to sit on my hands, or better yet, use all my skills to say what I need to without offending her or taking over the training. That will be hard unless she has a very similar philosophy of behavior mgt….and even on classroom management we have had at least one difference. In my opinion much of the ideas (Montessori, and others) on education were developed in a time and with a culture which was very emotionally restricted, upperclass, needing liberalization. And as much as I believe in this, and taught in this framework myself when raising my kids, I have learned that for kids from chaotic backgrounds, children with emotional and behavioral issues, there needs to be more structure and somewhat more restricted choices. Or at least to start with that until they feel secure about what is expected in class, then perhaps you can allow more freedom and choice. Besides the Circles people found that when choices and group size were limited, children interacted more verbally and tried more different activities. So….at any rate we will see about all that. 

Today I attended a Payasos training to attract new payasos to volunteer with us. Very entertaining. Lovely expressive people; and several young teens were there, wanting to become clowns. I have learned there is a strong expressive arts community emerging or growing stronger here. There was a collaborative meeting in San Marcos a few months ago, with dancers, and performers, including some from the Livingston group. This country is not huge, and thus collaboration is easy or at least possible. But I think good things are beginning to happen too. And Guat has a new President who promises to be slightly more liberal than the last. Like a Clinton compared to Bush or one even more militaristic than Bush. 

January 2008. I have seen all of 2007 here. I have a brief respite before the school year begins, and then we will see what the year holds. My “boss” said we will have more responsibility this year; not sure yet what that means, or if it involves me. 

There have been so many changes in Guatemala in just the short time I’ve been here. First and fore-most their airport, which has gone from a small and funky one, which I liked a lot, to one the equivalent of L.A. Other changes? The highway between Gua City and Antigua has been noticeably improved. That has been going on since I arrived, causing many delays in getting from city to town. On a local level, I notice more kids with bicycles and one with inline skates, though one ten-year-old boy watching the payasos in our park one day in December said he had never had a bicycle. And very close to my house is the first fast-food place in Santa Ana, offering pizza and hamburgers. It has become the front-step hangout for young men and a few women with motorcycles and scooters, or just standing around. The internet shop in Santa Ana - a hole in the wall, previously; the ground-floor front room of a two-story house where the shop-owner lives – has up-graded considerably. New linoleum tile on the floor, two rooms, more computers, internet setup for the kids and young men to play games, AND better quality connections. The owner still has his two young boys - maybe 11 and 15 - run the shop, though I notice they run upstairs to call him if something goes wrong. 

I have become concerned with a small and simple shift: all the older people always greet one another during the day and evening, with “Buenos dias, buenas tardes, buenas noches…” I love the sound of it as they pass and respond to my greetings. All the different intonations, different styles; it’s really quite lovely – I’d like to record it. But what concerns me is that most of the youth….or maybe half of them, toss off a “Buenas” or a “Hola” or don’t respond at all. Is this just another indicator that the old, polite, slow ways here are passing?? Will it all go in the direction of wanting more things, spending more time in loud bars? Today I read the book by Nicole Maxwell, about hunting for medicinal plants in the Amazon in the late 1950’s. “The younger Indians,” she writes of the Cárdenas, “consider such ‘classical’ sessions [of the men’s secret societies] rather a bore. They aren’t much interested in ancient beliefs, and when it comes to parties, they’d just as soon dance rumbas to the music of the radio on the smooth [new] floors of their living quarters.” So this has always been going on. Is this just because of the North American/European influence? or is this the natural Uranian thrust of youth? Always drawn to the new and different, rejecting of the “old” ways of their parents? I suspect there are always different temperaments, even within this young/old dichotomy………those who move eagerly to the new, those who hang onto the old forever. 

Something I love: yesterday on my way into town, a teenaged boy on a bicycle was pedaling his mother who sat on the crossbar in front of him, and a man was pedaling his three little kids: a girl on a seat behind him, and two boys, one on the crossbar in front of him, and one on the front fender, facing and hanging onto the handlebars. 

Bad News: My salsa teacher was wounded while taking part in a procession on Christmas day and has been unable to work all during the time I was in New York City for Xmas, so I had a class with a younger teacher in their new “salon,” which is just the large entry way of a small hotel – where they moved way over by the Mercado after the tienda of tipica they had been housed in was robbed during the night a few weeks ago. And that right after a day-time armed robbery of a regular tienda down the same street, which has caused it to bar its entrance. In the same week a young American friend of friends was stopped by a motorcyclist not too far from my area in broad daylight, and robbed at knifepoint, and a chickenbus from Comalapa was boarded, and everyone robbed of their huipils and their Christmas bonuses. So there is more crime and violence here than when I first came, and it is extending to the locals, not just the tourists. The “word” is that gangs from the City are moving out into the rural areas. 

On the way to walk out to my salsa class today (now nearly a mile away,) I noticed bundles of pine needles arriving on the main street of my pueblo, and more cars parked than I’ve seen before. I thought perhaps it is a saint’s day or something and that I would find a procession on my return. But coming back, I found the main street of Santa Ana full of people in black, following behind a carried gold casket. Hundreds of solemn people, walking…some singing. Back up the street toward my house there were still people lining the streets, so whatever it is is not over. There were bombas being set off as I left, but none now. We have had our electricity going off and on and off for several days, apparently due to high winds knocking trees onto the wires here and there in Guate. Our water is out today too, and for the first time we have none in our reserve tank. Internet is also out at my house, because the phone in the house I get wireless service from has not been working since the first power outage. We also had a 5.6 earthquake centered in “nearby” Esquintla yesterday evening. It was the first one that has startled me enough to cause me to run quickly out of the house…..where I found my neighbors, too. I thought it all seemed very 3rd world til I read the news today that 500,000 people in California (including my sister, for a time) are without power. My daughter living in my house has snow, no power, and no hot water. I had the house set up for those emergencies, but they aren't sure how to get the generator power going. Much email conversation about that. The huge bunch of bananas that has been hanging in the tree in the yard came down yesterday. And with it came the whole 30 foot tree. My Spanish teacher told me that the tree is no good once it produces a bunch…..that a sprout will grow out of the old trunk to produce a new "tree". It will be interesting to see how long that takes. The bananas are ripening in a wheelbarrow covered with a tarp in a corner of the yard. I’m sorry to see that long purple knobbed appendage come down with it. That was beautiful.

Mythical Mayan Pueblo - DOS

My mythical Mayan Pueblo #2 Went with a social worker to San Cristobal al Alto this morning, taking a road I walk past all the time on my way to the Project. This 5-mile road - almost all dirt, though fitted concrete blocks cover some especially steep parts - climbs the hillside maybe 1000' to a small pueblo which is the prettiest one I've seen. Unlike others, the road meanders a lot thru the pueblo, and the houses and tiendas are not just one long row of low concrete buildings or walls on either side of the road, painted different colors. There are gardens interspersed between the houses, some cultivated, some wild. The church is one of the least ornate I've seen....actually looks abandoned but is still in use on Sundays. The school appears to have about 3 classrooms. There is a medical clinic run by the government in a room of the school and a moderate-sized plaza between the school and the church. That's center of town. Along the - seems like just one main - road in the pueblo are several tiendas carrying the usual sorts of odd things, lots of wrapped penny candies, Ketchup, Corn Flakes, some bread rolls open in a case, next to a box of batteries, etc. The tiendas are jammed to the rafters but I am hard-pressed to say with exactly what. At one spot on our walk through town, a baby pig got out in the road and was chased or herded by me and several children (a sure sign that I'm going to like the place!) What was especially lovely [we're suddenly having an afternoon downpour in my pueblo and I hear the children playing in the plaza screaming and running for cover] is the view which you can see in places of Volcan Agua, pretty close, and in one direction of San Pedro (where I work in the school) and of Antigua in the other, way down below. Tan bonita! What was charming was all the gardens. Even at that altitude (probably 6000') lots of banana trees with huge leaves like elongated, slotted elephants' ears, many many Nispero trees (loquat), oranges, grapefruit, limes, corn galore, squash so verdant the vines were climbing 15-foot trees. The people are not really indigenous, there - no traje worn - but most are agricultural workers, some work in Antigua. The streets were mostly empty when we were there at 9-11 a.m. So most people were off at work. The woman we visited said the pueblo is very tranquil. Some danger from thieves if you walk down the hill by yourself, but otherwise no. As we drove in, the driver said an American lives there in a big house....no se' if it's year-round or occasionally, but it surprised me to hear this as it feels quite isolated up there. It was about a half-hour drive up the hill; maybe 12 mins. coming down. But there are actually busses that make it up that road, three times a day. That is phenomenal...I don't think I'd want to ride in one. Very steep and muddy. I asked a woman if there were houses for rent, because I was quite captivated, but she said she didn't think so. I can see that hill from my house as I sit here writing. I have such a strong craving to live in the country. My house here is surrounded by a nice cultivated garden and there are tall banana trees directly opposite my window, but it is not the same. It's just very difficult to do so, at least from my current vantage point. I think the only way it could happen is if a project has a small satellite somewhere and wants someone to "man" it....that way you have some status and protection....some raison d'etre. Otherwise I don't know how. And that particular place is a bit isolated from anything in Antigua, like my writer's group, or the mercado, or my salsa classes.But where there's a will...............there may be a way. 

