Sorry Mom and Dad

Situated on the majestic volcano and mountain encircled shores of Lago de Atitlán, Guatemala, San Pedro La Laguna exists for most tourists between the two arrival docks, a stretch of colorful storefronts, hippie-owned restaurants butchering international food and offering "special" brownies and cookies, and bars luring tourists with drink steals and American sports and cinema on TV. Townspeople venture into Gringoland to sell fresh-squeezed juices, basketfuls of warm pan, or handicrafts for an extra week's wage surcharge in quetzales. A few natives own and operate hotels, there's the one papuseria and a few Guatamalteco run restaurants. A handful of taxis crowd the docks offering tuk-tuk transport to lazy, bag-laden tourists who'll never do more than admire the steep hills rising into town proper and will be staying in a hotel a flat few hundred meters (maximum) from the dock. A shadier few with hoodies up and signature bloodshot eyes lurk in shadows and alleyways exercising their limited English, essentially the ability to ask, "What you need," and then run through a litany of illicit substances for smoke, snort, or syringe. But a quad-testing hike uphill reveals a different city entirely, closer to the third-world that characterizes much of Guatemala and Central America outside the major cities.

San Pedro above lake level is a grey concrete expanse. The ascending passageways are cobbled in varying degrees of danger to ankle ligaments. Those with a high dirt-to-stone ratio rearrange themselves during heavy rains. Every edifice bears the sharp edges of cinderblock construction and rusty tin roofing protects most homes, thin sheets spanning the poverty rainbow from dry blood reddish-brown to compost heap black. Tree limbs crudely fashioned into fenceposts and strewn with barbwire delineate dirtpatch yards; chimneys puff the breath of fresh tortillas from the moment the first rays of sunlight pierce the crisp morning cool. Men who don't work a farm, construction, or a store are simply there.

Dogs with countable ribs wander listlessly, following anyone holding so much as a candybar wrapper with a stray smear of chocolate or a sugary sprinkle tucked into their bushy mustache. Kids congregated in front of home-businesses kick and toss circular anythings in gestures of sport, donning tattered dusty clothes invariably sizes too small or large for their small frames, a few feet from a mother perched upon the entranceway steps with a basket of tortillas to vend. Traditionally dressed Mayan women stream by balancing baskets headtop, draped in flowing, intricately patterned cloths, multicolored garments that shame Crayola's suggestions of variety.

Amidst all this I've found a new family. Sorry Mom and Dad. Because I'm not entirely clear on the family surname -- the Spanish language has a tendency to keep things rather unclear for me -- we'll call it the household of Mama Melida (Meli for short) and Papa Mingo (who I see only in the evening, gone to work before my daily 7:30am breakfast). Besides the househeads, Tia Ana Maria, and myself, there are alternately between six and eight others in the household, a pack of tireless kids who love nothing more than wearing my watch and reporting every minute advancement: Mariori and Melani, ages four and five respectively, princesitas who shower me with hugs and kisses every time I reappear from Spanish class or a walk into town; Mingo (Mingito), a cool rascal of seven years who often sports a pair of blue goggles; Meli, eight years old, who communicates with me in words and at a pace slow enough that I can occasionally comprehend, generously accomodating my every "otra vez"; Jacuelin, nine years old, a cutie with an angelic voice who constantly keeps a sly eye on me; and Eric, twelve, a kite-flying professional patiently teaching me the craft, in the rare moments I escape Mariori and Melani's clutches. To be honest, I haven't figured out exactly who belongs to who, but that's the beauty of a Latin family: however tenuous the relationship, it's still family.

