So we’ve been going, almost everyday, to this place called “Solomon’s Porch” in Panajachel. It’s a nice place, lunch and dinner and they serve Moza, the beer we have grown most fond of here in Guatemala. The guy behind the counter, Noe, he’s really nice –and versatile. He’ll be fetching us beers, making lattes, serving tables, hooking up sound equipment (they have live music almost every night, the owner is a musician, we saw him at the festival and that’s when we heard about Solomon’s Porch!) and then keeping the internet under control all in the span of a few minutes. I didn’t realize Noe spoke English because he kept speaking in Spanish to us, Sal spoke in Spanish to him, it’s a Spanish-speaking country, but then the other day after I finished my Espaguetti Primavera (yum!) he walks over and says, “Are you finished with this?” in perfect English, no accent, just… smarter than me, apparently, I can barely mutter “Gracias,” without feeling like a big silly gringo.
The internet is the main thing. Sal’s gotten way too impatient with the slow internets at the house. At first it seemed like maybe it was enough, but in office places where people chat through e-mail like it were instant messaging and everything happens through the superfast inner-office network and T3 internets… well, it’s hard to keep up with these ambitious career types. Sal’s been saying stuff like he doesn’t like working in IT anymore and I don’t blame him. Yeah, if he didn’t have a thousand other interests (including me!) he could probably obsess over all this bullshit, but he’s a sweet, brilliant and artistic man who deserves better than being underestimated and talked down to by obsessive egotistical nerds.
But our financial constraints make it difficult to just go to Pana everyday, we have to be careful, be on a budget. Still, we’ve been there three times this week, and twice eaten their yummy food. Tonight we were there a little later than usual (we usually try to be at the embarcadero right after 5 to catch the boat home before sunset) and since we missed the 5:30 boat we went ahead and hung out until the 6:30-ish boat and Sal got up the courage to go play drums with the band!
Now. I know that lots of people have lots of friends. Some people have several different groups of friends to do different things. Like work friends. School friends. Friends to do fun outside things with. Friends to talk about your feelings with. But Sal and I just do all that stuff with each other. Of the two of us, he’s more outgoing, but we’re both big introverts. We’ve been together long enough to want to call each other husband and wife now, and I’m still consistently relieved to just stay in with Sal, have dinner and watch TV. Other people, in my experience, have been mostly disappointing.
But Sal was brave and outgoing and walked over to Leroy, the owner of the place, while he was practicing some drumming with a marimba and a bass and asked to play with them. I was reading the new book I bought, “The Time Traveler’s Wife” (I like it, it’s romantical) and watching over our laptops, but when Sal finished and came back over he was grinning from ear to ear. Playing music makes him so happy! They invited him to some sort of drum thing they’re doing on Tuesday, that’s payday so we’re going. We just have to make sure we can get transportation back to San Marcos afterwards, shouldn’t be too difficult.
Anyway, unless we think of some better internet plan, Solomon’s Porch is our new favorite hangout. It’s got awesome people, musical happenings, good food, and great beer. The coffee shop in the foyer of the place (I guess the layout is sort of like a little mall, one big hallway/foyer/lobby opens to the street and has several shops and restaurants inside) has really good coffee.
I know it’s ironic since Guatemala is a big coffee-growing region, and they grow coffee all over the hills right here at Lake Atitlan. But they sell it all to Starbucks for very little money (damn you, Starbucks!) and it’s kind of hard to find good beans. Most coffee, when you order at restaurants, is instant coffee. Other than that, they make espresso and put microwaved milk in it, “café con leche”. But the coffee place near Solomon’s porch has good coffee, steamed milk, good espresso (I had an espresso con panna with no disappointment! chocolate powder on top and all!), and they sell local beans. If only we had a coffee grinder….
Anyway, we had a nice boatride home, too. It was dark and the headlight is right in the middle of the little roof, Sal and I sat right in the front watching the bow dance up and down. I just really like riding on the boats. It’s choppy and the hard benches hurt my butt, but I still enjoy it. Anytime (mostly when it’s daytime) you can glance over your shoulder and see the dark mystical waters of Lake Atitlan churning and shining, like a big sky. It’s really amazing. Good thing I like it, because sometimes the boats are jampacked with people and have to go really slow over the bumpy waters. That ride can feel like an eternity, especially when Sal’s sealed in between stinky drunk German tourists who piss themselves, as has happened in the past.
On our way home we stopped at the bodega for cerveza and pan and Sal saw a stack of empty bottles next to the jalapeño peppers. He was completely intrigued and asked the girl behind the counter what they were. “Some empty bottles,” she smartly replied (in Spanish, so Sal told me).
Anyway, it’s called aguardiente (means: water burning, or firewater) añejo (we guess that means aged). A hard liquor made right here in Guatemala. Tastes like Spritevodka! I love it! It costs about a dollar for a little bottle that got me and Sal about four shots each and it felt nice. He made a little video when we brought it home, the girl at the bodega warned up it was strong, I was nervous it would be disgusting. But it’s not! On that note, goodnight, internets!
Tuesday, March 31, 2009
Tuesday, March 24, 2009
March 24, 2009 YouTube!
Sal's putting movies up on his YouTube! Go look at this one: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IVzKAluDHJk
It's the drive from Antigua to Panajachel in a shuttle with a couple of middle-aged Habitat for Humanity volunteers. They were funny.
He also took a beautiful movie of some birdies and put some music of him playing "Happy Flight" on the guitar: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rs7jL-p7DXk (Happy Flight is the song that plays in "The Neverending Story" when Bastian finally gets to ride on Falcor! Wheeeeee!)
It's the drive from Antigua to Panajachel in a shuttle with a couple of middle-aged Habitat for Humanity volunteers. They were funny.
He also took a beautiful movie of some birdies and put some music of him playing "Happy Flight" on the guitar: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rs7jL-p7DXk (Happy Flight is the song that plays in "The Neverending Story" when Bastian finally gets to ride on Falcor! Wheeeeee!)
March 24, 2009 Just Like Old Times
We pretty much ran out of money. It’s extra ridiculous because one of our main goals with this move was to live cheaply and save up. But not yet. Moving out of Oakland was expensive, and our budget was thrown askew when my tax refund didn’t go through (still hasn’t, it’s more than 3 weeks late now!) and our security deposit from our apartment wasn’t quickly available (we won’t get it until we go back to SF in April). So even though food is cheaper and we eat in most nights anyway, we’re still constantly out of money. Plus, no places take cards around here, and the only ATMs are in Panajachel or San Pedro, a 50Q or 30Q boat ride respectively.
Still, we’re scraping by. We just haven’t been able to go out and do amazing things and take pictures lately. We even had to skip the San Marcos Consciousness Festival, which may have been overpriced anyway.
