Guatemala is Cold!

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We arrived to Guatamala a few days ago, I think 5, only to find out it is very cold! You never would have known, but from San Cristobal, Mexico, we went to the border. There in front of us loomed huge mountains. As soon as we crossed the border, it was easy to tell we were in a whole new country. Todo, we´re not in mexico anymore! There was generally more bustle, more people about, and more trash on the streets. The busses were old school busses from the states, and they are colorfully decked out. We jumped on one to Huehuetenango, and it wasn´t like the luxurious busses we´d been having in mexico--those had movies and seats that recline. It was like being in school, but I´m a lot bigger, so now my legs are squished. The fares were different too--two bucks for the four hour ride to Huehue. But the roads were also different, way bumpier. we drove around mountain curves, up steep roads, passing other trucks and busses on blind corners. It´s really pretty scary, because whenever you ride anywhere, you are at the mercy of these crazy drivers.

Since my last blog we´ve had many fun adventures. We spent time in san cristobal, and we went to canyon, a river where there are 1000 meter high cliffs. That´s about 3300 feet or so. And there are crocodiles in the water--we were on a boat tour. The boat would zoom off to a place of interest, the wind in our hair. It was a beautiful sunny day and the air was so fresh and nice. The crocks were big, and they backed in the sun on the shore. Thousands of feet above, buzzards soared over the cliffs which were covered in jungle vegetation. We saw herons, egrets, and even pelicans. Also, my favorite waterfall in the world so far. I have pictures, I took about 20 of it. The water had been falling for thousands of years, and it formed these crazy rocks. We went right under it and saw the drops falling, illuminted by the sun. Then, moving a little down river, the spray from the fall was dew on our faces. Then we zoomed on. It was great, one of my favorite things yet.

Next, we went to another small maya town, where traditional ways are still lived. A girl, dressed in splendid garb, came up to us right away, and asked us if we´d like to see her house, where they do a lot of sewing. We thought, sure why not. The girl, Margarita, was only 9 years old, yet she was dressed in the blue, purple, green, and black clothing that is traditional. Tess and I were afraid to take pictures though. On the way, we passed a few trucks being loaded up with men in their traditional clothes--amazing colors I can hardly remember...Also, women were loading in. We asked Margarita, what is it? Un Muerte--a death. The funeral procession! But we didn´t really want to take any pictures, because we were scert--afraid. You can´t just take pictures of the locals there, it´s not a zoo, and it´s quite offensive. While some people in the states are indefferent to having their picture taken, such as me, for my mom took many pictures over the years, and always had a camera in my face, and I remember being quite annoyed at times, but now I´m quite over it. Thanks mom! Anyway, some people here, especially natives, don´t like to have their picture taken, believing it takes a part of their soul. So, we didn´t really get any pictures of the garb, once again, although it was quite amazing.

We went along with margarita, finally made it to her home. There, her family was weaving all kinds of amazing things, all by hand. It´s amazing to watch, and to think they do it all themselves. I can hardly believe, it is quite the art. They had a store there, and said we could take a picture of them weaving, but again we were skert, cause they wanted us to buy something, and we had no intention to, having only barely enough to get us across the border to guatemala, since we were leaving the next day. Our pesos were low, and besides, what would we do with the clothes anyway?

Margarita let us try some of the liquor they drink in that town for religious ritual. We looked at the stuff, and finally took our leave, heading for the distinctive hill of the town. The town was called Zinapotan, and this hill had a nice pointy peak. We started towards it, margarita´s house being somewhat on the way. We hiked up and went into this corn field. We were dodging corn, going on a small trail, which finally opened into a field. there was a farmer there, and he was gesturing crazy, like what the hell? Get out of here! What are you doing?

You see, spanish is the second language in these maya villages, the first being an ancient native tongue, Tzotil, I think. So this man didn´t speak spanish too well. We tried to explain to him we are trying to go up the hill, subir la montana. But he wasn´t getting it. He pointed. He seemed a bit irritated. Finally, I said, Estamos Perdido, we are lost. Then he almost instantly changed. He said, there is a road up there, and pointed. We just stared, stupidly, not sure how to navigate the corn field. Finally, he just started in front of us, motioned for us to come. He led us on a small trail that went through the corn. I was ducking down, it was kinda a tunnel. We walked after him, and I was highly amused. We walked for a few minutes, finally got out of the corn. There was a small trail with colorful flowers on one side, on the other, a steep canyon you didn´t want to slide down. We kept walking and walking, finally to make it to a small dirt road. He left us there. He went that far out of his way just to help us out, or to get rid of us! But mostly to help. It was really nice.

From there we climbed the hill, which was a good hike. We saw natives with huge bundles on their heads, carrying wood down the mountain. When we got to the top, there were about ten women all dressed up in native clothes, and they were pretty surprised to see us there! They greeted us with a surprised, buenos dias. Then they went down the sides of the hill, which were really steep, like almost vertical, and chopped some wood with huge machetes. Meanwhile, tess and I soaked up the view of the small town, which had many fields and greenhouses. We could see our little corn field from before.

While the women chopped away, tess and I had our picnic. we had bread and cheese from san cristobol, which was delicious. All the while we heard the women working, getting wood for fires and heating. A thick fog rolled in, and there was something magical about it. This is the ancient life, I thought.

