Samuc Champay

It was pitch black at the entrance to the cave.  We heard bats.  There was also the sound of moving water a river.

Our guide handed us one candle each.  They would shine our path for the rest of the trip.  We were in the Samuc Champay caves, located under the breathtaking scenery of the central Guatemalan highlands.

My companions were a nomadic spiritualist from India, who claimed she could see energy fields emanating from people, who walked with her own personal guardian spirit, a black panther.  There was the adventure seeker from England, who never went to university, but commanded dog sledding teams and conducted white water tours, who hand glided in his spare-time.  Then there were the two Argentines, tour guides from the mountains of southern Patagonia who were seeking work in the states.  They were traveling at a lightening speed pace to make it in time for ski season.

I felt the cool water of the river as soon as I stepped forward into the cave.  A few steps later and I waist deep.  Candles held high above our heads we had to swim to get to higher ground.  I was enshrouded by darkness, with only the faint flickering of my candle to remind me of the unknown.

A trip such as this couldn’t possibility exist back home.  There were no helmets, no protocals, no forms to sign – just the friendly voice of our guide, instructing us to swim slightly to the left as the invisible rocks on the right would be painful to cross.

I never knew what to expect.  The trek through the Samuc Champay caves was constantly an adventure.  At one point we arrived to a cascading waterfall where the guide held out a rope and simply gestured up.  Fighting cold rushing water, I tried to find my gripping as I pulled myself up about 15 feet.

The real test came later when under the cover of darkness, the guide instructed each of us to jump off of a cliff into the river below.  With fingers crossed, secretly hoping there were no rocks in the water, each of us took the plunge, one after another.

Our faith in the guide did not end there.  On the way back, he took us to a gapping hole in the ground.  I went first.  Squeezing my body through the hole, I hung on tight with my hands.  Then on the count of three, I was told to let go, absolutely uncertain of what lay below.

What followed was something of a natural water slide, made so from thousands of years of erosion.  The drop led me deep into water.  I felt a hand, it was my guide’s.  He stood ready to pull each of us out of the water. Just 18 years old and barely 150 pounds, he’d been doing this all of his life and knew the cafe like the back of his hand.

On our way out, we had been secretly hoping for sunshine.  It had been raining all morning and a thin ominous fog hovered around in the air.  The truth is, the rain only added to the sense of adventure.  Samuc Champay lies relatively off of the grid.  Eight hours of precarious mountain road deters many a tourist.  The rain that morning deterred even more.

With practically the entire landscape to ourselves, our guide took us to a turquoise tinted river running beside the cave.  We were off to go tubing for 3km along its tumulus rapids.  On the way, we passed by a rope swing about twenty feet high.  Taking turns, the guide sent us flying into the river.  I took a few less than graceful head first splashes into the river.

The turquoise river actually began from a waterfall upstream and that is where we headed next.  We were walking on a bridge to get there when all of a sudden the guide stopped.  He told us we can jump into the river if we wanted to.  Without thinking, the Englishman leaped straight from the bridge.  One of the Argentines quickly followed.

Seeing that I had no other choice, I trpidly climbed the banister and stood barefoot on the edge, clutching what I could behind me.  Pines and needles in my feet, I knew I had no way to go but down.  We were about thirty feet high and without thinking about it any further, I took a step forward.

Silence.  I couldn’t hear anything while I fell, just the view of the upcoming wall of water.

Wow. What a relief when I finally came up for air.  I had hurt my thumb with the impact but I had done it, and the feeling was incredible.

Onwards we went until we reached the idyllic pools that fed water into the river.  Each turquoise colored pool fed into the next, a waterfall composed of calm swimming pools. These pools are what really attract visitors to this far flung destination.  It was one of the greatest natural wonders I had ever seen. Hidden, empty, it felt like we were on the verge of a special secret.

 

Debating Religion (in spanish)

It’s something about their eyes. About the devoutly religious I mean. Wide eyed, trance like, my Spanish teacher’s husband preached the words of the bible to me this morning.

It’s a conversation difficult enough in English.  You can imagine it in Spanish.

I made the mistake a few days ago of confessing to my evangelical professora that I did not believe in God.  Now she’s dragged me to her humble home set high on a hill to meet her husband.

I tried to hide behind my sunglasses.

But I was getting bored and restless feigning nods and grunts of acknowledgment as he rambled away.  Plus the conversation was taking place on my Spanish lesson’s time – so to get the most out of it, I decided to take on the preacher at hand and challenge him with some questions.

If there is a God, then why do some people die in the most gruesome of manners?

>God tests your faith in him by putting you through hard times

Then why do some people get killed and others get spared?

>It is the devil that tempts the sin in man to commit murder, etc.  God does not actually kill you.