But we still manage to have a pretty darn good time. Today we’re in Panajachel, hanging out at Solomon’s Porch. This restaurant was recommended by one of the musicians we saw at the music festival the weekend before last. They have internet and Moza, the good, dark Guatemalan beer.
The other Guatemalan beer is Gallo, it’s everywhere. I like it, I like them both, but Moza is more our kind of beer.
Some things never change. We eat rice, beans and quesadillas pretty much every night (or black bean burgers, which is just the same ingredients cooked a different way, bread instead of tortillas). We watch My Name is Earl or Futurama before bed and go to sleep before 11 most nights. Even Sal’s allergies made a nasty comeback yesterday. I’ve heard many others sniffling and even I keep sneezing. Must be the seasons changing.
So, it’s true what they say: No matter where you go, there you are. We may be 2500 miles from where we were a month ago, and surrounded by glass-like lakes and skies full of mountains and living in a big, fancy house crawling with bugs, but even though we’re in paradise, we’re still Sal and Claire. 80% of the time we’re on the computer, and even though we could be hiking, kayaking, fishing, or a million other fun activities we couldn’t do back in Oakland without a bunch of hassle, we still stay home. We laugh about it. I kind of like it. We’ll travel all over the world, living in different cultures just so we can stay in and watch sci-fi/comedy cartoons. I love us.
And as for the future! Well, we’ve rented the Casa Blanca for another month, May. My mother is going to come stay with us during that time. After that we’ve secured a charming little cottage here in Panajachel, where the internet is much faster. We’ll live there for June, July and August. After that? Who knows? Our big plan here is to save up money so we can get married and then go bum around Europe for a few months as a honeymoon. But saving up enough money to afford flying our families to the same place and having an awesome party that makes people say things like, “Aw, man Sal and Claire are the greatest couple ever!” and “You guys (sniffle) are so beautiful….” and stuff like that…. Well, it’ll probably be expensive. When I first tried to pick a date for us, I said July 31st, 2010. Because if we’re not married by then I’ll be heartbroken. Ideally we’ll get hitched much sooner.
And adopt a puppy.
Did I tell you about how there are dogs all over? They run wild in the streets! Many dogs have homes, one golden retriever at the internet/laundry place in San Marcos is the most beautiful and perfect doggy ever. Someday.
Still, we’re scraping by. We just haven’t been able to go out and do amazing things and take pictures lately. We even had to skip the San Marcos Consciousness Festival, which may have been overpriced anyway.
But we still manage to have a pretty darn good time. Today we’re in Panajachel, hanging out at Solomon’s Porch. This restaurant was recommended by one of the musicians we saw at the music festival the weekend before last. They have internet and Moza, the good, dark Guatemalan beer.
The other Guatemalan beer is Gallo, it’s everywhere. I like it, I like them both, but Moza is more our kind of beer.Some things never change. We eat rice, beans and quesadillas pretty much every night (or black bean burgers, which is just the same ingredients cooked a different way, bread instead of tortillas). We watch My Name is Earl or Futurama before bed and go to sleep before 11 most nights. Even Sal’s allergies made a nasty comeback yesterday. I’ve heard many others sniffling and even I keep sneezing. Must be the seasons changing.
So, it’s true what they say: No matter where you go, there you are. We may be 2500 miles from where we were a month ago, and surrounded by glass-like lakes and skies full of mountains and living in a big, fancy house crawling with bugs, but even though we’re in paradise, we’re still Sal and Claire. 80% of the time we’re on the computer, and even though we could be hiking, kayaking, fishing, or a million other fun activities we couldn’t do back in Oakland without a bunch of hassle, we still stay home. We laugh about it. I kind of like it. We’ll travel all over the world, living in different cultures just so we can stay in and watch sci-fi/comedy cartoons. I love us.
And as for the future! Well, we’ve rented the Casa Blanca for another month, May. My mother is going to come stay with us during that time. After that we’ve secured a charming little cottage here in Panajachel, where the internet is much faster. We’ll live there for June, July and August. After that? Who knows? Our big plan here is to save up money so we can get married and then go bum around Europe for a few months as a honeymoon. But saving up enough money to afford flying our families to the same place and having an awesome party that makes people say things like, “Aw, man Sal and Claire are the greatest couple ever!” and “You guys (sniffle) are so beautiful….” and stuff like that…. Well, it’ll probably be expensive. When I first tried to pick a date for us, I said July 31st, 2010. Because if we’re not married by then I’ll be heartbroken. Ideally we’ll get hitched much sooner.
And adopt a puppy.
Did I tell you about how there are dogs all over? They run wild in the streets! Many dogs have homes, one golden retriever at the internet/laundry place in San Marcos is the most beautiful and perfect doggy ever. Someday.
March 23, 2009 Settled In
Well, it’s been just over three weeks since we’ve moved on to this plateau of paradise. In the past week or so I feel like I’ve really come to recognize how far away we are from everything we’ve ever known. Like maybe I was in culture shock, and now that it’s wearing off, there’s nothing left but noticing the distance and the differences.
My Spanish isn’t going along so swimmingly. I freeze up when people talk to me, like my brain says, “Oh, they’re speaking Spanish, don’t bother listening because you don’t know Spanish.” But I’ve been fighting that. Numbers were really hard for some reason, even though I learned counting and whatnot in my Spanish 1A class. I have some language lessons on my old iPod, and I really like them. But I haven’t done enough of those tapes to make a difference. I should do them everyday, but instead I spend a lot of my day loafing and slowly starting my rewrite (there’s so much I don’t want to change….).
The bugs are much less frequent now.
Spiders anyway. There’re these funny fuzzy black caterpillars that supposedly sting if you touch them, one of those was en la cocina recently and when Sal scooped it up with a piece of paper he excreted all this yellow goo that stuck to the floor. And I found one tiny scorpion in the kitchen and we found another last night, coming in through the bedroom door. Shivers. If Sal hadn’t of smashed that sucker he might’ve come inside! Scorpion stings aren’t super dangerous around here, our welcome packet of useful information from the house’s owner suggests you eat a spoonful of sugar and lie down if a scorpion stings. But I don’t want to give those assholes a chance!
I feel much less afraid of the big black spiders now, and when I see them on the outside walls, I kind of like it (as much as I can like a spider, which isn’t much). I know they eat mosquitoes, and the sight of them probably keeps away lots of other tiny annoyances. There’re still some little brown spiders that bite, and I keep finding them near our bed! No bites yet, that I know of. I just might have all my mosquito bites and spider bites mixed up. Whenever I go out at night, like walking home along narrow paths from the moya,
my ankles and legs become bug food. I have bites all over, plus I stopped shaving to enjoy how no one cares or even notices around here, and so my legs look kind of like a monkey’s. How about that?