Yes, I love my (new) family, communicated through an everpresent smile and bobblehead-nodding which has the family convinced I understand far more of their conversations than the random words I actually intercept from their unbroken strings of Spanish. Thank you active listening. Mini-Meli, however, did write me a note that could heartwarm a statue of Stalin: "Tu eres parte de la familia. Te queremos mucho." I guess it really does pay to sincerely enjoy the insanity of kids. A sampling of the daily play routine: loose the family dog in the streets and run away while he chases; pretend to be various animals and crawl around imitating their sounds; pick up and/or hug Melani and Mariori; chase Melani and Mariori pretending to be a monster, until they face me and cross their arms, at which point I'm magically transformed into a benevolent aficionado of pirouettes, extending a hand to each from which they dangle and spin like ballerinas on a windup toy until they become too bored or dizzy and I momentarily revert to monster; using two dilapitated wooden ladders laid on the ground to simulate American football footspeed drills; and my personal favorite, "El Rey", which involves me sitting anywhere upon an imaginary throne and ordering objects I want, sending los niños scattering in search, the first to return with an object satisfying the requested-item-criteria awarded a point, though at no accumulation of points does one actually win or the game actually end. Tireless, imaginative kids. Much preferred to America's TV-mesmerized french fry fatties are my Guatemaltecos with carb-fed panzitas.

The food, too, is much to my liking. That fresh tortillas are served with every lunch and dinner goes without saying. And that every meal is abuzz with flies is something I came to terms with the moment I hit Mexico in September. With limited resources, Mama Meli does a commendable job. My first meal was homemade ceviche, basically pico de gallo with bits of raw shrimp "cooked" in lime juice. Seriously great stuff. The anticipated fare of black beans, rice, and eggs has been accented by platanos fritos, homemade tamales topped with cabbage, salsa, and jalapeños; some delicious dish combining ejotes, huevos, salsa y chilis; and various other combinations of the usual suspects with meat and a vegetable or two. The unexpected versatility proves the all too common homestayer's culinary complaints and dietary denunciations spew forth from filet-spoiled lips that deserve only a hearty helping of comida tipica fattened pompis.

Living with a family -- and one I believe is slightly more well off than average for San Pedro -- elucidates what closer-to-third-than-first-world actually means. Like almost every building in San Pedro, my family's home is constructed of cinderblocks, but with the luxury of near-Ace Hardware grade planks of wood for fenceposts. The ubiquitous snaggle of livewires powering the waterheating showerhead provides warm to hot water. Drinking water arrives in five-gallon jugs delivered by truck, but I brush my teeth with buckets of water from a stagnant pool floating with insect corpses, a deep reservoir central in a massive sink system.

The central dining and dish-cleaning area is covered but open air, doors to the shower and bathroom stall each opening from one wall. Two bedrooms and the kitchen/prep closet open along the two walls along and behind the kitchen table. I reside in a separate two-story structure adjacent the kitchen, forming the fourth wall, sheltering the kitchen from the gale force winds gusts that haven't abated since they arrived four days ago, chasing the rain and introducing the cool winter nights that will quickly see my single Davidson sweatshirt out of style. The first floor of my homey concrete behemoth is under construction, eventually providing a handful of additional rooms, but I occupy one of two dorms on the second level. I'm provided a double bed and ample blanketry, a desk, chair, and small shelf, a hammock outside and rooftop access to peer down upon the lake, across and around at the terrestrial undulations of the highlands, or up into the starry nights. I also have a toilet closet immediately atop the staircase, obscured by a hanging cloth flap which the incessant gusts have effectively rendered useless, whipping the flap about so anyone on the street or the courtyard can observe my every piss and plop. All part of a different perspective, no doubt.

Concerning school, I'm still slow at Spanish. The process is trying for someone who born sans a natural reserve of patience and I'm cursed with a beautiful young guatemalteca maestra not averse to flirtation. At twenty-two and single, Mildred is both the reason I've signed up for another week of classes and the reason I can only half-concentrate during session. She's patient and encouraging and part of a traditional family that make it tough for me to torment her outside of class. If I can improve my Spanish and my tan, then maybe, just maybe...

El Dia de los Muertos is Sunday, though the celebration takes place all weekend. I've been spending a lot of time in the cemetary the past few days, which has been crowded with people repainting, cleaning, and otherwise touching up the graves of loved ones. The cemetary is colorful, beautiful, and to be the place of jubilation (and a bit of libation) this weekend. Should be fun...

