Tamales and Farewells

Friday
7.25.2008

Wow!  The last day in Central America.  All stories must end.  I actually got myself up at 5:45am.  It was hard, too, because I had to pack late last night after getting back from the Eks.  I didn't go to bed until midnight.

By 6:30am, though, I was in San Narciso, walking up to the Ek house.  The women let out a squeal of surprise, laughter, and delight to see me.  For the next two and a half hours I helped them make tamales.  They cooked me breakfast which I ate with Alfredo and his brother in law.  Delicious scrambled eggs with fresh avocado, black beans and pickled habaneros.  

At 9am I left to pick up the girls in Christo Rey, but before I left, Jesus, Sarge, a coach, his wife, and his son had piled in the car, too!  I hoped I could fit the girls in.  As we drove over the bumpy dirt road out of San Narciso we passed Alex Campos.  It was a gift to see him one last time.   In Christo Rey, Courtney and Abby sat in jump seats in the back of the car, and we had exactly enough seats for everyone.  It was a full house.  By 10:45am Zac and Mark and I were headed with all my luggage to the Corozal bus station.  The express bus came at 11:45am.  

While I waited for the bus I had another profound encounter with poverty, only hours before leaving Belize.  An elderly white man shuffled into the bus station and sat next to me.   He looked like he could be homeless, his fingernails were long and dirty, his clothes were soiled, and his skin was red and horribly flaking.  He smelled so bad, so sour, that I had difficulty talking to him.  He had a nice voice, though, and told me that he grew up in San Francisco.  He claimed that he had a house here in Corozal.  He also told me a wild story: how he drove across America in the 1960s, how his car broke down in Alabama, and how he eventually found himself crossing the Edmund Pettus Bridge with the marchers following Martin Luther King, Jr. to Montgomery.

I just couldn't stand his odor and I had to sit outside and wait.  This strange kid walked past me and whispered to me to come around the corner.  It was really weird and disturbing.  I shooed hi away.  Finally the express bus came at 12:15pm.  I arrived at the airport around 2pm and left Belize at 4pm.  

I watched the swamps and jungle and ocean pass away far below me.  I was ready to come home.

The Last Full Day

Thursday
7.24.2008

Last night after I blogged, we went to eat at the Chinese restaurant. My Guinness and my beef chow mein never tasted so delicious. Later I could not sleep, and I discovered that my camera can take long exposures, so I went taking night photographs at 11pm. I caught sight of Presh and Melanie on their enormous, second-story balcony, but they didn't see me.

Thursday morning I woke up early, ready to nail today's final video work. Zac, Kirk, and I interviewed Noe Smith and Albert at Cornerstone. We also got some footage of Zac telling his story at Cornerstone. After lunch we drove to San Narciso. In the middle of our conversation we fell silent when we caught sight of the soccer field. We were astounded. There were 60 kids out on the field, divided into groups, focused, and orderly. Zac later told me that he said to himself, "Who did all this?!" It was impressive to see so many Belizean coaches in control of all these soccer students.  When we drove up many kids ran up to greet me.  It was special to have formed meaningful relationships with them before I trekked off to Guatemala.  Their smiles felt like home.  Jesus alerted us that the Belizean news crew was on its way and soon they arrived. I filmed Zac being interviewed for television. The segment would run tonight at 6pm, 9pm, and 10pm. Afterwards I lashed on my back pack and began the 50 foot ascent to the top of the water tower by the field. The railing at the top was rusted out here and there so I hugged the concrete center. On top the view was amazing. I shot another interview with Zac and got lots of B-roll.

The entire month and all the camps came to a ceremonious end later that afternoon. The 2008 Sports Servants camps had ended. It was moving to see the San Narciso and Calcutta boys come together as a team, uniting young leaders from diverse backgrounds.

After all the campers had loaded into the buses and disappeared from our lives for another year, Zac and I split off from the team. We went two blocks away to the home of Mr. and Mrs. Ek senior.  We were always planning to visit them, but we had discovered that the clutch fluid was also leaking from the pick up truck.  

Mrs. Ek is very sick and Sports Servants recently gave her a generous monetary gift to help pay for her doctor visits and bi-weekly treatments. So all of a sudden I found myself in a special situation, alone with Zac and the entire Ek family. I was honored to be invited. As we walked up we saw Mrs. Ek seated outside by the house. Her husband, her sons and daughters, her sons-in-law and daughters-in-law, and her grandchildren were there.  In a separate wooden structure the women were cooking and laughing.  The Eks have a beautiful two-story wood and concrete house that they have lived in for 35 years. A second-story porch circles the entire building.   They have a two acre back yard that to me was paradise. Jesus showed me the orange, tamarind, lime, banana, coconut and avocado trees. There were habanero plants and other herbs, too. He and his father plucked a young and ripe coconut with a long pole. Jesus' brother, Alfredo, demonstrated how to open a coconut with a machete. Then Zac and I supped from these two coconuts, comparing the flavors. Mr. Ek cracked them open and we ate the tender meat with sugar. Next, Jesus peeled some oranges for us and we tasted those, too.

