I arrived about 10 minutes before the bus was supposed to leave. I waited in the doorway of the travel agency where the man had told me to wait, but when it was 5 till 07.00 and I had been told that the bus was to leave promptly on the hour, I started to get a little worried. I asked the employees of the bakery that shared part of the space, but they had not seen the travel agent. They suggested that I got to the corner of the block where the slightly larger street that leads out of town passes. I went to the corner and after waiting a few minutes the man appeared and told me that the bus had already left. I explained to him that I had been waiting where I had been told, that I had arrived with plenty of time. He hailed a tuk-tuk and we rode it up two blocks to the literal corner or the town (where the northern and eastern major roads intersect). There, I hopped on board the bus as it passed by.
Chicken buses are essentially like the school buses in the United States, painted with green, red, blue, yellow… and this one acted as a ‘city’ bus picking up passengers along the way, and it had a conductor that collected fees depending on the length to the destination. The trip was definitely 2.5 hours, possibly a little more, quite bumpy but otherwise comfortable. When we arrived in Panajachel, I used the guidance of two other passengers and took another tuk-tuk down to the docks. There, I boarded a small motorboat, and within 5 minutes I was put putting across the giant lake with about 8 other passengers. We made a couple of stops at other riverside towns. As we made our way along, I was looking at the surrounding mountain ranges and was surprised at the farming plots visible from the lake. Somehow, these Guatemalan are able to farm on slopes ridiculously close to 90 degrees. On a couple of mountains it looked like I was bizarrely looking out of an airplane window at farms below. Crazy.
I arrived at San Marcos and paid my fair. The hotel I was supposed to look for, ‘La Paz,’ was very close by, but when I arrived the lady had no idea who María or Henry where (the two people who were supposed to be there with the keys to the house). The lady let me drop off my stuff there while I went on a hunt, first looking for the house, asking around for ‘la casa de Susana,’ but apparently there are 3 or so ‘Susana’s and no one really seemed to know where this particular one lived. Eventually, I asked around about the location of the school, and I found it close to midday.
The campus is great, full of fruit trees, plants of all sorts, two eco-toilets, a kindergarten, a first grade and a second-third grade. Josh, my contact and the co-founder of the school, gave me a tour (he along with his wife, Courtney, created the school four years ago). It looks like I will be helping out with gardening or with painting the cement side to their newest restroom. Luckily, Josh had María and Henry’s number and confirmed that I would be coming over in a bit. Katie, one of the teachers at the school had lived in the house before, and she showed me the way up the mountainside to the house.
View from rooftop
Solar shower hose
Neighbors
Kitchen
Shower
San Marcos is in a valley between two mountain ranges, and the house where I am staying is up on one side. It is a very simple house. It has one room, with the bed, it has a roofed area where the kitchen (sink, oven) and the shower are located, and it has a small separate room with a sawdust toilet. The house has a very nice view of the lake, although it is slightly obscured by construction next door and a few trees.
I decided to hike down and bring up my stuff from La Paz. That was no simple task. The path, although well cobbled, is extremely steep and long. I huffed and puffed my way, saying ‘hola’ and ‘buenos días’ to all of the people I passed on the way, until I finally got to the house. I was hot and tired, so I rested for a bit, but I had to go fetch filtered water since there was none in the house. I grabbed the empty 5 gallon jug and made the trip down again.
The second store I went into agreed to fill up my jug from one that was a different brand, and I also bought some toilet paper and shampoo. Laden with supplies, I began the hardest yet climb up the mountainside. I arrived very, very tired and hot to the house, where just outside a neighbor told me that they sell water just around the corner up the hill a bit further. Quite frustrating.
I was very dehydrated and my arms were killing me, so I had two slices of the bread I brought with me and a bit of water before laying down for a nap for a bit.
At 5.30 I decided to go down and eat, I had been told that the food at La Paz was good, so I figured I could stick with that theme. I descended and ate a vegetarian meal of burritos with veggies in, salad, beans, and rice. I had pineapple juice to drink.
It was essentially dark when I left the hotel restaurant. I made the easiest climb of the day back up to the house, listening to the competing sounds of two churches, one on each side of the valley.
This deserves a little attention: starting at about 5.00 the churches started to project their sermons (speech, song, prayer) out across the valley. The church on this side of the valley is literally just behind me so I was nearly blasted out of the house when I went down to dinner. When I returned, they were still singing and reading from the Bible. They stopped about 10 minutes, I can still hear them in the church, but they are no longer using the speaker system. It lasted about 4 hours, and is supposed to be every day of the workweek.
My current main concerns are food, since I only have my bread here in the house (and there is no manner in which to refrigerate goods) and money. There are no ATMs in San Marcos, I have to cross the lake to San Pedro to withdraw money.
Well, I think that I will head to bed now, it is just after 8.00p, but I am quite tired. I will head off to school tomorrow around 08.30, the classes start up at 09.00. We shall see what this next day brings; I need to ask how the shower works since it is a solar shower and there is only a hose, I have not found the manner in which to ‘turn it on.’
Chao.
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