Jan. 29, 2004
Panajachel , Guatemala
The beginnings of trips such as this one are iffy: you never know whether they will start with a bang, or with a whimper. On shorter trips, the kind that usually pass for vacations in the US, the beginnings and the ends overlap to the degree that you may feel the trip is over before you start.
This trip isn’t like that. It is long enough that there will be a beginning, a middle, and an end. In my experience the middle and the end of such trips are fine: the middle is characterized by an acceptance of certain discomforts, inconveniences, and frustrations, (at least the places I go to) and a curiosity about what lies ahead. The optimism with which the trip was planned has returned, and the idea of adventure hangs out there like a beacon.
At the end of the trip, depending on how the middle went, sometimes you are happy you had a good time and sorry to see it end, or you didn’t have such a good time and are happy to be going home. Either way, you are happy.
I bring this up because the beginning of this trip was uneventful—nothing worth writing about. Going to a new place, sometimes a slow start is good, a time to get acclimatized. But I have returned to familiar territory. And while Guatemala is very different from home in the US, what little culture shock I experience when I first return here passes quickly. Habits cultivated on previous trips take over as soon as I arrive: Don’t drink the water, don’t flush toilet paper down the toilet, keep valuables safe—especially my passport—etc. I can’t say that I start thinking in Spanish (I wish I did), but my ears and my mouth make some needed adjustments.
Happiness is a Big Mac
The first couple of weeks here felt like a continuation of last year’s trip. After landing at the crack of dawn at the Guatemala City airport I took a bus directly to the city of Quetzaltenango (Xela) where my adopted family now lives—four godchildren, their older brother Rolando, and their parents. I discovered most of the family was still in their home village for the holidays, San Antonio Palopó on the shore of Lake Atitlan. The two boys, Winston and Rolando, were left in Xela to handle the family’s sidewalk sales stand.
Xela is high enough in the mountains that the mornings are often frosty; the nights are chilly, and the occasional cloudy days are pretty cold. One of the reasons I come to Central America is to escape that kind of thing—if it wasn’t for the family being there I probably wouldn’t stay in Xela very much. It is a decent city, but not exactly a vacation hotspot.
I spent as much quality time as I could with Winston and Rolando, then after a week or so I came down to the lakeside tourist-dominated town of Panajachel to warm up and visit some friends.
I’ve been coming to Pana since the mid-80s, and every year it gets tamer and more civilized. Once a hot spot for hippies on the “gringo trail” traveling through Latin America, now it is a destination for package tours. Tourists clutching guidebooks wander around with a vague air of bewilderment, as if they aren’t quite sure where they are. They rely on their guidebooks to not only tell them where they are, but where to stay and which restaurants to eat in.
I find myself in an odd position—most of those bewildered tourists are about my age, but they obviously have a better budget than I do. Most of the backpackers traveling on a budget similar to mine are about half my age. I don’t have a lot in common with either group. I don’t know whether to feel smug and worldly wise that I still have what it takes to stay in cheap hotels and jump on chicken buses with the locals, or embarrassed that I don’t have much choice.
I’ll admit, my budget is a lot better than it used to be; the places I usually stay these days are in the $4-$5 range, rather than the $2-a-night flea-bag joints I used to seek out. And when I eat beans and tortillas now it is because I want to, not because I have to. But still, when I see the tourists come to town in their big-window buses and wander around with their funny hats and white legs I know I’m on a whole different trip.
More Mitsubishi Madness
Several times I have written about the Mitsubishi mini-van Don Pablo, the patriarch of my adopted family, bought a few years ago. It was in pretty bad shape when he bought it, and it deteriorated after that. One evening, when it looked like we were going to get it running and on the road, Don Pablo pulled out a scenic calendar of Guatemala. He wistfully pointed to pictures of places he would like to visit. His eyesight was failing badly at the time and even if we had been able to go anywhere he would not have been able to see much. But touring Guatemala was part of the dream he had for the mini-van. I think I really hurt his feelings when I told him it was a worthless pile of junk and I never wanted to drive it again, but after the first outing we had after we got it running I was overcome by my own feelings.
When Don Pablo died, about a year and a half ago, I thought the Mitsubishi was history. (Ironically Don Pablo died in the Mitsubishi, on his way to a hospital. If I were dying that is not the vehicle I would want to find myself in being rushed to a hospital. But it is possible that is exactly where he wanted to be.) Last year I left Guatemala with the understanding that the mini-van had been put to rest. I would have thought it more likely that Don Pablo would be resurrected than the Mitsubishi. But, like Frankenstein’s monster, IT’S ALIVE!
The first I heard of it was in connection to a trip to some Mayan ruins near the city of Huehuetenango. When I was in Pana I went out to San Antonio for a quick visit to the rest of the family—the aunts, cousins, etc. Two of the aunts, 17-year-old Luisa and the elder sister, Petrona, from whom Faye and I rent a room when we stay in the village, asked me whether I would be interested in seeing the ruins. I’m not a big fan of Mayan ruins, but I had never heard of them, and had never been to Huehue (“WHEY whey”—place names here are often such a mouthful that the “tenango” is dropped.)
For years Petrona has talked about me going across the border into Mexico with her, just to show her the ropes of a border crossing, but nothing ever came of it. Like most Mayan villagers she works hard, and recreational trips are pretty rare. So I figured I’d play along with the idea of going to the ruins. “Sure,” I said. “Why not?”
