San Pedro
It rained last night. Not hard enough to cause another power outage, but hard enough to cause a leak in the roof and make a small puddle in the bathroom, which wound its way from just a few inches beyond the toilet paper holder around the corner into the walk-in closet. It was easily mopped up but still something I had to bring to Ventura’s attention so that he could fix it. I knew the words I wanted to say in Spanish – I should at least get partial credit for that – but was getting caught up in those damn verb tenses.
Present, Past, Future
Take me out of the present tense and I’m lost. I’ve talked to other gringos who experience the same difficulty: How to say something in the past or even future tense, let alone those conditional and other esoteric tenses. it’s amazing the contortions that one attempts in order to shape the present into these other tenses. Although English may be the most difficult language to learn, I think it may also be the most forgiving in terms of the way things are phrased, although often times the way something is phrased in English isn’t always what the speaker really meant to say.
Water Under The Bridge
If only I had left the water on the floor, I could have said, “There is water on the floor from the rain last night,” and kept the sentence in the present tense. Since I had already cleaned it up, that was water under the bridge, so to speak.
As I was trying to puzzle this out, Rosenda appeared at the door to ask if I had any laundry this morning. I invited her in and took her round to the bathroom. She was looking somewhat suspicious and fearful as to why I would show her into the bathroom, and I can’t say that I blame her. But once in there, I pointed to the floor and said, “Agua en la pared desde la lluvia anoche.” While I was saved from having to dredge up the past tense by not using a verb at all, I hope I can be forgiven for pointing to the floor and saying pared (wall) instead when I clearly meant piso (floor). Rosenda apparently understood what I was trying to say because she pointed up at the ceiling and in doing so I learned another new word when she said, “Techo" (roof). As I write this, Ventura is up on his ladder fixing the techo. He says that seven roofing tiles were damaged. It must have rained harder than I thought.
Generally as Life Permits
I recognize that I have neglected my blog for far too long. There’s a restaurant here in San Pedro that lists its opening and closing hours followed by the disclaimer: “Or, generally as life permits.” I like that a lot and am using it as my excuse for not updating my blog as often as I should.
Getting Away
Last week, I was in Antigua for two nights. For more than 200 years, Antigua served as the seat of the military governor of the Spanish colony of Guatemala, a large region that included most of present day Central America and Chiapas, the southern most state of Mexico. In 1773, earthquakes destroyed much of the town and in 1776 the Spanish crown ordered the removal of the capital to a safer location about 30 miles east, which is today's Guatemala City.
I can only imagine that with its cobblestone streets and mostly one story homes and buildings, Antigua resembles ancient
Pompei without the lava. It had been more than six weeks since I arrived in San Pedro and I was feeling like quite the country bumpkin who had come into the big city. Were there any tall buildings, I would probably have stared up at them.
Unlike San Pedro, where nearly everyone knows your name (or something close to it),the first thing to strike me was the sheer number of people on the street. Antigua is a UNESCO World Heritage Site, which makes it a top tourist destination in Guatemala and although I've been in Antigua numerous times on past trips to Guatemala, I still manage to walk around in circles since all the streets look the same to me and there are very few street signs. I’ve learned that if there’s a shop that seems interesting, I’d better go in before I pass it because I might never find it again. Even trying to establish landmarks doesn’t help me much.
The Choco Museo. Mmm, Mmm, Good!
Such was the case of the
Choco Museo. I stumbled on it Friday afternoon (4 Calle Oriente #14). Not one to pass up a free sample of chocolate, and drawn in by the delicious smells drifting from the store, I stepped inside. They had me even before one of the sales clerks handed me a sample of the chocolaté
con naranja (orange) and began telling me how well it goes with a particular variety of red wine – I replied that it would probably go well with
any variety of red wine – and concluded his sales pitch by telling me that he preferred the cacao chocolate over the milk chocolate. There was no difference in price, so I knew he was giving me an honest appraisal and not trying to upsell me.