And my skin is drier than it’s ever been. A few weeks before we moved out here, I decided to shake my dependency on lotion. Like most women in the U.S.A., I somehow got in the habit of smearing fancy-smelling and vitamin-enriched lotion all over myself after every shower, every time my hands felt a little crackly. Sure, it’ll make my skin nice and soft, kind of shiny, but I just don’t have the time or money to be in need of lotion all the time. So I decided to shake it. Still, since we’ve gotten here my skin has really been drying up. It’s itchy and painful, but I’m pretty sure if I endure it and eat plenty of vitamin E, I’ll be stronger for it. Now if only I could get my hair to dread up….
I’m definitely happy here, and proud of us for coming. It’s strange: it’ll be awhile before I’m comfortable conversing en español and I still get those scary creepy crawly feelings that make me kind of paranoid and uncomfortable. But here we are perched on a mountainous pedestal way up in the sky. When we look across the lake to San Pedro,
it’s like that mountain is in the sky and the clouds come crashing up behind it. There are birds singing beautiful songs all the time, Sal took movies of them yesterday. And at night the stars spread across the sky so close you think maybe I could just pluck one out and keep it in my pocket, for luck.
Also, I finally got some helado! mmm!
My Spanish isn’t going along so swimmingly. I freeze up when people talk to me, like my brain says, “Oh, they’re speaking Spanish, don’t bother listening because you don’t know Spanish.” But I’ve been fighting that. Numbers were really hard for some reason, even though I learned counting and whatnot in my Spanish 1A class. I have some language lessons on my old iPod, and I really like them. But I haven’t done enough of those tapes to make a difference. I should do them everyday, but instead I spend a lot of my day loafing and slowly starting my rewrite (there’s so much I don’t want to change….).
The bugs are much less frequent now.
Spiders anyway. There’re these funny fuzzy black caterpillars that supposedly sting if you touch them, one of those was en la cocina recently and when Sal scooped it up with a piece of paper he excreted all this yellow goo that stuck to the floor. And I found one tiny scorpion in the kitchen and we found another last night, coming in through the bedroom door. Shivers. If Sal hadn’t of smashed that sucker he might’ve come inside! Scorpion stings aren’t super dangerous around here, our welcome packet of useful information from the house’s owner suggests you eat a spoonful of sugar and lie down if a scorpion stings. But I don’t want to give those assholes a chance!I feel much less afraid of the big black spiders now, and when I see them on the outside walls, I kind of like it (as much as I can like a spider, which isn’t much). I know they eat mosquitoes, and the sight of them probably keeps away lots of other tiny annoyances. There’re still some little brown spiders that bite, and I keep finding them near our bed! No bites yet, that I know of. I just might have all my mosquito bites and spider bites mixed up. Whenever I go out at night, like walking home along narrow paths from the moya,
my ankles and legs become bug food. I have bites all over, plus I stopped shaving to enjoy how no one cares or even notices around here, and so my legs look kind of like a monkey’s. How about that?And my skin is drier than it’s ever been. A few weeks before we moved out here, I decided to shake my dependency on lotion. Like most women in the U.S.A., I somehow got in the habit of smearing fancy-smelling and vitamin-enriched lotion all over myself after every shower, every time my hands felt a little crackly. Sure, it’ll make my skin nice and soft, kind of shiny, but I just don’t have the time or money to be in need of lotion all the time. So I decided to shake it. Still, since we’ve gotten here my skin has really been drying up. It’s itchy and painful, but I’m pretty sure if I endure it and eat plenty of vitamin E, I’ll be stronger for it. Now if only I could get my hair to dread up….
I’m definitely happy here, and proud of us for coming. It’s strange: it’ll be awhile before I’m comfortable conversing en español and I still get those scary creepy crawly feelings that make me kind of paranoid and uncomfortable. But here we are perched on a mountainous pedestal way up in the sky. When we look across the lake to San Pedro,
it’s like that mountain is in the sky and the clouds come crashing up behind it. There are birds singing beautiful songs all the time, Sal took movies of them yesterday. And at night the stars spread across the sky so close you think maybe I could just pluck one out and keep it in my pocket, for luck.Also, I finally got some helado! mmm!
Thursday, March 19, 2009
March 18, 2009 Work is Stupid
We didn’t even realize it was St. Patrick’s Day yesterday. I mean the locals surely care very little, here in San Marcos anyway. But I’m sure the bars and restaurants were full of expats and tourists, both of whom seem to love getting drunk. I even read in Lake Atitlan’s little English magazine that the expats want the whole month of March to be about getting drunk and “forget Lent”!
The thing is, despite being in paradise
and waking up every morning to this view of the calm blue lake shimmering in the sun, Sal still has to work. And since his internet is much, much slower here, instead of working 8-hour days, he’s been working 12. And it seems like ever since we left California, things have been going wrong all over LesConcierge (sometimes when it loads slowly on his computer, it just says “LesCon” which, I bet, is where Sal wishes he worked). It almost seems like someone’s out to get him. And poor Sal, determined as he was to give us a better life, has been incredibly stressed over the work he’s doing and his job security doing it.
I don’t have much to do. I’ve been writing a book, fiction, for the past two years and I was putting the last touches on my first draft. But now I just wanted to sit on it for a while before starting the second. So other than doing a few tedious chores (like copying the video off our camcorder and cleaning the house – ugh, what a pain in the ass that was…) I mostly sit around listening to Sal work and sharing in his discomfort. He talks a lot about plans, what we’ll do if the job doesn’t work out, what we’ll do if he has free time again. He’s so talented in so many different areas: I’m not worried about him finding something to do. I’m just worried about him feeling useful and satisfied, there was a time this job made him feel that way.
I’ve spent a lot of time training myself in the luxury of not worrying about money. Not letting it stress me out. Because money does not now and will never dictate my happiness, only I do that. I believe it to be a passing craze, and I truly hope humanity will get over this obsession with separation and class structures soon. But Sal does not share in my hopeful naiveté, and he considers himself incapable of doing so. He’s very good to take on this responsibility, but I can think of a million things I’d rather see him doing.
Like making music, for the love of starfish.
I don’t have any answers. The rain on our parade is now and always has been balancing the importance of financial security with the much greater importance of us, our partnership, and the life we’re building together. Maybe without the concern of money, life would be too easy, and then what’s the point? I would like to generate an income, anyone need any papers edited? I’d like to see Sal free from the shackles of employment, he’s too creative, unique and beautiful to be titled and salaried, I don’t like it.
Save us, Universe, bring us some good luck, please.