(And a tuk-tuk blasting DMX just rolled by...what a place!)

Living the Lake Life

The nicest places hide the ugliest faces; at least straight-shooting shit towns can be commended for honesty. Antigua is regarded as Guatemala's jewel, a safe haven for tourists, an upper class enclave sheltered from poverty by looming volcanos. It is, in fact, a rich and rewarding city. By day. Night, however, introduces sinister elements, exaggerated or not by a litany of accounts of armed robberies and shootings targeting tourists and Guatemaltecos alike. The vibrant colors, crowded calles and avenues are muted at dusk, disparate realities that each forswear the other illusory.

Of all the places I've been, nowhere has an after-hours excursion felt so risky. For first impression's sake, it doesn't help that I was abused and intimidated in Spanish by a drunk thirty-plus thug and his crew of midget teenage minions. It is exceedingly uncomfortable when you're the only non-Spanish speaker in a bar after 1am, the streets are deserted and you have blocks to walk to your hostel, and the only word you understand from the rapidfire procession is "narcotráfico." Each repetition of narcotráfico, which is at least once per breath for the speaker, is followed by crazed stares in your direction and the type of chest-puffing that usually indicates an an alien is busy hatching behind the rib cage. Especially when you're accompanying the one female in the bar -- who is quite attractive at that -- the lone circumstance that has drawn the ire of the ponytail and wife-beater sporting wannabe-kingpin having a conversation through your very solid body, a fact proven when he rather forcefully drops a slice of lime into your chest. When you turn in bewilderment because someone mistook your chest for a Corona bottle and meet a stare befitting the next MTV Reality Competition, Ultimate Mad-Dogging, it's truly comically childish. Or so it is in retrospect, less so in the moment you're drinking just to dull the pain of the inevitable beating.

Poala and I emerged unscathed, hardened for battle with active Volcán de Pacaya, frequented everyday by hordes of hikers who, hungered by the steep, demanding ascent, hope for another's misstep, which, in the presence of lava rivers, amounts to an impromptu barbecue. Lava is awesome. It oozes and glows and flows and radiates heat to roast marshmallows and melt rubber soles, or, given a misstep, takes souls. The climb itself -- loose, rocky footing a broken ankle waiting to happen -- was a cakewalk compared to navigating my treacherous hostel room at Antigua's Black Cat. Simply reaching the ladder to my bunk involved more maneuvers than most Olympic gymnasts have in their repertoires, prancing and dancing around and atop bags and bundles stacked and splayed over the rare floor tile not already covered by beds.

The morning after climbing the volcano and conquering the unlit journey into my bunkbed --also after realizing delicious, inexpensive eats by food cart arrive in Antigua only during holidays -- I bused to backpacker favorite Lago de Atitlán, taking a lancha from Panajachel to San Pedro La Laguna. Atitlán is a massive lake in Guatemala's western highlands -- San Pedro sits at over 1600m -- picturesque towns sprinkled about its shores, all encompassed by pristine green peaks and climbing volcanoes, often cloud-enveloped, the dramatic landscape studded as if with prehistoric terrestrial welts from Pterodactyl-sized mosquitos tasked with exaggerating the earth.

San Pedro is an interesting blend of Maya and drug cultures, with more hippies than I'd prefer. Hippies who run restaurants touting renditions of the favorite international food, proving universally bland, but simple appearance on a menu sufficient to convince stoned munchies, thus the proliferation of shit restaurants stealing tourists' dollars from local establishments. I'm pround to report I support the Q$6 Papuseria, which qualifies as international cuisine by a single border, but is authentically executed. Likewise, I support the Bready Bunch, a pair of smiling kids accosting all whiteys with baskets brimming with mini-loaves of fresh-baked pan: de coco, banano, zanahoria y manzana, of which the fruit-chunk-filled manzana reigns supreme.

