The Bartman Cometh, and we get it Pupusa Poppin'

I finally dislodged my lazy ass from San Pedro La Laguna, Guatemala, my backside, I'm sure, still imprinted with routine, bearing the faint interlaced piecrust pattern of cushy hammock straps. My departure was a forty-eight hour whirlwind of house-hopping, issuing heartfelt goodbyes through chainlink fences and seated around comals burning dekerneled corncobs, promising I'd revisit my surrogate families...sometime. As I passed out photos I'd had printed from my digital camera, I was overwhelmed by reciprocal generosity, collecting a variety of handsewn items: a belt paved by stretches of majestic blues and a rainbow colored handbag adorned with a tiny wooden figurine of a Mayan woman in traditional dress; most touching of all was a plastic bagful of well-past-well-worn schoolbooks, broken spined and sans covers, loose pages rearranged haphazardly, accompanied by a stuffed ladybug and a photo in a frame crudely fashioned from a clear plate of hard plastic, tape and a bit of cardboard bent into a stand, all tied together with a red ribbon and two flowers with wire stems, shyly imparted by my recently befriended neighbor Rosita. Mildred gave me, in addition to a pile of handwritten cards collected in my final weeks, a fluffy stuffed puppy wearing a red heart inscribed with the word LOVE around its neck, and the puppy's paw-squeeze activated tune wavers lazily for a battery fading after who-knows-how-long-on-the-shelf-at-who-knows-what-tienda.

All the beauty of my departure created a karmic imbalance that was reset when I stepped off the bus in Antigua. As my eyes scanned parque central, the grand architecture and spewing fountain impressive as ever, I noticed a man, filthy, his head lolling about, sitting on outlying steps. His faded and tattered pants were spattered with, presumably, urine. On second glance I noticed his penis resting in his lap, jumping into action every few moments with as it was flicked or wagged, like some oddity peeking from its unzippered cave. That mental illness and public intoxication are ignored in Central America is distressing but, to be sure, the wealth of crazed men stumbling about -- singing and shouting incoherently, urinating and exposing themselves without regard to audience or location, rooting through garbage cans with no intention other than transplanting waste onto the surrounding concrete -- make the region a more entertaining place.

Barry showed up shortly, and we proceeded to waste several days in Antigua, Guatemala stalking the streets, ushered into every panaderia and pasteleria and grocery store by my addiction to pastries and cakes, especially those iced and or filled with creams and jellies and frostings. We sucked down a liter of Quezalteca Especial over two nights, amd I ate two to three market-cheap sapotes every day to fill the spaces of time (and the cavernous void of nutrition) between meals defined by saturated fats and simple sugars, or by grease and cheese dripping, salsa-mountain buried pupusas purchased for spare change at the food stalls surrounding the bus station. Submitting to the power of the pupusa, we finally embarked toward the pupusa heartland, El Salvador.

Minds clogged by cheesy pupusas, we nearly handed away our identities at the border between Guatemala and El Salvador, each extending our passports to the decidedly unofficial "officials" clamoring outside the bus' door. But as the images of the pupusa orgy to come began to flicker -- at the sight of our passports being hustled away to some location and with some intention obscured by Spanish, by guys dressed in torn t-shirts -- we simultaneously recovered our senses and snatched back our lives; more importantly our tickets to pupusa heaven.

Hotel Livingston in Santa Ana, El Salvador was our first sweaty stop, one of the first times in my life I haven't bemoaned a lack of hot water showers. We proceeded to pass two days just as we had in Antigua: exercise defined by the miles of cracked concrete walked to various foodstands and the heavy-lifting of pastries filled with thick custards, usually called leche. Genuinely concerned by my inability to refuse cakes and doughnuts (and packages of coconut-cream filled, coconut-flake covered Dinkis) following my departure from cream-and-icing starved San Pedro, I googled diabetes to determine if I could, in fact, overwhelm my system with sugar and induce disease. It seems, assuming I don't forsake exercise entirely and puff up, soft to the touch like any of my favorite pastries, I'll be safe. The halfmoon shaped, blackbean filled pancakes of Pan de Elote, which we devoured hot from the griddle daily in the central park, I have less guilt about eating.

At the end of each day spent sweating toward pastries, the sugar rush and inevitable crash crushing all ambitions but those of appetites unsatiated by white breads and simple sugars, we crawled the ghosttown-come-sunset toward pupusa stands or, on the second night and accompanied by (fellow Davidsonian, friend and current El Salvadoran Peace Corps volunteer) Jim Hooper, toward a local bar. (MS-13 never materialized, but a pirate and a maybe prostitute and a general excess of alcohol dispelled us from that bar rather suddenly.)

Moving southward through Central America, the women grow progressively more tantalizing while remaining completely impervious to accurate-age-determination -- is she 15 or 30? In Juayua, a charming, touristy mountain village on the Ruta de las Flores, where Jim, Barry, and I relocated for it's famed every-weekend food festival, we admired a couple of cute Salvadoran girls who seated themselves across from us while we sipped beers in the central park soon after dusk. We guessed their ages to be no more than 16, but captivated by their beauty and the giggles they unleashed every time we made eye contact, emboldened by a few beers and the fact that hitting on (even severely) underage girls was nothing that would phase the heavily armed police patrolling around the square, Barry and Jim's urgings were entirely sufficient. I approached the duo and ascertained that the first beauty was, indeed, fifteen. But the second, the more stunning of the two, claimed to be twenty, even after confronted with my barrage of stern "No te creo"s. As it was, I found myself a supermodel of a date for the political party sponsored town dance that evening, and shared two hours on a dancefloor, a head taller than anyone else, boring my partner with the same semi-hip-swiveling motion.

And so, Jimbo, Barry, and I passed the time: feasting at the foodstands for the weekend, spending two to five dollars for plates brimming with mouthwatering, generously portioned delicacies: fried yucca and chorizo to rabbit and shrimp, always with a side of thick tortillas. Hiking to a series of impressive waterfalls a few kilometers from town, where many locals were picnicking and swimming, eating too much ice cream and too many pastries, and passing the nights drinking around the town's central fountain. It was vacation, pure and simple, and quite clear that my life could not be better...unless my gorgeous dance partner, Ingrid, emails me, volunteering to nurture my Spanish language development. That is, assuming, my scribbled email address was even legible...