The thing is, despite being in paradise
and waking up every morning to this view of the calm blue lake shimmering in the sun, Sal still has to work. And since his internet is much, much slower here, instead of working 8-hour days, he’s been working 12. And it seems like ever since we left California, things have been going wrong all over LesConcierge (sometimes when it loads slowly on his computer, it just says “LesCon” which, I bet, is where Sal wishes he worked). It almost seems like someone’s out to get him. And poor Sal, determined as he was to give us a better life, has been incredibly stressed over the work he’s doing and his job security doing it.I don’t have much to do. I’ve been writing a book, fiction, for the past two years and I was putting the last touches on my first draft. But now I just wanted to sit on it for a while before starting the second. So other than doing a few tedious chores (like copying the video off our camcorder and cleaning the house – ugh, what a pain in the ass that was…) I mostly sit around listening to Sal work and sharing in his discomfort. He talks a lot about plans, what we’ll do if the job doesn’t work out, what we’ll do if he has free time again. He’s so talented in so many different areas: I’m not worried about him finding something to do. I’m just worried about him feeling useful and satisfied, there was a time this job made him feel that way.
I’ve spent a lot of time training myself in the luxury of not worrying about money. Not letting it stress me out. Because money does not now and will never dictate my happiness, only I do that. I believe it to be a passing craze, and I truly hope humanity will get over this obsession with separation and class structures soon. But Sal does not share in my hopeful naiveté, and he considers himself incapable of doing so. He’s very good to take on this responsibility, but I can think of a million things I’d rather see him doing.
Like making music, for the love of starfish.
I don’t have any answers. The rain on our parade is now and always has been balancing the importance of financial security with the much greater importance of us, our partnership, and the life we’re building together. Maybe without the concern of money, life would be too easy, and then what’s the point? I would like to generate an income, anyone need any papers edited? I’d like to see Sal free from the shackles of employment, he’s too creative, unique and beautiful to be titled and salaried, I don’t like it.
Save us, Universe, bring us some good luck, please.
March 14, 2009 Festival Atitlan
I slept in late, didn’t really want to do anything. But we couldn’t do nothing. We decided our break was over, payday was yesterday, and things are generally okay. Joe met a guy named Tim when he was down here, and he was part of a music festival in Santiago, the biggest town on the lake: today. But I didn’t really feel like doing anything.
So we walked down to the dock, figuring we’d just go to San Pedro, get some breakfast and use some slightly faster internets, but then the boat was there – with our brilliant-smiling sunglasses-wearing homeboy. His name is Henry. And his boat was going to Santiago with a bunch of tourists, nice people. So we jumped on and took the journey across the lake.
He ended up going to the festival too, Festival Atitlan.
It was in a medium-sized clearing, completely blanketed in orange pine needles and sheltered by small hills and trees. At first we just focused on getting some food, an egg burrito (I’m still getting used to spicy!) but then we bumped into Henry again and he invited us to sit with him nestled in these rocks near the back. It seemed like the cool kids table in the cafeteria, and throughout the day people would meander back and greet Henry happily with hand slaps and fist bumps.
Since Henry was driving the boat today, he took off to go get some more people and make some more money and while he was gone we got some falafel,
mojitos and watched the show. The first act we caught were dancers in what I assume were traditional Mayan costumes, wooden masks painted like animals and body paint. It was beautiful and the drums, flutes and singing were very moving.
Then there were several dance troupes from around the lake, and they were all fun to watch. Remember how I said I had yet to see women pulling down the big jobs? Well we saw some ladies playing music and they were STUNNING.
A fine chica from Costa Rica got up on stage with just her and her electric guitar and played about six songs – gorgeous songs – including “No Woman, No Cry” by Bob Marley:
After her set, we saw her walking around and I was surprised to see that she was no more than 5’4” – on stage she looked 7’ tall! But she was very beautiful and had a cool tattoo on her back. I’ll get her name from Sal’s recordings, Carmen, I think.
There was a bluegrass band that played “Man of Constant Sorrow” and Sal laughed, “Didn’t think I’d hear that out here!” And then they joked about how their female singer was from a town in Georgia so small no one could possibly have ever heard of it, but Sal had! They were fun. There were dancing girls and they dragged the local children out to dance like they were at a hoedown, it was funny.
Then an entire band of ladies played, Sal got some sound clips and I’ll try to put them up. All ladies – percussion, guitars, they kept switching up the instruments and different voices came up but it was amazing. Then they sang a song for “las mujers”! It was awesome. Sometime around then Henry came back and we recognized certain hell-raisin’ habits about him. He disappeared for a moment and returned with beer, another moment and returned with a pretty girl (and her friend). It was funny - he always had that bright smile on his face.
It’d be kind of weird to say to someone, “Hey, you’ve just met and befriended two of the sweetest people on this planet.” But he did (that’s us, we’re sweet).
Sal and I each had a mojito and two beers, smoked a little and watched all the crazies. Sal climbed a tree and got a bird’s eye view (he’s adorable).
Dancing girls, and lots of children were running around. Tons of baby boomers were there, people who had made permanent careers it seems, of being hippies. One guy was dressed in positively costume-quality hippie gear and I saw him praying to a rock nearby with floppy dancing and such. It made me giggle. And women in loose flowing blouses would shake their wrists like belly dancers when they saw each other and hug. And, like at most festivals in the world, there were crews of kids who travel from place to place, whose dreadlocks made me jealous, and one girl had a t-shirt covered in prints and stickers. My favorite read: “Champion Mustache Rider”. Again, I giggled for minutes and minutes.
At one point the announcer (Roberto, I believe) made an announcement, “I just want to warn you, there’s going to be some pot brownies going around and just…. know that they’re very strong. We don’t have anything to do with making or selling them, but they’re there and… you’ve been warned. You’re on your own.” Haha! I didn’t see any brownies, though.
We ran into Tim, the guy Joe had met and he seemed like your typical old hippie. Plays a 12-string guitar, seemed like he might have an uptight side. He told us that we should stay overnight to see the good stuff, and sure enough set up beyond the hill behind us were tents and camps, people were staying all weekend. But Sal and I decided that was crazy.
We took off just before sunset, as a real rock n’ roll band was playing. I know rock n’ roll is very versatile but these guys had it going on, three men with a heavy blues foundation and that psychedelic guitar… they played The Rolling Stones, Cream and other classics that made Sal and me grin from ear to ear.
We had to negotiate a private boat to San Marcos for 200Q. On our way home we got some more beers and some snack foods, then we watched Star Trek: TNG with our dinner of rice, beans, quesadillas and vegetables and went to bed happy.