Since arriving in Antigua, though, I've adhered to a steady 50% bread diet, which is threatening a mid-intestinal traffic jam, not to mention a previously unimaginable indifference to pan. I plan to refrain from loaves for a few days, which should be easier after moving in with a host family today, beginning at least a week of Spanish language instruction (Corazón Maya Escuela) tomorrow morning. Even though the daily meals will invariably feature tortillas, I'd have to eat foot-high stacks with each meal to even compete the pounds of pan I've been downing daily. My banana fix will meanwhile be satisfied by Q$1.50 chocobananos: frozen bananas covered in millimeters of chocolate and affixed with bits of nuts, a healthier, cheaper, regularity-encouraging alternative.

Churrasic Park

Stretching a single planned night into a stay longer than a week, I left my Italian (and Spanish and German) friends and hosts in Cobán, reluctantly departing Guatemala's capital of Churrascerias. Churrasco: delicious plates loaded with slabs of grilled, seasoned meat (puerco my carne of choice) and, depending on the vendor, some combination of rice and beans, hunks of baked potato slathered in sour cream, grilled tomatoes and onions, accompanied by garlic bread sometimes and tortillas always. My favorite comida corrida churrasceria loaded styrofoam plates with all the preceding less the rice and beans, for an absurdly low Q$15. The tough meat worked my jaws, but was so succulent I never ventured into Churrasic Park, the scene of central Cobán's nightly churrasco competition, a series of churrasco-selling carts lining one long side of the zócalo.

I caught a shuttle bus to Antigua yesterday morning, en route enjoying a joint, then a liter of milk and a divine slice of chocolate-caramel cake, reunited and sharing hightimes-hilarity with Paola, a lovely Italian I'd met in Livingston weeks before.

Not only that, but two North Carolinian girls inquired about my Davidson sweatshirt, kickstarting a conversation in which I realized I'd had beers with one of the girls at the Brickhouse, a restaurant-bar back home, a week before this travel began, that she is a good friend of my (currently displaced) fellow adventurer, Jackson, and his sister.

Antigua is a beautiful city, architecturally spellbinding, but it is far from a real representation of Guatemala. Money reveals itself in European sports cars and candlelit dining, a far cry from the favela buildup lining highway hillsides through Guatemala City. Still, my first night here I was offered a job at a restaurant gearing up for tourist high season, so swimming through this volcano-encircled tourist sea for a few months is an option. There is a fabled bakery here, offering an assortment of breads, most importantly pan de banano in cinderblock sized loaves. And cheap dining exists lining central park -- food carts steaming and smoking midday, meat sizzling and tortillas frying, crowded by camera happy tourists and hungry locals jostling for cartfront position. Yesterday's lunch cost me Q$18: a pupusa con queso covered in a colorfully piquant chili of chunked onions, carrots, broccoli, and cauliflower; and two tortillas hidden by black beans and steak, then covered with their own array of sauces, topped off by a generous portion of the aforementioned chunk-veggie chili, a popular condiment throughout Central America, often offered jarred on restaurant tabletops.

Today I'm hiking Volcán Pacaya, Antigua's active volcano. Safety regulations don't exist here, and a tourist in the lava is as quickly forgotten as a stench-free fart, his money collected pre-trek.

Semuc Champey and the Army at Darkness

Perched upon a mattress between five wooden walls, one adorned with a few askew, adjutting nails for hanging, and a concrete floor, I'm coming to comprehend the origins of the term bedroom. The only sound -- besides Guatemala's national music: the incessant chorus of rooster crows, to which I'm finally growing deaf -- is millions of simultaneous gentle thumps, plump raindrops acquainting themselves with the canopy of oversized fauna below, leaves the size of kites.

