‘¿Cuánto tiempo más?’ – the Spanish for ‘How much time more?’ – is received
with a mischievous smile, animating the lined face of the small man scrambling
down the slope in front of me. Thin, white hair, plastered carefully over his
scalp, and skin with the semi-firm elasticity of years working under
Guatemala´s strong sun hint at his age, but if he feels it he gives no
concession to it. His compact form exudes kinetic energy, as feet clad in thin
sandals jump from rock to rock.
I notice the neatness of his appearance. His loose jeans and tucked-in shirt
throw a sharp contrast to the beyond-colourful, traditional K´iche´ clothing
worn by the two women I had passed forty minutes before. But his answer is the
same: Two hours!
Ten minutes later I am standing on the summit of Volcan Santa María, one of a
chain of over thirty volcanoes stretching across Guatemala´s Pacific edge, and
smiling at the joke. Three and a half hours of almost continuous switchbacks,
their sinuous progression under pine cover allowing few gratifying glimpses of
height gained, are finally over. I have conquered the near-perfect cone.
My eyes head to the horizon, seeking their gratification. The impossibly
crumpled topography of the Western Highlands, lending shape to the forces of
the Caribbean and Cocos plates, stretches into the distance in a lightly hued
patchwork of yellows and browns and the dominating forms of other volcanoes can
be seen above a cloak of clouds. Volcan Tajumulco - at 4220m the highest point
in Central America - is visible, as well as the graceful outline of the three
volcanoes that surround Aldous Huxley´s most beautiful lake in the world, Lake
Atitlan.
Eager to see Volcan Santiaguito, the active lava dome that has been growing
since 1922, I cross the rocky outcrop that constitutes Santa María´s summit,
before swerving to avoid the burnt, blackened body of a goat. A group of
K´iche´ men and women stand a short distance away, chanting in their own
language around a small fire, and I realize I am intruding on a Mayan ceremony.
Led by an ‘Ajq'ijab',’ their slowly acted rituals demonstrate the continued
existence of a spirituality that has been forced to adapt to survive through
the generations and to a unique ‘cosmovision’ that sees the holy in everything.
I move respectfully away from the group and, as emotive wails of mourning -
left unchecked by lack of self-consciousness - begin, I see one man lift a
metal cylinder.
A huge boom announces the release of a cloud of coloured paper. As it
scatters in the breeze, falling amongst the bunt-out stumps of old candles, I
look again at the view. Their harmonious vision has survived repression by
other religions and an outright ban during Guatemala’s thirty-six year civil
war, but still survives. Remembering the old man I met on my ascent, and gazing
at the beautifully complex perfection of the world below, I feel I can
understand his happiness a little more.
