Dispatch Number 17 -Back Roads: Part I

The journey into Guatemala has been filled with rich experiences and closer contact with the people than I experienced during extended travel in Mexico. It could be attributed to the people, my increased comfort with the language, or perhaps the most influential, my choice to travel alone. I entered Guatemala by myself and have continued to travel this way for over 7-weeks.

The experience of living with Guatemalan people in their homes has been an unvarnished one. It has broadened my horizon. I have lived with Maya subsistence farmers, a Peace Corp volunteer (hats off, it is hard work often in isolated environments), I currently live with a Ladino family in the Cuchumantane mountains in northern Guatemala (Ladino is those of mixed Spanish and Maya blood).

I have taken meals in rural smoke filled houses with dirt floors under candle light, made friends with a Guatemalan biologist who was passionate about the under served people in her country, and discussed social differences between the U.S. and Guatemala with Salvador the owner of a hostel I stayed at for 10 days.

Of special note, I had the fortune to attend an ancient Maya Maize Ceremony, corn ceremony to pray for an abundant crop, it is rare for a foreign visitor to observe this ritual that goes back over 3,000 years, we drove many miles into the night crossing many rickety bridges to attend this gathering at a small hamlet close to the Mexican border. It was back roads travel at its best.

Many of the places I spent time in had no electricity, so when night fell the magic of candles took over. Walking about you could see families gather for dinner around candle light, it is a calming beautiful sight -the flame gently bursts through the wood slat houses delicately revealing silhouettes as you pass by on the foot path.

During the 7-weeks in Guatemala the visit has been punctuated by concentrated visits in three areas. All of them in the northern part of the country, these areas are jungle lowlands and steep mountains that make up the heart of Maya country. These lands have been continually inhabited by the Maya since 1,800 B.C., their blood lines and customs are remarkably intact. The journey has been punctuated by old and new. I have made visits to many ancient Maya sites, which are more numerous that most realize, it was a vast cultural empire but never unified under single rule.

I have been living with Guatemalan families in towns of all sizes. The equivalents are: towns-pueblos; villages-aldeas and hamlets- comunidades.

It has been raw and rewarding. It has also been dangerous and exhilarating. As I get to know myself better I realize I would not have it any other way.


To continue in next Dispatch.

David,
Todos Santos, Guatemala