If it is the devil that induces murder, why do some innocent people still die prematurely, say through sickness?

>It’s another test from god to see if you will continue to believe in him.

Then it’s god that causes illness? Why do some people get sick and other’s don’t?

>Because some people are more devout than others.

But what if there are two people, and both believe in God, and both are good and moral people.  Say one of them gets sick and dies but the other one lives on.  Why has that happened?

>Well it’s actually the devil that chooses people to get sick, sometimes randomly.

It is nearly impossible to have a rational conversation with religious folk as their faith is so irrational.  He wasn’t able to see through his hypocrisies and often referred to memorized axioms from the bible.  Religion is a cultural defense mechanism that people have developed to cope with difficult times.

My Spanish teacher and her husband believe that those who are rich signed a pact with the devil.  Poor people would have their turn in the next life.

As we stood on their hill overlooking the lake, I thought back to the Mayans who were so devout that they actually wanted to be sacrificed.  Competitions would be held and the winner in gladiator type battles would be the one sacrificed, not the loser.  I could see how an entire population, even slaves, could be kept at bay using religion.

Here were two people standing in front of me, using religion to justify their meager existence, content to live in poverty so long as they go to church twice a week.  I’m so fortunate to come from a place and time where I’ve learned to question everything around me.  Behind my sunglasses, I shuddered at the thought that had I lived in a different time, I might have been as lost as well.

 

Spanish Classes at Bio Itze in San Jose, Guatemala

I’m the only tourist here. Friendly smiles and curious eyes confirm it so. It’s late October, and I’m in San Jose, a small lakeside town nestled in the low lands of northern Guatemala.
I’m staying with a host family. Their house is just a few steep meters from the center but their means are modest. The walls are bare and grey with exposed cement blocks. There is no ventilation in my room and at times it feels like an oven.
There is no living room and a plethora of kids crowd around a tv in Marie’s, my host mother’s bedroom. She lives next door to her sisters, cousins, and mother; each home surrounding a sandy courtyard. The children are on vacation and watch tv all day. Marie says she prefers it that way as it keeps the children indoors and out of trouble.
When the adults tune into soap operas, the kids filter out to play soccer on the street. Marie’s family does not have any soccer balls, but they improvise with various plastic objects.
~
Although everyone in town seems to be equal, there are subtle differences. Of her sisters, only Marie has electricity. She is also the only one with a shower. The rest of her family bathes outside with well water. The mayor sits considerably better than everyone else. His vast house with a bright blue exterior and sun patios and decks overlooks the lake.
He’s been reelected four times and is surely corrupt. But as he’s secured his own riches, he has also helped the town. San Jose doesn’t have any natural industries and sits just outside of the reach of tourist traffic.
Twenty years ago the town was a dusty spec on the map with no roads and little electricity. Then the improvising mayor built a water park to attract weekenders from neighboring towns and developed a small town square that would eventually be filled with stores and restaurants. The construction boom put hundreds of men to work and the standard of living improved almost immediately.
~
People seem to be hard working here, providing for their families however possible. Those who dropped out of school have to resort to blue collar jobs like driving a cab or filling gas. Most people have worked in a number of different jobs. My spanish teacher’s husband is an electrician, a taxi driver, a construction worker, and a fisherman.
Luckier ones whose families have a bit of money to spare (or family members in the states) go on to become teachers, doctors, lawyers, and administrators. It’s a clientisitic system in the government and the mayor employs mostly family members and close friends.
Over dinner one night, Marie explained to me that she didn’t like the mayor much because he didn’t distribute jobs throughout the community. She used to be a primary school teacher but she quit because it took her two hours every morning to commute to a distant mountain village in order to work. Teaching is a common profession in northern Guatemala and unemployment is high as teachers vastly out number schools.
Marie’s husband David was the major bread maker for the family. He was a gas attendant with a 20 day on, 10 day off rotation. I didn’t see much of David as he would rise at 5 in the morning and return around 10 o clock at night.
~
Most of my meals in turn were spent with Marie and their eight year old boy Cesar. Marie didn’t talk much during our meals. She was friendly and answered all of my probing questions, but when I didn’t have anything to say, neither did she.
The portions were small. Sometimes it seemed like Cesar was still hungry after the meals too. When he didn’t ask for seconds, I could only assume that there weren’t any.
Some of the dishes were truly terrible. The thought of an egg broth soap with a floating fried egg on top still makes my stomach turn. One warm, corn based chocolate and mint smoothie elicits a similar feeling.
The rest of the meals were better. A typical dinner consisted of eggs, black beans, and several tortillas. Most dishes were also finished with a bit of hot sauce and farmer’s cheese. There was not much meat or poultry served. They saved them for holidays and birthdays.
Super sweet coffee accompanied every meal. I had to purchase my own water as Marie only had sodas and sweet juices. The children, as young as two and three also drank the coffee. I wasn’t sure why Marie would actually caffeinate already energetic toddlers but I suppose coffee is cheaper than milk.
~
Diabetes is a problem in San Jose. There is a hospital being built this year (another initiative from the enterprising mayor) but while healthcare is free, medicine is not.
Until then, there is one clinic in town. When I developed a rotten blister on my foot and had hypochondriasque fears of tetanus, I paid the local doctor ten bucks to check out my foot. He told me I should keep the blister hot – then in the same breath said I should get ice and keep it cold.
Unfortunately there was no ice in hot and humid San Jose so I opted for the keep-it-hot option. Marie and her sister-in-law held burning branches of wood to my blister later that night. I had been running around barefoot playing soccer with the littles ones and it took less than half of an hour to get the most painful blister I’ve ever gotten. The piping branches helped burn the skin and seal the blister.
~
Marie’s sister in-law lived a few paces away. She married Marie’s brother when she was 16 and has had three kids since. Girls are often forced away to run away from home when their disapproving mothers attempt to dissuade them from marriage. It is common to hear of parents literally dragging their daughters back home. Sometimes these episodes turn violent too. Recently there have been some laws instituted to protect women from these types of situations.
Most men and women do not stay single in their twenties. As a twenty five year old man, it was considered odd that I didn’t have a wife and kids. These days, most people have less than four kids. Just one generation ago, it was nothing less than normal to have six, seven, eight children. Many had more.
~
The town is lively for a kid growing up. He would have a dozen cousins his age to play with. There is a dock on the lake where everyone goes swimming – a lake which truly resembles an impressionistic painting. Music flows from most houses. One house played the Macarena.
At night the tranquil town of San Jose shuts down relatively earlier. By 10 there is absolutely nothing that is still open and soon after I would fall asleep – which was just fine as I had Spanish classes at 8 in the morning.
~
My Spanish teacher soyla embraced me with open arms and did her best to make me feel at home. She showed me around town, introduced me to her family, and even took me fishing. Her spanish classes on the other hand were a test in patience at times. There are two Spanish schools in town and I was taking classes at Bio Itze in San Jose. It was a decent refresher course though and at the end of the day, a decent place to have waited out the hurricanes.