I’m not usually one for crowds, but this festival was just the right size. Maybe one or two hundred people, it got more crowded as the day stretched on. But no assholes, it seems like assholes don’t make it up to this altitude (except yuppie tourists). One stage, only about four food options (most vegetarian friendly) and plenty of booze, it just hit the spot. It was a good opportunity to remind myself what this new phase of our lives means. It’s not that we have a new home here at the Casa Blanca, and it’s not that we’re homeless travelers. This part of our lives is about how Sal and I have been blessed: we take our home with us wherever we go. Home is where your heart is and my heart is with Sal, so I’m at home wherever he is. It’s perfect.
So we walked down to the dock, figuring we’d just go to San Pedro, get some breakfast and use some slightly faster internets, but then the boat was there – with our brilliant-smiling sunglasses-wearing homeboy. His name is Henry. And his boat was going to Santiago with a bunch of tourists, nice people. So we jumped on and took the journey across the lake.
He ended up going to the festival too, Festival Atitlan.
It was in a medium-sized clearing, completely blanketed in orange pine needles and sheltered by small hills and trees. At first we just focused on getting some food, an egg burrito (I’m still getting used to spicy!) but then we bumped into Henry again and he invited us to sit with him nestled in these rocks near the back. It seemed like the cool kids table in the cafeteria, and throughout the day people would meander back and greet Henry happily with hand slaps and fist bumps.Since Henry was driving the boat today, he took off to go get some more people and make some more money and while he was gone we got some falafel,
mojitos and watched the show. The first act we caught were dancers in what I assume were traditional Mayan costumes, wooden masks painted like animals and body paint. It was beautiful and the drums, flutes and singing were very moving.Then there were several dance troupes from around the lake, and they were all fun to watch. Remember how I said I had yet to see women pulling down the big jobs? Well we saw some ladies playing music and they were STUNNING.
A fine chica from Costa Rica got up on stage with just her and her electric guitar and played about six songs – gorgeous songs – including “No Woman, No Cry” by Bob Marley:After her set, we saw her walking around and I was surprised to see that she was no more than 5’4” – on stage she looked 7’ tall! But she was very beautiful and had a cool tattoo on her back. I’ll get her name from Sal’s recordings, Carmen, I think.
There was a bluegrass band that played “Man of Constant Sorrow” and Sal laughed, “Didn’t think I’d hear that out here!” And then they joked about how their female singer was from a town in Georgia so small no one could possibly have ever heard of it, but Sal had! They were fun. There were dancing girls and they dragged the local children out to dance like they were at a hoedown, it was funny.
Then an entire band of ladies played, Sal got some sound clips and I’ll try to put them up. All ladies – percussion, guitars, they kept switching up the instruments and different voices came up but it was amazing. Then they sang a song for “las mujers”! It was awesome. Sometime around then Henry came back and we recognized certain hell-raisin’ habits about him. He disappeared for a moment and returned with beer, another moment and returned with a pretty girl (and her friend). It was funny - he always had that bright smile on his face.
It’d be kind of weird to say to someone, “Hey, you’ve just met and befriended two of the sweetest people on this planet.” But he did (that’s us, we’re sweet).
Sal and I each had a mojito and two beers, smoked a little and watched all the crazies. Sal climbed a tree and got a bird’s eye view (he’s adorable).
Dancing girls, and lots of children were running around. Tons of baby boomers were there, people who had made permanent careers it seems, of being hippies. One guy was dressed in positively costume-quality hippie gear and I saw him praying to a rock nearby with floppy dancing and such. It made me giggle. And women in loose flowing blouses would shake their wrists like belly dancers when they saw each other and hug. And, like at most festivals in the world, there were crews of kids who travel from place to place, whose dreadlocks made me jealous, and one girl had a t-shirt covered in prints and stickers. My favorite read: “Champion Mustache Rider”. Again, I giggled for minutes and minutes.At one point the announcer (Roberto, I believe) made an announcement, “I just want to warn you, there’s going to be some pot brownies going around and just…. know that they’re very strong. We don’t have anything to do with making or selling them, but they’re there and… you’ve been warned. You’re on your own.” Haha! I didn’t see any brownies, though.
We ran into Tim, the guy Joe had met and he seemed like your typical old hippie. Plays a 12-string guitar, seemed like he might have an uptight side. He told us that we should stay overnight to see the good stuff, and sure enough set up beyond the hill behind us were tents and camps, people were staying all weekend. But Sal and I decided that was crazy.
We took off just before sunset, as a real rock n’ roll band was playing. I know rock n’ roll is very versatile but these guys had it going on, three men with a heavy blues foundation and that psychedelic guitar… they played The Rolling Stones, Cream and other classics that made Sal and me grin from ear to ear.We had to negotiate a private boat to San Marcos for 200Q. On our way home we got some more beers and some snack foods, then we watched Star Trek: TNG with our dinner of rice, beans, quesadillas and vegetables and went to bed happy.
I’m not usually one for crowds, but this festival was just the right size. Maybe one or two hundred people, it got more crowded as the day stretched on. But no assholes, it seems like assholes don’t make it up to this altitude (except yuppie tourists). One stage, only about four food options (most vegetarian friendly) and plenty of booze, it just hit the spot. It was a good opportunity to remind myself what this new phase of our lives means. It’s not that we have a new home here at the Casa Blanca, and it’s not that we’re homeless travelers. This part of our lives is about how Sal and I have been blessed: we take our home with us wherever we go. Home is where your heart is and my heart is with Sal, so I’m at home wherever he is. It’s perfect.
Friday, March 13, 2009
March 13, 2009 Tuks Tuks and Chicken Boats
There’s this one chicken boat driver who keeps trying to rip us off. I’m going to catch a picture of him and if any of you ever come out here, be mean to this guy. The other day we were completely low on money, we just had enough to get back to San Marcos with the 50Q in our pocket to return to Pana when we had more money in our bank accounts (the only ATM machines are in Pana and San Pedro, and the San Pedro ones run out sometimes). And this mean boat captain was trying to charge us 150Q! A public boat ride from Pana to San Marcos is 25Q each, and a private ride is twice that. So he was ripping us off big time! But we needed to get home and finally he said if we share the boat with a few other people, he’d bring us to San Marcos for 75Q. Still a jacked up price – and then this motherfucker filled his boat up anyway! I’m sure he’s just racist, or thinks that anyone with an accent has money – but COME ON! We’re good nice people and we aren’t rich. And then! This morning we took his boat back to Pana and I handed him 60Q (it’s 50Q for both of us) and he just waved me along like I don’t get any change! But we stood there and Sal told him, no, give us 10Q back and he finally did. What a JERK!
