Christie's Arrival!

Today, Elizabeth and I arrived at the bus terminal and waited for Christie to arrive from the airport. We hugged and giggled and then ate breakfast with her and this other really nice guy named David who is Honduran, lives in Los Angeles, but is visiting a sick uncle. We all then boarded a bus to the border, passed through the easiest migration checkpoint I’ve ever been through (the two countries’ offices weren’t separated by kilometers, meaning no taxi rides!), and rode a ways more to Copán. Here we ate, found a hostel, and are now catching up on communications. We’ll visit the Mayan ruins tomorrow (supposedly the Paris of the mayan world, while Tikal in Guatemala is the New York), after a nice 3 hour horse-back ride. We’ll then head to the beach and bum around awhile until sufficiently burned (just kidding, mom).

Here these two silly girls are trying to squeeze into the ATM booth because it is air-conditioned and it is sweltering hot in Honduras! More fun times ahead...

Reuniting with Elizabeth

Saturday was spent waiting for buses and waiting on buses while traveling back to Guatemala. I had a lovely dinner with Elizabeth’s host family, which will also be my family when I get back. Quique (dad) and Jenny (mom) have a few others who are there learning English, as well as Julio who is a really quiet and nice guy doing something there, not sure what.
If you’re inclined to send me stuff, you now have a 2-week head start to get mail there. I’ll be gone by August 15th, and I don’t know how long it takes to arrive, but here’s the address just in case:

Familia Soto
20 Av. 1-16 Zona 3
Quetzaltenango
Guatemala C.A.

Sunday, Elizabeth and I left bright and early for Chichicastenango, an indigenous town famous for it’s Sunday market. A hustling, bustling blend of tourist vendors and fruit/ veggie/ livestock vendors abounded and bottlenecks led to some intense pushing matches to get to the next street over! We bought more than we should have, especially considering that we have two countries to go!

We then bused to Guatemala City, arriving in time to check out the Museo del Ferrocarril—the Railroad Museum. Daddy, you would have loved it! In fact, I took a bunch of pictures thinking of you, and also because I had no idea what they were! I missed the overly-detailed explanations of what each little part of the railroad and yard does and how it all works and when it all started and where the last one was built, etc. I’ll wait for the picture tour later!

After a wonderful dinner, some investigations on bus routes and such, we settled in for a night in quite possible the grossest hotel I’ve ever stayed in. The sheets seemed clean, though the walls certainly weren’t, but after Eli’s comment that her friend had bedbugs, I had that mentally-induced itchy feeling all night! To make matters worse, we awoke to watch a cockroach scatter across the floor! Oh well, it only cost $4 after all.

The Mexican Tour Group

Friday I went on another tour, even though I could have gone on my own. I wasn’t in the mood to switch buses 12 times, so I thought I’d pay a few dollars more. It turns out the “guide” was really just a chauffeur, as he didn’t know anything about where we were or what we’d see! The good part, though, was that all the other people on the tour were Mexicans, and they were a riot!
There were two female doctors here on a conference, a mom and her 17 year old daughter who was mature and still silly, the young married couple, two adventurous guys who were up for all things climbing and who weren’t deterred by a little rain. The funniest part was that as the guide continually didn’t know anything, one of the doctors just straight up asked him how he could work in tourism and not know anything! She wasn’t mad or anything, but she then asked if he knew how to read! We all cracked up (or nearly exploded trying not to) at her blunt questions (that we all were thinking), and she went on to tell him he needs to read more! From then on, any question we asked we immediately followed with “no sé” and laughed even more!

So were did we go all day? We started off going to some caves where we walked along the path and saw all sorts of stalactite and stalagmite formations.

We then drove to la Cascada de Chiflón where we had to climb countless steps to reach a lookout over a beautiful waterfall of 70 km. We were first soaked in sweat, then we got wet by all the mist, and by the time we got back down it was raining!

But we drove on to the Lagunas de Montebello, a series of lakes that are beautifully blue and green colors. We first ate these great tortillas filled with frijoles and topped with cheese and salsa (they have some tsozil name I can’t remember). Then I crossed the first lake on a wooden raft, helping paddle us to the small island where there were great views and a lot of orchids growing. It was still raining.