In The Woods, Guatemala, or, if one must assign a mappable name, Semuc Champey (Kekchi for "Sacred Water"), consists if my basic accomodations (one night at Casa Sapote included in my Q$100 roundtrip shuttle from Cobán); random indigenous persons emerging from the jungle at random, or walking along the 20km dirt road to nowhere, baskets balanced headtop, who presumably take shelter somewhere in the vicinity; and a small army of shotgun-wielding guards protecting the crude and treacherous corridor to Semuc Champey's natural wonder: a 300m limestone bridge, lined with a series of stepped and swimmable pools and waterfalls, water of colors most people experience only through Photoshop, depth-dependent hues transparent turquoise to deep blue.

The serenity atop the bridge, placid pools and short stepping cascades, belies the torrent below. I was one of the few adventurers to follow our tour guide, Renee, toward the point where the raging Río Cahabón, which thrashes through an eons worn cave beneath the bridge, reemerges from its tunnel, rejoining the water flowing from the pools. Mimicking Renee and his small, agile sidekick, we swam, slid, and tiptoed the entire slick limestone bridge. At the end, a 20m high ledge overlooking violence below, sheets of white froth launching from the backs of boulders unflinching through ages of pounding.

Impressive.

Then I noticed the curled rope ladder Sidekick carried slung over his shoulder. Summarily unraveled, Renee secured it to a boulder in that lowest calm pool, and we descended one-by-one, the waterfall rushing into our faces, ladder hidden. From a rocky outcropping 10m below we crawled beneath the waterfall into the cave's mouth, crouching and shuffling beneath stalactites to another ledge, eroded by the river exploding from the darkness stretching back beneath which we'd recently traversed. Semuc Champey's bridgetop pool views are easily worth admission, but the prize is becoming acquainted with the beast snaking below.

Emerging unscathed from the tower climbs at Tikal and a rope ladder excursion through a waterfall with a rocky bed below, quiet death tonight -- gaps in the warped lengths of wood comprising my walls offering free admission to any creature that can compact or contract itself less the width of a human fist -- would be a cruel fate, an entire loaf of banana bread awaiting me at sunrise.

---

(A.M. UPDATE)

A few minutes after handwriting the above journal, a variation of my worst movie-come-true nightmare began. OK, Candyman materializing is actually first. But an arachnid invasion a al Arachnaphobia ranks a close second.

Intending to shower, I rose from the bed and walked toward the door, halting when I noticed the gray floor about the doorway transformed into a swirling black, blooming outward. My peripheral registered black swarms advancing up either wall, toward the ceiling, the door already conquered. Like my room was constructed atop a hill-sized nest of biting black ants that I had offended, stirred from some perfect slumber with my mere soundless presence.

I stretched long and jerked the door open with nervous, dancing fingers before retreating, stamping about like an enraged marching bandee, trying to stem the dark flood from engulfing my bed, my bags, and my body, my only escape blocked by the agitated black tornado already spread to far to consider hurdling. Shortly, nerves fraying as ants began divebombing into my hair from the ceiling, a scattered few landing softly on the bed, Santiago, who lives and works at Casa Zapote, stopped in the open doorway, oblivious to the fury at his feet. "Amigo," I warned, indicating something amiss at his feet with a shaky finger in between the slaps to my head and shoulders. Dancing and clawing spectacle as I was -- probably not particularly startling given the flow of drug-addled hippies traveling the Central American travel circuit -- he glanced at the floor before launching himself back with a yelp, smacking with both hands at his ankles.

He motioned to my bags and indicated for me to follow. I hastily collected my belongings, inhaled deeply, and propelled myself across millions of tinybiters, landing in a soft pit of collected rainwater. The squish of my soggy shoes didn't bother me a bit on the sprint to my comped honeymoon suite, nor did the giant jungle spiders lurking in the shadows outside the door, their presence as insect demolishers finally appreciated.

Engagement Grills

Maybe impertinent to travel itself, but a thought occuring during travel: It's outright unjust when a man in the disorienting throes of love splurges on more karats than Bugs Bunny can dream, for an engagement that disintegrates sometime later, some lucky ex-fiance pawning a Porsche off her ring finger.

