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Published: October 2nd 2009
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One of the many pyramids in Tikal
The photo was taken by my Mexican friend while we are standing on top of one of the pyramids. Tourist hassle
From Lanquin I went to a small town Flores. This was the first time I took one of the tourist shuttles. So the busride was less interesting but surely much faster. After six or seven hours we reached the destination. But just before the busdriver stopped at an ATM nearby and said the ATM’s at Flores didn’t work. Kind of strange, especially when I saw later that the ATM’s did work. The guy that stepped in the bus said he was from the same company and wanted to drop us at a hostel and most people followed him. Of course he get’s a commission for bringing people in, but I wanted to go my own way. So I grabbed my bag from the roof of the bus and went to the place were I wanted to stay. I like to be independent.
The next day I took the bus to Tikal. It is a huge Maya site with a lot of ruins. In the bus I met a Mexican guy and we were the only ones in the bus until we encountered the next tourist trick. A guy stepped in halfway pretending to be a normal passenger,
Maya's wonders
Maybe you have heard. According to the Maya caledar the world ends at 2012. So we have got three years left to make the most of it. Do you believe in it? but halfway he started talking about the ruins and the minute he started I knew. Just another tourguide who wants to earns money. It was like he was reading a book. I think he just learned everything by heart. You can say much but he must have a good memory. It is all about how you bring something like that. If he was just honest about being a tourguide and started with: “hello, I am so and so… I earn my living with being a tourguide and I can tell you something about the history of Tikal. You can give me something afterwards, or not, it is up to you.” Then I would at least give him something because he is open about it. But instead he just started talking and wasn’t honest, but only trying to get money from tourists. Well that trick didn’t work this time.
Funny Mexican
I found myself very lucky to meet this Mexican guy. We had the same view about a lot of things and he had a good sense of humour. We walked at least five hours around the site. The building are huge and spread all around. We climbed up
on a lot of temples. The view is amazing from there. High above the jungle and with a view on other temples and pyramids. Amazing that people could build this so many years ago. So huge and very impressive. It was ideal to experience the area at it’s fullest because it was really quiet with not so many people around. My new Mexican friend carried a gallon (3,5 litre) of water with him and we had a good laugh about it. He was carrying it up and down the pyramids which made him sweat even more than he already did. He tried to drink faster because it was so heavy and that’s the reason why he needed to go to the toilet several times. It was funny and surely he stayed hydrated this way.
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