Volunteering yesterday a gringa speech therapist and I went to a home in a downpour of rain....up the narrow dirt path between barbed wire fences, the rain making a river of the path with just a 6" dry part....thru the scrap-wood gate (happy hollering kid in the rain opening the gate for us) and thru the filthy yard. I know there is nothing about poverty that requires a yard to be full of trash (except perhaps no $5 per month for trash pickup).....but this one is the worst I've seen. But a large yard, at this moment all mud....a few wet flowering plants, a banana tree or two. The house is two concrete block rooms without doors or windows and a kitchen area that is just an open shed with sink, woodstove and plank table. The five kids are all wet and dirty; we work with them (me doing a puzzle with the three boys to keep them occupied while the younger daughter gets speech therapy) in the kitchen/shed area. Can't remember if the floor is cement or dirt, I think cement, but there is no electricity, so we work in the very dim light on this grey day. The young dog hangs out under the table since he has discovered I pet him; his nose is constantly in my hand as the kids and I play. The boys are great. Their hair hasn't been washed in awhile and sticks out all over; their faces are very Mayan....although narrow, but high cheekbones, dark skin. They are fairly quiet and pretty cooperative with each other; they sort of ignore me, as many kids do because I don't speak a lot and not always well....but they get along well together and respond more to me as time goes on. The mother is small and dark, smooth hair, wearing American clothes, a sweater; she is quick in her movements........she reads to the other daughter and is generally good to her kids, but slaps if they displease her....and last time berated her daughter to tears for spilling something. I want to do some parenting but the speech teacher rightly says the mother hasn't agreed to this, and I don't have the language to do the adroit entries into suggesting this ("Perhaps you'd like some ideas for other ways of handling her behavior," or such as that.) It isn't that I can't say those things ("Tal vez quisieras unas sugerencias para otras maneras en que tu puedes mantener su comportamiento") but here in the quiet of my home it takes me a whole minute to think of it....and in the flow of rapid conversation in the home it's hard to stop everything for me to get it out clearly. But that will come. My sister suggested that I could live up in S.C. al Alto and still maintain my contacts here. That hadn’t occurred to me. Buses up and down for writers' group, salsa class, and spanish. I could speak to the alcalde of the town about a place to live and work. But I don’t feel the impulse to actually DO it. I suppose I could have a room in a house, rather than a whole house to myself, but that is not really my style. Thinking of the difficulty I have speaking to Maria and Tono, maybe we’re talking about six months from now. Maybe I won’t be doing writers’ group and salsa by then???

More Guatemala travel - to San Marcos

Trip to San Marcos L.L.
It is beyond beautiful here.................the way we came in from the dock (after a VERY choppy boat-ride with 12 indigenous people with their baskets and bags,) led us through stone covered paths through the banana trees and other vegetation.....very thick and lush, turning here and there through cultivated veggie gardens, coffee plots, everything totally rich and lush and verdant.
We are staying at the hotel of a grey-tressed woman I once met at a music concert in Jocotenango almost a year ago. She has built a lovely place with hammocks on the porch, and for herself a wonderful grand treehouse. She has little indigenous kids running around, her ¨god-children¨ and the whole place is just easy and lovely.
We went up to Blind Lemon's for a hamburger and to use the internet; tonite after dinner the woman and her Argentinian friends will play music. My friend Merri is at a clinic right now, seeing about a possible job. I would love to have a job and live here.
The hippie part of it is like the best of Berkeley thrown willy-nilly in to the jungle, and above this low-lying area, which was sold to the hippies after a Hurricane destroyed everything in the low part 10 yrs ago or so and the indigeneous-Hispanics (mostly indig.) moved their town up a little further, contiguous with this. That area is just a regular Mayan pueblo, but a little cleaner, and more pleasantly meandering than others I´ve seen. But kids of 11 or so trundling huge boulders out of a hole beside the street (i.e. men´s work,) a small group of young kids catching bugs on some plants on the side of the road (starting to interact with them I suddenly remembered a recent warning not to engage with children because of the rumors we gringas try to steal them,) a school in session, the clinic with the moms and babies waiting on the porch, etc. i.e. just a town, like Santa Ana but at least the part I saw more charming.
No howler monkeys, unfortunately, in the San Marcos “jungle”, and no unique singing or noise-making birds, but some evangelical Mayan woman singing over a loudspeaker at 6 am which I could hear clearly from my hotel....which was actually quite lovely........sort of an endless chant in a voice that sounded childlike and innocent but strong. Nice.
Last nite was music by the "wildwoman" I met at the concert at Jocotenango. I was prepared, in my critical way, to not like her...........I am predisposed to dislike these strong outgoing large wild grey haired women, it seems...........but in fact her guitar-playing was very good (all those bar chords up the neck I could never manage) and her voice was strong enough and clear and had a nice quality, and she sang some Billie Holliday and not Mae West but some woman of the 20s and 30s songs that were just a pure delight.........one made me ask her if she knew The Sheik of Araby, because it was of the same genre. Anyway she was a great pleasure.
And then she was joined by some black guy on drums who just happened to be there for his honeymoon with his lovely hippie wife, and an Argentinian man I liked very much, and, unfortunately an Argentinian woman who had a nice clear strong voice and slim body, very beautiful, but her voice just too strident for me.
But the Scene (which Merri described as very "clique-y" tho I didn't see that) was that the woman from the clinic (another big wild-grey-haired woman) came down for the music, with several people in tow.
Twenty-five or so people showed up in this small venue, which the woman (Terri) built.
So that shows you the extent of night life around there, although we met some guys from Australia on the bus back who had been at a different bar/music venue, there.
The whole town seems to be these two parallel walkways from the lake/dock that lead up to a regular street that apparently goes up to Solola which is the border of the regular town. On either side of these walkways are probably 12-16 shops, restaurants, B&Bs, and Centres. And then there is Blind Lemon's at the top and then the town.
A life there would be (for me)....like.....maybe a little work at the clinic, doing Infant Stimulation stuff or possibly counseling with better spanish (which would be hard to achieve since most of the people I would know tend to speak English with each other)....maybe volunteer in the indigenous school up the road a ways. Then I discovered a Therapy Center down by the dock (lovely wood-frame home up from the lake.........which I adore.......I can't believe how much it affects me each time, being by the water) which does past life regression therapy, etc etc etc. I'd be interested in learning more about doing that (I've done a lot on myself, a little with another therapist, and a few sessions with friends), and also maybe doing some of that myself, as well as Astrology....especially now that I've learned to do re-location therapy, and I think that would be a "seller." Anyway so I could do those things, write, adopt some little kids, have a garden. But no pigs, goats, etc. A little too uppity for me, really, tho I like uppity hippie-new age better than uppity-tourist. And these folks still have to deal with insects, mud, rain, blackouts, etc....I mean real things, and more than in Antigua. And days of choppy water when no one can get anywhere.
So it's appealing but not absolutely. It's missing something low-key, comfortable, and warm. My friend's reaction to it all is a bit iffy (I noticed on the whole trip that she and her daughter are much more negative about people, especially men, but everyone, than I am.) But if she goes up there again for a week, I'll go with her and just check things out.
But it would be the ideal, like Antigua, of a place to work with needy folks,while still having your internet, and health food store etc.
And of course it would be a more likely place for a Danceaway, or Auth. Movmt group, or whatever than even Antigua. All this a bit like trying to figure out who you ARE, really - what do I need to live?
Here one year today….September 5th, 2007. Almost two years since my romance with Guatemala began.

The Mythical Mayan Village

Mini-jaunt On a Sunday, Fred (director of our project) and I walk up to Santa Maria. This is the pueblo furthest up the road that passes Santa Ana and Familias de Esperanza and continues up the volcano.  Once I could see the lights of Santa Maria from my rooftop terrace on Callejon Lopez. We walked for miles up a steep hill, past Finca Carmona, the furthest school on that road that I’d ever visited and then miles more. Finally, legs aching, I asked if we were close and Fred said “About half way.” I said a few swear words and then said, “I’m going to take the next bus that comes along.” And along it came, moments later. We walked around town and looked at things in the market, just like in Antigua and other places, and then started back down the hill. That’s where I fell in love. Looking out across the verdant fields of corn and squash and beans, below us, criss-crossed with makeshift fences and dotted with small sheds, I felt as though I were feeding, as thought the landscape were a source of direct nourishment through my eyes and heart. “Yes,” I kept exulting inwardly, near tears. “Yes! This is what I’ve been missing – with only that narrow vista of banana trees and the hillside from my windows. This is what nourishes me.” It seemed like a great confirmation. 

