I forgot to mention that i caught the bouquet at beth´s quiche wedding. Twice. I caught it the first time and this guy was like, she throws it three times, and took it away from me. alright. Beth threw it again and i caught again. This time he said, well alright i guess it´s over. You can have it. Sweet.
So i met some us congressmen in antigua. Appearently there was some sort of reception planned with peace corps volunteers at casa santo domingo, the nicest hotel in antigua. Alexa and i were in antigua because we were passing through after the wedding, working on grad school apps and waiting for her mom to fly in later that week. we were not invited to the reception, nor informed of it at all. Some of our friends who were invited told us that it was only for volunteers who had helped during hurricane stan. Not us. so we were at the internet cafe and alexa had to go to the bathroom. I continued typing emails and stuff. She was gone a really long time and when she came back she was all excited. Guess who i just met in the bathroom? Congressman ortiz. He gave me a personal invitation to the meeting this afternoon and your coming too. Alexa, seeing the woman´s bathroom was occuppied decided to use the men´s instead. She then saw a big pair of black hands reaching over the door, and someone demanding, ¨who´s in there?¨ when alexa came out of the bathroom, she said, it´s just me. while washing her hands she made small talk with a man who turned out to be congressman ortiz and it came out that she was a pcv, she was not invited to the meeting, and so he invited her. He asked her where she was from and she told him queens. Funny coincidence the man trying to barge in on her in the men´s room was the 6th district rep from queens. So alexa and and i show up in the best clothes that we had at the time; it was a limited selection because we had just taken all our dirty clothes to the laundry mat. I went with carharts and my boots, alexa choose jeans and a turtleneck. We showed up at the five star hotel at five. All the rest of the pcv´s and our country director were already there. We were excited to see the look on our boss´s face as we rolled in, invited by her, but summoned by a higher power. Alexa exlpained the situation and the congressmen trickled in one after another in their khaki pants and polo shirts. They were from texas, missouri, new york, florida, and wisconsin so i didnt recognize any of the names. Plus i´ve been in guatemala for 2 years. They were mostly democrats and on a whirlwind tour of central america promoting cafta (or tlc as it´s known her). I stood next to the majority whip in the group foto. They all really nice things to say to us; how they were so proud of the work that we were doing, how we were american ambassadors, etc. Although it was politiky reteric, it was nice to hear. Honestly, guatemalans rarely thank us or recognize the sacrifices we make. Luckily my friends in ipala support me and are a little more aware, but i think it´s an exception. So i made small talk with a rep from wisconsin, i don´t remember his name. Or maybe it was missourri. Whatever, it´s all the same. Anyway, he started asked about my work and if it was ¨real primitive¨ where i live. His jaw dropped when i told him that i have a hot shower and a gas stove. When he asked me what my plans where for after peace corps, i told him that i´ve been applying to planning schools. he asked me which ones and i told him and somehow slipped in that i graduated from brown. His reaction was, wow that´s a liberal school. My daughter looked at brown but ended up playing lacrosse at dartmouth. Of course he has a daughter who played lacrosse at dartmouth. He then proceded to tell me about how the congressmen were discussing on the plane how the great thing about being in central america was you can say merry christmas without any problems and how in the united states you have to say happy holidays. ¨Happy holidays, well i say BS to that. It´s merry christmas.¨ i really didn´t know what to say. I kind of wish i was jewish so i could have said so. But instead i just said it had been nice talking to him and ¨Happ- I mean merry christmas!!¨ Then i went to talk to congressman foley from florida with some other volunteers. We called him mr. Pink because he had a pink shirt, pink pants, and loafters on. And he was ready to party. He started telling stories about hanging out with the kennedy family while the rest of us golped down american beers (sam adams ligtht, coors light, michalob light, and other beers i´ve never seen in guatemala before). He then asked what languages the ¨tribes¨ spoke where we lived. I answered ¨well, actually there arent any indigious mayan people in my town; they all speak spanish.¨ then this sharply dressed guy came up to our group. I can´t remember who introduced themself first, but we were all peace corps volunteers and he was in charge of setting exxon´s prices for all of central (maybe it was latin) america. Hmm. This could be awkward. But he was actually really nice. Or maybe that was the sam adams light working it´s magic. Anyway all the congressmen drifted off to their big fancy dinner and we headed to the greek place. alexa exchanged phone numbers with the guy in charge of planning their evening activies so that we could meet up later. Mr. Pink seemed really excited at that prospect. Alexa called tom later on; it seemed that the congressmen would not be leaving the casa santa domingo compound that evening, but there was an open bar set up at the hotel and we were invited. Done and done. We should up and i poured myself a triple amaretto on the rocks and ate a handful of cookes. Alexa put some kiwi in her bag and snagged some bottles of water. There weren´t any congressmen there, just pcv´s stuffing their faces and downing the fancy imported liquor. As it should be. They get this kind of treatment on the time. I can´t even remember the last time i saw a kiwi. Then tom showed up and told us it was time to move on before we devoured everything in site. We headed back to our, much more modest hotel and called it a nite.
Alexa and i headed into the capital to pick up her mom on the 22nd. It´s so interesting to meet people from home. We all came here alone, without any links to our past lives. We know about each others´ past from fotos and stories, but as to how we behave and who we are in our natural environment, it´s a mystery. That´s why it´s so great to meet friends and family from home; it gives a little window into who we are and most of us are eager to introduce our visitors to our pc friends. As alexa said about her mom ¨she is her own show¨ and i understand alexa so much better after meeting her. We had a very pleasant dinner at cuatro grados norte in guate and her mom gave me a box of godiva chocolates. The next day i left for ipala, and alexa and her mom for huehue. Have you every traveled on Friday, december 23rd before? In public transportation? With a huge backpack? In guatemala? It´s not recomendable, but it can be done. I was happy to be back in ipala and had dinner at the neighbors.