In addition to the chocolate bars, they have chocolate in all its various stages and permutations, including even cacao husk tea. There are also two-hour candy making classes as well as a café. I wasn’t so much interested in making my own candy as I was in eating it. As I was supposed to be on a lactose-free diet – at least last week – I opted to buy some white chocolate, one bar with Oreo cookies in it and the other with macadamia nuts. There is actually a sort of museum there, too.
The next morning, before I had to catch the shuttle van back to San Pedro, I wanted to again go to the Choco Museo to get a gift for Ventura, Rosenda and their daughter Elena. As I noted earlier, because all the streets look the same to me, and there are few street signs, I had trouble getting back to the Museo. I knew I was on the wrong street by the time I reached the Hotel Casa Santo Domingo, a beautiful five star property with a museum on the grounds where a room night starts at $136 mid-week and rises to $153 on the weekend. It is without a doubt a magnificent hotel with swimming pool, beautifully landscaped gardens and colorful parrots perched in the trees. The hotel also gets my vote for best restrooms in Antigua.
Less Upscale; Perfectly Acceptable
Casa Cristina’s roof deck is a great place for a glass of wine (or two)
in the afternoon.
I stayed at the slightly less upscale Casa Cristina (Callejon Camposeco #3-A), a perfectly acceptable mid-range hotel, near La Merced Church, within convenient walking distance of nearly anywhere in the city. I discovered this hotel on a previous trip to Guatemala and keep coming back to it. It’s spotlessly clean and has a staff that is warm, inviting and accommodating. Its location on a small street between two major avenues sees little traffic, so there is very little, if any, street noise. Although my room was small, there was a private bathroom, cable television, a wardrobe and the narrowest writing desk I've ever seen in addition to, of course, the bed, which was a matrimonial (double). Although the Casa Cristina lacks the manicured grounds of the Casa Santo Domingo, and there are no parrots perched on tree branches, it does have a pleasant roof deck with sweeping views of the volcano where I had a glass (or two) of wine in the afternoon. The cost per night is a more budget-friendly $32, including taxes. There are less expensive rooms, but they are either on the ground floor and/or have windows that face into the corridor. On the corner of the street is Fernando’s Café, which is convenient for breakfast, and two doors down from the hotel, in the opposite direction, is a reliable travel agent where you can book a shuttle for San Pedro and the lake for $10.
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Views from the Casa Cristina roof deck.
Great and Unusual Restaurants
There’s no end of great and unusual restaurants in Antigua and, of course, I have some favorites. Among them are La Fonda de la Calle Real for traditional Guatemalan food and NiFu-NiFa, an Argentinean-style steakhouse (3 Calle Oriente #21). La Fonda has three locations around town and is where Bill Clinton ate when he was president. Apparently, he couldn’t decide what to order, so they made up a combination platter for him and today, if you can’t decide what to order, you can get the same platter and “eat what Bill Clinton ate.”
NiFu-NiFa
NiFu-NiFa is definitely a splurge. Set around a garden, you know this is going to be a five forks up restaurant. There are starched white tablecloths and waiters in bowties who stand by discretely to take care of whatever you need. Although there is indoor seating as well, it’s not nearly as atmospheric or fun.
Meat, of course, is the attraction here and, although I don’t think it’s ever seen the Pampas, it’s still quite good. Upon the waiter’s recommendation, I got the top sirloin, which was done perfectly, an order of papas fritas (very Argentinean) and a half-bottle of Malbec wine. All the meals come with an all-you-can-eat salad bar. At almost $40, this is the most I have ever paid for a meal in Guatemala, which, by U.S. standards, I think would be pretty moderate. What can you get at Ruth Chris’ Steakhouse or Morton’s for $40.
I have to admit to having lunch one day at Pollo Campañero, Guatemala’s answer to KFC, which has practically a cult following here. Frankly, I’m not sure what that’s all about. Finally, you can take the North American out of the U.S., but you can’t take the U.S. out of the North American and, yes, I did, in a moment of weakness, go to McDonald’s. But when I tell you that the dining area in the Antigua outpost is set outside in a beautiful garden, well, it changes the ambiance entirely.