As the sun began to set Zac and I organized the interview.  We set Mr. and Mrs. Ek in chairs beside one another.  Then we gathered the entire family around them which looked impressive.  Before we started the interview Alex Campos, a strong and intelligent boy, with a fantastic smile, rode up on his bike along with several other boys from the camps.  He invited me to his house for dinner.  This gift made a realization hit me: "No matter how well, or how poorly, we participated as volunteers in the camps, we became role models to many children, especially to those that we had no clue we affected. They looked up to us."  I regretfully but gratefully declined because we were going to have dinner with the Eks.  The interview commenced.  After the interview Zac and I were presented with Belizean gifts!  I received a pen that said Belize on it, a hunk of homemade sweet cake, and a beautiful small tablecloth woven by an Ek sister.  (By the way, Ek is Mayan for "wasp" or for "star."  Mr. Ek, Sr. speaks fluent Mayan.)  The evening was getting better and better.

Then Alex rode up again.  He gave me a T-shirt that had the flag of Belize on it.  He had also written on the shirt in marker: "To Andrew, From Alex."  The generosity of my new friends overwhelmed me again.

Night came, and the rest of the evening was full of laughter and just being with friends.  It was a blessing that we had to stay there and wait for the car rental company to come with a new car, because we got to spend so much time with the Eks.  They were greatly amused by my interest in the Tamales they were making.  They were making 150 of them to sell the next day to raise money for future doctor visits of Mr. Ek.  There was no complaining of whining about the hard work, only joyful laughter and enjoyment of the time spent together.  (The absence of whining has really stood out to me about the Belizeans and the Guatemalans.  There is a tone of negativity that Americans have which these two countries seem to lack.)   They invited me to come tomorrow morning at 6am to finish making the tamales with them!  I promised that I would try to come before I had to leave for the airport.  I hoped that I could make it.

So the wonderful and memorable evening came to a close.  I was anxious all of a sudden to come home to the U.S., but I realized that I had made friends here who I felt deeply committed to.

-AR

Corozal: Home Sweet Home

Wednesday
7.23.2008

I finally made it home to Corozal, Belize! My clock was fast for some reason (I've had this problem a couple of times so far) and so I woke up at 4am and didn't know it! Then I had to wait until 7am for my bus to leave Flores. It was a slow 6 hour ride to Belize City. Fortunately, after a quick break and ATM stop, I jumped on a 1:30pm chicken bus bound for Corozal. We stopped for everyone and everything and I finally arrived in Corozal at 5pm. Whew! It feels great to be back after my 12 day adventure in Guatemala. Below is a photo that Maya and James, whom I met in Antigua, mailed to me today. They thought it was close enough. I love it.
I got a brief debriefing from Zac before he headed over to the camp in Calcutta. Things are going really well. Some amazing new story lines have emerged. Tomorrow we will kick butt and take names - in interviews of course. Then my plane leaves for home on Friday at 4:00pm. I'm looking forward to getting back to Country Music City USA. -AR

Tikal: The Mayan Rome

Tuesday

7.22.2008

I arrived in Flores at 5am after an eight-hour Linea Dorada bus ride from Guatemala City. Fortunately, Joanna Zaremba gave me one of her prescription sleeping pills, and I slept like a baby. By 8am I had arrived in Tikal National Park with Joanna and two girls from Wisconsin.

Tikal is a stunning site. It is like the Rome of the Mayan world . . . well, sort of. Actually, a lot of things about Tikal remind me of ancient Rome. I like to juxtapose in my mind what was happening thousands of miles away in Europe at the same time as the construction of these Central American pyramids. Both cultures did not know each other existed, and both thought that they were the center of the known universe. Similar to Rome, the first peoples started gathering on the low hill that would become Tikal around 700 B.C. Rome had huts on the Palatine Hill at this time. Around 250 B.C. Tikal was building its first stone structures and Rome was amassing its Republican temples, too. The North Acropolis in the Grand Plaza at Tikal shares similarities with the Capitoline Hill: it is a layering of sacred temples built on top of pre-existing structures dating back to 500 B.C. And the Central Acropolis, on the south side of the Grand Plaza, is the royal palace complex of Tikal like the mansions on the Palatine Hill.