Jim had to return to work and Barry and I have relocated to the stretch of surf spots spanning the Pacific coast. A few chicken bus changes led us to Bus 80, departing La Libertad for Playa El Tunco. The handful of Bus 80s running the coastal route are the usual chicken buses, but ours had been outfitted with a bassy speaker system that showered unwitting El Salvadorans with uncensored American rap, a deluge of odes celebrating the nomenclature of genitalia and the juicy details of romantic strip club encounters. Or maybe the words had been slightly altered for regional appropriateness: "Pupusa poppin' on a handstand."

El Tunco is a quiet beach with a few hostels filled with surfers, a few restaurants, cheap beers, and enchanting sunsets. Walking the road for twenty five minutes we can eat for half the price, and with the all-important option of pupusas, so we trek a few times daily to the dilapitated stands and in-house eateries at the next beach, sharing hours of postmeal conversation seated in the carport/dining area of our favorite mom-and-pop operation.

My vacation within a vacation continues, and I'm completely infatuated with El Salvador, mesmerized by, in this particular order: it's women; their pupusas; and the delightful citizens always quick to converse with a pasty foreigner butchering their language.

Life's a Zoo

In the midst of a coconut cake drought, galletas have reasserted themselves in my post-dinner dessert marches. Emperador® cream sandwiches -- vanilla cookies and filling; chocolate cookies and filling; and a corporate ode to diversity, combination flavor -- are nearly irresistable. But I've been hooked by Panaderia Peter Pan's footlong surfboard sugar cookies, a steal at Q$1 each.

I do feel something of a traitor, however, even tempting taste-buds at any Panaderia not named Panificadora Mana, home (literally) to my friend and dedicated purveyor of pan and pastel, Olga. Olga, who gifted me free pastel frio on my birthday. Who was slightly offended when I didn't appear to compart and feast with her family on Noche Buena. And who Friday night set a stool in front of her counter -- amidst metal prong-bearing breadshoppers plucking and placing pan from the glass display cases into their plastic baskets -- brewed me coffee, handed me the cellphone when her illegal daughter called from ATL, and fed me pastel and galleta while we chatted away an hour, eventually declining any sort of payment when I stood to exit.

I woke up early Saturday for a microbus-shuttled daytrip to Guate's zoo, chaperoning with Corazòn Maya's maestras a group of precious niñas involved in the school's outreach project. The project, spearheaded by schoolhead Marta, funded in part by a percentage from every extranjero's school tuition, but mostly by saintly Canadian Beth, assists twenty truly impoverished Pedronan families. The Mayan girls, who would otherwise be toiling spanking out tortillas or handwashing clothes, sitting on the curb with a basket of manderins, are provided occasional organized excursions, game-filled weekly gatherings and English instruction at Corazón Maya, and helping funds for life's staples: edibles (arroz, frijoles, y maíz) and (as the project's eminent contribution) public education.

The girls are adorable, loving and playful, so much it's easy to forget they're saddled with struggle daily, that every Quetzal their mothers imparted them for snacks represents a portion less of some essential at home. Many of these homes, some of which I've toured, are crude constructions of concrete and corrugated tin roofing; others gap-riddled, walled by vertically-arranged wooden slats. Uneven dirt floors aren't uncommon, sheen hanging cloths or sections of sheet metal for doors separate the family upon family crammed inside one or two small rooms -- littered, spaceless enclosures without the luxury of distinction between bedroom, bathroom, and kitchen -- from the biting, windy winter nights. Mattresses on the floor are fire hazards bumping the chimneyless comal, which chokes the air before every meal, a sheet of plastic hanging around a bucket feet away designating the bathroom. Agua pura, a few dollars every five gallons, is an unaffordable step up the sanitation scale.

A trip out of San Pedro is a world's-away jaunt for the girls; for whom, unaccustomed to travel, the ruthlessly winding road, obstacle-littered roads to the city are the recipe for motion sickness. Whipping around turns approaching 180º, the girls one-by-one began reenacting that unforgettable scene from "Stand By Me", the backseat retches and putrid odors wafting from the plastic bags the girls donned like oversized SARS-masks catalyzing a chain reaction. The girl beside me succumbed, twice belching projectile showers before someone handed her a cute, pink sack big enough for a bakery cookie. For me, the soundtrack of the trip was the crinkling of plastic bags and the soft plop, slosh and slop accompanying every subsequent purging, plus the chorus of laughter erupting every time another girl dropped a freshly-filled vomit-bomb out the window.

By the time we arrived at the zoo, health had been restored. We entered a train of kids and adults toting backpacks and shoulderbags, starving for stomachs recently emptied or yet empty. Sitting down on shaded benches, sirvilletas concealing cylindrical towers of tortillas and plastic containers of cold beef, fish, and chicken materialized beside every girl. With dirty hands we feasted, and I never thought twice snagging hunks of for-who-knows-how-long-unrefigerated-meat to enliven my tortillas (which just happened to be the delicious black bean-filled variety!).

In the manic following hours the girls, fascinated by photography, took advantage of my inability to refuse their smiling faces, effectively keeping my camera out of my hands. Sure, fingerprints smudged the lens by the time I got it back and, because every girl was certain her photo of this or that animal from the exact same angle and with the exact same (lack of) zoom would be award winning, I had at least five identical shots of every exhibit. But the girls were also invaluable accomplices in the difficult quest to shoot cameraphobic Mildred, whose sixth-sense for covert-photo-detection is at full height when I'm fingering the trigger.

After the zoo, once each girl had removed any visible jewelry, we herded the girls into Guate's Constitutional Plaza, zona una's plaza central, where we enjoyed ice cream on the central fountain's steps among the milling vendors, visitors, and petty criminals, soon afterward enveloped in a white mass of marching thousands chanting for peace.

Here I am, in a foreign land, accumulating kids like Ghengis Khan, but without the fun in bed. Though, in the context of modern times, without the child support as well...

Observational humor

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Matters of Taste

The yolky yellow center of a properly fried egg sunny side up is like an otherwordly portal, a humpy, fluid-filled gelatinous jiggler with an outer film strong enough to require effort to penetrate. At Friday's breakfast -- fried eggs and tortillas made from maìz negro, what we call "blue corn" -- I watched (with a tingle of apprehension) Melani's probing, ketchup-dabbed fingertip attempting to breach the exterior skin and spill the runny yellow soul over her plate. And in the process maybe, just maybe, accidentally unleashing dimension-jumping supervillians. But the sunny hump just bulged this way and that, each poke and prod distorting the dome, seamlessly reshaping the yellow mound until the pressure alleviated and the yolk melted back into a perfect dome. It was strangely exciting, and at least the second time this trip I've anticipated the sudden manifestation of General Trag...or worse.

