July 06, 2004
well george bush intercontinental airport in houston, despite the name, wasn't so horrible after all, at least not compared to its namesake... the trip was uneventful, as flights should be, except for all the stupid ads continental shows for the first 30 minutes of the flight.
now i'm safely ensconced in la hacienda, helping with tory's mural project as rain permits (there's lots of rain). today i taught a bunch of kids to play middle eastern rhythms on water jugs (beledi & malfuf, for those who are dying to know). i felt a little like tobias after we started stringing them together in a little composition. i'd started with a cuban beat-- not much, bass holding the main 4/4 pulse, a clave on top of that, & one other simple pattern, but the teenage girls deserted as soon as the teenage boys showed up & the little kids couldn't hold it together. the middle eastern stuff worked better.
we're hoping (ok i'm hoping, i'm not sure the kids care, or even understood me when i tried to explain in spanish) to play for a puppet show here, as some other kids are making marionettes, other kids are writing a story (or 12, we'll see) & others are painting backdrops.
yesterday we worked on outlining the mural on the wall in preparation for painting to begin, but then today the rain stalled everything paintery...
el salvador is gorgeous, by the way. even just outside the airport. everything is lush & green. interestingly, there aren't many OTHER colors in the wild, like flowers etc, it's just all green hills. the hacienda is beautiful but a strange environment. the community isn't allowed into most of it, only the main meeting areas. there's a swimming pool & whole back area that are closed off. yet we gringos (actually mostly gringas) have free run of the place. feels kinda imperialistic. plus there was a massacre of 50 people here during the civil war, right in the courtyard where we eat dinner, and that pall hangs over the place a bit. but the only war now is between us, mosquitos, & amoebas, and folks seem acclimated to history (what are they gonna do, after all? there were so many damn massacres & atrocities, if every place became a shrine everyone would just have to move out of the country).
anyway i promised to play some music with some of the others here (lena & carolyn ryder cooley, for those of you who know them) so i don't wanna keep them waiting any more.
July 10, 2004
hola queridas, lo siento por la espera;) now it's saturday & much has passed... wednesday i spent the morning painting the mural again, then afternoon teaching more rhythms until ryder (nee carolyn) arrived with her translation of "tres ratones ciegos" (three blind mice) which we taught to a bunch of kids (ever tried to scan spanish translations into a melody for an english song? lotsa syllables to squeeze). then some kids said they wanted to learn it in english also, so we started painstakingly teaching syllable by syllable the anomalous english-spelled slightly morbid tune. by the end (about an hour & a half later) only one pupil remained, but she had it, and mostly knew which words were which. hardest word: "thing". español centroamericano has no unvoiced "th" sound so poor rosa had to struggle with the right position of tongue between teeth (teethththth). she got it, but every time she came to the word she got nervous & invented a new pronunciation.
also some of the gringas had created a dance to the following song:
once there was a candy store
business was so bad
asked my wife
what to do
this is what she said:
take zee can of gasoline
spread it on zee floor
take zee match
make zee scratch
no more candy store, hey!
(repeat last 3 lines 2ce)
(song courtesy of ryder, "obviously" if you know her)
by then the kids musta thought all english-speakers are demented, which i guess isn't that far from the truth...
then yesterday about half of us rose at 6am to head to izalco, whence we rode horses up the volcano of which i've thoroughly forgotten the name. these were, bluntly, some ragged caballos. at first most barely wanted to move, though a couple were a bit too eager. one of our crew, jen, was nearly tossed off a cliff when her galloping horse decided to plant her front hooves fast, & kick her back legs out at the following horse & rider. jen grabbed the neck of her steed & held on but managed to hit her throat on the saddle horn hard enough to require a trip to the hospital, as she was having trouble breathing. she's ok, back here again, but that sucked. luckily it was early in the trip & we had (pathetically enough) two escorts: the horse owner in a jeep, and three cops on foot (apparently "tour groups" here usually get police escorts to ensure safety; a bit creepy to see them lurking in the brush behind us at times). so jen was easily whisked away to the relative safety of the izalco clinic (though i've heard some unencouraging things about other hospitals here...)
anyway, i personally loved the galloping (after trading in my original nag, i got a pretty antsy steed), not only for the thrill but also because those were some damn hard saddles & the transition from cantering (whereupon yr butt slams hard against the saddle with every step) & galloping (which feels more like gently leaping 20 feet, gingerly touching down, then leaping again) was ever more comfortable.