The second lake was an international one so we could see Guatemala on the other side. Still raining.

The third lake looks just like all the ones in Minnesota, pretty but not spectacular. The fourth one that we went to was a deep blue, but it was still raining and the mud was deep, so we didn’t venture too close or stay too long.

Although I could have seen more, maybe gone swimming, and gotten back before 9 p.m., I haven’t laughed that hard in weeks, so the tour was definitely worth it!

Bailando y La Cultura Maya

For those of you who were worried, last night was wonderfully fun! I really didn't have high expectations, and I would have been absolutely right except that I met a guy in the central park listening to some hippie drummers as I waited for people to start showing up at the bar. He is now a chemical engineer for Coke (at least he's not a marketer for them), but he taught chemistry and physics for about 10 years. He was in town on business and offered to accompany me to the cumbia bar. I only agreed because he sounded like he could dance, and sure enough he can dance...cumbia. We ended up going to a different bar that played salsas, cumbias, and a merengue, but I had to teach Rico the basic salsa spins and the fun merengue moves. Nevertheless, he's a really respectable guy and we had fun chatting. Other dances of note were the banda, duranguense, and achy breaky heart. Yes, after nearly 10 years of last dancing that wonderful tune, I caught on quickly and scuffed my flipflips as best I could, envisioning boots, sombrero, and a big belt.

Today I went on a tour of two local Mayan towns, San Juan Chamura and Zinocantan. We learned all about their houses, their elaborate church and religious riturals, and their textiles. I bought a lovely woven purse and ate some great ice cream (not really a cultural novelty, but tasty), and am off to the Mayan Medicine Museum where there's a graphic 12-minute video on childbirth, or so the guidebook says. Sweet!

Mis Primeras Aventuras Mexicanas

Well, I arrived safely in Guatemala city, bused to Xela without a problem (i.e. cankles), and stayed with Elizabeth and her wonderful host family. It was great to catch up with her!!!

The next morning I bused to the Mexican border, crossed just fine, and then had to wait 4.5 hours for the bus to San Cristobal de las Casa, my destination. I can't say how grateful I am for the book Katrina got me! And normally border towns are bustling with vendors and theives and the like, but this town was dead. I was lucky to be able to buy cookies and water! Ah well, I arrived around 11 p.m. to a beautifully colonial town that is perfectly safe to walk around in all alone at night. After finding 3 hostels full or closed, I ended up in a women-only dorm room (not inteded, but I thought my mom would approve) and slept/shivered the whole night long. Holy cow is it cold here at night! Too bad I thought it was going to be sweltering and accidentally left my sweater in Xela.

I awoke and was surpised by the glorious views from the hostel and by a free breakfast. Also, my hostel has hot water!!! However, I didn't know that there was a time change from Guatemala to Mexico, so I missed the tour group by about 30 minutes. I just switched up my plans and headed for Chiapa de Corzo instead. The town is quaint and I took a 2 hour boat tour through an impressive canyon that is more than 1 km high at points. We saw crocodiles, spider monkeys, moss formations, stalagtites, and lots of plant adaptations for growing out the side of a vertical rock!

I ate lunch at a restaurant that had marimba players accompanied by a drummer. They were AWESOME! I took videos and pictures and they explained how they get it to sound so amplified (they use square/pyramid boxes of wood under each note) and I was mesmerized well past the time I finished eating. (p.s.: mom, you made out good today--in addition to the video I'll send you, I also bought you my very first souvenir!)

The next stop was to Tuxtla Gutierrez to go to the zoo, but after many bus routes, a 30-minute downpour, and an error in the tour guide, I arrived 20 minutes after they closed. I guess things have changed since the most recent tour book was published. Ah well, I headed back to San Cristobal where I had an amazing vegetarian dinner and browsed some souvenir shops.

Pictures will come later, but right now I'm off to dance some cumbia and/or salsa! I hope los mexicanos know how to dance!

Packing

I hate packing. With all that is in me, I hate packing. And now, back to work...