Days 9-10 May 31-June 1
A Good Rest at La Capital






After the labor of Santa María, a leisurely stroll through the capital city's Zócalo (town center) did us much good. The National Palace and Metropolitan Cathedral (shown above), with their dull, formulaic architecture, were not edifying sights, but I was thankful to be on flat ground once again.

With a population of over two million, Guatemala City is the largest urban area between Mexico City and Medellín, Colombia. It is a modern cosmopolitan center with a generous share of ethnic communities and restaurants. (We tried turtle soup for the first time in a Spanish restaurant, and bought pastries from an Italian bakery. Unfortunately, we did not completely avoid the deadly hamburger and fried chicken establishments.) Like many big cities in Latin America, the majority of its people are poor-- many desperately so --living on squatted land in makeshift shacks without running water or electricity. In the nearby fashionable districts, the rich few bask in palatial homes, shielded from the rest of the world by walls and bodyguards.

The city is already bursting at its seams with people and the antiquated smoke-belching vehicles they miraculously maintain. Piles of rubbish and clouds of acrid fumes rudely remind pedestrians of La Capital's worsening environmental problems. Yet incessant migration from the countryside continues to swell its borders and shanty towns. Along its shops and billboards proclaiming the latest consumer goods, beggars and street urchins are a common sight.




We had a pleasant merienda (afternoon snack) with Roberto's professor and classmates, Lukey and Mauricio, in an outdoor café. The conversation focused on comparing different cultures, and Lukey, in particular, was very curious about Algeria, Madjid's home country. (The ladies' man!)

Actually, Lukey had good reason to be inquisitive. Relations between Algeria and Guatemala were strained, at best. Madjid's visa application was rejected at the Guatemalan consulate in Chicago; the Republique Populaire of Algeria was a "communist state" in the eyes of the consul. It took two weeks of appeals and one of Roberto's hefty government connections to make Madjid's Guatemalan adventure even possible.






Our trip to Tikal was coming up. Aside from groceries and basic camping equipment, we needed some local cash-- which was practically the only form of currency accepted. The round-trip airfare was a whopping $100 per person, but we were planning to save drastically on food and lodging (more on this to follow).

We spent an entire morning at the bank. Lines were long and many, and computers were slow and few. We soon lost track of the number of forms we had to fill out. This was our not our first taste of Guatemala's justly infamous redtape; besides, Roberto had forewarned us to summon great reserves of patience for the occasion. Although it was a painful wait, we were cheered on by the recent fall of the quetzal against the dollar. One of our our green bills could command about two of its lesser counterparts.

When my turn finally came, I quickly forgot about what had brought me there in the first place. I did not even count the money neatly handed to me by the teller. Comically enough, all I could think of was her strikingly beautiful face, and vague plans of opening up a conversation in a language I hardly knew. There was no harshness in her bright eyes and angelic features, but she had an unmistakably aristocratic bearing (delicate hands, upturned nose, aloof demeanor, etc.) that made me feel uncomfortable. I mumbled a hasty gracias-- the pathetic peak of my eloquence. In a firm but elegant voice, she gave the customary de nada.

As we left the building, I asked Roberto if he had noticed the gorgeous "princess". But my more experienced friend was blunt. "If she were so aristocratic, then she wouldn't be working in a bank," he remarked cooly. I began to understand that the rich and powerful in Guatemala, whatever their occupations, did little, if any, work. (Princess Di, in her role as former kindergarten teacher, would have appeared plebeian in comparison.) Roberto's remark did not lower "her highness" in my eyes, but instead, made her seem much more approachable. Unfortunately, this would be our first and last visit to her bank.




We spent a few hours at the National Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology. There was a small but fine collection of Pre-Columbian artifacts here, with beautifully decorated ceramics depicting the gods and myths of the Maya cosmos. As in many other museums, picture-taking was not allowed, but fortunately, illustrated guides to Maya art are readily available. (In the section on Tikal, I include a picture of a famous piece.)

I bought a Spanish translation of the Popol Vuh, the Maya creation myth, at the Museo Ixchel, a museum devoted to indigenous dress. This imaginative and strange tale tells of the Hero Twins, Hunahpu and Ixbalanque, who play a ballgame-- the Mesoamerican variety that culminated in the sacrifice of the losers --with the lords of the Underworld to rescue their fathers from death. Perhaps the world's most fantastic genesis story, the Popol Vuh was, according to modern Mayanists, inspired by celestial phenomena, such as the vanishing and re-appearance of constellations in the night sky. However, the ancient Maya priest's custom of ingesting hallucinogenic psylocybe mushrooms (native to Mexico) during religious rituals must have boosted his myth-making ability.

Also at this museum, I picked up a tape featuring traditional Maya music. At once haunting and exotic to me, an outsider from industrial society, it helped me imagine the fantastic but no less poetic and rhythmic world of the ancient Maya and their enduring descendants. Here is a brief clip from the recording (40 second .wav file; size: 845 Kb).




A final "gourmet" supper with Roberto's brother, Oscar (in this land of volcanoes, strangely enough, a volcanologist), and his wife. We depart for Tikal and the Petén jungle tomorrow, where for almost a week, dinners will consist of canned sausage, biscuits, and the like.

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Into Guatemala 1989. © 1999 J. L. Pe