On the hike down, there was a lady we stopped to talk to, dressed in the peacock-like colors, of course. She had a few little kids who watched us. The little boy, about 3 years old, was chewing some gum and at the same time making a friendship bracelet. The gum popped out of his mouth and on to the dirty ground. He quickly picked it up and popped it back in his mouth, while the mom made a feeble effort to stop him. We all laughed at that for a while. I couldn´t believe he was that young and already weaving! On the way down, we saw other women weaving, just on their front porches. It was the thing to do in town.

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So, after that, we went to guatemala, and here we are!
Huehue was mad. we could surely tell we were in another country. We thought it would just be more mexico, only a little different. Boy were we wrong! Everyone was hanging out in the park sunday evening, when we got in. We found a catholic bake out, and some old ladies cooked us the traditional food of guatemala: it was rico! Delicious. At our hotel, we had a shared bathroom. Everything cost a lot less, we noticed right off, but we were also less spoiled. THe room wasn´t that clean and we didn´t even have our own sink.

The very next day we took of for todos santos, home of the horse races, nov. 1. The dress there was also distinctive, yet different. The men wear these red pants with cool shirts, embroidered collars. Again we were afraid to take pictures, but in the end we got a few. I noticed once when tess got up to pay for lunch, how much she towered over the women. The women were about our height when I was sitting down. Then we saw face to face. So imagine how big I was! The women wore much different clothes than in Zincotan, then men too. It´s great how these kinds of traditions can endure. They also spoke a different mayan language here.

Todos santos was great. I was feeling like I was catching a cold, but tess and I went up into the mountains on a hike. We made it up to the cloud forest, searching for the elusive quetzal, the national bird of guatemala. Finally it started raining, and got really cold! We had raincoats, but weren´t prepared for this much cold! I was afraid I´d get pnuemonia, since I was feeling sick already. We waited the rain out under a tree, moved on, but it picked up again. Finally, the trail turned into a stream, more or less, and we went a different way down. But once out of the cloud forest, the rain stopped, for Todos santos is surrounded by mountains, and when you go up, the climate changes a lot.


Well, we decided we couldn´t stay much longer, because it was so cold. At night we barely were warm enough staying cuddled together, even with the heavy sheets we had! The last night, we rode the ferris wheel, which is set up for the big celebration nov 1. It started off slow, and we wondered if it was going to go around ever. It was just loading up, and we were in for a big surprise--it started going backwards. Around and around it went. everytime we got near the bottom, this group of 6 kids tried to throw us a pencil. We tried to catch it, but they never got it high enough. Each time they threw it, they would squeel in delight. It was funny. We were the only gringos out, so they had to try to get it to us. Finally, I threw them a clay iguana from my bag--which I bought in another interesting event...(but that was in san cristobal. We had just finished a nice dinner, and these kids all came up with clay animales. The kid put each one out one by one, saying the name. Elefante, armadillo, etc until he had them all out, about twenty. All the kids, four of them, stood around watching. We all started cracking up for some reason, because it was pretty funny. We just laughed for a while. I bought two from him, just planning to give them away, and help the kids out. Tess said each one had been by individually before, during dinner, but I never noticed them, so that was funny.) So I got to give the iguana away. The other was a deer type thing, kinda like a mexican moose, i was going to give to my mom, but it was fragile, didn´t know how I´d send it, so I gave it to a guatemalan man who was very helpful.

Before we left todos santos, we were hanging out with some austrian girls we made friends with. we asked them about taking pictures of natives, and they thought we were funny how timid we were. They said, they just ask, and usually people don´t mind. So they encouraged us some. This funny guy, a todos santoian, who followed us around the night before, giving me hugs and pointing (for he was slightly retarted, we were told) found us when we were about to leave. He came and gave me a big hug, and we got some really funny pictures of that. As we waited for the bus with our austrian friends, I pulled my guitar out and played a little, even though my voice is hurt from my cold. A few people stood around, highly amused. But I kept my hat on, because it was a free concert, and I didn´t feel it was right to even ask these people for money.

And now wé´re in Quetzal (Xela). Many volcanoes around. We are going to hike up some of them, and we hope we don´t fall in. We´re also going to spanish school for one week, and to live with host families, separate ones, so we get to interact with them individually more. Tomorrow we are going to hike to a volcano with the school. The school has all kinds of neat activities. Anyway, we´ve been taking it really easy, because I´m beat, and feel pretty sick, but I think it´s just a cold. But I´m feverish at night it seems. Hopefully all is well! It is way colder than you think.

Todos santos is almost 9000 feet high!
We are now at an altitude higher than Denver, CO.
We are 7660 feet high...
And in the cloud forest, we were probably 10000 feet high! No wonder it´s cold. We don´t have the clothes for this, that´s for sure. I thought it´s suppossed to be tropical.
13845 is the highest point in central america--it´s in guatemala, near us! It´s a volcano too.

There are active vocanoes here!

Well, Guatemala is full of surprises. We are pretty overwhelmed for now. This is phase two of the trip, and it´s been tough. Tess, just lost her Grandpa, so she´s been bummed. She wrote him a nice eulogy though,

travelblog.org/bloggers/tess

But we´re gunna make it through somehow!

Colin

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