There’s another boat and the guy who takes the money and ties the rope to the dock (I’m sure there’s a title for such a person, skipper? maybe?) is awesome. This boat has speakers in the back and they play reggae music (reminded us both of Joe!). I only know this guy from his big, shiny sunglasses and brilliant fucking smile. We caught his boat to San Pedro (the party town) and he asked us (in English) where we’re from. As soon as we said California he started in with, “Oh, I’ve got some purple haze, granddaddy purps, all indoor grown, buds no seeds” the whole spiel. We explained that we’re taking a break from smoking for now, but I’m glad he remembers us (he even gave us 10Q off a ride from Pana earlier this week).
Something about the way we look must make people think we want to buy marijuana, though. Because we keep getting offers, and it seems like everyone thinks we must be headed to San Pedro (San Pedro has everything, not just pot). Even our landlady has offered to sell us some herb, she said, “Oh, this isn’t really a good place to take a break, there’s some great stuff around.” But what’s a few weeks after living in California for three years with a medical card for two of those years? I’m still hesitant as to whether the local buds could possibly come close to the quality we had in California.
The boats are all pretty standard, painted blue and white mostly, with hard metal benches. I like the way you get sprayed in the face when they drive fast, though. It’s refreshing. In the afternoon the winds pick up and the water gets all choppy (that, they say, is when the monster of Lago Atitlan is luring boats into the middle of the lake to eat them!) and the boat rides are really quite fun. We took a private boat back one night, with just the two of us and a captain and it was really choppy. Weeeeee!
Tuk tuks are the other form of transportation.
Supposedly you could take a Tuk tuk from San Marcos to San Pedro but it must take forever, whereas the boat takes only 15 minutes. Other than that, it’s 5Q a person to get around in a Tuk Tuk. It comes in handy when you don’t really know where you’re going. Because the Tuk tuk drivers know where everything is.Tuk tuks are all decked out too. The other day we were in one with a radio and it had a big Tom (of Tom & Jerry) sticker. Sadly (to me, at least) most of the decorations on the Tuk tuks consist of crying Jesus stickers and other more depressing images of Christianity (why always so depressing, Jesus, why? it makes me want to get some Buddy Christ memorabilia a’la “Dogma”). But they’re all fun. Here in San Marcos we took one up the hill to our front door and it was covered in rock and roll stickers!
A big Nirvana sticker on the front, KISS, Slipknot, you name it, this kid loves rock and roll. Yeah, most of the Tuk tuks are driven by teenage boys, some older men, no women.Women here mostly seem to work in shops or bodegas, but not much else. I never see women driving or doing other more laborious jobs. Ah, patriarchal societies. Whatcha gunna do? The young girls seem okay; I have faith that it’ll be all right. Maybe the headstrong women all move away to the cities, that’s all. There are tons of women tourists here, though. I see them around all the time all on their own. Sisters, doing it for themselves.
March 12, 2009 Arañas, gatos, y bananas
Getting used to the spiders sucks. I don’t mean to dwell on unpleasant topics, but these spiders really had me freaked out. Anything bigger than my thumbnail and I feel paralyzed. All I can do is yell, “Sal! Spider!” like some sort of pathetic baby. (I'm trying to catch a picture of them, but now that I want to find one, I can't... it'll happen.)
It is getting better, and they’re becoming scarcer. I can accept now that the big black hairy ones on the walls aren’t harmful. In fact, locals consider it bad karma to kill them (oops). The brown ones are menacing (I credit those assholes for the bite on my thigh, ew) and I brought myself to smashing one the other day with a big candle on the terrace. But still. Every time we (still Sal for the most part, I’m a chicken, I know) shoo the spiders out of the house I have to follow it up with the ritual “creepy crawly dance”. You know the one.
But while the first few days here I asked Sal to precede me into every room and kill them or at least thump the walls to scare them all off, now I feel comfortable venturing around our house alone. The bedrooms seem pretty spider-free most of the time. Ants love the bathroom though. Getting over the creepy crawlies is largely a matter of accepting how powerful I am as a human being. It helps that nothing at this altitude is deadly; nothing can kill me. So I know that no matter what, out here, I really am the predator. They’re the weak little creatures that should run in fear. (Beer also helps. Quite a lot.)
The best thing, I’ve decided, is to keep the house clean. I sweep all the time and our lush vacation rental actually includes the cost of a maid service, a local woman named Lucia will come clean our house for two whole hours every week. I don’t think we’re messy enough to warrant that much cleaning, but why say no to it? This could be the last time in our lives we can have someone scrub our toilets for us. Plus, the garbage situation out here is kind of confusing and Lucia would help us with that.
Nothing can go in the toilet except what comes out of your body; so all toilet paper and sanitary napkins go in a little wastebasket. Gross? Not as much as you’d think, actually. But there’s not a dump, no sanit
ation service to set out your big green trashcan for on Monday mornings. There’s a recycling center here in town where we can take our plastics, glass bottles, cans and such (we sort it all out ourselves). But what about organic waste? Egg shells, mango peels, and so on? And the paper trash is generally burned, we’ve been told – but does that include our toilet paper? Wouldn’t that smell awful? I just don’t know.
I made the mistake of bagging up our organic waste and setting it outside, then forgetting about it. Inside were two fish skeletons (with heads attached) from lunch the other day. So this morning I got up and the trash was strewn about the courtyard and a cute kitty was prancing about (remnants of fish – nowhere to be found). I think we inadvertently made a new friend. I cleaned up the mess, but what now? Leave the stinkiest of our trash in the kitchen? Doesn’t someone around here have a compost heap?
I am thinking of setting out a bowl of food so the kitty sticks around. Maybe he’ll scare off the bugs. If nothing else, I like kitties. Even Sal says this is a pretty good plan, and he’s allergic!
One of the things that excite me the most about living in a farm community is fresh fruits and vegetables. For a really good price we can walk down the main path and buy onions, tomatoes, mangoes, avocados and other such goodies from women with kind smiles or their bored sarcastic offspring.
But on our very own property are real fruiting banana trees! The first one we noticed would be easy to reach but needs a few more weeks.
The way you can tell is the big flower on the end of the banana bunch, once all the petals fall off you can cut down the bunch and hang it upside down by a piece of string. Then all the bananas ripen at once. There are three trees with three big bunches (at least 40 bananas per bunch) on our property – we’ll be up to our elbows in bananas before long! I can’t wait to make banana bread and banana cookies and just plain eat bananas. We 
have a blender, too, so we can make smoothies.
The two other banana trees are really tall so, fittingly, we’ll have to act like monkeys to get them down. I’m up for it as long as nothing crawls on me while I’m precariously reaching for yummy yummy nanas. Now if only we had a mango tree, I’d be in absolute heaven.