I keep looking for the Mythical Mayan Village So today I went to the pueblo of one of our young maestras, who is indigenous, spoke Katchiquel as a child, and still does occasionally at home. I had thought she lived in my mythical village, but it is nearly as big as Antigua, mostly concrete streets - a few mud - a large municipal building being built, and a big plazuela with, on this day, a ferris wheel, big jumping house for kids, several stands for marimba bands, a vegetable and textiles fair......and so on. First we looked at her house.....which is a series of side-by-side rooms down one side of a large cleared dirt space with little "flower beds" in it, with fruit trees or vegetables growing in them. One room was her "kitchen" - dirt floor, corn-cane walls, woodburning "stove". The other side of the cleared space is for the houses of two of her uncles. The whole thing about 100 ft sq. She showed us her backstrap loom, the first time I´ve seen them unassembled.   (I realize I could easily have one at my house!) Then we walked to the fair area and suddenly started seeing masqued and costumed figures coming out of a large building and followed them to a big roped off area in the plaza where they danced and paraded for the next hour. The most interesting and elaborate costumes! Many like the conquistadors with epaulettes and much metallic embroidery, some like Native North Americans!, some with horns coming from their shoulders, heads, chests, some like something from Mad Max at Thunderdrome (much leather and spikes), some like humanoid figures in Star Wars, several men dressed as women, two skeletons with skulls on their upper arms and backs, a few clown-types, but most interesting were the masques they wore.....almost like mannequin´s faces, but even more stylized.....perfect flawless faces, some with perfect goatees, but so many of them identical, and all with that strange immoble look on these vigorously dancing figures. Very surreal, really. I enjoyed that a lot. Then they started a contest.....pole climbing. The pole was maybe 40-50 feet tall and had been slicked and covered with pig grease. There were 4-5 men gathered to climb it for the 800Q tacked at the top of it (maybe $110.) What was interesting is that they carried bags of sand over their shoulders, and scrapers in their pockets, and it seemed to be okay to use this to try to get rid of the pig fat which was making it impossible to climb up (no cleats, of course...bare feet or tennies) But I also loved the cooperation between the contestants.....scraping and cleaning a section, then coming down to let someone else try to get further, boosting each other, standing on each others´ shoulders and sometimes heads by mistake (much unintentionally or intentionally funny behavior, like sliding down on top of each other)...at one point the pole looked like a totem pole, with 5 human figures crouched one on top of the other on the lower half. There were also some monkey figures in costume running around, who were messing around (sort of like Coyote in this culture, I think) messing up their attempts, getting in the way, etc. And then just some older drunks who were trying to be helpful but of course slipped or fell. So the whole thing was hilarious and yet the contestants were very persevering and serious about it. They had made it half the way up the pole in the 40 mins or so that I watched. We also went up to the church where there were the most beautiful large wheels covered in peacock and other feathers with a saint´s image in the middle, lots of incense smoke in the air, beautifully dressed women in typical huipiles and faldas, such as all the women in the town wears, but with the addition of silver and colored ribbons tying up their hair, and a white veil draped over the whole thing...carrying these lovely fabric-covered poles with images at the top. Later they came out of the church and formed a procession through town...along with the big "wheels" carried on the shoulders of the men. But we had to leave. On the way back (in a friend from the project´s pickup truck - some of us sitting down in the back) we saw a dirt road leading to a pueblo and one of the young maestra´s invited me to go up there with them in two weeks to do a training in Brain Gym..........so maybe THAT is my mythical mayan village! I´ll go see....

More Cultural Events

Sunday 17th June. Photo on left is from yearly procession in Antigua.

Something in me has shifted just recently. Or maybe there were several slight, un-noticed shifts before the results became apparent. Whatever has occurred, I am feeling happy and grateful again. My Spanish has improved enough to make some communication possible, though I still struggle with hearing well in the group settings, now two children’s groups. And I think I have just accepted my slow learning progress; which together with a bit of improvement, makes for a lot of improvement in how I feel. And I have loved working in the school classrooms, several days this week because the main teacher had to be at a training all week. So I felt like I was a real help. And Jose, in one class, who was so dreadful at first, is doing better behaviorally, working more at his school work, and when I pass he looks up at me to get his approving looks from me. That really touches me. And then I worked one day in the prepa class at San Cristobal, too, and felt effective, though I have to be very careful not to step on toes, and I need more manipulables for that class. So all that just makes me happy. 

 

And then Fred told me that at their training, the Santa Ana teacher said she was looking forward to my behavior training, which means I have to get back to her in the morning (I want to peek in her prepa class, too.) I wish I had a good translator, familiar with classroom teaching; then I could do these behavior trainings instead of just handing out written materials (checked and corrected in my Spanish class.) And now it’s just one week until it’s time to go home again. What a pain. I don’t care to leave when I’ve just gotten started. I said that last time too. 

 

So it seems I had to come all the way to Guatemala to find out who I am. And oddly enough, it’s who I thought I was all the time. Cut to the bone, without friends or family to distract me………I am what I love……my emotional connections…………the things in my life that make me feel emotional: The kids and my varied relationships with them My dance teacher and the dancing we do.  My TV movies………all emotional ones.  My writing about my emotional life, and that of others. That is my life here. That is who I am. Scorpio, scorpio, cancer cancer And Aquarius writes about it. And of course Capricorn keeps up the struggle of it all. Too funny, really. And of course that is what my horoscope for Guatemala said. 

 

Those kids are killing me. I’ve been getting too physical with the ones in Dianet’s class…pushing them into Time Out for instance, holding the door against them to keep them out at recess (I’m not sure why she wants this.) And when the door banged into the back of my foot, I got a nail in my heel for my trouble, and to remind me that being physical is not the way. We have to set it up clearly so that the consequences speak for themselves and we can be the coaches………trying to help them learn behavior appropriate to a learning situation. I have to remember that for the training. And before I left I spoke to both teachers, and left a written explanation of this stance. But today, in the prepa class, with those three little boys laughing at everything I tried to say….that was hard (I make the mistake of wanting them to like me, that emotional need thing, again) and the boy who screams in my face (and at the other teachers.) I did well with shining both of them on, but didn’t need to make faces at the screaming boy, funny or not. Just shine it one and go about my business, but then exact consequences. And of course later, when I had the manipulatives out and was left in charge of the kids, it was exactly those boys (“my” kids) who were there wanting interaction with me (and the toys) and appreciating my comments. It is interesting to me that Guatemalan kids don’t gravitate to me like the children I’ve known in California. Part of this is the language barrier, but I think some part may be the greater affection I see children getting here. They don’t need me or my attention as much. This is a little difficult to take, but I’m here to help them, not get my emotional needs met. 

 

July. For the past three days this pueblo has dressed itself up as I’ve never seen it before, in preparation for two days of a futbol tournament, evidently. Makeshift booths line two sides of the plazuela, full of video games and food. Both nights the teams came, in full regalia, with referees and a scoreboard. And both nights it RAINED and RAINED, a “tormenta” my manager calls it. And it has been a torment for these people, though I don’t hear them complaining. For awhile the audience sat under umbrellas and the players slipped and slid across the slick court. Hilarious to watch; but it must have hurt and been disappointing for those who invested time and hopes of some income. Finally everyone went home. But the fiesta goes on….evidently working up to the big Antigua festival starting this weekend and continuing on to Miercoles, it’s Saint’s Day. Today many paper decorations on the church, and tonite some performances including two very dramatic but very off-key singers. 

 

Guatemala goes on revealing itself. A social worker I know from FdeE came back from the lake today, just as I’ve been thinking I need to call them to come visit (thinking more and more about San Juan.) She and her husband have left there because the “moral cleansing” that has been going on there for five years started hitting closer to home. I have never heard of this before, even the few times I was in that area, but evidently people who rob and steal or commit adultery, or who knows what else, homosexuality possibly….are being shot, and the people of the community stand behind it. Three teenagers were killed recently for stealing bikes and dealing pot, I think; and she received a threat against one of their employees. So that was it for them. Que lastima for me, possibly, (or maybe I’m supposed to stay here) and que lastima if those projects that are helping the area recover from the pollution of the lake begin leaving it. 

