back from guatemala. my experience there was a little on the surreal side - strange, but definitely interesting.
with no regular internet access, blogging much was out of the question, so i did the next best thing - i kept a journal on my sidekick. if you're interested, i'm posting the whole thing here, unedited - but it's a bit of a long read.

Allen's Guatemala Journal

11/14 -
Left NOLA around 1pm... 2.5 hr flight (slept most of it) to san pedro sula, honduras, then 40 minutes to san salvador (weird crowd got on -
the guy in the window seat next to me kept playing obsessively with the wattles of fat under his chin, squeezing and plucking at it with both hands, which made really strange noises. Then the man in the seat in front of me reached over the top of the seat for a minute, displaying a weirdly deformed nubby 3/4 of a finger... In El Salvado, we had a 2 hour layover (tried some "pupusas" - cheese filled tortillas - in the airport), then another 40 minute hop to guatemala city, got in around 8pm...did I mention TACA has nice, shiny new high tech planes, airbus 320s... took a taxi to the "hotel majestic", which is anything but - and most creepily, lacking in reasonable locks on the
door, just one of those button doorknob things. dirty room, grimy bedding, grimy walls, grimy ants all over the floor. won't even go into
the bano... so kind of a "grimy" theme here. I guess the grimy high ceiling would be a redeeming factor, kind of? that, and the prostitutes
on the street outside seemed pretty hot, though I really didn't get a good look. pablo (now alternately snoring emphasemically in the other
bed and playing his circa 1982 LCD travel solitaire game) says this is a good neighborhood. it's called zona 9, apparently. went to an argentino restaurant down the block called "Tingo al Tango" - P. got some tripe thing; I went with the "fetuchine de la casa" which was a red sauce with mushrooms - a bit cautious, admittedly, but tasty, with a local "Bravha" cervesa. GPS'ed the hotel on the way back. watched some movie with ashley judd and morgan freeman, in english with spanish subtitles. reading about after effects cameras now, listening to the arcade fire on my ipod and typing this... it's 11:30, and waiting for sleep to descend, which it likely soon will - flying can be exhausting, a bit.

already begiining to pensar en espanol - think in spanish. que rado!

11-15:
ubiquitous throughout guaciudad - streetbuskers, shotguns & shoestores. rentacops everywhere - though they look more like renta-stormtroopers -
cargo pants bloused in boots, bandoleros and berets - in every store, not just banks and groceries - some with dubious looking sidearms but
the great majority hefting big pump-action shotguns.

woke up this morning, walked to a tiny little restaurant and got huevos revueltos con platanos fritos, crema y frijoles, which were of nearly
the same soupy consistency as la crema... meanwhile, a boy came in and shined pablo's shoes, then mine, and now the white cording is all black,
dammit. whatever. then, went to the banco occidente to get on pablo's account, and were foiled somewhat by their annoying need for local
references and address info, which we will fabricate and deliver when we return to the capital later in the week.

went back to the hotel, and then to the bus station by taxi. this city is a chaos of people and traffic and street commerce. it's also a
typeophile's delight, every available surface is plastered with advertisments and notices (no, seriously - they paint the rock
mountainsides near the road white and then paint ads on them.) mostly hand painted, the variety of typeface and design and color is infinite.
bright colors. I love hand-painted signage. this bus is at standing room only (we have seats) and its 3 hours to chiquimulas. dios salvamos.
crazy mountain roads...I dig the hand painted pepsi signs everywhere.

the street vendors who board the bus at every stop, walk down the aisle selling fruit or agua or perfume or que quieres from buckets or baskets
balanced upon their heads, not so hard to understand. but now, there is an 8 year old clown on the damn bus, blowing a fucking whistle and
shaking marracas. and of course he wants money, which at this point I have none of.

survived the seemingly endless busride through the mountains hasta chiquimulas - which was actually an open question, apparently these
busses are hijacked on a regular basis and the occupants who resist, los asesinan sin verguenza. not to mention the absolutely stupid mountain
roads and the steep thousand foot drops off the sides. must note that the damn things are well paved, though. and some beautiful mountain
vistas - so many, I'm already sick of them... honestly, they're not the prettiest mountains. functional, I'm sure, but a bit mangy looking,
spotted here and there with vegetation. they look arid and hot, and I think I like my mountains kind of cold and misty.

that being said, the temperature isn't so bad, it was a bit chilly in the capital last night (60s) and here in chiquimulas, it's tepid - mid
70s, about like nola, really. still plenty of sangudos about though. they call chiquimulas "la perla del oriente" on all the signs - "pearl
of the east". if guatemala is your oyster... well, at least its an "r" month.

got to the hotel - "posada perla del oriente". it's okay, honestly, beats hell outta the urban hole we were in last night. imagine, say, the
nicest, least sleazy hotel that airline highway in nola has to offer. then imagine it 25 years ago when it was clean and habitable. that's
about what this place is like. pablo rents a permanent room here, for amounts to about $90 a month, and he's got it well appointed with a new
refrigerator, microwave, toaster oven, tv, etc. two full beds, two little chiffarobe/vanity combo things, a breakfast table, tile floors.
there's no a.c., gracias a dios we don't need it this time of year; nor is there hot water (not looking forward to showering in the am.) door
opens on a courtyard with a pool and a hammock. comfortable, and could be worse, considering we're in la perla del middle of nowhere.
he's also got a car here, a 1995 compact something or other which from an expired breaktag apparently had a previous life in texas - looks to
be in quite good condition.