Chicken Bus

The soundtrack of chickens provided a balance to the rancourous bus engine.  I was on one of the famous chicken buses in guatemala, and yes, there were chickens on the bus.

There were also dogs on the roof.  As well as forty or so people packed into a small bus with seats for made for fifeteen.

There was only one afternoon bus from rural Carmelita to the city and the bus stopped every few minutes to load in more people.  Most of the passengers had to stand.  It was a tight fit.

Then just when there wasn’t room for anyone else, five men wielding machetes and cowboy hats stood waiting on the side of the road.

The driver promptly pulled over and collected the machetes before allowing the passengers to board.  I wasn’t sure if it was a safety precaution or just his attempt at saving space.

The cramped quarters led to curious questions from the locals. The men with machetes were on their way home from working the fields.  They liked tourists, they tell me.  Tourists bring money and work to the region.

There was something of a communal spirit on the bus.  An old man with just one tooth left was given a seat by a young woman.  Only the young children got short shrift.  They weren’t allowed to have their own seats.  When one little girl didn’t budge, a heavy set lady with indigenous garb sat right on top of her until she wriggled herself free from the giant confines of her bossum.

I tried to make her feel better by teaching her rock, paper, scissor.  I’m not sure if she actually understood the rules or whether she just got lucky three times in a row.

I had an opportunity to entertain another little kid on the trip as well.  A woman bearing two very young children stood waiting to board the bus well into the route.  She realized she wouldn’t fit with her children so she passed one of them through an open window into the hands of a stranger.  The second one came to me.

I spent the next several hours of the trip with a sleepy four year old on my lap.  It wasn’t until he peed on me that I was forced to pass him up the bus till he was reunited with his mom.

In the end, I never did find out why someone brought dogs and put them on the roof.  I did learn that the woman with chickens in her sack was off to the market to make a few coins.

And that was my chicken bus experience.

Hike to El Mirador

Middle of October, 2010

I´m in a misquito tent full of misquiots as well as one mean tarantualla.  I´ve just witnessed an argument between my fellow italian traveler and our tour guide over the best way to cook pasta.  Pio´s hands pleaded his case and exasperated, he vowed to never talk to Maria, the tour guide again.  It started two nights ago when Maria mixed ketchup with mayonaise in an unforgetatable combination that upset the italiean so –  that he wouldnt touch his plate, even after an entire day of trekking.