Santa Ana is having another celebration….for Corpus Christi my teacher says, describing some sort of vessel into which the host is placed, which is carried around the village. Maybe that’s what they were carrying this morning, on the third day of celebrations. Unfortunately for the pueblo, the first two nights it rained torrents. The valiant jugadors continued on but they were slipping and falling in the water on the concrete court until they finally called it quits. Last night was clear; it had rained earlier. So the games went on, the women’s teams appearing first. The skill level is not first-rate but good enough. Then the canned music started. Boom boom boom go the woofers, making my windows rattle. Nearly the whole pueblo seems to be out in the plazuela, and finally from my upper window I can see some heads bobbing, which pleases me (it has seemed to me that no Guatemalans dance at these public ferias.) Earlier they had some men and boys with giant animal and people heads on their shoulders, dancing in concert. THAT brought me out into the plaza; they were really wonderful dancers. Later in the evening I saw them from my window, dancing in the futbol court. They had taken off their big heads, revealing lots of dark-skinned young men and boys and a few older men, all dancing with such vigor, arms flying, legs pumping in unison. Just wonderful! But the music went on til at least midnight, when I finally got to sleep. And this morning at 6 am they were at it again, this time with loud bombas in the cancha (futbol court) rattling my windows and setting off car alarms. And then the traditional drums and flutes started to play, and I looked out to see about 100 people - dressed mostly in black, the women with their heads covered with scarves or lace – proceeding from the church, a few people carrying the big vessel, the others walking slowly and singing or chanting. I took a few photos and then stood respectfully as my fellow Santa Anans walked slowly by. And now…at 3:30 pm, it’s time for the full band, with trumpets and trombones, to start shaking the windows again. And again with the bombas. I’m game, but this window-rattling is too much. I think my neighbors will also be annoyed and perhaps get it to stop, but when I look out I see the whole pueblo seems to be in the plaza. No wonder they don’t mind about the windows.

Culture and History

May 20, 2007: the election campaigning has started already – headed for September. At 10:15 am a cavalcade rolls through tiny Santa Ana. About twenty cars, each identified by something orange (balloons, signs, tshirts) and many signs on its sides. The usual loudspeakers, music, a few bombas set off…..drivers jumping out, setting up the launcher, setting the charge, running a short distance away, boom….and then in the sky, a second boom…..repeating the process once or twice. Then putting the launcher back in the truck to drive on, chasing the calvalcade. This one was for General Molina, a candidate for the party identified by a drawing of a raised fist and the word URGE. He was standing in the back of a new pickup with orange balloons all over it, with his wife. He actually looked rather handsome, competent, and nice. And as far as I could see, no secret service. Definitely no policia. 

5/30/07 And finally, after nearly nine months here……!!....Something may happen. I spoke to the director at San Cristobal el Bajo about consulting with them and she wants me to see this mother tomorrow morning. She also agreed they could use help in the prepa (preschool) classroom. I had to wait 40 minutes, standing outside her office, looking at the view, wondering about their water system, before she spoke to me. Evidently I didn’t make myself clear and she thought I was waiting for the other teachers. So there’s a hint, for the start of my project: be sure I’m clear about things and being clear. And of course more than half the time I’m just faking it in Spanish. I wish I were comfortable admitting I understand so little. And I’m starting to work in the special ed classroom at San Pedro, thanks to my Spanish teacher’s friend, and taking some motivational stuff there this morning. And I have permission from Fred to do all this, because we now have four teachers and I'm really not needed in those classrooms. And there’s something of an opening at San Juan because that director wants to start a program, and this would demonstrate need. I think I could convince her to do a parenting training (maybe group but I’m not ready for that) and maybe an infant stimulation group. Then borrow the materials from Felipe (I thought I was just in there for fun.) I’ve spoken to Sandra about hooking this up with F. E. but she thinks better not (not sure why; she’s going to speak to someone.) And through Francisco maybe I could get an AA person up to San Juan for the group she wants. Or perhaps someone from the F.E. AA group. So all this would fit my individualist/ do things now personality, and yet I tried to make it more structured and connected to F.E., if only to require people I see to sign up there first. I know I’m gong to end up spending money, adopting people, etc. I hope not.

Sometimes – watching HBO at my house, walking on the street with motorcycles going by, sitting in the internet shop, buying groceries at the gringo food store, sitting in my writers’ group, or having lunch at a nice café – it’s easy to forget that I’m in Guatemala……although the movies have Spanish subtitles, the motorcyclists don’t wear helmets, the rest of the folks in my internet shop are young Guatemalan boys playing videogames, and my lunch today was with the four young Guatemalan teachers I work with. But it hits home that I’m in a “third-world” country when we go to San Juan, today, to visit a family, walk down a rutted, trash-strewn alley to a wooden gate in a wire fence which opens to show a rain-washed cement patio leading to a dark cement house, much of it open to the air, and the roof – like so many – just corrugated tin, with openings everywhere under the roof. A young boy asks what we want, his clean school uniform in sharp contrast to his surroundings. Two other children wave and rush up to talk to us. They are a young girl who is in my kids’ group - she is a little shy with me – and a young boy in the older group whom I always watch because his face is so appealing; beautiful, with high Mayan cheekbones, dark-lashed eyes……….something about his manner is so slightly-tough or restrained on the surface, and sweetly shy underneath. I am so moved by all these kids and their difficult lives. I am so touched when they recognize me. 

Guatemala reveals itself slowly. I have been somewhat disturbed by reading The Long Night of White Chickens…..which paints such a dark and negative picture of Guatemala, of course during the long time of violence, here. But he paints, also, a negative feeling about Guatemalans, themselves; almost as though something in their nature could have brought about this time of silence, betrayal, and viciousness. My Guatemalan writer friend comes by my house to talk about his emerging book and says, without my mentioning this book or my thoughts about it, that he wants to get out of Guatemala again; away from this place where there has been such ugliness. He tells me friends of his were tortured and murdered during that period. This story from him makes the history I know even more personal and apparently more wide-spread, since he and his friends lived in the Capital. Somehow I had thought the massacres and torture and uprootings that existed in the highlands – evidently unknown to Antigua-dwellers, according to my Spanish teacher and my expatriate friend, (although she said, “We didn’t know; we didn’t WANT to know”) – was the only period or place of horror since the conquest. In the long history of Guatemala there were of course earlier times of terror……..the conquest, certainly, the herding of indigenous people into small aldeas like the one I live in now, the civil war in the 60s - started by soldiers angered at the placement of troops here by the US, to train to fight in Cuba, as I understand it from him, and then the massacres in the 80s. And there were natural disasters, notably in the early colonial period…..devastating earthquakes, Volcan Agua’s deluge….and later earthquakes, and the hurricane that destroyed lives in October of 2005, just before my first visit here. Layers and layers. Perhaps some of the joy I sense here in people is just the joy of being alive in a time in which these things are NOT going on. I think of the way the earth recovers after a natural disaster, and even a war. Sometimes it takes years but the spirit of life recovers, plants grow up from the overturned soil, flowers blossom, and seeds drop to sprout again.

Guatemalan culture past and present

This pueblo continues to surprise me. I moved here in part because I wanted to be more part of a community; I didn’t realize how community-oriented this plazuela would be. Not only are there games of futbol at all hours of the day and evening, and some odd type of basketball that allows you to run, holding the ball, but next door to our “compound” there is a center at which young girls hold their Quinciñeras (essentially “coming out” parties, at age 15) and people of all ages have their birthday parties – complete with loud music, one night rattling our windows. Fortunately it tends to be types of dance music that I enjoy. Then there is the reggaeton music, which I also love, broadcasted to accompany the more up-scale futbol games. And, more quietly, every night men use the street light very close to my house to play cards, sitting on the plazuelas low concrete bleachers, but of course this is also accompanied by music on the radio and occasional hoots and howls. Recently they have initiated bingo games in the center of the futbol court, accompanied by a loud announcer. As relatively quiet person, when I’m not dancing - and accustomed to near-absolute silence at my home in California - I could let this annoy me, especially when it all goes on really late, but consciously allow myself to be “part of a community,” to just let the sound come in and out of me without resistance. But this morning, at 5:15 am on a Sunday is a first: I am wakened by loud singing. Going to the window that looks out on the plazuela I see a group of men standing under the street light in the middle of the plazuela 100 feet away. Putting my glasses on, I see two are playing the large guitars (guitarones?) I sometimes see here. They are singing loudly, seeming a little drunk – but maybe that’s just my perception of the hour. The singing and playing are both good, somewhat like mariachi music. As I watch, they part and the musicians – one of them with an accordion – walk past me. I notice there are a lot of people on the street at this hour….that is, groups of 2 or 3 pass my house every 3-5 minutes, all walking down my street in the same direction. It seems obvious that some sort of celebration is taking place on one of the streets behind my house. I notice my manager’s family is up and walking around; I am tempted to ask them what’s going on and imagine being swept up into yet another odd and interesting local activity, or not. I elect to stay in my robe. Then there is a loud honking, and I see two chickenbusses parked in the road in front of the gancha (court.) I can’t imagine how they reached here through these narrow streets. I see several children with packs pile into one, which is evidently already filled; it takes off down my street, with what appears to be a huge paint bucket and a babystroller on top. Another parked bus is filling up with adults carrying packs and bags. The whole town is having an excursion somewhere? Finally it takes off, too, and at 6:30 am everything is quiet again. 

