Guatemala, Parte Dos

After three weeks, I am about to leave Guatemala. Rather than write a lot I thought I'd let the pictures (and their captions) do the talking.

Xela, where I spent a week taking Spanish classes.

To me Xela is the perfect mix of touristy and genuine: cafes, live music, book stores. Full of young travellers, but also Guatemalan students. The centre really reminds me of Europe.

Beautiful old building in the centre, housing my Spanish school.

My 'host family', actually just other students staying with the same family. It was Jorge's birthday the night I left. I also got a chance to meet my friend Andrea's family who are from Xela, although she now studies in Alberta. They were absolutely amazing.  

Steam baths/sauna outside of town, wonderful!

 Chichicastenango, largest market in Central America (so I am told..)

More of Chichi

Next stop was San Pedro on Lake Atitlan. Amazing where people opt to grow food.

Volcanoes around Lake Atitlan.

 Coffee

Hiking near San Pedro

View during the hike

View of San Pedro from the hostel roof

Antigua. Supposedly the most beautiful city in Guatemala and equally as tourist. Although I'm only here for a day, it's probably my least favourite city so far. Really seems like a place where families come if they only have a week in Guatemala, want to buy souvenirs at exorbitant rates, eat in fine restaurants and maybe even hike a volcano. And it's not even that great to look at!

Okay, maybe it does have a nice feature or two.

 This was two.

Tomorrow morning I leave bright and early for San Salvador, where I'm couch surfing for a few days. I've been told San Salvador is fairly dangerous, so I plan to exercise extreme caution, take taxis when I have my bags and not stay out late without locals. At the same time, I feel like you have to take these things with a grain of salt. Apparently the travel advisory for Guatemala suggests only taking special tourist buses and avoiding local transportation, which is ridiculous and I've never met anyone who's had a problem (minus some surfboards flying off the roof). I'm curious to see if San Salvador is as bad as everyone says (still going to be extra careful, of course). 

I'm excited to begin this final leg of the journey. I've got three weeks to get to Panama City. This means skipping over Honduras and Costa Rica (something had to go), and spending a week in each of El Salvador, Nicaragua and Panama. Of course not nearly enough time, I've come to accept that I can't do everything and so I'm going to just enjoy the parts I can do. So here goes!

Mmmm Guacamole

Oh Guatemala, where to begin? We entered from Belize, heading straight for the quaint little town of El Remate, 30km south of the famous Mayan site of Tikal. After spending a few days visiting Tikal and exploring a couple towns around the adjacent lake, we continued further south to the highland (and freezing) town of Coban where it proceeded to rain the entire time. Although not the finest weather, it was a relief from the intense heat experienced in Mexico and Belize. Actually, the fog, mountains and chill air made it feel a little like Christmas.

Sunset in El Remate

 Tikal

 Max and Stef, from Montreal

This artificial beer-company Christmas tree may have contributed to the Christmas feeling. Unfortunately corporations are becoming rather aggressive with their advertising campaigns in Guatemala. It is not uncommon to see entire streets and houses decked out in Tigo or Claro cell phone advertising.

From Coban I began another solo portion of my trip, taking the rugged and rarely travelled journey west to Huehue (way-way). Although geographically only 100km apart, it took over seven hours and three buses (vans) to reach Huehue from Coban. Upon arrival, I proceeded to plop myself down for the night in Hotel Central, what the Lonely Planet accurately describes as a "rough and ready little number".

Yes, that was my road

One of the transfer points

I had originally planned to spend a week studying Spanish in a small town three hours north of Huehue called Todos Santos. After spending a night there I opted to head back to Huehue instead. Although it was a beautiful town, most of the inhabitants are indigenous and speak Mam at home, rather than Spanish. It also just felt really lonely and I decided I may have been a tad ambitious with my plan to really rough it in a small community. I did have time to take a hike up one of the mountains and watch a documentary about the history of the community and the impact of the civil war. It was really sad to see how the ordinary people in the town were caught between the two sides.

Todos Santos

Beginning of the hike

Near the summit

 My guide, Rigo

 Abandoned house at the top

Back in Huehue, I found some couch surfers to stay with: a household of three women, one from each generation. Maria Jose recently graduated from an undergrad in law and works with her mother at their small firm. Maria Jose's father was never really in the picture, and it was interesting to get to know such independent women in what is often a very macho society. No one spoke any English either, so it was another great opportunity to work on my Spanish.

 Maria Jose, at the office

Maria Jose's mother and I

On my last night in Huehue I found myself at a nearby village's beauty pageant, which turned out to be quite the affair. A hip-hop group from Guatemala City performed, as well as a more traditional singer, and of course there was all the standard beauty pageant activities. I think the whole thing really illuminated the country's (or at least the community's) attitudes about gender roles and about who a young woman "should be". Some of the hip-hop performance was also quite graphic considering much of the audience was children. Mind you, it certainly wasn't anything worse than what North American kids see on TV. On the plus side, it was inspiring to see so many people out for an event and I think it says a lot about the strength of the community. Either way, I was extremely grateful for such a unique experience.

Several of the contestants

The hip-hop performers from Guatemala City

The judging panel

I'm now in the slightly larger, and significantly more touristy city of Xela (sh-ela). Starting Spanish classes and a homestay this afternoon, going to be here for a week.