And recently, accompanying our broccoli fried in egg (another simple but delicious creation from the kitchens of shoppers bound to local markets, not Wal-Marts), what did we sip for dinner? According to four-year-old Mariori, mugs full of Tè de Maricón, a declaration that sprayed hot Tè de Pericón out many nostrils.

Emperador® galletas, all varieties, reign supreme. Not only do they best all cream sandwich cookie competitors in taste, but in price as well, and the second listed ingredient in Azùcar. As in Pure Cane Sugar. Good luck finding packaged products made with sugar stateside.

And last night I dined upon a Middle-Eastern tasting delicacy, another unforgettable creation from the limited pantry: fried patties mixing beef, egg, herbs (including mint), and chopped vegetables (including, at least, onion and tomato). A fried and spiced super burger. Incredibly flavorful. Thus Mama Meli's name for the creation is something of a letdown: "Torta de Carne." That's right, "meat sandwich." As in slap a patty between tortillas and dig in! I guess sublimity defies naming.

Pavement is an awesome band. And an awesome place for drunks to rest their faces.

I've officially held down a girlfriend for longer than ever before. That wasn't supposed to make me sound like a rapist. I even brought her home to meet mom -- my Guatemalan host mom, that is -- who was quick to allude to marriage (and a promised lifetime of tortillas is, to be honest, enticing). Sorry Real Mom and Dad; someday you, too, will have an opportunity to create the same awkwardness.

After reprising World War Whatever at every opportunity for the last week, San Pedro seems to be returning to normal. Who knows, maybe the town just ran out of fireworks; either way, the barking of feral packs has returned as my nightly sleep soundtrack. Families are filtering back to the city, packing buses every hour. Meat will soon again be a mealtime rarity, the festive chilera replaced by simpler green chili and cilantro concoctions. Dessert disappeared with the final crumbs of panes de zanahoria y banano and pay de piña. Midnight tamale feasts have been relegated to late-night craving-stoking memory.

Without my friends Adam and Ricardo, who departed just short of el Año Nuevo, I passed the year's end marathon of reveling admiring drunks zombie-shuffling through the streets or, in my favorite position, facedown on concrete, fresh piss straining their pants and darkening the dusty cobblestones crotch-level, discoloration streaming down-gradient.

How to Clean Everything (out of your intestines by introducing worms)

This morning at my Spanish School I scooped a fallen orange from the grass, shoving it in my pocket for an after-lunch snack. >The fruit's exterior was almost flawless, a few hints of green at the gnarled pole where the orange disconnected from its tree swirled into the predominant orange hue. A sticky mist sprayed as my fingernails penetrated through and peeled back the skin, fat orange droplets spattering on the concrete beneath my feet. My fingers detected a soft spot on one side of my prize, so I halved the orange and first devoured, section by section, the unblemished portion.

Delighted, with sticky juice-tracks meandering from the corners of my mouth down my chin, as always concerned by the perceived lack of vitamins in my diet, I chomped into the half deemed less appealing. My foray into the rotted area proved fruitful, but a quick examination of the newly tooth-torn cavity in the hunk hemorrhaging juice into my palm revealed a teeming mass of squirmy white worms, with little black freckles for faces, burrowing throughout. Immediately I emptied the contents of my mouth into my hand, but whether I'd first swallowed or anything had wriggled down my throat are mysteries I'm attempting not to ponder.

This is a regular Slither scenario...without the comedy.

I can't believe I'm writing this: There's a good chance I might have ingested any number of maggots or whatever kind of goddamnfuckingawful worm colonizes oranges. I'm left convinced nothing is sufficiently offensive to make me throw up, the probability to having swallowed worms insufficient even to induce nausea. And because the trade secrets of bulimiacs yet confound me, I can do nothing but wait to see what interesting illness arises or parasitic invasion manifests in my digestive tract.

Guess I'll be watching the toilet to see if it turns into a fishbowl.

Student-Teacher Conduct

Haunted by a lingering American lingering perspective, it's cien por ciento awesome crushing on my spanish teacher. Now of age, the chase retains a deliciously illicit feel without the impending prison term and pervert reputation that I'm convinced deterred various vixen teachers from succumbing to my schoolboy charms. (And I'm not referencing their miraculous supression of the urge to lean down and pluck with their lips Lucky's stray, spoon-diving made-sticky-by-milk-saturation marshmallows and grainy stars that adorned my face and clothes each morning.)

Christmas Eve, Noche Buena in Guatemala, I accompanied Mildred to her Evangelical Church, unaware earplugs are a requisite accessory. I staggered out two hours later, shellshocked, and deafened after an aural assault perpetrated by a handful of musicians flailing without regard to time or rhythm -- as if names were drawn and instruments assigned as the congregation arrived. I think I understand why so many people in the audience were crying.

But the churchgoers were exceedingly friendly, anxious to greet me, and the kid-carried tunes were cute and hilarious, the youngest performers standing at ankle's-height, picking their noses and yawning, contorting their bodies and faces, oblivious to their on-stage responsibilities.

Afterward I passed time juggling homecalls, stuffing three dinners into three hours, concluding with the traditional midnight tamale feast with my suddenly swollen host family, Melida having returned from la ciudad with extended family in tow. When the clock struck midnight I occupied high ground, overlooking San Pedro with an unobscured view of the other pueblos across and around Lago de Atitlàn. Armageddon was gorgeous, rockets launching from every alleyway and rooftop citywide, exploding rainbows of color casting shimmering sprinkles across the water, like the Mayan Gods were skipping rocks with giant, luminescent Skittles. Belts of firecrackers machine-gunned incessantly, which coupled with the heavier booms thundering down built a wall of war so uniform the cacaphony coalesced into it's own form of screaming silence.