we didn't actually completely climb the volcano unfortunately (probably because we were so gosh darn slow), but ended on an old lava flow dating from 1956 or 1963 (the guy said one date in spanish & the other in english) which also offered a lovely view of most of the country (hey it's small) & also the coast.
ok other highlights: i drank from a spigot what was described as (& i still hope to be) spring water, figuring we were high enough above the cities' water tables that it wouldn't be contaminated by the same horrible things that they dump directly into most of the water supplies. i also ate three pupusas de queso & frijoles with the pickled cabbage stuff which seemed not entirely sanitary but by then i was feeling invincible (hey i'd just ridden a grumpy but hurried horse up & down most of a volcano).
another highlight. after our descent & starved 4:40pm lunch, we visited a tiny church which was essentially the center of a santeria sect. the couple explained how the indigenas had once worshipped sun & wind &c, & when the conquistadores came, they'd essentially just placed intermediaries in there, one saint representing the sun, another the east wind, another corn, etc, & placed jesus above them all so they're technically christian, but they still have largely the same rituals as 600 years ago. they also served us a rice wine that tasted a little like homebrewed mead, lots of it.
today, i made a point of doing as little as possible, since i'm shall we say a bit sore, especially shall we say my ass. i painted a bit, sorted through the photos on my camera (oh i took some really nice shots at 70 miles per hour from the bus window), & now i'm emailing.
we'll be here another week & then tory & i strike off for guatemala & oaxaca. thanks for yr responses & i love you all. p
July 21, 2004
Currently Tory, Caitlin (a friend from San Francisco who also was part of the project at the hacienda), & Mary (another SFan who met us 5 days ago) are in Antigua, Guatemala, and thankful for the altitude, coolness (it's probably only 80 outside right now, and last night I wore a jacket), & resultant scarcity of mosquitos & fleas, thank the god(s) of your choice(s). This is by far the most gringoed out place we've been, since there are dozens of homestay language schools here & it's therefore one of the most popular places in the world to learn Español. I'd say 1/3 to 1/2 of the people I see here are extrañeros. But an interesting side effect is that the native Spanish speakers are very used to people who are just learning, so they speak very clearly, slowly, & simply, and even if their English is better than your Spanish, they'll stick to Spanish so you can practice. As a result i suddenly feel like i can speak intelligibly;). & Even aside from my newfound brilliance I like it here, it's bloody gorgeous, surrounded by mountains & volcanoes & lush lush land. & did i mention no fleas?
Yesterday we left San Salvador by bus, crossed the border (where I managed to get mildly scammed three times in about 10 minutes, losing a total probably of $6, but still frustrating to realize that I'm just not the most street smart person out there, for all my other formidable talents), hit Ciudad Guatemala, damn that place is intense--smog, hustlers, sprawl, apparently serious gangs as well--tried & failed to get Tory's return ticket changed from last Friday from San Slavador (i like that misspelling so i'm keeping it;) to the 31st from Mexico City (after repeated emails telling her that she could do that, the office said no, we don't fly out of Mexico City). While she was in the office getting dumped by Taca, I stood with our taxi driver outside, talking about marriage & divorce & sex before marriage, lemme tell you he has some strong opinions & wanted to know all about me-- had i had many girlfriends, had i had relaciones sexuales with them, will i get married, if i have kids would i ever consider divorce... He wasn't judgmental at all, just really interested. He was also really impressed when i said i made about $800/month, and similarly amazed that i pay $525 in rent.
Thus thwarted, we pressed on via campesino bus (no chickens on board, alas, but someone's parcel did picturesquely fly off the roof onto the highway) to Antigua. Off the bus there was the old familiar feeling of being hustled from every side. Much as I hate that (and reflexively say no to everyone without hearing a word they say), it did at least make me feel for the first time that I'm really traveling. That & finally using foreign currency & having to multiply & divide by 7.50 all the time... There was something about Colima & even San Salvador that felt too familiar. Probably partially due to using dollars & partially due to my expectation that all foreign countries should be as different from SF as Cairo, Jerusalem, & Istanbul are. Even Greece & Bulgaria, though in some ways familiar in that European "everything's almost familiar except the cars & boxes & streets are too skinny & tall", use different alphabets & no one smiles in Bulgaria;) All this is to say that I guess all my time living in the Mission has made Latin American culture familiar enough that I can forget I'm somewhere else entirely, perhaps just in Modesto.
Umm. Tangent. Anyway so before that we were in San Salvador for three nights & did very little. Stayed two nights with our friend Mauricio in his little basement apartment off his parents' really nice house in a pretty posh neighborhood. Parts of their house have no roof, by design, because you just don't need it (there are drains in the tile floors in those areas though) & extra airflow is much more important than hermetical seals. The architecture of the houses actually reminded me a lot of St. Croix when i was a kid.
