Its only words, and words are all i have, to take your heart with me...to Guati Guati Guati
GUATEMALA | Sunday, 20 September 2009 | Views [150] | Comments [2]
The current state of the blog site is thus:
It's the start of
3rd quater and we are down by about 50 points and going against the
wind. The coach is a litte angry about the lack of committment that I
have shown but is confident if not hopeful that all can be saved. We
must play catch up footy! Play gutsy, dig in and we´ll run all over
them in the final term. Thus, here I am, about to play gutsy, nothing
too special, just going to get it down on paper what has happened
recently.
GUATI GUATI GUATI GUATI!
The cries of the bus driver from across the border. Welcome to Guatamala.
ohhh
high fives all round, or in the case of the Guatamalan people,
relatively low fives as the average hieght reaches slightly over 5.4.
The
first highlight of Guatemala was by far the money. We recieved our
change from the bus driver in the form of huge gold coins. These gold
coins are brilliant, the type of money that Captain Jack found in his
treasure trunk. Although Jack was probably dissapointed to find out
that the gold coin quetzal wasn´t worth very much. Also highly ammusing
about the money was the name of the currency, the Quetzal, named after
the national bird which happens to be the national bird for nearly all
central American countries. Regardless of this can you imagine if in
Australia we called our currency the Emu?
´Aghh yes mate thats gonna set ya back about 15 emus thanks.´
So across the border we hop and arrive in a bustling little town called Chiquimula. Highlights reel include:
-The
first meal which included rice, beans, pasta (that came under the
catagory of salad,) scrambled eggs, potatoes (salad) and tortilla. A
note to anyone who is travelling in Guatemala and wants to go on the
Atkins diet...no chance, absolutly no chance what so ever! If you want
I can give you another Aussie Rules football metaphor to make it
absolutly clear that no one could survive here with out Carbs.
-
A cool market dinner where we watched the sunset being blurred by
incredible clouds of dust and eating Guatemalan Pupusas. Which
unfortunately dont make the cut against the El Salavadorian pups.
Salama
-The
first ´rip off´ on tour. We paid 5 dollars more than we should have.
Although it doesnt sound like much it left a bitter taste in the mouth
and if anything highlighted hilariously how bad my Spanish was in times
of emergency. 'Hey you, that's too much aghh no, come back , hey, muy
caro, you are bad', later that was translated as 'you are hard'. As
always though, a lesson was learnt and we were thankful that it was
only 5 dollars. I really hope that this doesnt make me sound like a
tight ass.
-A wicked hotel with cable t.v hehe
-Great
street food where I trialed the flat style tacos styled out with cooked
salty cabbage, spicy mince, great melted cheese and lovely tomato sauce
with a kick to finsh. Super Rico!
- A morning market which
specialised in incredibly ugly, warty turkeys. A lady in all
seriousness asked if we wanted to buy her turkey for a cheap price.
This allowed hilarious visions of ´Bandy and the Turkey´ tootling
around Guatemala becoming the best of friends.
-The incredible
bus journey from Salama to Coban where we were not surpirsed to find
that in this part of the country they max out the amount of people they
cant fit in a mini bus. Built to fit 12 people, at one stage I counted
no less than 25 fricken people in a mini bus hahaha. Good luck getting
two cheeks on the seat.
- It was at this early stage of the
Guati experience that we realised that Guatemala was dedicated to the
chicken/cock. Everthing is named or dedicated to the most beautiful of
birds.
The Gym...El Gallo Mas Gallo- translated as The Cock More Cock
The electronics store ´Gallo Gallo´ simply Cock Cock
and of course the numerous chicken eateries which can all be found on the same street of a tiny town.
Pollo Campensino- Peasant/farmer chicken
Pollo Campero- peasant/farmer chicken
Pollo Frito- fried chicken
Pollolandia- chicken land
After your delicious meal of chicken with chicken, wash it all down with a delicious Cervesa Gallo- Cock Beer.
-
Beth loses crib again and vows never to play another game ever again. A
bitter sweet victory- Currently in the process of writing up the Treaty
of Crib acknowledging forever my dominance.
Uspantan- western Highlands
Anoither
terrifically crammed and scarey bus ride thru the highlands of
Guatemala. The dark and low clouds gave off a wicked effect on the
mountains which would have been uplifting if it wasnt for the enourmous
landslide in the distance.
This landslide was a real
eyeopener, streching over 500 metres wide and carrying huge boulders.
Of course we were a little shaky especially when we drove passed the
road closed sign accomanied by another sign a few metres down the track
of a warning ´rocks falling on your head´sign. No need for the
translation underneath!
Rest assured we got through the
avalanche risk area with only a bum that had lost all feeling, which I
thought was a fair compromise. Unfortunatly the danger hadn't passed.
After a short stop for some snacks and supplies that bus driver turned
around and noted that ahead there may be bandits. We didn´t quite
understand what he had said until the man next to us, or should I say
on top of us started taking his life savings out of his pockets and
stuffing them down his pants. haha very comical if you werent about to
lose everything you own! Thus we flew into action, Beth taking camera
chips and cash and hiding them in secret places that Bandits were never
likely to look. I rued the decision of wearing loose fitting boxer
shorts, not only because there were 50 people in the bloody car!
aghhhh no grip for the passports Beth...what are we going to do...maybe they wont make us stand up!?
Whoooo but a few stressful hours later and we arrived unscathed and holding everything except my stomach.
-
Not much of a town, found a group of dispensars that issued the usual
lollies, chocolates and peanuts haha peanuts in a coin dispensar, what
will they think of next! A lovely steak dinner and a dissapointing
pupusa. The Guati have a lot to learn from thier neighbours about the
art of the pupusa.
The following day we headed to Quetzalango
which is known locally as Xela, pronounced Shayla...(got you on my
knees shayla) where in fact we still are. Xela is the 2nd biggest
gringo town behind Antigua and along with its neighbour the land of
Spanish schools. By all accounts its the cheapest place in central
America if not the world to have Spanish lessons.
Xela is a
wicked little colonial town that has a real European feel to it. A big
central park surrounded by a church, museum, theatre and a plethora of
shit to swanky restaraunts scattered all over the cobbled stone roads
gone wrong by too much rain.
Highlights up until we started Spainish and volunteering include.
Meeting
a NZ family in out cute little hostel who defined the word courageous.
They are two parents Tim and Phillipa are currently studying Spainish 5
hours a day in order to become fluent to pursue a volunteering projext
in mexico in December. What makes this incredible is that in tow they
have a 6 month old baby boy, a two year old boy who is definatly
definining what they call terrible twos and a 5 year old who is kicking
it at a local Guatemalan school. Brilliant. And this voluntereing in
mexico is no walk in the park, moving to a slum in Mexico city for 5
years to help kickstart some infrastructure! Truly awesome!!!
Anyway living with the family was so much fun, loud, crazy, 6.00 am wake ups.
I
fetl a little guilty when I made Hudson the 5 year old try a cooked
chilli...Beth came to the rescue with a glass of milk... a narrow
escape!
- What is now three weeks ago, we signed up for a
months intense Spanish lessons with volunteering in thier school in the
afternoons and living with a host family. I wont go into the details
now but the last three weeks have been absolutly incredible which I
will devote a long and hopefully detailed and ammusing account. SO SO
SO much has happened. Rest assured I still cant speak Spanish haha but
having the time of my life!
stay tuned.
para
Good times and Great classic Hits
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