Well of all the celebrations we’ve had here (and these folks love ‘em!) this one most has me both gnashing my teeth and dying of laughter. It’s El Dia de Madre - their Mother’s Day a few days before ours. It starts at 3:05 a.m. with a loud amplified voice and marimba music for ½ hour; which suddenly seems to grow very loud, pass on the small street right next to my house and disappear. 4:35 a.m. again a loud voice announcing the wonder of mothers and this day set aside for them, and lots more music, but this one is stationary and on-going. I have cotton in my ears and a pillow over my head (though I like the music well enough) but the sound is coming through the cobblestone streets into my bones. Eventually I give it up and get up about 5:45, deciding this is a great day to wash my sheets (by hand on my own little pila outside on my back patio.) I notice my gringa neighbor peeking out the door of our gate so I look too. From the music you would expect at least dancing couples with full skirts lifted up. But we see a lone man sitting at a table with huge amplifiers, talking into a microphone, and not too far from him (all this in our plazuela in front of our – now beautifully lit – church) a row of about six women sitting silently in chairs side by side. And of course every so often tons of firecrackers or the larger bombas. Just what every mother wants at 6 a.m. I sort of like displaying our mothers NOT making tortillas for the family at this hour, although in this “day and age” there are women around town who specialize in fresh tortillas (no salt) and you either go to their house or tienda, or get them when they walk around with large plastic baskets, the warm tortillas covered with brightly-colored cloths. Suddenly there is competing music coming from the other size of the plazuela and I see 4 cars with a loudspeaker. I say "competing music" but it’s exactly the same music played independently. Some people in orange jackets get out, set off a few bombas (while the other music plays on,) and a disembodied voice talks about how wonderful “madrecitas” are. I notice on the back of one of these cars what appears to be a political poster. Since campaigning for the September presidential election has already begun, I suspect that somebody’s sentiments are “for sale.” I suspect these folks are the ones who started the day off at 3 a.m. Now the music has switched to a slight rap or hip hop flavor…but no, we’re back to more soulful men singing about the saintliness of their mothers. And of course more firecrackers. 

Yesterday was sweet…..we went to our schools to work but found most of the classes were preparing little gifts and cards for Mother’s Day and getting ready for some sort of presentation at a special Mass in the local (beautiful, old) church. And all around town yesterday were children walking holding carefully-made little gifts and mothers with large baskets of goodies. These folks do revere their mothers. The mothers in front of the church have dispersed, now, and the music has stopped at 7 a.m. Looks like people are getting ready for Mass in this church. I’m sure there are more things planned all day. Think I will finish washing my sheets. 

 And yes…..more things are planned. I walk out into the plazuela (aware of being the only gringa, though there are a dozen of us volunteers living here and there in this town, I hear) and stand to watch several acts put on by different classrooms (children reciting, dancing, acting in some skit) and two women who do the meringue with the school director (who is pretty good) and one of the practicantes (student teachers.) 

I had heard the story of the woman who declared herself empress, here, after her husband’s death and was then killed by the deluge from Volcan Agua, but here is the official story (“A Short History of Guatemala,” Ralph Lee Woodward, Jr.): “Unwelcome in Peru, Pedro de Alvarado (who had, with his brother Jorge, established a town very close to Antigua as the capital of the Guatemalan region-which stretched to Panama) returned to Spain where his wife, Francisco de la Cueva had died in 1528.” (Seven years before....in those years distances were real.) “Alvarado now married her sister, Dona Beatriz de Alva de la Cueva. Accompanied by his new bride, he returned to Guatemala in 1539, but rumors of golden cities in Cibola lured him north to Mexico. There he fought with his characteristic courage and recklessness in the Mizston War against the rebellious Chichimecas until he died in Guadalajara on 4 July `1541 after a horse fell on him. Word of his death did not reach Santiago de Guatemala (the capital) until 29 August, when a letter…ordered Lt. Governor Francisco de la Cueva, a cousin of Alvarado’s widow to continue as governor in Guatemala. In her grief over the loss of her husband, Dona Beatriz reportedly wailed excessively and called herself “la sin ventura” (the unfortunate or hapless one [and I heard elsewhere she had the building housing the present salsa bar Sin Ventura painted black and she and all the servants dressed in black for a year.] "Her tears were matched by unusually heavy rains that drenched Guatemala in early September 1541. On 9 September the City Council and other notables including Alvarado’s widow, met to install [her cousin] as governor of the kingdom [sic] but the strong-willed and ambitious Beatriz, supported by the powerful Bishop of Guatemala, Francisco Marroquin [whose name I know only as one of the schools we visit] managed to…make her interim governor. ….[she] would rule but a pair of days, however. The rains continued throughout Saturday, 10 September 1541, and on that night tremors from the nearby and active Fuego Volcano [which still sends up plumes of smoke every day and produced a tremor that shook my bed last week] caused the crater at the top of the Agua volcano to rupture. A torrent of water and mud gushed down the volcano’s side carrying away part of [Ciudad Vieja] and killing many people, including Dona Beatriz.” The cousin, Francisco De la Cueva and Marroquin then established Antigua “on the other side of the valley” [not far.] De la Cueva then married a daughter of Alvarado and Tlaxcalan Princess Dona Luisa de Xicotencatl [who must be Mayan], who had survived the destruction of the capital along with several ladies that Dona Beatriz had brought with her from Spain. These survivors were important in Guatemalan history as mothers of many of the principal families of the colonial era. Alvarado had no children by his De la Cueva wives. His legacy in Guatemala continued only through the descendants of his union with Dona Luisa., [the Mayan.]" This is of course fascinating to me primarily to consider the drama of the lives involved. I would like to know more about these families.

Madrina y voluntaria

I go for my first visit since returning to Guate to live, to see Denilson, my ahijado (“god-son”) or sponsored child from the Camino Seguro project in Guatemala City. I chose Guatemala to live (over Jamaica) in part because of the idea that I would be closer to Denilson. Yet I have been here six months without spending time with him, though I bought a basket of food and some shoes for him at Christmas, as well as supporting him at $25/ every month. There are a few reasons for this: one is advised NOT to go to Guatemala City on the chicken bus. It is an hour ride in a densely-crowded bus. One tourist was killed on the bus for not giving up his money just after I arrived here. A bus driver and his assistant were shot and killed just the other day. And once you get to Guate City, you have to change to another bus, and then walk through a very poor area to reach the project. Camino Seguro strongly advises against it. So the other option (besides an expensive cab) is to go with the project tour. This leaves at noon and returns at 4:30. Since I have wanted to take him to the zoo, this gives us only 2 hours for that trip, which seems too short. So I kept putting it off, trying to come up with some other solution. And then I have been working a lot, though I have deliberately kept Thursdays off because that is the day for the tour. So this Thursday I go with the tour, and the trip there is uneventful except that even with our regular guide we somehow get on the wrong bus and have to walk further than usual through the streets, crowded with peddlers. I don’t recognize the road, despite 4-5 trips with the tour group. And then, as our group of 15 or so people is straggling along through the crowd to get to the “more dangerous” area, the girl behind me is “attacked”: a man pushes her in the chest to throw her off balance and grabs her expensive necklace and runs. She is shaking and crying, but unhurt. I never wear expensive jewelry here, but I commiserate with her shock. 

Denilson is waiting at the project, and looks delighted to see me. We take a cab with the social worker to the zoo, where it turns out Denilson has been several times with his school or the project. But he loves to see the lions, we eat pizza and take a lot of photos, and he goes on a few rides. His shining face is a pleasure, but once again I am disappointed that he connects more with the social worker (a nice young man) than with me. It stands to reason, and I am glad that Denilson receives enough from his mother that he doesn’t hunger for the kind of attention that I give out….which so many children have gravitated to. But it is slightly disappointing. It is also VERY expensive to take a taxi (well 80Q) and to pay for food and fees for all three of us…..I spend about $50 on the trip. This definitely limits the number of times I’m going to be able to come, though I'll admit to paying more for my salsa classes. But really it's that he doesn't seem to need it; again, this is a good thing. I talk to the social worker about finding out what the family needs; maybe this is a better way to use my money for him. 