But while the first few days here I asked Sal to precede me into every room and kill them or at least thump the walls to scare them all off, now I feel comfortable venturing around our house alone. The bedrooms seem pretty spider-free most of the time. Ants love the bathroom though. Getting over the creepy crawlies is largely a matter of accepting how powerful I am as a human being. It helps that nothing at this altitude is deadly; nothing can kill me. So I know that no matter what, out here, I really am the predator. They’re the weak little creatures that should run in fear. (Beer also helps. Quite a lot.)
The best thing, I’ve decided, is to keep the house clean. I sweep all the time and our lush vacation rental actually includes the cost of a maid service, a local woman named Lucia will come clean our house for two whole hours every week. I don’t think we’re messy enough to warrant that much cleaning, but why say no to it? This could be the last time in our lives we can have someone scrub our toilets for us. Plus, the garbage situation out here is kind of confusing and Lucia would help us with that.
Nothing can go in the toilet except what comes out of your body; so all toilet paper and sanitary napkins go in a little wastebasket. Gross? Not as much as you’d think, actually. But there’s not a dump, no sanit
ation service to set out your big green trashcan for on Monday mornings. There’s a recycling center here in town where we can take our plastics, glass bottles, cans and such (we sort it all out ourselves). But what about organic waste? Egg shells, mango peels, and so on? And the paper trash is generally burned, we’ve been told – but does that include our toilet paper? Wouldn’t that smell awful? I just don’t know.I made the mistake of bagging up our organic waste and setting it outside, then forgetting about it. Inside were two fish skeletons (with heads attached) from lunch the other day. So this morning I got up and the trash was strewn about the courtyard and a cute kitty was prancing about (remnants of fish – nowhere to be found). I think we inadvertently made a new friend. I cleaned up the mess, but what now? Leave the stinkiest of our trash in the kitchen? Doesn’t someone around here have a compost heap?
I am thinking of setting out a bowl of food so the kitty sticks around. Maybe he’ll scare off the bugs. If nothing else, I like kitties. Even Sal says this is a pretty good plan, and he’s allergic!
One of the things that excite me the most about living in a farm community is fresh fruits and vegetables. For a really good price we can walk down the main path and buy onions, tomatoes, mangoes, avocados and other such goodies from women with kind smiles or their bored sarcastic offspring.
But on our very own property are real fruiting banana trees! The first one we noticed would be easy to reach but needs a few more weeks.
The way you can tell is the big flower on the end of the banana bunch, once all the petals fall off you can cut down the bunch and hang it upside down by a piece of string. Then all the bananas ripen at once. There are three trees with three big bunches (at least 40 bananas per bunch) on our property – we’ll be up to our elbows in bananas before long! I can’t wait to make banana bread and banana cookies and just plain eat bananas. We 
have a blender, too, so we can make smoothies.The two other banana trees are really tall so, fittingly, we’ll have to act like monkeys to get them down. I’m up for it as long as nothing crawls on me while I’m precariously reaching for yummy yummy nanas. Now if only we had a mango tree, I’d be in absolute heaven.
March 11, 2009 Guatemalan Cookies
Today I made my first batch of cookies in a foreign country! 
Yay! I was concerned, when we first planned our big move, that I wouldn’t be able to find all the ingredients. Flour, eggs, sugar, sure, sure, those are the easy ones. But I did have a hard time finding chocolate chips, and milk isn’t so easy to come by here in sleepy San Marcos (but that’s just for dunking). Butter, salt, baking powder, these were all pretty easy. The one thing I still haven’t gotten is vanilla.
Nonetheless I whipped up my first batch of cookies, oatmeal raisin chocolate chip with pecans. The raisins are the size of your fist here! Not really. But at first I thought, “Uh oh, did I get prunes?” but no, they’re just really big, juicy delicious raisins. To find chocolate chips we went to the gringo store, Pana Super, in Panajachel. Gringo store, gringo prices (that means it was expensive). But they had a HUGE bag (6 cups) of Ghiradelli chocolate chips! I usually get milk chocolate and these were semisweet, but that’s fine. I need to start weaning myself onto dark chocolate - with the amount of chocolate I eat.
But I made some awesome cookies. I added peanut butter at the last minute and regretted it (I almost always do). I love the peanut butter flavor, but it changes the consistency too much. Makes them all crumbly, and that kind of makes my mouth pucker. It’s okay when they’re dunked in milk.
No recipe (I know it by heart by now anyway) and there weren’t any measuring cups, so I had to do my best with guesswork and how it feels in the palm of my hand. I like baking like that. Being as I’ve made cookies about a thousand times in my life, I know what the consistency should be like. It all started with the recipe on the Nestle Tollhouse bag, of all the cookie recipes I’ve ever used (and that’s a lot) – that one is THE ONE and it is forever imprinted on a gilded recipe card in my heart.
I always say I’m at home and comfortable so long as I can walk into my kitchen and make cookies any time I feel like it. So... I'm home.
Yay! I was concerned, when we first planned our big move, that I wouldn’t be able to find all the ingredients. Flour, eggs, sugar, sure, sure, those are the easy ones. But I did have a hard time finding chocolate chips, and milk isn’t so easy to come by here in sleepy San Marcos (but that’s just for dunking). Butter, salt, baking powder, these were all pretty easy. The one thing I still haven’t gotten is vanilla.Nonetheless I whipped up my first batch of cookies, oatmeal raisin chocolate chip with pecans. The raisins are the size of your fist here! Not really. But at first I thought, “Uh oh, did I get prunes?” but no, they’re just really big, juicy delicious raisins. To find chocolate chips we went to the gringo store, Pana Super, in Panajachel. Gringo store, gringo prices (that means it was expensive). But they had a HUGE bag (6 cups) of Ghiradelli chocolate chips! I usually get milk chocolate and these were semisweet, but that’s fine. I need to start weaning myself onto dark chocolate - with the amount of chocolate I eat.
But I made some awesome cookies. I added peanut butter at the last minute and regretted it (I almost always do). I love the peanut butter flavor, but it changes the consistency too much. Makes them all crumbly, and that kind of makes my mouth pucker. It’s okay when they’re dunked in milk.
No recipe (I know it by heart by now anyway) and there weren’t any measuring cups, so I had to do my best with guesswork and how it feels in the palm of my hand. I like baking like that. Being as I’ve made cookies about a thousand times in my life, I know what the consistency should be like. It all started with the recipe on the Nestle Tollhouse bag, of all the cookie recipes I’ve ever used (and that’s a lot) – that one is THE ONE and it is forever imprinted on a gilded recipe card in my heart.
I always say I’m at home and comfortable so long as I can walk into my kitchen and make cookies any time I feel like it. So... I'm home.
Monday, March 9, 2009
Casa Blanca
Our house is called the Casa Blanca, formerly called the Casa Delphini. There's a lot of different architectural styles around the lake, I've seen them from the chicken boats we take from San Marcos to Panajachel. Ours is Greek style. Sal loves it because it has a big central courtyard, I love it because it has pretty tile floors, a fireplace and one of those doors that you can open the top half or the bottom half. 