By three AM the town was quiet again, the streets littered with exploded confetti and blackened sparklers, a breath of sulfer hanging in the air, the odd drunk veering through the alleyways, mumbling to himself as he lurched from wall-to-wall, confounding stoop-sitting couples with unintelligible gestures and monologues. One special drunk, who moved with the fluidity of an animation missing 90% of its frames, alternated between dancing with lampposts, arguing with an unoccupied car, and patrolling the strip of cobblestone in front of Mildred's home, admonishing us with a finger to his lips and whispers.

Christmas Day was low key, almost like any other day but gathered with family. A town-attended convite in the central cancha de basquetbol lasted the afternoon, throngs of Pedranos ringing the court, licking ice cream cones purchased from the many vendors pushing three-wheeled wooden iceboxes, wheelbarrows fashioned into coolers, the jingling belss signaling rushes of open palms stretched up and out every parent's pockets. Lines of dancers costumed as random stars of American cinema and world history (including two of the Nutty Professor, one Batman and one Catwoman) dipped and swiveled through choreographed routines, and every fifteen minutes another drunk would stumble into the middle, a mess of incoordination weaving about until the police could escort him away.

Bkicjs (I was trying to type something else and missed the keys. This title seems somehow more appropriate.)

Fine as wine, I'm aged a quarter century. To celebrate, I've buzzed my hair back to 1/4 inch, paying an outrageous Q$25 (US$3.50) for the 5-minute shearing, but at least I'm free of the fledgling mullet that always sprouts as my hair grows thicker and longer, the only consistency as my headtop shrub blooms with cowlicks and curls.

Transportion in San Pedro has improved significantly since I arrived in October, steady construction transforming the rainy season's rocky-river-roads to level cement pathways. With the road running in front of Mama Meli's house recently reopened, the town has inherited unexpected gifts: Free Speedbum(p)s! Specifically, the unconscious alcoholics, splayed across the road just down the hill from the church, in front of El Rinconcito.

Last Friday Ricardo and I trekked the lakeshore, skirting water, scaling rocks and mounds of tide-deposited basura, working around obstacles from crops to cows, on the way to San Marcos La Laguna. We strayed from the road after warnings from numerous Chapins that we, tall, pasty extranjeros, are walking targets for the machete-wielding ladrones in less foreigner-friendly San Pablo La Laguna.

Closer to San Marcos, the lakeside is suddenly peppered with massive estates resting a half football-field's length back from the shore in perfectly maintained, flower-, tree- and fountain-filled yards. These foreigner spectacles are offensive, flaunting wealth greater than neighboring townships possess collectively, and these private residences have hogged the beachfront, rendering Atitlàn almost inaccessible to actual Atitlànians.

Worst of all, the white invaders are hippies of the fruitiest sort. San Marcos is a town populated by dreadlocked backpackers practicing every sort of "art" and "technique" except basic hygiene. Alternative practices run the gamut of "seriously, you're an idiot" from spirituality-on-superhippy-steroids yoga to ESP. We chatted up a space cadet couple who were renting a room in their lakeside castle a kilometer shy of San Marcos, interrupting their -- and this is not a joke -- "Cranial Mayan Massage" session when we appeared. "We practice alternative sciences," they droned. "I do a little mind reading," informed the woman, amongst a litany of other "sciences" I can't remember for the vomit and laughter I was struggling to surpress. We agreed to wait fifteen minutes for the "cranial massage" to end so the guy could accompany us to town, but for all their practiced powers the pair was unable to detect our deception. The moment the resumed chanting and rubbing we dipped, impervious to the "ancient energy fields" running directly from the mountain through the property into the lake, tractor beams to filthy rich foreign loonies.

We caught the last daily lancha back to San Pedro, and I hummed Death By Stereo's "Hippie Holocaust" as we skipped across the choppy waters. After dinner Ricardo and I enjoyed a light cocktail of mota and rum, then embarked on an entirely stereotypical mota-affected evening. Our every lazy movement was dictated by munchies, intentions frequently derailed by hysterical fits of laughter, as we proceeded to patrol back-and-forth the town central strip, zombie-stalking snacks, making laps to re-up the moment we'd licked the last crumbs or flecks of icing from our hands. In between we were accosted by an unusually hilarious array of english-butchering drunks and a guy -- who may not have been especially poor -- who asked for (and received) bites of our food. How I wish I'd been eating carrots instead of coconut cake...

A mean Patìn

I almost killed a precious child on Saturday. I was standing on Mildred's doorstep when I rocked back into the street, taking a small step down and catching just enough of a sprinting doll's toe with my heel. She entered a flight parallel with the ground, challenging Guatemalan Olympic long-jump records before she skidded across stones on her forearms and face. I felt awful, especially because I'm useless at comforting kids in Spanish. A teen sitting on a moto who'd witnessed the collision transpire grinned at me.

Sunday's lunch was typical San Pedronian fare called Patìn. A hunk of flank steak marinated and cooked in a tomato salsa with lime juice was served beside a multiple avocados-worth sized mound of perfectly mashed and seasoned guacamole. Tortillas and tomalitos served hot from the comal were provided as modes of plate-to-mouth transport for mountains of the lumpy green, onion-studded condiment-turned-side. Patìn is pushing rellenitos for el mejor comida tipica.

Completing a delicious day, I spanked out my first few tortillas, several using less common but more durable (and thus more resistant to beginners' blunders) blue corn masa. For dessert, school-and-housemate Ricardo baked a killer, cumpleaños commemorating strawberry-peach cobbler. The suspense: will my birthday strike unexpectedly again?

Change

Why is making change in Guatemala so difficult? I've handed business as little as Q$10 for a Q$3 or Q$5 purchase and put them in panic mode, some daughter summarily summoned from the next room to skamper across town begging other businesses to break my bill. Q$10, mind you, is less than US$1.50. No less than half the time, San Pedro La Laguna's bank is unable to change any bills, suggesting people holding the essentially-unspendable-unless-you-want-to-buy-the-whole-store Q$50 and Q$100 denominations spit out by the ATM "try again later." The stories I've heard about severe cash shortages sweeping Guatemala in years past were, I believe, not exaggerated.