It is our last night together and we are on the way back from the lost Mayan city of El Mirador.  Covered by dense sub-tropical jungle, El Mirador has only recently been discovered and most of it still sits below a vengenful jungle canopy on the border of Mexico and Guatemala.

To get there is an adventure.

Four days ago, an ill-fated van with hopelessly thin tires and no suspension to speak of picked up myself and six other sleepy tourists from our hostel in the middle of the night.  It would wobble along Guatemala´s rocky backroads for the next four hours, the scenery wavering from busy forest to african like havannas.

We arrived in Carmalita, a relaxed frontier town with small wooden huts surrounding a soccer field.  It’s a warm, small community.  Maria invited us into her home and offered us chicken for breakfast.  I was happy when I learned the rest of my group was not very thrilled with the idea either.  Seeing our reactions, Maria whipped up scrambled eggs with homemade corn tortillas, avocados, and beans, and we readied ouselves for the hike of a life time.

The trail was long and ardous and although there were never any steep ascents, it was thoroughly covered with mud and painful brush.  We hiked with dizzying speed and no breaks were permitted.

Then after six grueling hours,  a blue tent became visible through the trees and two rangers greeted us with warm eyes and glowing smiles.  They were stationed there in thirty day rotations and any company was good company, even if we didn´t speak the same language.

After seeing the sunset on top of an old mayan pyramid, the rangers entertained us with stories of jaguars and mexican drug cartels and conjured up living nightmares by showing us scorpians and tarantulas.  Thrilled and shaken, we called it a night in our respective hammocks.

Hiking the next day was suprisingly easier and our group glided over the drier terrain.  The sceneray stayed much the same though and soon I was surrounded by one giant green blurr.  We played games and got to know each other to keep things interesting while we trekked.

I was amazed at Pio´s ability to spot out details in the otherwise mundane scenery.  Were I saw rocks and dirt, Pio would stop mid stride to avoid stepping on a dieing butterfly.  Out of the corner of his eye, Pio would stop me to point out a tree he recognized, a bird nestled in a tree, or a posinous insect to avoid.  He worked in a steel mill back home in southern italy, but he loved nature, and he appeciated it with all his heart.

We played soccer against the locals when we arrived at the camp grounds later that day and Pio showed us again why he was from Italy.  With every play, near foul, and missed goal, his hands flew up in protest and cries.  He accused our opponents of cheating and dropped to the ground when a defenders foot came near.

I loved every moment of it.

We spent the next day touring the vast city state of El Mirador.  At times, it took 45 minutes to walk from one ruin to the next.  This was one of the largest Mayan settlements and it was truly special when we stumbled upon El Dante, a fully excavated temple.

The heart of an empire once stood where we had lunch.  Men were killed and sacrificed and there we were, on blood stained steps, enjoying the day, humbled by the enormity of what lay before us.

Onwards we went, treading in and around archeological digs still in progress.  Shovels,and water bottles still visible from the labor that ended a few months prior.  Only 10 percent of the ruins have been explored and rumor has it that millions of dollars in ancient treasure still remains buried through out the jungle.

As we trekked from the ruins back to Carmelita on the fourth day, I kept my eyes out for any old artifacts that might still be abound.  I couldn’t believe it when I saw a ceramic hidden in the leaves.  It was a small piece.  Broken.

Back in my hammock on the last night, I examine my discovery.  It might have been an old plate or vase but it didn’t matter to me.  I was happy to have claimed my own little prize for the arduous undertaking I had done.

The next morning Pio and I would wake in the middle of the night to climb the heights of an old temple to see the sunrise. Suddenly the jungle which had almost appeared friendly by day was an eerie, unforgiving place.

The thunder of birds in the night startled us as the unkown intruders awoke them.   Territorial monkeys rustled the tree branches at the sight of two incoming men.

At the top of the temple, the jungle seemed haunted.  Like a magnificent optical illusion, mountain tops enshrouded by a thick layer of fog were belittled to little islands.

Then, beat by beat, the jungle awoke with every ray of the sun.  The earth groaned, like an animal unkown, and we could here a hungry tremor emanating from the center of it all.  Birds and insects became filled with life and a cacophonous song started the day.

Pio and I sat on top, waiting for the glow of the sun to warm us.  He was still sore from the previous night’s altercation.  Halfway around the world, in the middle of a dense jungle, cultural differences still played their role just like the struggle over who would have the rights to study the temples.  But underneath it all, the Mayan lay silent.  And next to us, a spear-like plant pertrudeding straight into the air, stood nature’s flag in the end.

Top of Mayan Temple

The lake of monet’s eye

Behind temples where people die

Time passes and shines

The jungle of the hidden mayans

It all comes back

The beat of the sun

Awakens what has already been done

Enshrouded by fog

Listen to the thunderous clap of the log

It groans and it sings

Animal unknown, like a hungry tremor it rings