I could give you the whole history but I´ll spare you. The Mayan kings have fabuous names like King Great Jaguar Paw, Moon Double Comb or Lord Chocolate, Lord Water, and my favorite, Smoking Frog. The significant structures are all from the 7th and 8th centuries.

My photos do not represent the many temples, only my best photos.
The sacred Ceiba tree, or world-tree.
Templo II, the Temple of the Masks, in the Grand Plaza opposite The Temple of the Grand Jaguar (Templo I).
High above the jungle canopy on Templo IV with the tops of Temples I and II and III in the background.
The 58m high, enormous, Templo V!
Templo V. Do you see the tiny people at the top?
At the top of Templo V. You can see why they dont allow you to climb the stairs.
That´s me in the blue shirt half way down Templo V.
In the Plaza de los Siete Templos they were restoring a temple. This construction worker whistled us over and showed us what he had trapped in his water bottle!
I felt safe going to the Templos de los Inscripciones with Toby and Christine. By the way, they were my travel buddies all day.
Toby and Christine left at 2pm and I stayed until 5pm. I hoped to catch a gorgeous sunset from the top of Templo IV after the afternoon downpour. Tomorrow at 7am my 12 day Guatemalan extravaganza comes to and end as I travel to Belize City, then north to Corozal. Seeing Tikal was an explosive, and appropriate finale, to Guatemala. -AR

Guatemala By Land

Monday

7.21.2008


Notes:

Lot's of rain last night

Salon Tecun with German dudes

Conversation with Glen from Colorado about his dissertation research

Breakfast, mass, statues

photo expedition

Meeting Joanna Zaremba from Poland.

farewell to Xela

Aborted Santiaguito Hike

Saturday
7.19.2008

(Before you get tired of reading this entry check out the two videos in the Video Bar on the right. Santiaguito Hike 1 and 2. There are also pictures from the hike at the bottom.)

Today was the two-day overnight Santiaguito hike, a very difficult six or seven hour hike in and out. It totally kicked my butt - that´s a euphimism. I really don't know how to express how gruelling it was. There were only three of us. Mic from Austria, me, and our guide, Saul. I felt like I was in The Two Towers, romping into Mordor. First of all, Mic and I were hauling 25 pound packs and our guide was hauling an enormous, unbalanced, twice-as-heavy, makeshift pack, like some llama in the Peruvian highlands. The hike began with a steep ascent over the massive bulk of Volcan Santa Maria. She looked different now, two days after the full moon hike. About half way up, at 8,000 feet, we veered to the right and followed a cow trail around Santa Maria´s great mass.

Two and a half hours into the hike it started to rain. We had just passed El Mirado, the lookout over the crater, where clouds obscured everything, even the view of the Pacific Ocean. Our guide told us we definitely would not get to the crater and would have to sleep at plan B campsite. Within the next hour the rain was absolutely pouring. We couldn't see farther than 50 feet because we were in a cloud at about 8,000 feet.

Then we started DESCENDING down the steepest path I think is possible, literally holding on to roots, the volcanic soil crumbling beneath our feet . . . for an hour! I really didn´t like the looks of it because for every step that I hauled my butt into the forest I had to haul it out. On this descent the vegetation turned into scrubby, rooty stuff that stood just barely above our head. The roots were as thick as grass and we were moving through a tunnel of branches that groped for our packs. By now I was totally soaked and muddy and didn't care. After a gruelling, hour descent we finally made it down this ridge to a very wide and rocky trough. The water was really filling up fast and it was super slick. Mic and I stopped for fifteen minutes and held council, weighing in our minds what we should do. Saul said the campsite was still another hour straight down! We tried it for 10 minutes and got even more concerned when we were descending down this drainage trough off Volcan Santa Maria. At night it would only get colder, likely rain more, the cloud wasn't clearing, we had to climb back up this damn vertical path, a guide we passed at El Mirador had told us a storm was coming, we weren't going into the crater or even to the original campsite anyway, and all the rain on the mountain would be coming into this river bed before long. Finally we wised up and turned back; I'm glad we did. The rain came harder and the volume of water was greatly incresing down this flume. The next hour and a half was the hardest freakin hike of my life. Ascending through this otherworldly tunnel, completely soaked, hauling our packs, will get me out of purgatory. It was sooo hard. I was climbing on all fours at times and really using these roots to haul me up. At one point up this steep vertical ascent, the path had collapsed. It was an eight foot cliff we had to get up. Mic got up first and I formed a step with my hands to help hoist our short guide, Saul, up to Mic. We lifted our packs up one by one, followed by our bodies.