Saturday I was lucky to find a tienda that could change Q$50, picking up four packages of then ungobbled galletas for Q$8.50. Chiky-brand variations cobertura de fresa, de vainilla, and the new Chiky Blak, galletas con sabor y cobertura de chocolate, were all tasty and standard, but the star of my in-room cookie fest was Arcoiris. Each of the eight cookies had a square butter cookie base, topped with four colored mini-marshmallow humps, alternated so as to be diagonally consistent punk and white, edges slightly melted together to form a unified marshmallow mound. Not only were the marshmallow puffs topped with coconut flakes and colorful sugary specks, but inside the foil package was a fast food condiment squeezepack filled with chemical-red fresa-flavored goo, to be smeared or dotted atop the cookies. A perfect interactive cookie experience for those wowed by processed sugars. A dream come true.

At night, speaking of dreams, I dreamed about moonpies.

Birthday surprise!

Saturday morning while running my usual footpath out of San Pedro toward a tiny coffee farm -- its stone huts and giant concrete clearing for trying harvested beans alien interruptions in the volcano-base jungle growth, the jagged path an imperceptible scar of humanity cutting through the vegetation, winding the hills above the shores of Lake Atitlàn -- I passed a peculiar sight: a middle-aged man, whom I've passed before and whose vacant eyes never register our encounters, was trudging though the dirt toward town. A taut string ran from his right hand, his dangling right arm trailing his body ever so slightly, leading a handfashioned wooden dumptruck loaded with mandarin sized rocks. Five hours later we crossed paths again in San Pedro's center, the dumptruck still in town, clattering over cobblestones, having emptied its load, the man's eyes downcast as he muttered to himself (perhaps about the presumably incredibly slow progress of whatever construction project he's undertaken). Where he materializes from and where he goes I've yet to discover, but he was wearing clothes so I assume somebody is looking out for him. (Or maybe the listless wanderer was just shellshocked from the daily and nightly firework bombardments that keep Guatemalan skies filled with flashes, pops and booms reverberating through alleyways. Usually I can't identify any particular occasion, so maybe some Guatemalans just enjoy preserving, reliving their war-marred recent history?)

Midafternoon I was summoned downstairs for a birthday cake five days early, Mama Meli having mistaken the dates. Which is better, actually, because she'll be in the capital on the 18th, so I got to hug and thank her in person. The carrot cake -- unfrosted yellow cake interspersed with carrot shavings -- reminds me that even though I'm having at least as much fun as (The return of Choose Your Own Analogy!):

a) ...kids (before bedtime) at Michael Jackson's Neverland Ranch...

b) ...the pleasantly mentally handicapped for whom smiling and giggling are as involuntary as heartbeats...

...there's no substitute for Mom's homecooking (and Dad's twice-yearly homemade pizzas) and my family and friends freezing back home.

(Keys To) The Other Bible Belt

Another day, another pastry orgy in my dreams. Through three months of traveling, I can recollect two dreams, both featuring casts of pies and cakes. Not Heidi Klum. Not Heidi Klum covered in pies and cakes. Just spreads of delights baked with love by aproned geriatrics.

Won't it be cute if I end up dating an Evangelical Church youth group president? Firmly infatuated with my Spanish instructor, my flirtations reciprocated in full, I'm now a devotee to Chapin courtship, passing evenings posted in the doorstep of my maestra's house, a doubletake worthy white oddity for the gawking and whispering enjoyment of passerbys.

This is territory with obstacles more daunting than any supposed divine wrath. Not a man of bastante patience, Evangelical principles demand a man of demasiado patience. Some cravings even pastries can't cure.

Ah, well, if the biggest stress in my life is wavering between practicing my corruptions on a 22-year-old angel or entertaining eager streetstalkers on the short path to motherhood, that's a damn fine life.

Don't worry, Mom, no "surprises" for Christmas.

Mas Hermanitos

Rarely do I remember dreams -- twenty times a year being a generous estimate -- but yesterday I awoke from a midafternoon slumber with images indelible: In my slumber I was attending some sort of college reunion attended by nobody I knew, in a long, L-shaped arcade framed by food stands. The meal itself of no consequence, at some point while I was cleaning my plate the hall magically transformed into a dessert bazaar, walking space sandwiched between stands serving plated portions of every sort of pie and cake and orgasmic imaginary hybrids of pie and cake, pie crusts filled with cake, covered in neon-colored icings. Ice creams and cookies, brownies and lemon bars begged to be piled together in sink-sized bowls.

When I awoke I was still in feverish, a rude porcupine rambling about my stomach, my mattress an oversized sweatsponge, sheets and blankets wrapped around my shivering body like coverall sweatbands. My return to San Pedro La Laguna, until this morning, was tortured, night and day tossing in bed, unable to purge whatever demon plagued me (in what, although contrary to my beliefs, may be a divine reprimand for my return to false pre-meal prayer, my thrice daily ode to the Carolina Panthers and Davidson Wildcats). Yesterday I feigned focus in my four hour return to Spanish class, hoping the Ciproflaxacin would keep calm my screaming bowels until noon, pushing tortilla-tinted burps out the side of my mouth, away from Mildred.

I know my perception of Guatemala City is skewed for having passed my stay with the monied few, chauffeured about -- and thus kept clear of public buses which, statistically speaking, are as likely to lead you into armed robbery as they are your intended destination -- pampered as though wholly incapable, but I loved to contrast to San Pedro. Major cities are fascinating beasts, hubs where gang-controlled corridors of cracked concrete and graffiti and razor wire border zones of plush highrises and residences -- and the requisite razorwire!

December 7th, national event Quema Del Diablo is another Chapin excuse for drinking, fireworks and burning trash in the streets -- much like sports celebrations in West Virginia. At 6pm our party of adults and kids -- gathered at Ana Maria's for an unrelated fundraiser - congregated in the streets where several paper-machè devils strapped with belts of firecrackers were torched, flaming and exploding until only crude wire frames remained, kids running wild with sparklers, bottle rockets launching in quick procession. This, as was transpiring on our block, transpired across Guatemala, and Roberto assured my with considerably more mayhem (and excitement) when perpetrated by the less safety conscious.

