Blogs from Guatemala, Central America Caribbean - page 345

Etter en lang uke med spansk var det endelig helg. Sammen med Judith og Maren fra Holland og Cornelia og Celine fra Tyskland dro jeg til Panahajel ved Lago de Atitlan tidlig lordag morgn. Her i Guatemala er det to maatr aa bevege seg paa, enten med de allerede omtalte chickenbussene eller med det dyrere, men dog mer behagelige alternativet shuttle. Vi gikk for det siste, da det ikke fristet aa staa i to og en halv time i en trang buss paa en svingete vei. 0700 lordag morgen (det er en kjempefordel aa komme hit med jet lag, for da kan man faktisk programmere kroppen til aa ville sove klokken halv ti - ti og staa opp klokken seks) troppet vi opp hos reiseselskapet. Turen til Panahajel betalte vi 36 kroner for og skulle vaere ... read more

Tenkte jeg skulle samle blomsterbildene og bildene av lokale produkter paa ett sted. Har ikke tatt saa mange tekstilbilder enda, det kommer naar vi har vaert paa det virkelig store markedet i Chichicastenango, kanskje paa sondag!... read more

Just realised I never published this before...better late than never! ************* I´m writing this having got up at 4.30 in the morning so apologies for any typos! I went to see the ruins of Tikal this morning. They were amazing. These are the ancient Mayan ruins and date back thousands of years. They are in the middle of the jungle, and some of the temples are still covered in jungles (you can tell these by the hills). The culture had everthing including saunas! Although not wheels.... Clearly they had their priorities straight! Before that we went to a place called Rio Dulce, where we stayed in a swamp (nice!). It was very close to nature! i.e. loads of insects, argh! But we were able to have a very good time despite that. We took a boat ... read more

Hei alle sammen! Naa er det endelig fredag og jeg er helt utslitt. Masse, masse spansk som er blitt puttet inn i hodet mitt og baade familien min og laereren min snakker naa til meg utelukkende paa spansk. Mandag faar jeg heller ikke lov til aa snakke engelsk paa skolen, hjelpe meg! I gaar fikk jeg en forsmak paa det aa vaere turist da jeg hadde en middels elefant eller saa trampende paa magen min (det kjentes iallefall saann ut!) Min mamma hadde samme problemet saa vi ressonnerte oss frem til at det maatte vaere eggene vi hadde til frokost. Ble iallefall lite sovn i natt, men naa har jeg begynt aa spise litt igjen. Orket ikke noe saerlig til lunch, men Estella (min mamma) sa jeg maatte faa i meg litt mat, saa jeg fikk ... read more

Guatemalan history and the recent, lengthy, civil war is in large a story of perscution, racism, injustice and war. Many of it´s fellow Central American countries have suffered from the same fate. Following on from a previous point, this this is the reason why some indigenous people (mostly men) don´t wear the traditional dress, to avoid persecution. It´s typical in Guatemalan society for the men to do the work outside of the home environment and ,as a result, they put themselves in the front line, identifying themselves as supporters of the rebels forces from the civil war (mostly indigenous people though this was a frequent misidentification). My language school owner was one, he sees himself as weak for conforming, compromising with this. Using the same counter argument as used in the Zapatistas stuff, Do you stand ... read more