so we went driving - scary but unavoidable, pablo's emphysema keeps him from walking far without having to stop to pant and use his albuterol
inhaler. went to the banco de commercios for some cash, then to Paiz, the catch all department store/grocery. kind of like super kmart, but
not very super. really ratty, actually. we got some basics - gatorade, beer, (the local hero, Gallo, whose rooster head logo is nearly as unavoidable as the pepsi disc on the walls and signs around here.) bread, and coca-cola light, ostensibly diet coke's identical international twin. I got a kinder-surprise egg in the checkout line, just because I could. neat little spaceship inside.

I saw this painted near the door of a little cafe: "no servimos: •menores •borrachos •gente con machete" - "we don't serve: •minors •drunks •people with machetes" ... and they're serious.

apparently, my grandfather has very little in the way of dream/physiology barrier, because when not snoring, he talks in his sleep like anything. complete sentences, often intelligible, always in spanish. ah, fuck. whatever. off to sleep myself I guess.

11-16

Met the girl. Erica. She's nice. Kind, patient, and totally normal, in a way that's kind of out of place in the dirt poor streets of Chiquimulas. much more cosmoplitan, clearly very intelligent, sporty - kind of tomboyish - and cute as a button by guatemalan standards. I don't get any of the creepy vibes I guess I was expecting - nothing promiscuous or slutty or manipulative. she clearly enjoys spending time with Pablo... I can't help but like her on first impression. fortunately, I also realize that my good impression is only more reason to be sospechoso, because for christ's sake, she's fucking my 79 year old grandfather, she aint' in it for the companionship. and I just realized this, but holy fuck if she doesn't remind me of a certain friend of mine. face, laugh, demeanor. eerie.

we went to esquipulas, a town maybe 30 miles from chiquimulas - just to see the miraculous "christo negro" statue in the basilica there,
apparently a major pilgrimage destination. what struck me most was the utter devotion and awe on the faces of the locals worshipping there -
backing away from it so as not to turn their backs toward the altar. increible. ate camarrones con ajillo (garlic) at a little place, not bad.
got back to chiquimulas, drove around to see the basketball courts where erica apparently spends her days...

tv is also odd here, a mix of the asinine sketch comedy that seems to tipify spanish language television and american channels overdubbed or
captioned in spanish. one funny thing is that MTV censors the captions, but not the audio - so you can hear jessica simpson saying "I don't give a fuck." but the caption says, "no me importa un *$%@." the assumptions involved there on the part of mtv are pretty amusing and more than a little strange to me. as does the fact that I'm reduced to watching mtv here for a little english language relief. one general mtv comment:
neither ashley nor jessica simpson deserve to share the same last name as bart and homer.

I've also noticed that spanish music seems to have no "alternative" side, even the bands we think of as "rock en espanol" like aterciopelados, oreja de van gogh, molotov, etc., don't seem to be known down here. maybe the music underground is just really obvious to me in the US, but latin music seems limited to either cheezy romantic boyband/enrique inglesias type stuff or else local culture type things like mariachi or whatever. oh, and puertoriqeño hiphop.

today we drove around a lot, to various heights surrounding chiquimulas, so I could take pictures of the city. it really is a pretty little
valley town. we went out to a little river outside of town, saw the swimming hole/public laundry, drove around some more, went to the city
cemetary to take pictures, which was cool - all the tombs are painted bright colors, just like the homes and businesses here. one thing I think is interesting is how every little doorway is a little tienda, and they're all named after the woman of the house - "tienda betty", "tienda rosita", "pupuceria cristal" etc. I got bunches of interesting typography photos, but that's about it. I'm getting a little restless to head back to the capital, which, though only about 70 miles away as the crow flies, as a metroplis is more familiar to me... and then home, good god, sweet muggy new orleans and straight into the arms of my friends and the local indie rock scene
sunday night.

watched the gua v. canada game with the crowd here at the hotel, that was pretty interesting, but they lost... heard some fireworks and
thought I was being shot at, I'm still a bit paranoid about this place... some generator broke at the hotel, so not only do we not have hot water, tonight we don't have running water (no hay agua caliente NI agua corriente) tonight, so we're flushing with pool water. fun times in the 3rd world.

11-18
not much doing today, we slept in, met with evelyn, the girl who's going to run pablo's business, for lunch, then drove out to some hot springs
with ericka - which were really more like filthy public pools, so I didn't get in, just dipped my feet, which was still gross... came back,
got some little tortilla things with cheese, and haggled a bit for a tshirt... introduced ericka to the wonders of the ipod, and confounded
her by not having any popular american music on it... and that was about it for today. leaving for the capital, or "guate" as the call it, early AM tomorrow!!!