Ana Maria and Roberto were gracious and accomodating beyond reason. Juanita cooked up delicious eats and her son, Hector, was quick to interrupt me and correct my Spanish pronunciation, help most adults eschew giving for fear I'll never complete a thought. Groundskeeper Simon's stable of loving youngsters (Neddy, Karin, Esmeralda, y Liliana, names as interpreted through conversation), plus Ana Miriam, the cute and sarcastic daughter of one of Ana Maria's school's working staff, are my newest adopted hermanitos. The days of escondidos, futbol, and tickling (which is great fun until a gang of kids incapacitate you with their fingers) flew past. If only I hadn't been so well sheltered from the harsher realities of Guate, perhaps I could've been mugged of my passport and thus required to linger longer, in proximity to the US Embassy. As it is, I promised my hermanitos I will return, and that was before Monday morning when I departed, Esmeralda, Neddy and Karin peeking from behind a window near the stairs descending into the carport for who knows how long, waiting only for my appearance to hug me goodbye. Adorably, Karin gifted me a Spongebob action figure, a gesture of kindness unquantifiable. From a family of less means than I'll ever know, from children who can't afford to simply replace toys, a gift I certainly don't need but with which I'll never part.

"Does it say slavery?"

Aruba’s first world finery is two worlds ahead of Central American anything, the disparate locales linked only by gargantuan tropical fruit, each home to freakish papayas larger than any infant not scion of Shaq. And, I guess, relaxed standards of public toileting: exploring Aruba we passed a cute, naked three-year-old girl, standing on the side of the road, hands on her hips, pelvis thrust slightly forward, almost sassily, like a professional model at practice, at first glance presumably peeing, actually taking a standing dump.

Aruba is almost perfect: sweaty weather and turquoise seas; unlimited drink-and-eat access spanning a ½ mile of beachfront resorts (“Yes, I need six White Russians made with Stoli, and fourteen of the seared tuna appetizer. Make it snappy and you might land two Washingtons.”), including dietary essentials lacking in my Central American diet: vegetables, protein, and soft-serve ice cream; big screen TVs with multiple sports and movie channels; and my beloved parents and brother, aunt, uncle, cousins and a boyfriend. The only imperfection in the fantasy for our trio of single twenty-somethings is that were not twelve, the Divi All Inclusive crawling with families toting preteen princesses but nothing legal for us, even by possibly permissive Aruban standards. We’ll see how many days and drinks it takes to transform sun-wrinkled, pudge-bellied tourist moms into eye candy.

The last few days in Guatemala leading up to Aruba saw changes of scenery. There was a shuttle bus connection to Chichicastenango’s sprawling Sunday market, a massive, tourist marketed maze of vendors selling some essentials and many more lengths of intricately patterned fabrics and traditional clothing, bags and crafts, all fashioned by impoverished hands and all accompanied by the same shouted encouragement to purchase (which is the official phrase of Chichi and, traditionally, the first phrase spoken by infants): “¡Buen precio!” The competition between vendors and the necessity of feeding one’s family make Chichi a bizarro eBay, sellers undercutting each other's already low prices to win access to tourist wallets. The ride to Chichi also featured an incomprehensibly heavily guarded checkpoint, randomly placed on a mountain road, at which an armed man among many threw open the sliding van door, bent at the waist until his head was even and parallel with the floor, and demanded, while his eyes scanned beneath seats, “Algunas frutas?” Not drugs. Not weapons. Not children we might be smuggling for international slave trade. Grapes. And if you don’t give 'em up, you’re gonna need ‘em to plug the holes in your chest.

After Chichi I spent a final night in San Pedro La Laguna, enjoying as usual the variety of death metal shirts international aid services have distributed in hyper-religious countries, leaving legions of young men oblivious to the irony of their satanic Sunday’s finest. And after a brutal four-hour chicken bus ride across unpaved Guatemala highway and mountain passes -- the driver testing every bolt in the bus’ construction by hitting every meteoric-crater-sized “pothole,” enduring a lengthy sermon from one of the all-too-common obviously mentally tortured travel-preachers, always exhibiting at least one serious physical defect as well, who suddenly stand up in the middle of a packed bus, holding a bible in one hand and an overhead rail in the other, arching their backs and embarking on an animated screech fest, “Jeeeeeeeeesus Chriiiiiisto!” – I made it to Guate, La Capital, where, again, thanks to international aid, it’s not unlikely to be robbed by a thug wearing a neon-colored Looney Tunes hoodie.

For a family friend’s thoughtfulness and her friends in Guatemala, I landed in the generous care of Guatemalan elite, living in an every way modern and first world palace just outside the city. My bags were carried and my meals prepared by the live-in family of house- and groundskeepers. The huge garden- and tree-filled property is surrounded by a military-grade brick wall topped with razor wire, five or six massive, trained attack dogs prowling the premises at night. In order to keep my throat from resembling a platter of pulled pork bathed in tomato sauce, I wasn’t allowed out of the house once the roaming killers were released for the night.

La Capital is unlike rural Guatemala, it is modern, marred by US fastfood, marked with malls and at least one Hooters too, and the people, on average, stand taller than my waist. I indulged in Guatemala’s most popular street eats, pollo frito y papas fritas, at the ubiquitous Pollo Campero chain. And I drained a few hot mugs of homemade Atol de Elote, a delicacy with the color and consistency of snot from a winter cold, spotted with bits of corn kernels, a liquid version of Pan de Elote. I toured the city with a family friend, Eddy, and enjoyed sights like El Mapa en Relieve, Plaza Mayor de la Constitución, a museum documenting and displaying historical artifacts and another tracing the history and evolution of ropa tìpica.

Then I flew away, but not before tormenting everyone in my smell radius at the Guatemala City airport’s security checkpoint (and again in Miami) when I had to remove my one well-past-well-used pair of all-purpose sneakers. (For the benefit of everyone I have encountered since, I succeeded in washing my well-exercised, sweat-stiffened wardrobe here in Aruba, the first wash in a month.) Family fun commenced immediately upon reuniting in Miami International Airport, the extended family waiting for the same connection to Aruba. As reports were breaking about the outbreak of coordinated and deadly terrorist attacks in India, CNN was reporting the rather unnewsworthy in a bottom-scrolling text bar: “President Elect Obama Condemns the Attacks.” Kerry, Tony, and I exchanged “No shit” glances and discussed headlines that would actually be newsworthy: “President Elect Obama claims responsibility for the terrorist attacks!”

On the flight to Aruba, while we were filling out our immigration cards, my cousin Tony and I wondered aloud where the “Slavery” checkbox was located in the “Purpose of Visit” section, our stated purpose finding a Venezuelan slave trader interested in purchasing my brother. My cousin Lindsey, in one of those classic lapses of thought everyone -- save the blessed mute -- experiences from time to time to the delight of anyone in earshot, asked, quite concerned, “Does it say slavery?”