Feliz navidad
So on the 24th i made may way to san luis, after being in ipala less than 24 hours. Mirna had invited me over la noche buena and gabriel had made his way to the oriente for the first time. Some of my friends and neighbors were a little upset that i wasnt spending the christmas eve in ipala but i explained that i´d be back for xmas day and the neighbors invited me and my friends over for lunch. I got to mirna´s in the afternoon and we decided to make pupusas for dinner. Gabriel uncorked a bottle of wine, i put on the salsa, mirna made masa, and the festivities began. The pupusas turned out pretty good; gabriel and i even tried to make a couple inbetween salsa lessons. He asked me if i wanted to take classes with him in antigua some time and i was shocked. I mean the man is from puerto rico and i feel like i have 2 left feet every time i try to dance with him. I´m really excited about the dance classes. Anyway some of mirna´s female friends came over and some reggaeton songs and two bottles of tequila later we headed over to omar´s family´s house. After mirna finished her tamales, we said goodbye and headed out. Mirna needed to go visit some more friends but gabriel and i were ready for the dance floor so we headed to salón. There were like 3 people inside but that didn´t matter and gabriel and i danced a couple songs until they cut the music off at midnite so people could go outside and get their xmas hugs. On cue mirna appeared on the muni steps as we walked outside to the sounds of firecrackers and guns blazing. We walked back to omar´s house to give them hugs and decided to wait inside while neighbors shot off pistol rounds into the air. Gabriel commented that in puerto rico there are always accidental deaths as a result of the christmas eve celebrations. We then headed to another house, more food and hugs. Finally we made our way back to the dance floor. But unfortunately the music sucked. It was mostly ranchera, and while i like ranchera, i don´t really like dancing to it. The dance lasted until about 3 and we continued the after party in mirna´s house. Some more dancing and drinking. People started drifting out, and finally we had the house to ourselves. We stayed up talking, a dizzying mixture of english and spanish, through sunrise and went to bed around 6:30. the next day the neighbors called me around 10 to tell me to hurry up and get back to ipala in time for lunch. Gabriel decided to go with mirna to an aldea in san luis instead of coming to ipala, and i was really upset about it at first. There wasnt any public transportation so juan and ema came to pick me up in san luis (about 20 minutes away) i felt really bad but they said it was no trouble and i had a wonderful xmas lunch with the monroy family. I ate too much. And when i tried to help with the dishes, selma told me to go rest in the hammock. Alright. I spent all afternoon at my neighbors, drinking ponche de frutas and looking at ema´s baby pictures. He was adorable!! I went home around 7, made a few phone calls and crashed. All in all it was one of the best christmases i´ve had.
Happy two thousand kicks!!
For new year´s i had decided to go to lanquin. I wasnt sure who was going to be there except for mirna, gabriel, and dan, a former pcv who lives in coban. I left Friday afternoon, dreading the trip. I love the verapazes, but i hate the trip getting there. Long story short, mirna and i decided to stay at noel´s place in purulhá. I´d never been there before and since mirna wanted to stay with him, i didnt want to stay in coban by myself. I got there first and called noel from the highway. I was expecting him to come meet me and take me to his house himself, but he thought that giving me directions over the phone was a sufficient greeting. After a little searching i found him at his house. Its a nice place and his new site suits him well. Its all cold and mountainy and green. He´s got a latrine outside the house which i didnt appreciate later in the nite when i almost fell of the barranca trying to get to it. I decided that if i had to pee again, i´d do it behind the house. Mirna called a bit later. She had gotten off at the wrong stop and was a little lost. Noel orientated her by phone (his seemingly preferred method of greeting visitors) and with some luck she found us. we had a nice dinner and i spent the rest of the cold, snuggling with mirna. We woke up at 5 to catch a bus to coban so that we could meet dan by 7. unfortunately we got really lost in the dark while trying to find the highway. Mirna asked a guy that we passed if we were on the right track. He told us that we absolutely were not, that we were in the fincas and it was dangerous and that he would take us to the highway. (i won´t make any comments about how this complete stranger was more a better host than noel. Oh wait yeah i will. Its my blog and i can write what ever i want.) so we finally got to coban and arrived just in time for dan to come pick us up. We were a random group of people, pcv´s, dan´s friend from home who is serving in el salvador, some swedish people, a guatemalan cafe owner, and more randoms were waiting for us in lanquin. i spent the day swimming in the natural rock pools, enjoying good conversation, and devouring a milky way. for the evening celebration we headed over to gabriel`s house. he lives in a building that one day may or may not be a functioning hotel. it`s hard to describe but he set it up nicely with candles and and the bar area was stocked with tamales, tacos, and drinks. we spent the early evening warming up on the dance floor, and in dan i found someone who helped me take my ironic 80`s dance moves to a whole new level. it was magical. we went on to the hotel we were met with acid jazz (needless to say the ironic dancing continued) and at the stroke of midnite we all hugged and kissed and drank champie. it was a wonderful new years. one of the best i´ve ever had. the next day dan was in a hurry to get back to coban for the first week of playoff football. i lounged with the boys and the we realized that it was in fact the last week of the regular season and all that hurry and flurry to get back really was for naught. oh well. mirna and i stayed at carmen`s place as her roommates are out of town and stayed up late drinking tea and talking about strange jungle sicknesses you can catch in the petèn. the next day a friend of a carmen`s gave us a ride as far as el rancho and mirna and i made the rest of the trip back home to ipala with out incident. all in all a great time.