We both love it because of the view. (That's San Pedro Volcano.) So we love the house.
Our first few nights we didn't sleep normally, but we did sleep a lot. Our house has two buildings, looking at the picture, to the right is the living room and kitchen and to the left is a bedroom on each floor, each with it's own bathroom. The downstairs bathroom is much nicer, but upstairs we have the terrace.
The drawback? Those damn spiders. Man. I guess living in the city your whole life (even the burbs) you take for granted how rarely spiders get inside. But here, in a house no one's really lived in for a few months, we've had to fight them off. Not literally. I just never realized how scared I was of spiders, and how irrational and gripping that fear could be. It got to me on our second morning and I kind of freaked out. But now I think the worst is over and I can start getting over my fear. I considered fighting them off, putting traps and stinky cleaners and all that stuff to ward them off. But now I think it's better for me if I force myself to look at them and not be scared. Sal still fosters big dreams of Peru, and if I'm still as arachnophobic as I am now when we're drinking ayahuasca in the jungle that'd be trouble. So. Time to grow up. Even so, spiders hate people and already just with daily cleaning and thumping the wall next to them so they scamper away, they don't come inside as often.
Definitely worth it.
We both love it because of the view. (That's San Pedro Volcano.) So we love the house.Our first few nights we didn't sleep normally, but we did sleep a lot. Our house has two buildings, looking at the picture, to the right is the living room and kitchen and to the left is a bedroom on each floor, each with it's own bathroom. The downstairs bathroom is much nicer, but upstairs we have the terrace.
The drawback? Those damn spiders. Man. I guess living in the city your whole life (even the burbs) you take for granted how rarely spiders get inside. But here, in a house no one's really lived in for a few months, we've had to fight them off. Not literally. I just never realized how scared I was of spiders, and how irrational and gripping that fear could be. It got to me on our second morning and I kind of freaked out. But now I think the worst is over and I can start getting over my fear. I considered fighting them off, putting traps and stinky cleaners and all that stuff to ward them off. But now I think it's better for me if I force myself to look at them and not be scared. Sal still fosters big dreams of Peru, and if I'm still as arachnophobic as I am now when we're drinking ayahuasca in the jungle that'd be trouble. So. Time to grow up. Even so, spiders hate people and already just with daily cleaning and thumping the wall next to them so they scamper away, they don't come inside as often.
Definitely worth it.
The Big Goodbye, The Big Hello
Leaving our apartment was the hard part. I thought once I was able to quit my job slinging coffee, the stress would ebb. But it was only the beginning. Packing our loved belongings into boxes was heartbreaking, getting rid of all our junk was frustrating and saying goodbye to our lovenest of two blissful years felt impossible. We were good though. We were strong and after three steady weeks of packing, selling, giving, and not crying, we finally spend our last few nights in a big empty apartment.
Sal wrote a song about the apartment where we stayed so comfortable for so long. And that's when we finally cried. We were good not to cry before that (me especially) it would have opened floodgates. But our last morning his voice echoed through those empty rooms and I couldn't stop myself from sobbing like a little baby. "Are we idiots," I kept thinking, "to walk away from such a perfect, happy, comfortable home?"
No, we're not.
For about ten weeks we'd been formulating the plan to quit the place, and begin making our move into the world. Sal and I are not meant for stationary endeavors and I think we both knew it was only a matter of time before our adventures would begin. Ten weeks feels short looking back, but it was forever at the time.
So it was Monday morning when we got on BART to SFO and took a plane to L.A. where we slept in a fancy hotel, had yummy dinner and woke up early, early, early in the morning to journey through customs. The flight to Mexico City was easy and short, then we spent all day (eight whole hours) in the Mexico City airport, which was like a big shiny mall. I spent the time napping, listening to my Spanish language tapes and watching "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas"
which made me feel a little dazed afterwards.
We were definitely dazed our first few days.
Well, it's Monday now, one week from our big goodbye and I'm proud to say that Lago Atitlan is my new home. I couldn't imagine being anyplace more beautiful and peaceful. The people are kind and friendly and even though I haven't mastered Spanish yet, I'm confident that I'll get the hang of it soon.
Well, I'll write more specifically later. I hope to keep tabs on all the adventures and mini adventures we have. Peace.
Sal wrote a song about the apartment where we stayed so comfortable for so long. And that's when we finally cried. We were good not to cry before that (me especially) it would have opened floodgates. But our last morning his voice echoed through those empty rooms and I couldn't stop myself from sobbing like a little baby. "Are we idiots," I kept thinking, "to walk away from such a perfect, happy, comfortable home?"
No, we're not.For about ten weeks we'd been formulating the plan to quit the place, and begin making our move into the world. Sal and I are not meant for stationary endeavors and I think we both knew it was only a matter of time before our adventures would begin. Ten weeks feels short looking back, but it was forever at the time.
So it was Monday morning when we got on BART to SFO and took a plane to L.A. where we slept in a fancy hotel, had yummy dinner and woke up early, early, early in the morning to journey through customs. The flight to Mexico City was easy and short, then we spent all day (eight whole hours) in the Mexico City airport, which was like a big shiny mall. I spent the time napping, listening to my Spanish language tapes and watching "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas"
which made me feel a little dazed afterwards.It was dark when our plane took off for Guatemala City, and it was late when we go there. I was nervous, because I'd heard that Guatemala City could be unkind to tourists. But it was extremely kind. Sal was feeling lush enough to get us a fancy hotel room at the Grand Tikal Futura, where almost everyone spoke English. The breakfast was amazing, Sal would undoubtedly eat that for every meal for the rest of his life. 
(Scrambled eggs, fried plantains, refried black beans, spicy sauce and fresh orange juice.)
So we spent two nights at that fancy hotel, eating delicious but inexpensive food and enjoying the ease of Guatemala's newfound obsession with malls (ew). Finally, Thursday morning we got in a big van with several other tourists and began the drive to Lake Atitlan. We stopped in Antigua, which was beautiful, and then trekked up through the hills before breaking down into this gorgeous lake-filled valley.(Scrambled eggs, fried plantains, refried black beans, spicy sauce and fresh orange juice.)We were definitely dazed our first few days.
Well, it's Monday now, one week from our big goodbye and I'm proud to say that Lago Atitlan is my new home. I couldn't imagine being anyplace more beautiful and peaceful. The people are kind and friendly and even though I haven't mastered Spanish yet, I'm confident that I'll get the hang of it soon.
Well, I'll write more specifically later. I hope to keep tabs on all the adventures and mini adventures we have. Peace.
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