Since landing, we’ve enjoyed sun, sand, snorkeling, and, for the three young-lads searching for an elixir to induce hallucinations halving or quartering the age of drunk tourist moms and grandmas dance-lurching as nightly entertainment, a horrible day-after blackout, for me a Top 20 all-time hangover that even endless bowls of soft serve burying mounds of chocolate cake couldn’t cure. As reported by my aunt and uncle with whom I reportedly shared a lost conversation -- while awaiting a pizza and panini I’d ordered in a fit of B.A.C. overwhelming consideration for my stomach’s next-morning wellbeing -- a few minutes into our exchange I suddenly raised a hand to my lips and began poking and tracing the flesh, slurring, “Are my lips moving? Can you understand the words that are coming out of my mouth?” Meanwhile Kerry milled around, holding two drink cups in one hand, one upright and filled, the other parallel to the ground, empty. All this after an impressive day of productivity and exercise and avoiding the bar; I'd remained alcohol-free and vegetable-full until 8pm, yet I was unconscious and bloated on greasy junkfood by midnight. I blame it on SoCo and lime. I'd ordered two Soco and limes and two White Russians for me and Kerry to share, and when the bartender asked if we'd like ice in our SoCo and limes, of course I replied no. Who puts an ice cube in a shot glass? When he returned with two cups filled with warm SoCo and a wedge of lime hanging from each rim, I realized I'd missed obvious clues.

I’ve only been quick and sober enough to document a few of the hilarious conversations and exchanges in my omnipresent pocket notepad, like my mom’s description of the daily lives of scallops: “They go around clappin’ their clams.” And her imaginative extension of logic, concerned because my father hadn’t informed the credit card company he would be vacationing in Aruba: “They’re going to call the house (to verify a foreign purchase), nobody will answer, and they’re gonna think we’re stabbed.” Or when Tony and I argued age-appropriateness in the pursuit of females, Tony claiming he, being twenty-one and three years younger than me, is subject to different basements and ceilings in target ages; I countered with typical sleaze, adamant we share the same basement and ceiling ages, coining my new mantra in the process: “Eighteen to the grave.”

Como siempre, time with my family is absolutely priceless. Now back to Guatemala, enjoying my occupational travel and Spanish language acquisition, counting the days until the next reunion.

Leaving the Lake Life (for a moment)

I'm finally preparing to leave my school, host family, and beautiful and impoverished town and home of more than one month, San Pedro La Laguna, Guatemala. If Chocobananos will be more difficult to hunt, at least I can end the premeal ritual of blaspheming deities whose existence I deny anyway. And I can avoid the occasional, always uncomfortable hours of post-dinner preaching, exponentially expanded explications of three words I can summarize in a breath, "Todo es dios."

I'm going to log a few more checkmarks in the tourist ledger before I arrive in Aruba next Wednesday: Chichicastenango and Guate, la Capital, where, even if I get robbed six times in two days like the statistics predict, I'm still going to have a Q$50 bill stashed beneath my insole with which to indulge the gods of high metabolism at Patsy, a chain of Guatemalan pastelerias.

My spanish is progressing faster than the digested tortilla-paste tube through my intestines, which means that I can now name a few more doughy foods I've tasted and then rub my belly and nod my head enthusiastically, repeating "muy" for upwards of a minute and then concluding the imposter oraciòn with "rica." If I'm feeling especially authentic I might skip the foreplay and just drop "¡Calidad!" Speaking of, the most recent additions to my international foods digest include chuchitos: balls of masa, oil, and salt, the same mixture from which tortillas are spanked into shape, filled with a spiced tomato salsa and chunks of chicken; and extra-crisped tortillas filled with a simple black bean paste, almost a Salvadoran papusa. Simple and exquisite.

And, after a few confidence-crushing attempted-conversations marred by sudden onset inability to form, much less string, syllables, the last few days have been promising. I've been visiting my 22-year-old teacher in the popular 'Teco night hour pastime of doorstep conversation; and, no, I haven't changed instructors in my four weeks of study, even though I know exposure to different speech patterns and teaching methods would prove beneficial. I've been playfully conversing with groups of inquisitive youngsters all over town, in particular a gang of boys who ask for endless vocabulary translations from spanish to english and a group of shy, smiling maybe 10-year-old girls from whom I buy grilled bananas sprinkled with sugar or homemade Chocobananos from their store-and-homefront alleyway-dustyard arrangement of closed-lidded pots clouded with steam and a sixpack sized cooler. Like the Guatemalan equivalent of American kids with lemonade stands. Except that lots of adults run juice stands in Central America, but fresh squeezed as opposed to lazy American kids and their from concentrate jugs.

The teens and adult-aged hoopers know me, most by name, and I've met a few of their sisters, who may or may not me married and/or with children. I caught a ¡Que guapo! from two cute and of-age 'Tecas while walking down on of my regular alleys the other night. I've also earned smiles and waves and playful accusations ("¡Eres mentiroso!") from the Sarita (Guatemala's Ben & Jerry's) ice cream attendant.

When I return to the third world from Arubian excess, I expect I'll make my way back to San Pedro shortly, maybe after a week of studies in Xela (Quetzaltenango), to study here at least a few more weeks, maybe longer. But I do, I promise, intend to keep traveling. Don't fret friends and family and cousins who plan to visit. I'm responsible enough to make sure a combination of cuties and ¡Que guapo!s and Quezalteca Especial don't strand me in San Pedro La Laguna with a Surprise! infant-anchor. Anyway, let's be honest: I can't settle in a town without the daily waking assurance of an available array of fruity goo-filled delicacies and icing-stacked layer cakes.

Whatta pisser

Where it has ended up costing me $850 in legal fees to have a UIP (Urinating in Public) citation expunged from my permanent record -- thanks to an alert crime fighting police duo working latenight undercover in an empty Charlotte parking garage last spring, and who, ignoring my cordial compliance with their every inquiry and demand, indulged in the powertrip of constantly reminding me, "We can take you to jail right now. Wanna go to jail for the night?" -- in Guatemala any place a man can plant two feet is a public toilet. Everyday I see the phallically-endowed suddenly veer from their paths and, shielded by turned backs, relieve themselves roadside. And yet half the population radiates scorn should I run past barechested.