Me, if I'm creating the impression that I'm forking over more cheddar than Chester Cheetah, I'm outfitting my future ex with a gaudy grill, alternating imitation silver and gold, with "P's ______(Fill-in-the-blank with a choice as loving or lowlife as you like)" spelled out in lip-bulging cubic zirconium. It'll be so hideous that even if she dumps me and dips with her booty, I can sleep soundly knowing she sure as hell won't be rocking my prize, and pawning it will be near impossible. If she's smart enough to disassemble my gesture of faith, she'll find her precious metals and stones worth a handful of M&Ms. Which hopefully will melt in her hand.

Quicksand Cobàn / Que dia es hoy?

My conception of time has fully eroded, the names of weekdays some vestigial cranial accessory. I remained in Flores for nearly one week, leaving the tranquil island on the morning of my seventh day, a week expired spent shooting hoops and playing futbol with local teens on the town-center court, exploring Santa Elena's panaderias and market with Canadian co-hosteler Killian, running circles around the island (evaluating posted daily dinner specials) or huffing exhaust straight out the only highway into Santa Elena. One productive run revealed a cheap seaside diner where I enjoyed a traditional Guatemalteca soup, Pepián, a rich tomato- and onion-based broth filled with hunks of carrot and green pepper, rice, and a roasted chicken breast. My remaining daily hours were spent promoting my favorite banana bread baker, who beamed when I deemed her pan de banano "el mejor in Flores," a quote she cited the next day, settling my debate between yet another hunk of banana bread or a slice of fresh pan dulce.

I followed a fun crew of girls to Tikal, the famous Mayan ruins, at 5am, led by a pair of Germans to whom Renè had introduced me, Lisa and Lucia, and superchill Spaniard Lu. (The Guatemalteca ticket vendor laughed when we purchased our roundtrip shuttle tickets, a lone American guy with five non-gringo girls.) Tikal's monolithic pyramids and temples tower above the jungle, the terrifying shrieks of Howler monkeys, impossibilities from creatures so minuscule, tearing through the lifting haze as slivers of sunlight sneak past obscuring stone monuments. We visited the central plaza and nearby main sites, choosing to relax overlooking treetops rather than trudging to outlying temples, the seedier Tikal districts, including one the girls affectionately dubbed the "rape temple" based upon Lonely Planet's warnings.

Climbing cloudward to unrailed vantage points tested my willpower and sweatglands, but I successfully navigated the highest towers; the highest with a cruel interpretation of the word staircase, a sequence of narrow steps that rises fifty plus meters while creeping forward maybe two. Safety standards won't permit ladders to be positioned so steeply (though ladderwise one must scale and descend)! (In fact, every Tikal tourist I've talked to since, including Barry who visited years ago, has recalled, "Oh, you mean the tower with the ladder.")

The quivering, lightheadedness and torrentially sweating hands didn't begin until I was atop the monument, seated a few feet from the sheer face of certain death, my back attempting to tunnel into the stone wall. None of that detracted from the stunning panorama, and I was content at least my final vision would be so magnificent and serene. Our descent was precipitated by a guide-led group beginning their climb, in numbers sufficient that, should we remain, at least one person would fall from the overcrowded lookout. When I touched down on earth with a soft step instead of a thunderous crunch, I gushed with arterial enthusiasm to everyone within earshot my new and profound affinity for terra.

I'd discovered Jackson was in Antigua (also, I'd worded extremely poorly an offer of seat exchange to the hostel's middle-aged british employee during the nightly movie: "Do you want to come inside me?") and it was time to move on...so I headed opposite Jackson to Rio Dulce, a river through the Guatemala's coastal jungle swath near Belize and Honduras. When the chicken bus parked in dumpy Rio Dulce town, I forewent plans to spend the night and followed my British escort, Becky, to the main dock, arranging a lancha onward to Livingston -- an isolated, culturally diverse hub downriver known especially for its Caribbean influence. Latins, Mayans, and Garifina, black Caribbean slave descendents share Livingston with tourists, and Betsy and I crashed at the highly recommended Casa de la Iguana. To my pleasure, Renè was camped there too, still trying to shake a messy stomach bug.

