The Wormlips Scrapbook

Today I made three phone calls entirely in Spanish, visited one English-free indigenous home and went to one Spanish-only birthday party. Would you like to hear all about it? Great. Thanks.

I took a huge leap and decided to stay here another week. After I get back from Costa Rica I hope to move to a house with Internet access so I can work a few hours a day.

After changing my plane ticket, the agent asked if I needed any help from the “travel designer.”

Romelia (who owns the house where I’m staying) and I took the bus (didn’t require a travel designer) to San Antonio so I could track down a huipil with Maya calendar symbols.

(Romelia translated that bumper sticker for me. Roughly, it means “We may be friends but you still have to pay.”)

After five painful minutes in the market with aggressive vendors we had to escape, and walked over to see Romelia’s acquaintance a couple blocks away. When we knocked, two little girls cracked open the portón and peered out, and then ran for their mother who invited us in.

The large main room had a floor of packed, well-swept dirt. The roof was made of sections of corrugated metal, held up by wooden posts. Straight ahead were two roosters in a cage. To the left, right and in the back, the area was subdivided with pieces of cloth and boards into living areas for cousins, aunts, uncles: I think about fifteen in all.

While Romelia talked to her friend, I was surrounded by children who leaned on me and stroked my arm and patted my hair. We talked about jewelry and drawing and homework. I’m happy to report that I speak better Spanish than Daniel, the one-year-old. But he could do a fine rooster impression — cawca-cawww — though I’m not sure they were the best of friends. At one point we heard a tussle and then avian and human shrieking, and saw the rooster rocket straight up in a flurry of feathers. I don’t know who was attacking whom.

The ten-year-old girl brought us blue plastic cups full of a milky liquid. You wouldn’t believe how much I didn’t want it, but out of courtesy I took a few minuscule sips with devout hopes that it was made of agua pura. It was very sweet and sort of coconut-y.

After half an hour we returned to the mercado where I bargained (in Spanish) for two huipiles — at one point outbidding myself.

Sometimes my language mistakes aren’t funny. This afternoon I asked some workmen on the street if they knew where I could throw out my soft drink. I may have asked them if they wanted to drink my trash. Whatever I said, they were not amused and they shot dirty looks as I walked away.

On to Maria’s birthday party. Her big-hearted friends — Rosa, Justa, Mercedes, Santos, José — adore her.

Maria asked everyone to say a little about what they hope for the coming year, and what they’re grateful for. That was well and good as long as I was just listening, but they wanted me to talk. Taking my cue from the others and from Guatemalan sneezing blessings, I wished for salud, amor and dinero. And when, in my own unique language, I told them how grateful I am to be in their beautiful country, they clapped.

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A gale from the mountain howled down in blasts all last night. I dreamed about hurricanes. At 1:30 a.m. the Christian revival was still going strong, more electric than ever and carried on the winds.

Maria had a full day planned for us, so at 5:45 a.m. we got ready to leave Jaibalito. On the way to the dock we passed through the village one last time, accompanied by the talented gardener of the Volcano Lodge.

Before the sun had fully risen over the volcano we were already buzzing across the huge and choppy lake, bound for Santiago de Atitlán 45 minutes away.

Incorrectly assuming I understand Spanish as badly as I speak it, our handsome capitán asked Maria questions about me, including my marital status. I confess I was flattered. Why is it that Guatemalan men always ask how old I am? But this time, against all odds, he guessed a couple years on the younger side, which made me love him dearly — almost dearly enough to ride with him into the sunset, except we reached the lakeshore first.

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At the Posada de Atitlán, Maria and I had our favorite meal while sitting at the very same table where Santa Claus almost shot me two years ago.

In the lake below the hotel, women wash clothing.

Entonces we tuc-tuc’d to the radio station, Voz de Atitlán. Santiago was the scene of massive violence during the war, and the station played a significant part in pulling the community together. Maria has worked with them a lot over the years, leading journalism training programs.

These days, Voz de Atitlán supports two additional community projects: a school and a dental and medical care program.

I’m certain I heard myself volunteer to help them put together a brochure in English.

Our next stop was for mass at the giant Iglesia Parroquia Santiage Apóstol, built in the mid-1500s. It’s the same church where Father Rother was murdered in 1981, during the war. Maria told me that Santiago and Solalá are the only two regions in Guatemala where Mayan men still wear traditional clothing.

Along both walls inside the church are scores of wooden saints dressed in what looks like Hawaiian shirts, each cluster wearing its own design.

One apostle was a dead-ringer for Elvis. The Jesuses in Guatemala appear to suffer more than most, with more contortion and blood-trickles and expressions of agony.

The church was packed with over 500 people, almost entirely indigenous, and the service was bilingual in Spanish and Tz’utujil. In refreshing contrast to the sounds of Jaibalito, the music was pretty and not amplified, backed by half a dozen or more big-bodied, mellow-toned guitars that were tuned just a little bit flat. The priest had a beautiful voice and the chorus sounded informal, like a roomful of friends.

During the stand-up times, I noticed once again that I towered over everyone except a tall women up front who was sucking on a lollipop. She turned out to be a girl on her father’s shoulders.

Though I have a marked aversion to churchy things on the whole, this was deeply moving and fascinating. I loved the peace handshake.

Maria and I buzzed around town in a tuc-tuc for a while.

We bought some stuff like matching bracelets.

We rode back to Antigua with Don Toño and his wife Sara. Two big metal things in their car’s engine had snapped in half, so it roared all the way home. We bought strange fruit (cuchín) by the side of the road.

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On the highway we passed a motorcycle with five passengers: father driving, mother clutching an infant behind him, toddler in back and a boy riding up front on the gas tank.

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Here are a few shots of Jaibalito. In the background you’ll hear some of the Pentecostal singing that started at 7 a.m. and is still going strong at 10 p.m. Most of the day it’s been men’s voices, but this funky little audio sample has the women.

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