Petrona looked at me with a sly smile and said “We could take the Mitsubishi.” She jokes quite a lot, so I just said, “Yeah, right.”
“No really, it’s running! We could all go in it,” she said. I finally realized with horror that she was serious.
So we did the trip—Luisa and Petrona, me, four of the kids—and a driver named José.
I guess they figured, correctly, that I was not about to drive the Mitsubishi. (Rumor has it that José is the boyfriend of Alva, the aunt that is in law school in Xela. And that they have a baby. Neither Alva nor José have let on that either rumor is true.)
In all fairness the Mitsubishi performed pretty well on the trip to Huehue. It is still so feeble that, I swear, it slows down when it turns north. And it needs a muffler, not only to make it quieter but to route the exhaust fumes away from the passenger compartment. But we made it with no mishaps. José is a good driver, uncharacteristically cautious for a Guatemalan.
The ruins were pretty dull. There were several small pyramids which had been “restored” by the United Fruit Company during its heyday in the 50s. The pyramids had been excavated and plastered over with concrete. They probably looked more like they actually did when they were in use by the Mayas, but they might as well have been modern reproductions.
Run for the Border
After the trip to the ruins I guess Petrona figured that the trip to Mexico was a real possibility this year. I told her I was up for it if she was. We made plans for her and Luisa to meet the kids and I in Xela the following weekend. Nothing was said about the Mitsubishi, but I wasn’t completely surprised when they pulled up in it—José driving. (Neither was I surprised when they showed up five hours late.)
The border was about three hours away. When we got there we didn’t really know what to expect as far as getting the Guatemalans and the Mitsubishi across. I knew I would have no trouble. José parked the Mitsubishi and we went to the Guatemalan border station. We learned getting out of Guatemala was not going to be a problem—just pay the proper fee, get some papers stamped, and adiós. I got the exit stamp on my passport and we walked across a bridge to the Mexican border station.
On the window of the office of the border official there was a notice in big letters saying that minors must be accompanied by a parent. I figured we might as well turn around and go back. José explained the situation to the official, and the official told him just what the notice said. José explained a bit more (I didn’t catch all he was saying) and the official reached through the little hole in his window and tapped the notice and said something like “Can’t you read the sign?” This went on for a while longer, then we left and started walking back towards where the mini-van was parked.
“That’s too bad,” I said. “The kids are going to be really disappointed.”
José said, “I’m going to go get the car and drive across and see what happens.” I thought I had a pretty good idea what would happen, considering the conversation with the Mexican border official. But I figured we had nothing to lose by trying. I explained to José that I couldn’t go back and forth across the Guatemalan border since I already had an exit stamp in my passport. I told him I would stay on the bridge until we knew whether they would get across.
So I waited in the no-man’s land between the two countries. It was a little like being in limbo, strangely peaceful. I had left Guatemala, but had not yet entered Mexico. To entertain myself while I waited I pondered what complications might arise if I lost my passport at that point. Then I thought about what if an alert Mexican official realized that the Mitsubishi had no business being on the road. That fantasy didn’t last long. That might happen in California, but not Mexico. (In Mexico, if anyone noticed at all, it would just be a matter of paying the proper fee.)
I saw the mini-van clear the Guatemalan station. José stopped on the bridge where I was waiting and Luisa shouted out to me, “Petrona and I have the same last name as the kids. It will be OK.” And it was. One thing you learn down here is whatever anyone says, written or otherwise, it is never the last word.
By the time we got across it was getting on towards evening. Our destination was the city of Tapachula, about an hour from the border. I had been to Tapachula several times, but mostly passing through on a bus. I wasn’t much help guiding José to the plaza in the center of the city, but we eventually found it. It was a Saturday and as usual on Saturday nights in Mexican towns the plaza was crowded and festive. We parked and everyone (but me) got their first taste of Mexico. Folkloric dancers performed on a stage at one end of the plaza, and all over there were food vendors, musicians and street performers. Our enjoyment was tempered by the stifling heat of the coastal lowlands, which we were unaccustomed to. All of us were sweating; I felt sorry for the dancers but they showed no signs of discomfort.
We stayed in the plaza until long after dark. Finally we had had enough and decided it was time to look for a hotel. The hotels near the center of town turned out to be rather pricy, so we started driving around.
We finally found a small hotel on a dark street a couple dozen blocks from the center of town. We took a quick look at the rooms and agreed that they were adequate, and they were in our price range. We took three rooms; José stayed in one by himself, 11-year-old Winston and I stayed in one, and the other four kids and their two aunts took a third room with two beds.
It wasn’t until we had paid and gotten settled we discovered that our hotel offered its customers the convenience of renting rooms by the hour. (The locked cage we had to go through to get to our rooms should have tipped us off, but I just thought that they took security seriously.) Several times during the night I heard the desk clerk knock on a door down the hall and call out “time’s up!”
The three rooms we took comprised half the capacity of the hotel, so we probably put a damper on that kind of business. I can only speculate what affect the sound of children laughing and cartoons on the TV had on the other guests. But I like to think that at least briefly we brought a family atmosphere to the place.
I think everyone, especially the kids, enjoyed our little Mexican adventure, but we were happy to cross back into Guatemala the next day, onto familiar ground. Next year we might try it again. I am hoping I can convince them to go by bus.
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So, with those two modest adventures I feel like I entered the middle part of this trip. Faye is flying down to Nicaragua in the middle of February, so I’ll get on a bus and meet her in Managua. Between now and then there are several possibilities as to what I will do. We’ll see what happens.