In Livingston I made the obligatory trek through the town, jungle and coast, Belize stenciled on the horizon, to Los Siete Altares, a series of spellbinding freshwater waterfalls cutting through untamed jungle. Our tour guide, Francis, was an Air Jordan adoring treat, recognizing immediately NC as the birthplace of His Airness. Francis was hilarious and informative, quick to joke with me about all the curvacious women sauntering along, exchanging dap to celebrate the healthiness of many a passerby, shapeliness ensuring "she´s eating her yogurt." Daps were also exchanged when we agreed a girl wasn't eating her yogurt. Noteworthy as well was a meal of Topado, a soup of sea delicacies simmering in coconut milk and spices, swimming with shrimp, mussels, crab, and a whole fish, boiled but otherwise unshelled and unmolested. It was a welcome departure from tortilla framed tastes.

After a few days with the bugs and Garifuna and the threat of malaria, I decided to embark for Lanquin and Semuc Champey, essential Central Guatemala. Rather than spend a night in drab Rio Dulce township to catch an early morning direct shuttle to Lanquin, I snagged a lancha to Puerto Barrios hoping for a bus to Cobán, where I could find transport to Lanquin. At the bus station, in the panicked moment I realized the particular busline's routes were all direct to Guatemala City and that my random arrangements of spanish vocabulary would be insufficient to mine the ticket seller for information about how and where to change buses for Coban, concerned a miscommunication could prove suicidal, I was saved by three Spanish-fluent Italians, Paulo, Gilberto, and Jenny, the former two who speak conversational English. And just happened to be from Cobán.

They conversed with the ticket attendant then led me across the street, where we hitched a ride on a chicken bus to somewhere, endured two shuttle rides playing Central America's third favorite pastime, "How many people can we cram into a fifteen passenger van?" and presto! Cobán. Gracious and accomodating to Mother Teresian extremes, I was offered a night in their spacious and charming abode: five spacious rooms, a restroom, and a covered, open-aired dining and lounging area behind a metal doored and barred exterior, down some muddy, rutty street. I intended to leave the next day, but I'm still there something close to a week later. Between the encouragement to speak Spanish, delicious home-cooked meals (and the occasional take-out churrascos as well), and the tall-standing marijuana plants, I don't think they resent my extended stay.

PBA's Nuggets on Inanity

My good ol' work buddy, Mr. New York himself, Baby Fetus Craig, recently emailed me the following quote, which I was recorded (soberly) uttering at work sometime during the past year:

"If pancakes had little arms and legs and walked around like little, flattened, circular people, I'd always carry syrup and silverware."

I've been sequestered in a heavy metal door sealed domicile in the dirt-road backstreets of Cobàn, Guatemala for over a week. I sleep on a cot on the floor in a closet. Hardly a kidnap victim, I'm camped out with a trio of generous Spanish-fluent Italians who saved me from bus station blundering in Puerto Barrios nearly a week ago...maybe a week ago...days no longer exist except to distinguish the newspapers I struggle to read with my morning coffees, toasts and breads. The homecooked meals are fantastic, I sleep comfortably, and my Spanish is creeping toward advanced infant. I keep planning to leave, this was initially but a one-night stay, but I haven't made it out yet. A detailed update is forthcoming.

Hasta luego, snorkel dude!

After four quiet days on Caye Caulker, Belize, running the same three main streets more times than a kindergartner can count; enjoying stew chicken, rice and beans, or lobster or snapper at a number of restaurants (the cheaper and superior eateries situated on the poorer backstreets); reverting to bad vacation habits and constructing meals of cakes alone, sampling plastic wrapped pieces of caramel and pineapple upside-down cake from every bikefront pastry-peddler; and reading through the oppressive afternoon heat, passing quiet nights on our hotel's pier with a few Belikin and a little mota, I was tanner and revitalized for travel.