With another psicologo (here, a college graduate in psychology) from Familias de Esperanza, I finally go to a pueblo to visit a family home. We go to San Juan, past the center of town and the school I visit with the Brain Gym folks, and down into the back alleys. I am stunned at how these people have to live. I have seen scattered houses along the highways with tin roofing for the outside walls, held together with baling wire, but never so omnipresent as it is here. Maybe I have forgotten so quickly, but this area, except for the flying trash, looks worse than the Basura (dump) area in Guatemala City where the Camino Seguro project is. The alleys are hilly, rocky, dirt - wide pathways, really – along which children play and ride a few bicycles downhill. Small children are filthy with uncombed hair; older children, returning home from school, are clean and neat in sharp contrast. 

We enter the home we’ve come to visit through the makeshift gate. Wash is on a line, the yard is dirt, a dog barks from a corner where he’s on a short chain. There are piles of concrete, brick, and lumber here and there, covered with dust. The pila, full of dirty dishes, is outside the front door. We enter through a torn lace curtain. Inside one of the project houses, made of cement sheets and roughed-out timbers, with a tin roof and air space under the eaves, the family lives in a room 15 feet square. Two double beds are on two walls, a dresser is in the middle of the room with a table covered in linoleum cloth behind it. Remnants of a meal are on the table. I notice there is a project stove in the courtyard, tucked under some tin materials. The grandmother is trying to cook on it, unsuccessfully…..she can’t get the fire going hot enough. There are women who are able to keep an orderly house in this sort of environment – I have been one, myself, although even my log cabin was in better condition than this – but this woman is not. Evidently, we learn, she works all day, earning pennies selling things door to door. There is no electricity (or water) in this house she rents for 150Q a month (about $20 American) so at night there is no light for housework or her granddaughter’s homework. This is one of the problems she wants help in addressing. She talks rapidly with my co-worker in Spanish. I catch only about 40% of what they are saying, but enough to start thinking of solutions. I can observe the girl in the classroom when I go there with the Brain Gym folks next week. I can see if there are some sort of lanterns here… kerosene or oil…..which I could buy them to start with. But where would she get more kerosene? New things to learn. I can also ask her teacher if there is any sort of homework club after school to provide the girl with a place to do this; as California’s schools and projects have. Or, failing that, if there is a neighbor she can stay with for an hour while the grandmother continues to work alone. I can also help with the cookstove fire, which I do, showing the grandmother that she needs to keep the wood entrance open enough to allow a draft through, rather than jamming it full and trying to blow thru the top hole. In a few minutes the fire is going briskly, but I notice she doesn’t attend it during our conversation in the home, and doesn’t check her beans. Having cooked on a woodstove for years in California, I know what is necessary, and am a little confused at her response. But we will learn more when we visit next week.

Personal/cultural musings

April 15: I start a full work-week (I’m limiting it to four days) next week, with both the Brain Gym teachers in the small pueblo schools, and seeing some women in their homes with a social worker and held in the kids group for Familias de Esperanza. Frankly, I’ve been enjoying my time off to go out of the country, to Chico the last week in March, for Semana Santa in Antigua and the week my sister was here - just going from this to that………..but volunteering is what I came down here for and I know I’ll get caught up in that again, too.

I still don’t feel centered here, but can’t imagine anyplace else that is more right – not Chico, not Livingston, though I hope to go there again in November, and still fantasize at times about living with more music and dance….and pigs in the street. I think about San Juan on Lago Atitlan….which would keep me in touch with the Brain Gym project, be the same climate (though I’d like it a little warmer,) and be a little quieter and more tranquil – possibly even more “in the country.” And last nite by chance I met a woman from Spain who is volunteering in Xela, and very much wants me to come up to see the children in the orphanage there which she works for…..but reading in the guidebook, the altitude could touch into my fear of heights, and it is COLDER than Antigua, not warmer.
So nothing’s quite right. But I’m still putting one foot in front of another, feeling my way along.
Actually what I enjoy most is sitting at my computer, writing on one or another project I’ve become involved with….looking out at the banana trees and bouganvilla in my yard here in Santa Ana.
And of course when the people next door suddenly start playing some good CDs really loud (usually there is no sound from there – it seems to be a small convention center) and the plaza is full of fathers and kids playing papi futbol……and I’m going out to dinner with some folks from the project………it all seems pretty good.

Cultural/Personal
As I’m walking home from the bus at lunch time – the side street from Calle Hermano Pedro to my house is a little more deserted than it usually is at 8 or 5 – two Guatemalan men are coming down the street in my direction.
“Hello,” the man closest calls out, in stilted English. “How are you?” “I’m just fine,” I say, with an off-hand smile, but he sticks his hand out to shake mine. I take his hand, but notice that his eyes and his friend’s look a little drunk, at this hour. “You can give me money for lunch?” He asks. I often hand out quetzals but not to drunk-looking men. “No,” I say, “No hoy.” (Not today.) And pass on.
In retrospect I realized that in my intention to be friendly and respectful to all passersby, no matter their outward appearance, I could have been in trouble in this instance, with no one else on the street. When I gave him my hand he could easily have pulled me to him, at least robbing me.
I am careful not to carry much money, and when I have a little more than usual with me, for some purpose, to put it in my pants pocket or an inner pocket of my bag. But I think on an empty street like that I need to steer clear of getting so close to strange men.
Later in the day, I hear that the body of a 30-year-old man was recently found a block from that spot. I will be a little more cautious.

If I want to involve myself more in the culture here, I am going to have to change some life-long habits. I have already shifted one: my tendency is to get right to whatever subject I have when talking with another person. I was already cautioned about that when meeting with some Native Americans in California; first they want to get to know who you are before you start discussing business.
Here, the cultural tendency is to say, “Hello, How are you? I am fine, thank you, and you?” before even the briefest phone conversation. I am learning this. At least it is not the more elaborate greeting that I understand exists in Afghanistan (and all Muslim countries?) where you enquire after the person’s family back to the 10th generation, the health of their households, etc.
Secondly, everyone here kisses on one or both cheeks even on first meeting. In California, I often hug people I’m very fond of, touch them on the hand or arm, and so forth, but not in a routine way on meeting and departing, as they do here. And not when I first meet someone.
Oddly enough, now that I’ve gotten used to it, Guatemalans in the psicologia department at the project, are NOT greeting me like that, and I miss it. And of course I decide to change that immediately, and with my salsa teacher, too, by initiating it.
Another custom, which I ran into with my mother-in-law in East Oakland, was to feed everyone who comes into your home. Maybe this is just a poor, rather than Guatemalan, custom. Well I don’t do this except if someone has come from a long way and is staying awhile.
More habits to change. More reference to the Alchemical idea of working on oneself in anything you do, and I guess, anywhere you go.

Chichi et environs

We stayed the night in a small hotel near the market and central square between the two churches [the most beautiful church in the photo.] What we didn’t know was that the night of Easter, music and dancing goes on there – very loud - until 3 a.m. This was a live marimba band who played non-stop, but the traditional music was also well-integrated with much more modern trends (my sister described it as similar to Tex-Mex.) The only unfortunate thing was that we didn’t feel quite safe enough to travel through the dark streets to and from the activity….although it was only a few blocks away. In the light of day that seemed silly, but…. If I’d known about the music I would have arranged with the guide to escort us to and from.
The guide, the young artist from whom Suzanne bought some paintings, and the young man who waited our table, all indigines, were so friendly and open and sweet………..these interactions were a high point of our trip. I am happy that my Spanish has mas o menos progressed to the point that this sort of interaction is possible. Tomas told us that his family lives outside of Chichi in the country, neither of his parents were literate, his father died a few years ago so he is head of the family and has to work as a guide, but he is finishing high school at night.

