Guat City

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A wrinkle leaving Honduras.

Border Crossings are always fraught with possibilities. (yellow dot) I crossed too many, eight, on this trip. The drill is: everybody out of the bus, unload all your baggage from the roof of the bus, wait in line for emigration, wait in line for immigration visa, go through customs, walk a block to wait for the bus to go through customs, load all the baggage back on the roof, everyone back on the bus—hope you get your seat back.

Agents present calm intimidators, knowing that even on this boring day, and they are all boring days, a cheap thrill can be had by an arbitrary unnecessary decision, just to watch us squirm. Our agent wore a crisp uniform, a tight hair bun and hard dark eyes. As we approached her throne she went into instant butt lock.

Looking over Maureen’s many visas, “What do you do Honduras?”
“I am a teacher in Cofradia.”
“Ahh, so you work there?”
“Yes.”
“Well then you need a special permit to cross the border.”
“No, we’re just visiting. I’m on vacation.”
“No matter. Workers need permits.”
“No, I am not a paid worker. I am

a volunteer.”
“It doesn’t matter whether you are paid or not. You cannot just go back and forth across the border. If you leave you cannot come back for a month.” She stamps Maureen’s passport and circles something on the visa. She writes something down on a scrap of paper.
“What are you writing?”
“Your name and passport number so I can alert the borders. If you try to come back too soon you will have trouble.”

She took my passport, no questions asked, and stamped a visa. Afterwards, we saw that she had circled different letters on our visas. Maureen was upset; she emailed her NGO and hoped it could be worked out. Might take a day or two trip, a dollar or two bribe, but a hassle. This was before we found the armadillo.

Rain poured all the way to Guat City. We were dropped off at sundown on a street with no signs and no awnings. I flagged down a cab, which seemed like a good idea but only for a moment. Did he know “X hotel”? “Oh, sure, get in” is a vulnerable moment for tourists. We did not know how far we were going or the exchange rate and had lost all our bargaining leverage in rain and darkness. Oh, well, even when you get ripped off C.A. is still cheap.

Guat City

Guatamala City is a city inhaling, a manufacturing and commercial center, like San Pedro Sula, just taking off ─ think Chicago in 1900, Los Angeles in 1950─purpose full, bustling, filled with diesel and noise and traffic and hope. Yikes, what a hole. Three million people, all who seemed to be in a hurry down narrow cobblestone streets. Cheaper hostels were usually near the center of town. (red dot) “Hector will take your luggage.” I turned to the corner where Hector had been lurking in the shadows. His lower jaw stuck out, like a drawer that hadn’t been fully closed. With his bushy eyebrows, low sloping forehead, and ape-like crouch, I visualized him taking my suitcase, all right, throwing it against the wall, then jumping up and down on it.

We checked in and walked out, just two drizzly blocks to the central mercado when it began to rain and rain hard, a thunderstorm with wind. People seemed used to shopping in typhoons, just shout louder, an intense

scene we both agreed. When plastic tarps over stalls fill with water, just poke them up with broom handles….and dump it all on passing shoppers…like me. Got soaked.

People seem to take typhoons in stride, just shout louder. Stall owners scrambling to salvage clothing, anything from the rain, it was intense, a movie. Oh, you do have to use the broom handle to push up the plastic tarp when it sags from six gallons of water. Just dump it in the aisle…and me. I got soaked. We got dinner “tipico,” in a busy, clean, plastic dive, formica booths of laughing male workers drinking their dinner and pinching waitresses. Tipico is not always charming.

Television

Went back to dry out and watch TV. Cable without an onscreen guide, so selection process involves clicking through a hundred channels to find the six in English or dubbed or with subtitles. Usually two stations are MTV, two are CNN and Fox, two are movies, and two are Spanish ESPN. At that time, one ESPN channel seemed all Bowl games during the week and NFL playoffs on the weekends. I am surprised that other channel is usually road racing. I don’t need the commentary for a football game, but it was fun to listen to their play-by-play. Translation was easy. “There’s the snap, the player has the ball, Look! Look! Look!” I found this hysterical. I did notice in other Latin programming (soap operas, game shows) the enthusiasm in your voice is more important than what you say. The color commentator was a little better, though more likely to explain a rule than provide analysis.

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Comments

[Marcia Billings]

Actually, a lot of this sounds hard, exhausting. Thank god you had Maureen and her Spanish, energy, resilience.