11-19

hah. hid a geocache today, just brfore leaving chiquimulas. who knows how long it'll stay there, but I tried, right?

back in the capital, for a while. interesting how, just a couple of weeks after the election, where it was easy to think of the us as very separate states, I'm now, in guatemala, inclined to think of the us as a cohesive whole, and myself more as just a us citizen than anything else. funny, pablo is obsessed with this girl lying to him, as if it matters... its weird, the relationship angst, the jeaolusy, mixed with a
kind of fatherly disapproval... and how he's emotionally wrapped up in the thing. eh. ha! was I right or what. my grandfather is actually
jealous of me! he actually told me just now he was pissed that i gave her my contact info, so she could contact me if anything happened to him (which eventuality is really the whole point of this trip, right?) "why don't you just take her back with you! she likes you, I can see it! etc., etc...." which I just think is hilarious and only took minimal offense at the accusation. kind of cute, actually, and kind of fucking surreal. as if I don't have enough trouble with girls at home, and I need to be worrying about 21 year old non-english speaking girls who are fucking my grandfather 1000 miles away. yeah, sorry, not even interested. christ. so I told him sorry, not my type, not what I'm here for, wouldn't go there if I could, and that he was imagining things, which of course he is, but why shouldn't he? he's 60 years older than she is, and I'm not. in the immortal words of william s. burroughs, "haven't you forgotten something, gramps? in order to feel something, you have to BE there, you have to BE 18, you're not 18, you're 78... old fool sold his soul for a strap-on." these days I guess its viagra though. gross. fucking gross. odd, though, how I feel pity for them both, knowing they're in this situation of their own volition, for their own interests; though his are so... corruptive, but it's so lolita/humbert I can't stand it, because he so obviously loves her and she, well, she certainly seems to care about him, but he should read his nabokov...

so we've now made it to antigua, the old city near the capital, which is the big tourist mecca in these parts. after living in el campo - the
sticks - for a week, it's strange seeing US tourists - a mixture of contempt and relief - but good god is it nice to hear good ole american
english and see cute european/american women. ahhh. honestly it's like fresh water when you're thirsty. I may even have a new appreciation for
the blonde of the species...

antigua:
went souvenir shopping in the artisans market. pablo showcased his haggling skills, which was embarrassing, but I'm pretty sure he saved us
several hundred quetzales (7.72Q=1USD) went to italian restaurant called el punto, had good pasta de mariscos, and three glasses of wine and 3 or 4 gallos - got drunk with pablo and ericka - he made her cry, which was fun because then I had to mediate, which is absurd - then, we ended up not having a hotel and being too drunk to drive back to guate, have been sleeping in the car for several hours. I woke up and am attempting to get into the trunk through the back seats for more room. there, I've made it... my torso and head are in the baoul, which (as opposed to the
ret of the car, which is heater-stuffy) is cool and has fresh air and smells thick and sweet with melons (due to the bags of cantaloupe and
watermelon we picked up on the way from chiquimulas.) only problem is a bit of claustrophobia, which I've alleviated a bit by practicing my
escape move a few times...

sleeping-in-the-trunk dream: entered movie theater with girl (seemed who was angry at me because I'd tried to gently brush her hair away from her
face, asked her if shed talk to me when I got back, but I had to do something first, went down a few rows and discovered tiny little
nano-sized toy figures moving around - ant sized - which in reality were ants genetically engineered to look like trademarked characters
at some point in their growth cycle, ie having malformed and colored thoraxes, etc.
*11/20
back to guate, back to hotel mayestic, where I got my own room this time, actually not bad, in that ratty hostel kind of way. but private,
which was nice. immediately slept for two hours, and was awoken to get lunch. we went to an equadorian cevecheria, and watched the first half
of the real madrid v. barcelona spanish league chamiponship while we ate some bad-ass food, without a doubt the best I've had since I've been
here. best ceviche I've ever had. a few empanada type appetizers, and an absolutely wicked shrimp soup called "chupa de camarrones." went back to the hotel, watched the second half of the game, and then left again for some shopping and a haircut by the cutest guatemalan girl I may have
seen so far.

that's pretty much it. went back to the hotel, cut up some sandia for dinner, went up to my room, and packed. watched spanish subtitled "40
days and 40 nights" which was cuter than I expected, and then a mexican MTV like channel called "mas nescafe" with a hot hostess. apparently
there IS *some* good latin alternative rock, but this is the first I've heard of it. anyway. enjoyed my privacy and tried not to think of what
might be going on in the other room. set up the ipod, listened to hem, and read. the ipod has been great the whole trip, being able to have
that comfort with me has been invaluable.

ok, no, the prettiest guatemalan woman I've seen just walked past down the airplane aisle...

so I'm in the plane, on the ground in san pedro sula, honduras, again - the last stop before new orleans - and pretty much grinning ear to ear at the prospect of finally going back to the world, ready for things to regresar a normál ... to sleep on my bed, in my apartment. to see my family and friends. jezzus, its only been a week, but it feels like so much longer. I'm glad I went, though. time to practice my spanish, and go somewhere I've never been, and see new things. and i got back fine, no hijacked busses, no tropical diseases, and just enough weirdness to fuel some good fiction writing.

hmm...that's not a bad idea.