We then went back to Pana and got hustled by two young guys into taking a private boat for 100Q each to the little “resort” we’d reserved for two nights. (Take the public boats for 15-20Q.) Isla Verde was created by a young woman from Spain over the last three years. It has.a lovely common room, kitchen, deck overlooking the lake, meditation platform and yoga space…..and lots of little cabins strung up the hillside also overlooking the whole lake. The little bathroom of our cabin was charming, open-air, with lots of plants growing into the space. The owner/builder used the concrete parts of all structures in a way reminiscent of the Southwest of the US – free-form, curved shapes.
It was a little expensive by my standards ($175 for 2 people 2 nights and all the excellent meals and help from the staff.) She is interested in hosting workshops there – weaving, yoga, or whatever.
We did quite a bit of relaxing there, though the hottub wasn’t functioning, and we didn’t indulge in the massages offered. In the day time we took small public boats (which are a trip in themselves, as the locals shuttle themselves and various goods from one dock to another) to several villages around the lake. There is a very hippie village there – San Marcos – which we didn’t visit, but we went to San Juan (which I am sort of interested in living in, at some point) where we went to a painter’s workplace and talked with him about his wonderful folk-art paintings, and to a weaving coop which uses all natural dyes, where we shopped in their tienda for lovely scarves and walked through their dye process, and talked with a lovely woman weaver. They use the backstrap loom, like all the other weavers I’ve seen in Guatemala
San Juan is one of the cleanest, quietest villages I’ve been to. We met only two gringos on the street, both volunteers (one with the Peace Corps) in various projects in the area, teaching reproductive choices and women’s rights (one) and helping develop small economic projects (P.C.) Lovely people we talked to, and a very nice restaurant there, as well.
We then walked to the next village – San Pedro – where I took a training for 4 days some months ago. We took a winding way thru the village (evidently known locally for its drug culture) and then got another public launch to Santiago, home of Maximon, the local saint. He’s a cigar-smoking, whiskey-drinking saint you can appeal to for curing and other benefits. A tuk tuk took us to his current home (he is passed around the village annually to vs. members of the brotherhood,) and a little boy guided us up the alley and through a curtained doorway to confront Maximon, a few feet from the door. The assembled men quickly pulled it together to receive visitors and for a few quetzals we could take photos, look at the other saints reclining in biers nearby, and see all the plants hanging from the low ceiling, that are used in various parts of the ceremonies (the Curasca among them.) I tried to get more information about the ceremony and Maximon, but there was only one man who spoke Spanish, and that was limited. Suzanne picked up a book about him, though, so I will learn more in the future.
We then backtracked to Antigua the following day, spent a day seeing the sights here, and finished an incredibly lovely 8-day vacation.
It was really lovely to have her here, and to see all these things which I’ve seen before (except for Semana Santa) but from yet another perspective.

Cultural Traditions and another visit

For two weeks I have been volunteering four mornings a week with the young teachers with whom I went to San Pedro de la Laguna. We go into the classrooms in the various public schools in the small pueblos near the project: San Juan Obispo, San Pedro de las Huertas, San Cristobal Abajo, Santa Catarina Bobadillo, and my own Santa Ana. Public schools in Guatemala are for the poor. Even my Spanish teacher and Salsa teacher send their children to private schools.
I’m not sure if taxes in Guatemala go to the public school system but whatever the revenue there doesn’t seem to be much. The buildings are old concrete block, the classrooms too small, there is no money for extra classroom materials, although their text workbooks look good (describing moder teaching methods, etc.) and seem to be new. But for several weeks San Cristobal didn’t even have water for the bathrooms! The school year is nine months, mid-January through mid-October, half-day for all grades; with lots of vacation days for local fiestas and national holidays.
However I have been very impressed with the quality - the compassion, dedication and interest in the welfare of their students - of the Directors of the various schools.
We go into the classrooms to do Pedagogia Basica (Brain Gym) activities with the students, sometimes in class if we need the blackboard, and otherwise outside. My role is to observe our teachers and make suggestions, to be sure their delivery stays in line with the original intent of the training, and to help with behavior management. Every class has four or five students who are usually out of line, or take every opportunity to get there. If we let them go for a moment, the whole class goes bonkers. But part of behavior management is keeping the kids from getting bored, so I also spend time encouraging, giving thumbs-up’s and nods or words of approval.
And of course encourage our teachers (we hire two more before long) who are just-graduated students, themselves, but quite gifted. I really enjoy doing this when there are just two teachers and I feel fully involved and useful.

Cultural
April '07: Antigua just had its biggest celebration of the year – Semana Santa or Holy Week.

This country takes its religion very seriously. For several weeks BEFORE Semana Santa, the outlying communities have their fiestas and processions ….each of them depicting a different part of the Stations of the Cross. These start at the church in their town (where there are sellers of food and religious items) and proceed into Antigua. (For non-Catholics, like me: each of the Stations represent a different stage of the procession to the cross – where Jesus stumbled and fell, where Veronica washed his face, where someone gave him a drink of water, where someone carried the cross for him for a way, where he was beaten, etc.) These depictions take place in one after another of the outlying communities first, each winding their way into the center of Antigua on successive weekends.
Then Semana Santa begins. For all the processions, different schools, and groups and even different stores or tiendas, create an “alfombra” (carpet) on the street outside their building. These are made of colored sawdust, placed via templates into patterns worthy of Persian rugs, or made of flowers and other parts of plants; the latter can be incredibly elaborate or quite simple. (Around the alfombras in the aisles of the churches there are even elaborate borders created of various vegetables in incredible patterns – the food is then distributed to the poor.) One plant that is used in many variations (individual rice-like seeds in decorative piles, the fan of 5” seed-heads, the individual linear stalks as lines, the full, thick 4’ stalk with all the seedheads, either in or out of its pod, and pieces of the pod itself) is called Carascol?? I think. These pods and interior parts also are used as hanging decorations.
It is lovely to walk around town and watch the care and often devotion that goes into the creation of these alfombras. Even teenage boys take part. Anyone can participate, of course. Unfortunately I was in Chico while the fiesta for my pueblo – Santa Ana – took place, but my Guatemalan neighbor and her eight year old daughter took part in creating an alfombra on the street near our houses, and her gringo husband walked in the procession, carrying a “float.”
The processions – large “floats” called andas, (the word andar means to walk) depicting Christ or Mary in one or another scene, which are carried on the shoulders of 20 or more people, usually groups of men for Christ and women for Mary – then proceed through these alfombras, destroying the work of many hours in a few minutes, which is the “sacrifice,” as is the act of carrying the anda. They pay the church for this privilege.
Setting aside any feelings I have about the negative aspects of the Catholic church, or about Christ’s “sacrifice for our sins”……..I was SO moved by some of these processions, and the feeling among most of the onlookers (although of course there were balloon-sellers, and people chatting among them,) that I was often in tears. The procession which depicts each of the Stations via life-size, very realistic and beautifully- sculpted figures, on one float after another (these on wheels) was almost too much to take.
The crucifixion of course took place on Friday, toward dusk, in the central square in Antigua. Frankly, I don’t know how a Christian can get through it all….if you felt Christ went through all this for YOU.....extremely moving, but I suppose if you watch it every year from the time you are carried “in arms,” you become accustomed to it, if not inured.
I understand that Saturday’s processions are mostly devoted to Mary, and Easter Sunday there is a joyous procession. But my sister (who has been visiting for this special week) and I were on our way to Panajachel for a day of sight-seeing, and then to Chichicastenango for Easter.
Their market was huge, as usual, but the activities on the church steps, where Mayan traditions have been intermingled with the Catholic ones for several centuries….where there are Mayan altars all down the central aisle of the beautiful cathedral….and where the church facing the main one seems to be predominantly Mayan (there were so many beautiful old people on their knees with candles, that I decided not to go in.) One custom there – and perhaps elsewhere, but I haven’t seen it) is to crawl on your knees (upright holding a candle) up to the altar, to ask for help or healing of some kind. An old man who did this 3 times in succession on his bare knees on each side of the aisle for at least 30 feet, moved me so strongly, I sent him light and added my prayers to his.
Outside the church on the steps were huge wheels of bright objects and feathers, carried by several men. We saw this depicted in various paintings around town as well.
A young man named Tomas became our guide to go up to where the Mayan healing ceremonies regularly takes place, on top of a hill looking out over the valley where Chichi is and up to the brightly colored cementary on the hill on the other side. Fires are burned by the Mayan priest (sorry I don’t know the proper appellation, I don’t think it’s “bruja”) and in them are sacrificed things like chocolate and candles, and in the case of benedictions for a wedding, the priest sacrifices a cock and hen for the bride and groom, subsequently throwing the blood and then the bodies into the fire. If they jump around, this is a good augury for the wedding. I’m not sure what happens if they don’t….probably prayers and maybe personal sacrifice.
The priest we saw was a young man with a lovely manner and very expressive body, who was attending a couple. Tomas said the couple had problems in their family. They knelt at a stone altar with a large round stone as representation of the deity (sorry not to have researched my facts on this.)
It was okay to watch, to donate, and even to take photos, as long as we stood back. I was pleased to notice that Tomas, a good Catholic boy, showed so much respect for the ceremonies; he said he would certainly ask for one if he had the need, a more personal evidence of the integration of the Catholic and Mayan traditions.

