DAY 3
I find out it was Rafael, an (I suspect) perhaps retarded Mayan guy who lives in the other bedroom at the school; is probably in his 50’s; is supposed to be taking of the property; smiles at one blankly who barged into the bedroom where I was sleeping shouting about the electricity being out. All very strange. Feel like I may have just dreamed it. At any rate, I am so glad to see dawn, to be able to stop breathing the mold spores in the mattress and pillow and finally after this long trip to get to my place, wherever the hell it is, unpack my huge suitcase, hook up to the much touted internet connection, take a shower and get my little San Pedro life arranged. You know, like put your toiletries in a nice row on a shelf, hang up your clothes and pretend everything is normal. I need some order. Somebody is supposed to arrive to take me to the new place, in the meantime I wander out onto the grounds of the school. Leaving the communal gathering space through a gate, one descends into a lush tropical garden down to the lake itself. Amazing things grow between, over and around huge boulders that fell from steep mountainsides or were thrown here by some primal volcanic explosion. I hear that the lake itself is the caldera of an ancient, extinct volcano. And all through this garden, that looks at once cared for and at the same time forgotten, are palapas, tiny ones, where the maestros work with their students. Looks good to me. Can hardly wait! And beyond this forgotten-cared-for garden is the lake, blue, blue and sometimes still and sometimes moving as if some huge creature stirs beneath its surface. It must be very deep.
A very sweet Mayan woman arrives in traditional dress, greets me and says that if I am ready she will take me to the apartment. As soon as I have my bags ready to haul out, she, however, introduces me to the notorious Rafael and explains that he lives in the other room and is the care taker and that now the arrangement is that he will take me to the other place. Hmmmm. Rafael smiles at me a little insanely or hungrily. I can’t figure out which. And I really can’t figure out why he ‘broke into my room’ in the middle of the night. He is from here, after all. Electrical outages are par for the course. What could possibly have motivated all the commotion.
I ask Ramón, the director of the school, if I can just pay him now for the whole thing, tuition and rent and everything. I don’t feel comfortable carrying around so much cash. And then something happens that takes my breath away. Or I mean something doesn’t happen. I can’t find my money. I have hidden these dollars (I will now admit) in a tiny, zippered Guatemalan coin purse my daughter gave me a long time ago. And then when we left San Cristóbal I hid the little purse inside my underwear for the whole trip. Actually, it wasn’t especially comfortable and a couple of times I had to reach in at inopportune moments and keep the zipper from pinching tender parts of my anatomy, but I thought if we were robbed on the highways (you hear stories!) that my crotch would be the last place they would think to look. Unless……..but we won’t go there.
Anyway, the little purse isn’t where I put it when I got undressed for bed last night. Ramón is standing there waiting to take the money. I am frantically searching through my bags, trying to act casual about not finding anything, but really I am simply unable to breathe, thinking, “What I do I do now….I don’t even know if I have that much money in the one account I could conceivably access with an atm.” And then it hits me: the late night break into my room! What a good ruse! Panic, the electricity is out. Shine a flashlight in my eyes so that I can’t even see who you are and while you rave on about something stupid you take my money. Of course. Why was I so naïve as simply to lie there and make mumbly comments about the lights being out and squint into the flashlight sleepily? I am horrified. Oh! And then I find the money. It is exactly where I put it. I was making jokes about being sooooooo absent-minded and, actually, it was very true. I am breathing again and so glad to be getting rid of this cash and feeling rather light headed. Need to breathe more. They say it’s good for you.
And the little apartment is fine. Almost new, very clean, up on the second story of the building with a view in one direction of amazing tropical growth and out another window a view of an extinct volcano looming directly above. I thought I was told it was a 2 room apartment. The bathroom must be the 2nd room, but not problem. It’s actually quite spacious for this kind of thing. Ramón arrives and installs a new television and tells me that watching Guatemalan TV is a good way to keep making progress. I arrange my toiletries in neat rows, my shirts in a color coordinated row, and remake the bed. I do need some order in my life and the kind of order that I have determined, not anybody else, nothing random needs to be happening here. And take a hot shower. Ahhhhhhhhhhhhh. And plan to explore San Pedro before the rains hit again. Looking out at the volcano outside my window, already the clouds are beginning to hide its summit.
My god, I will admit that I love this traditional dress thing. And, wandering the so-called streets of this little town, that is exactly what you see. Well, mostly the women. Almost exclusively the women. They are in beautiful embroidered huipiles and then some wonderful ‘corte’ as they call them, the wrap-around skirt, also embroidered and held together by a beautiful woven belt. And then many of them wear an additional embroidered apron, with metallic threads and lace. The little girls, too. And the teenagers along with them. Black hair pulled back and often parted in the middle. Very little make up. I am sorry, but I find it really beautiful and want to take photos, but can’t quite get myself to do it head on, so I will have a lot of photos of Guatemaltecas from behind. Of course, the wrap around corte does not make their behinds look especially svelte, but I bet that’s not even a word in their language. I will ask and get back to you on that.
Oh, and these so-called streets of San Pedro are often unpaved foot paths meandering along the lake through groves of coffee plants, corn, banana trees, juniper trees and past little gardens with palapas, some of them abandoned and some of them under water with the lake so high from all the rain. Or, one step up from the foot paths are tiny paved walkways wondering between buildings, always turning, revealing some new miniature vista. Actually, a little Venice like without, you know, all the Venice stuff. Or Perugia like. Now that’s closer to it.
I wander just out beyond the apartment at the edge of town along the lake and hear voices. Getting closer I find a little point of land jutting into the lake with big rocks. And all around in secret little corners are bathers. Real bathers as in soap. And while they bathe they wash their clothes and splash each other. And I understand nothing because no one is speaking Spanish, but their own local Mayan dialect. There are 23 different and very distinct Mayan dialects in Guatemala, as I hear. Around on one side of the little point are a group of girls bathing. I feel funny watching them, but the scene is so beautiful and serene and whole. And then there is a men’s group. They are in the water in their varied colored bikini briefs, soaping and laughing and lounging on the ground. And further around the point are the women and this is where the laundry is taking place, rubbing soap on clothes flattened against big rocks in the water and splashing, soap in their long black hair.
It’s been warm this afternoon and now with the approach of evening it is suddenly very cool. Clouds close in around the jagged remnants of the volcano that created this lake. Everything is blue and silver again and the rain begins, like a curtain coming down on stage.
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