We went to the mall (Mauricio's attempt to shut us up from our constant requests for good coffee was to take us the "The Coffee Cup", which sucked). We saw "21 Grams" subtitled in Spanish (which was actually helpful when the characters mumbled (or am i losing my hearing?)) at the "Foto Cafe", which actually DID have good coffee. Mary & Tory both came down with pretty bad digestive issues so we all went to the medical clinic & got them their antibiotics, & both are feeling much better now. It rained torrentially one night, Mauricio's roof leaked straight in & soaked a mattress, & i got some kinda cool photos of lightning.
before that we were two nights in a little hotel on the beach in La Libertad. the first night most of the hacienda folks were there so it was a nice cushy send off. ryder & lena & i played some music & we ordered food off a menu & didn't all have to eat at the same time & i think there weren't even fleas. (i think i haven't mentioned in email yet but my left ankle was one night at the hacienda devoured by spiders, fleas, and of course mosquitos & swelled up insanely for about a week, basically until yesterday. now it just itches.) Swam in the unpacified Pacific during a gorgeous lightning storm. Got locked out of the hotel grounds & had to jump the fence to get back in.
The last few days at the hacienda were eventful & hectic. We had a party which started with a procession from the mural, led by Ryder, Lena & me, enshrouded in a dingy mosquito net, cascading sweat & playing a funereal klezmer kolomeike. Ryder described it as cathartic, like breaking a fever. Several people asked what it meant, a question which we left mysteriously unanswered, because we hadn't really thought about that.
There were piñatas. Bloodthirsty kids. Griselda got punched in the eye for a dulce. The evening was calmer, just our closer commadres remaining. Rose & Shamita & Crystal & Melanie & i exited the guarded gate, crossed the highway, & played pool with the guys under the loving gaze of many swimsuited women on posters (was it love or lust i saw in that one girl's eyes?).
I don't know. i think there was lots more but i feel like i've been typing for hours & that my stories are getting increasingly dull (not that they were fascinating to start with). so i'll stop. we'll be here another night, then probably somewhere on lake atitlan, then perhaps quetzaltenango, then san cristobal (chiapas mexico), then oaxaca, then d.f. to see where the virgin mary appeared, then home, in just ten days, strange. i've never traveled so quickly...
anyway i have no phone number for the moment, nor text message access. but internet in antigua is fairly cheap so i'll check again tomorrow before we leave.
love p
July 24, 2004
tory & i pulled into san cristobal de las casas, chiapas, mexico, today at 5 pm after a day filled with scams but which began & is ending beautifully. we awoke in santiago de atitlan (guatemala) where yesterday we witnessed a ceremony asking intervention from Maximon (San Simon), the patron saint of vice, presumably to help a family member with a cocaine problem. i'd tell you more but everything the man said was in a Mayan language except for "bendecir" to bless the cigarettes & booze being offered, and "cocaina" & "marijuana". The attendants pour the booze into the wooden statue's gullet, & stick cigarettes in his mouth, light em, & gingerly tap the ashes off as it burns down. He chain smokes, by the way. He has to to smoke all the cigarettes he's being offered. He's also wearing about 50 neckties. We showed up as a giant group of German? tourists was leaving, & were left alone with the attendants, Maximon, & a drunk who was cursing the Saint from the street, mostly again in Maya. But then came the man with the offering & the prayer, which went almost an hour while Tory drew portraits of the still-standing-despite-enormous-quantities-of-alcohol saint, and our young guide waited patiently.
So um yeah i was trying to say how we woke this morning at 5am & took the boat (you can only get to Santiago de Atitlan by boat) back to Panajachel, whence we got a horrible breakfast & shelled out $30 each (yup 30 american dollars) to get a ride to the border, whereupon our until-then-very-helpful driver managed to stick us for $20 more as the "border crossing fee" supposedly paid to the border guards but for various reasons we're pretty sure he pocketed it. Once in Mexico we ended up having to change Quetzales to Pesos at a horrible rate because we were stuck, then i got stuck for 10 pesos by our first bus driver (my fault this time, i converted wrong)... finally, though we're back in North America & it feels good. actually this town reminds me a little of Italy or something, except for all the little revolutionary Zapatista dolls for sale on the street (this was the center of the 1994 uprising).
Oh yeah, hot showers & great pizza. We're happy.
they're closing the internet down now, gotta go.
love p