New Home

2nd of March. I've been here for six months, and I’ve moved to another home….less expensive, less beautiful, less private, and further from all the activities I’ve grown to love. But not without charm. This casa in pueblo Santa Ana was the first I considered in the Antigua area, but I kept hearing stories about que peligrosa (how dangerous) the area was. So, on my way to rent this house, I ran into the one that I ultimately rented. But $3600 and no roommate later, I’ve decided there are better ways to spend my money than on rent.
So my new “direccion” (address) is “frente plazuela 36A, alcalde Santa Ana.” Or in front of the plaza in the little pueblo of Santa Ana. It’s a sweet stand-alone house with grated windows, within the walls of a “complex” (but not, mind you, a fancy “gated community,” which there are many of here) with two other identical houses, painted dark rusty orange (mine is golden yellow.) In one of them live five young Belgian volunteers with a loquat project. In the other is a young family from Oregon; the husband gringo, the wife Guatemalan. The other habitacíon in the complex is a small bungalow of maybe two rooms, in which live the “manager” and his wife, and a varied assortment of other people including a grandchild of 4 or so. Fortunately for me they all prefer to speak Spanish, and of course the manager and his family only speak Spanish. It bothers me a little that Tono and Maria and so many other members of their family live in this tiny cottage, and I have a small, but 3-bedroom, house all for myself. But moving here from my former “palace” is all I can do to equalize matters. They live, I understand, on $50 per month rental of each of the three houses. They and the water bill. I hope to find various chores over time that I can pay them to do……like my wash, and maybe cleaning before family comes. The owner advised that they will do these things.
The owner and her family – all very nice people – look nearly white, like many Guatemalans, probably due to the presence of Germans workmen and engineers in this country during a period of massive dam-building and other projects in the early 1900s. Or possibly they are from Spanish forebears.

At any rate I am here, in front of the plazuela on which resides a beautiful old church, and a “papi futbol” court. Right now there are a group of men playing out there, rather poorly, but watched by a lot of people from the community, mostly men. There’s not much to do in this pueblo in the evenings.
Not much for me, either, as neither cable nor internet has been connected.
So I am proof-reading the story of another writer from our writers’ group – a Guatemalan man who spent his childhood in a very poor section of Guatemala, during a time of a lot of violence…..feuds between families over land, honor, and women. It’s a privilege to read the story.
The house I have rented came furnished, but unlike the last house, had no kitchenware whatsoever. Several trips to the Mercado outfitted me nicely for about $45. It also had no table to use for the computer. I found reasonable unfinished tables at the Mercado, hand-made for about Q150, but didn’t know exactly how I would get them over here. So I asked the manager’s wife and she introduced me to a carpenter in this community, and we arranged that he would make me one…finished, and with a wider drawer, for Q200, or about $26, delivered into the room. It is a little tall, as I hadn’t specified the height….but I will borrow a neighbor’s skilsaw and cut it down a bit tomorrow. So I am set up to live here, in that respect.
~~~~~~~~~
Yesterday, in this plaza, an older man had been sitting in front of the church all day long, beating a drum at intervals; at others whistling on a small pipe. I felt a little foolish, thinking of going over to ask him why he was playing; thinking I would look the fool to my new neighbors. I finally decided I didn’t care and went out my gate and across the plaza to ask him. He said it had to do with Semana Santa, nearly a month away.
Will he play all month? I didn’t ask, but I said that it sounded like it was a gift to the church, so I had a gift for him. He was very pleased with 10Q and the young man setting up a table nearby grinned at us. Hearing him beating his drum from time to time, after that, I’m glad I did.
~~~~~~~~~~
Just when I was thinking that I would miss all the processions that used to come by my old house, because probably this little community didn’t have such things, I heard singing outside and looked out my window to see 5 or 6 men and some women from the church, carrying a float with Christ carrying the cross on it, with candles, and singing, and the drum beating at intervals. Tiny and sweet.

More training

1/19/07
I take a second training in Brain Gym materials here in Antigua on this beautiful January day – a repeat of the one in San Pedro last week. There are about 35 young teachers from the Antigua area here for this training, which is given in a beautifully-designed, well lit and well ventilated building at the Familias de Esperanza project,. The first thing I notice is that most of the participants wear jeans and sports jackets, not typical (traditional) dress as they all did in San Pedro.
The training is scheduled for 8 am. Most of the participants and the trainers are there at 8, but there is a problem; the written materials, which the trainers have to use during the training, are not ready (even though I offered to help and was told they would have all been completed last week.) I am blown away by both the unpreparedness (I think what my boss at Head Start would have done if I started a training without any materials and made the participants wait) and secondly by the patience of the waiting participants. I can just imagine the HS community workers walking out in a huff if I had made them wait half-an-hour. But these folks sit quietly and chat with each other.
The trainers wait, and wait, and finally decide to go ahead and show the video first. And they can’t get the bloody power point laptop to work! They have 3 competent-looking people up in front working on it – sending the girl member of the team out to hunt for other cables, finally producing another laptop. At about 9 am, the trainer decides to go ahead and just start the training – sans video, sans written material – and actually it turns out well; a rather personal warm up for the more scientific material in the video. But I’m still blown away that these quite professional trainers didn’t get someone to check out the materials and equipment BEFORE the training. Or that the young man I thought so much of muffed this so badly.
They teach the various Brain Gym exercises and then get the various participants – mostly young teachers, all of them with little more than a high school education – the only requirement for a primary and secondary teacher in Guatemala, tho many go on to take more classes – to get up and demonstrate how they would teach the children what they had just been taught. I am SO impressed with these young folks! Confidence, a good memory for the details of what has been demonstrated to them, and already some internalization of the philosophy behind the material.
This day really speaks well for the Guatemalan people and the school system! I am really impressed.
I am also a little surprised by two things – probably because of the little that we know in California about Guatemalan culture. One is that some of the activities require the teachers to physically prompt the “children” (adult volunteers) to do the exercises, and that the male teachers seem to think nothing of lifting the women’s arms, or putting their hands on their shoulders or backs to assist them, though noone does more than gesture at the legs (and this is part of the instructions.)
The other is that references are made to the similarities in these exercises, especially the ones involving pressure points and breathing, to tai chi and yoga, and the word “chakra” is used. Although it seems to be assumed that not many have taken classes in these topics, it seems assumed that all have heard of them. And these are teachers from the small pueblos between Antigua and Panajachel, hardly a modern area.
And of course the basic wonder is that the school systems here have embraced the Brain Gym materials for their pre-kinder, kinder, and primary classrooms – taking seriously the need these children (with poor early stimulation) have for left-right hemispheric coordination and requiring these exercises for 20 mins. each morning.
~~~~~~~
I will be going into the local primary schools in the small pueblos around Antigua with the two young women teachers whom I stayed with in the hotel in San Pedro la Laguna. Last week, they, and the woman trainer we had in San Pedro la Laguna, and I spent two days going from pueblo to pueblo, on chicken buses and walking. The local San Pedro, which I'd seen once before, now seemed sprawling and a little dirty; a little edgy. I felt better that I was there with 3 Guatemaltecan women. I remembered thinking on my first trip that I would like to live there, but can’t imagine that on this visit. A nearby school on a coffee finca was the opposite. Up a dirt lane and through a grand gate into the finca, then up two more paths to the tiny two-room schoolhouse. The smiling teacher was very welcoming. The children peeked at us from the doorway. That school should be fun. It seems that the owner of the finca started (subsidizes?) this school, primarily for her workers’ children.
Then I convinced the others that Santa Ana would be easy to reach, so we went there and found the school very close to the house I once wanted to live in when I first looked for a rented home in the Antigua area. In each case, we just located the school and got our bearings, because we have yet to get authorization to enter.
Then we walked down the road I would take for the bus, if I lived at that house, but turned left and took a back road to the next Pueblo - Santa Catarina. The trainer kept emphasizing that we should never walk this road alone. We took a look at the school in that pueblo, and then walked back to the road and took a short chickenbus ride to the project for lunch.
Then into Antigua and walking all over Antigua to see the 6-7 schools there. Throughout this time the three of them are chattering in Spanish. It seems many times that the trainer is repeating the same materials which we already learned in the training, and discussed at the meeting. Maybe these youngsters didn’t catch on as quickly as I thought, though mostly their questions are about how to deliver the materials in the classroom. The answers seem obvious to me, so it is evident that various experiences I’ve had with teaching and going into schools to observe are serving me here.

Cultural differences
There is a knock on my gate at 8:30 am on a Saturday. I’m tempted not to answer – anyone I know would have called, first. But I answer to find an old indigenous man in a plaid sweater and beaten-down hat. He asks for “Christina.” “No soy,” I tell him. He gestures toward a small bookcase nearby, with a carrying strap around it. Ohmigosh, he is one of those bent-over men I see in the street, carrying large or small pieces of furniture on their backs. I ask him, “Have you been carrying this piece?” “Oh si,” he nods, smiling, “de Solola.”
So he has been carrying this piece of furniture (since what hour of the morning?) all the way from Solola…..several hours on the bus and a half-hour walk through town….and his target customer is not to be found. Yet his dark eyes are shining with warmth and his smile carves deep creases in his face. How does he do it? My parting comment to him is not perfunctory: “Que le vaya bien.” (May you go well.)