We finally made it up around 3:30pm. At El Mirador, the lookout, Santiaguito teased us and poked bits of her spiny, rocky neck up through the clouds. She was so close! It was then apparent that if we had ascended from that rocky river down Santa Maria, and rounded that final ridge, we would have found ourself in Santiaguito´s gray, ashy landscape. Suddenly, like a young bride disrobing on the wedding night, Santiaguito pulled back the clouds, and for twenty long minutes we beheld her smoking cone for the first time. When the eruption finally came, at that exact moment, she closed the curtain of clouds again, giving us a peak of the plume above the clouds, forcing us to listen to her rumbling, and imagine what ecstasy she shrouded at the source.

We had hiked continuously, down a very difficult path made extreme because of bad weather, for 8 hours straight. All my stuff is soaked and tomorrow I'm going to do laundry half the day. My hot shower never felt so good. Was it worth it. . . I don't know. It was certainly an adventure. And an unforgetable adventure.

-AR


The hike in pictures:

7am: Meeting at Kaqchikel Tours. The day is pregnant with promise.

The 30 minute chicken bus ride over a thousand pot holes.

Disembarking from the chicken bus to begin the ascent. Volcan Santa Maria is heavily shrouded in clouds unlike the night of the full moon hike. See that chicken bus rumbling by?

Near the beginning of the hike I got tired, so Saul stuffed me into his enormous pack along with the rest of Guatemala.
Our first stop at El Mirador during the hike in. Nothing but clouds, but at least it is dry!
At El Mirador another hiker tried to join our group without paying.

Turning off the comfy, level path, down down down through cow and horse pastures.

Beginning the step descent in rain and cloud through the mines of Moria.

Our guide, Saul, sems awfully happy despite the circumstances, and despite his heavy load. This guy is one srappy little hombre. Notice the silver star cap on his front tooth.

When we first reached the bottom of this steep descent down the ridge, there was only a trickle in the trough.

After ten difficult minutes of trying to descend down this trough we turned back. The volume of water coming off Volcan Santa Maria had incresed dramatically!

Above that little water fall we had our lunch in the down pour. And my camera fell out of level.

You can´t tell how steep it is. Here we are ascending back up this ridge for the next hour and a half.

Mic looking back at the camera.

Finally we made it back to level ground and El Mirador. You can see the final ridge down in the clouds, past that watery trough - and beyond that, our first glimpse of Santiaguito´s bulk. So near and yet so far!

Our only visible eruption moments before Santiaguito pulled the cloud curtain back across her cone.

Altitude Sickness

Friday
7.18.2008

During the night I got sick, really sick. I couldn´t figure out what was going on. My skin was really red like I had got sunburn, even though my body had been covered during the full moon hike and even though half of the hike was at night. I felt like I was going to vomit all night and maybe I had a fever. I certainly couldn´t get warm. All my energy was sapped. In the middle of the night I felt so awful I told myself I didn´t care if I couldn´t attempt the Santiaguito hike on Saturday if I still felt like this.

I wanted to skip my Spanish lesson, too. But i had enough strength, and enough pride, to go from 8am to 1pm when I should have been sleeping. My brain didn´t work and neither did my Spanish. I looked at the symptoms for altitude sickness and everything I read matched my experience. Incidents of Altitude Sickness, or AMS, typically happen above 6,500 feet and increase dramatically above 12,000 feet. Xela is at almost 8,000 feet and Volcan Santa Maria is above 12,000 feet. At 8,000 feet the amount of oxygen is 25% less than at sea level and northern Belize is all at sea level. During the full moon hike we had a very rapid ascent, too. I think the cold and the early morning start were additional aggravators.

The only cure for altitude sickness is to descend to lower altitudes, drink water, and sleep alot. I didn´t do enough sleeping but I did move slowly all day. I bought lots of food and 6 liters of water for the Santiaguito hike tomorrow. I wonder if I will have the strength to go. . .
-AR

Volcano Santa Maria y Volcan Santiaguito

Thursday
7.17.2008

There is so much I need to, and will write, but I just haven't had time. I need to describe the hike in words to really make sense of this haunting, mysterious, greulling, beautiful experience climbing all 12,372 feet of Volcan Santa Maria. This internet cafe closes in 15 minutes. For now, and to share my experience as soon as possible, I will let some pictures do the talking. Check out my panorama video to the right in the video bar. Also on the right click on the link titled Andrew's Video of Santiaguito! Hasta Luego. -AR