The Shuttle From Hell
Solina was leaving to go home to the States for awhile, so she and I split the cost of a private car and driver. We hired Manuel, the driver who had picked me up at the airport and brought me to San Pedro last month. It was sheer luxury and kind of decadent to have a shuttle van meant for 15 people all to ourselves. Manuel and Solina dropped me off in Antigua before they went on to the Capital.
Coming back to San Pedro was not quite so luxurious. I had to take a public shuttle where the prime objective is to pack in as many bodies as possible and see how uncomfortable you can make them. First, the driver throws your luggage up on the roof and you hope it won’t fall off before he’s picked up the other passengers and tied it all down. Then, under the circumstances, you choose the best seat you can and don’t give it up while other passengers get on board and scramble over you to get to theirs. Finally, you pray that your fellow passengers won’t be loud, or obnoxious, or both and that you’ll still have feeling in your extremities after sitting for several hours with your knees tucked up under your chin.
With all due respect to my fellow passengers, the only other person on the shuttle when the driver picked me up was a Japanese girl who was plugged into and singing along with her mp3 player. Her voice was much like fingernails scratching on a chalkboard. It was like a nail being driven into my head. Eventually, she was drowned out by the group of Israelis who got on board next. Spoken Hebrew is a loud language – at least the way these Israelis spoke it – and was very harsh on this Anglo ear.
May Contain Images Not Suitable for All Readers
The next sentence may contain images that aren’t suitable for all readers. A few hours into the ride, WHOMP, the driver hit a dog that was in the middle of the road. The dog was lifted up by the van and thrown to the side of the road. The driver neither slowed down nor stopped. There was a collective gasp from all of the passengers in several different languages. Later on in the trip, while passing through one of the small pueblos along the way, the driver nearly hit another dog. He didn’t bother to honk his horn or slow down this time either. The dog narrowly escaped; it wasn’t his day to die.
Thump on The Pan American
Shortly after the driver hit the first dog, we heard – or more felt – a thumping. Whether it was from hitting the dog, or from something else, we had a flat tire. If there was a silver lining to this cloud, it was that it happened on the Pan American Highway as opposed to the road leading to San Pedro, which is under construction in a number of areas.
The Pan American is a modern, well-kept highway; the road branching off to San Pedro and this area of the lake, not so much. It’s barely one lane in each direction filled with hairpin turns, numerous axle-eating potholes and no guardrails as it snakes its way down the mountain. In many areas, the pavement ends and the road becomes dirt before the pavement begins again. They are making a real effort to resurface the road with concrete instead of the usual patch job. Projects of this nature, however, are done a little differently here than they are in the U.S. During working hours, a flagman stops traffic in one direction, so cars coming from the other direction can get through. The workday ends and the flagman goes home. This leaves the driver not knowing if a car is coming from the opposite direction, so as he goes into one of the hairpin turns or another blind curve, he lays on his horn to warn approaching traffic. And, to ensure that a driver won’t go on to the newly laid road surface, the workmen litter it with large rocks to make it impossible to drive up on. Fortunately, we encountered only one other vehicle approaching from the opposite direction and were able to pass one another with only fractions of an inch between us. If this flat tire had happened on that road, I don’t know how or where the driver would have pulled over to repair it.
I was happy that we managed to make it back to San Pedro before dark. I never want to be on that road after dark. Oh, and yes, I was able to find my way back to the Choco Museo.
There’s no getting away from telemarketers, even here in Guatemala. For the past three mornings, my phone has rung and when I answer it, a man starts talking in rapid fire Spanish. I can only assume that he’s trying to sell me something because the only people to whom I’ve given my number are people that I know, and I’ve only had my current number since I arrived here at the beginning of April. I know he knows he’s not dialed my number in error because I don’t answer the phone with an alo, hola, sí or digamé but with a very unmistakably American accented English “hello.” I suppose I could ask the man to slow down and try to understand what he’s calling about, but I’m not interested in what he’s selling. And, because native speakers of Spanish are able to talk at seemingly machine gun-like speed, it’s near impossible to interject a despacio (slowly) into the conversation.