Jackson, the displaced sea-creature that he is, decided around midnight our last prepaid night on Caye Caulker, a number of stiff rum and cokes deep, that he wanted to join a group of nice guys who surely comprise half the population of Isreal and two cute girls we'd met that afternoon for a three day, two night snorkling extravaganza departing the next morning. I, more terrestrially inclined, opted instead to depart Belize for Guatemala, having completed my beach-trip checklist that afternoon, finally wading into the water after four days within a stingray's leaping-kill-radius of the ocean.

We've temporarily parted ways, and I'm sure Jackson's enjoying himself as much as I am. I chicken-bused out of Belize, though not without another history lesson from Prince Charles, who likely can't afford a change of clothing because he invests all his damn money in advanced military homing devices and radar. I made it to Guatemala, running into our Asheville, NC biker buddies at the border, and again once my cabbie deposited me in Flores, Guatemala, a beautiful and tiny island sanctuary in the middle of one of Guatemala's many massive lakes. The ride to Flores was eventful, the driver deftly dodging kamikaze pigs scurrying from the roadside brush, skillfully navigating his Toyota Corolla around what Guatemaltecos consider potholes, and what Americans more accurately describe as meteoric impact craters.

Franklin dropped me off at hostel Los Amigos, which, for $40 Quetzales (less than US$6) per night, provides a dorm complete with two fans, private bath, and an queen bed to complement our bunk, which God might fill with supermodels were I not it signed possession of Barry's soul, my intentions devious. If only I'd made everyone in high school pay with their souls for the right to copy my homework...

Anyway, the hostel is fantastic. Lots of travelers, many personable, some attractive, with clean rooms, a huge library, affordable internet and drinks with a good restaurant to match: the best and cheapest hostel yet, in a city I'd heard was too expensive and hardly worth nothing more than being a base for day-trips to Tikal. Moreover, we're a few hundred feet from a basketball court, and the hostel provides free sports equipment. The town epitomizes safety, midnight walks through the streets without trepidation.

Running, I can circle the island in less than six minutes, but it's densely built. The main street encircles the island, both sides packed with restaurants, hotels, shops and houses, breaks between buildings only for narrow streets leading up to the zocalo and basketball court. There is obviously wealth here, with as many upscale restaurants as cheap eats, and flat-screen TVs visible inside well-kempt houses, and a rare sense of total security, different from neighboring Santa Elena, the gritty city a Barry Bond's steroid-blast across the bridge.

A few days alone is exactly what I needed. I'm forced to swallow my misanthropic posturing and practice my spanish (and negotiating an ice cream deal for three scoops in a cup, which doesn't exist on the menu, is quite entertaining for both sides). I made quick friends with my German roomate René (who accidentally coined my new favorite word, the child of meat and beef, "Meef"; "Doomfuck," also Renè's, is a close second), and two delightful Danish girls, Kit and Cristina. Our quartet ventured for drinks the past two nights, a classyish steak dinner last night as well, for which we were accompanied by two cool Dutch newcomers. The way we laugh, spectators must assume we're steeped in serious substances. Truthfully, we're four afficionados of absurdity, cracking up over lingual mistakes in foreign tongues [Kit: "See you tomorrow morning at 9pm"; "I was sick in Guatemala for 4 years (intending days)"; y "I just love papel (intending pastel!) de chocolate."], slang and obscene phrases from across the globe, the Dutch duck dance and grandpa's glass eye. "Keep it real, pop." Alas, Kit and Cristina split this morning for Rio Dulce, René will be heading out in the next few days, hopefully we'll all cross paths again. ¿Por qué no?

Youth Hostel Los Amigos now holds less amigos, but I'll wait in Isla de Flores, cheap lodging, eats and drinks with good changing company, locals quick with smiles and salutations, chasing hoops dreams overlooking a majestic lake until I hear from Jackson, hitting Tikal before moving on. Guatemala could be home for a while.