Keeping with reminiscence, I just had a classic American moment. Not quite eating an entire Trader Joe's frozen carrot cake in one sitting, and certainly not a repeat of representative feat of good ol' American gluttony nonetheless: upping my daily consumption of pastel de coco to two hefty, indeed already Texas-sized, portions. The type of $8 slices dates share after a nice steakhouse dinner, hefted into my to-go back for Q$6 each. It's a heavy cake, literally, with a dense cake portion and sufficient frosting, but not the inch-thick layers necessary to satiate a frosting-fiend like me. The solution: eat all the cake from one slice, leaving an L-shaped surface of frosting, then tip the untouched slice on its side and layer the extra frosting atop, effectively creating a side-and-top iced slice of bliss, a triangularly-cut piece that is frosted like a corner chunk from a rectangular cake. Or, another option I haven't tried -- maybe tomorrow -- is draping the lonely layer of icing directly over the icing of the slice still intact, like an icing-armor upgrade or a vanilla-frosting cape.

Taming the Lion

I have only to endure one additional five day deluge of mind-cluttering conjugations until I can catch a bus to Chichicastenango for the city-sized Sunday market, then waste a few days in Guate dodging armed robberies and seeking out the Patsy chain of pastelerias with tiered cakes beore I jet to Aruba for a mini family reunion, trading third-world struggles for first-world excess. Resort life: prepaid drinks and eats during a week of beachside splendor. I'm salivating for cakes sliced into American proportions with blizzards' accumulations of fresh white frosting, longing for menus where "steak" signifies a hunk of meat thicker and tenderer than a t-shirt. Stiff mixed drinks and hoppy imported beers will feed a steady stream of clear urine belying the dehydration I'm suffering in the sun.

I doubt I'll be able to find rellenitos though, my new favorite Guatemalteco snack, an alternative take on the popular plates of planatos fritos con frijoles y crema: rellenitos are platanos mashed and then reformed around a thick paste of sweetened refried black beans, then fried until crispy and golden brown. The final product resembles a fresh foods Twinkie summoned from Dimension Unprocessed and Unchemically Altered (which is nearby but securely separate from Dimension X, so there's no risk that preparing rellenitos will transform your frying pan into a portal for Armageddon, General Trag, Bebop and Rocksteady not a threat to burst into your kitchen in a spray of spattering oil).

Until Aruba I expect my vision will be blurred and judgement impaired by the pursuit of a woman: the traditionally garbed bottlefront sketch adorning every bottle of Quezalteca Especial. Friday night she led me and two fellow gringos into the neighborhood den of seediness: La Cantina el Rinconcito. Mildred, my maestra, had advised against our patronage, suggesting instead the nearby La Estrella, reasoning, "It's safer and cleaner. La Estrella doesn't allow borrachos to snort coke off its tables." But already swigs deep into the Quezalteca, carrying a half can of Cola to chase gulps from my next 1/8th liter bottle, el Rinconcito was a fated adventure.

When we entered three or four drunks were slouched against walls, balancing within a lurch of the bars from behind which are dispensed bottles of beer and liquor. Not drinks. Bottles. We ordered our bottles and before I could clear a chug a diminutive man who was watching at least three of me sidled up and said something about Jean Claude Van-Damme, then Chuck Norris. As usual in San Pedro, the bums speak the best English, always enough to ask you for a drink or a few Quetzales and recite the names -- accompanied by the requisite handchops and halfkicks -- of the butchers of acting and bad guys who dominate American superaction cinema.

After I passed the bottles of liquor and Coke to Devin, friend and fellow student from Denver, a blue t-shirt clad man stumbled into the room, spouting nonsense as his eyes pinballed about his sockets, his hands and arms disassociated entities rising and falling, waving and gesturing without any discernable pattern or motive. His fingernails appeared to have been cultivated for years, his fingers permanently mangled, like crooked and bentback remnants from a hobby of slamming them in heavy wooden doors. Afraid anything could rile the man further, his finger-and-fist assaults on his own cranium increasingly violent by the second, I turned around to talk to the bartender, hoping his eyes might indicate were I about to be impaled by knife or fingernail.

My drunken spanish exhausted itself after the usual introductory probing and I turned back to the floor, where the maniac was removing his shirt, staring down my other friend, Florian. Suddenly he turned to me, dropped his shirt, raised both hands with fingers fanned and fashioned into crude claws and began roaring like a lion. With a hybrid gulp-laugh I stepped past the drunk and exited the bar, as did Devin, and shortly Florian too, followed by the manimal still babbling ominous nonsense in Florian's face. The beast kicked at nothing like Bruce Lee in super slo-mo, much to the delight of the short kung fu fanatic who'd likewise followed the action into the street. The bartender ever materialized from behind his barricade, poking his head out of a doorway into the street to motion that we should leave, alternately pointing toward the raving Guatemalteco and aiming the same finger at his own temple, air-tracing invisible cones in the swift rotations thereof.

And we walked to La Estrella, where an extra Quetzal per bottle is the price of safety.

Fresca como una lechuga

The house has emptied out, Mama Claudia popping in from Guate to recollect her rascals, Melida and Mariori. When Mingito and Jacueline are at home with Ana Maria and I'm lounging in the hammock enraptured by Cormac McCarthy's Border Trilogy, the only sound to break the silence is the soft slapping of palm on dough, the gentle spanking of barely resistant fistfuls of dough into flat, round tortillas to be fired on the comal the ritual premeal toll.

It's when we sit down for meals that -- if I were a God-fearing man -- I'd be concerned about my soul. As it is, I'm content to respect the religious beliefs of friends and family and enemies too while reserving my Sunday mornings for worship at the waffle iron, especially when I can get my hands sticky with authentic Vermont maple syrup. Guatemala is like home in that Bible-beltish kind of way. Which is fine and well, except I'm uncomfortable attempting to explain my lack of religion to a wonderful and devout family that prays before every meal. I think admitting "Soy ateo," would have me ostracized faster than a pedophile at preschool. (If that analogy is too much to stomach, substitute "Christian Laettner at a 1992 UK basketball reunion.")

As it is, I've adopted Davidson College Presbyterian Church as my place of worship, because I once entered for a wedding during the proceedings of which God was invoked or mentioned at least. For now I can rely upon my lacking language skills to circumvent discussion of the finer points of Presbyterianism, of which the only components I'm certain are the Bible and God. I've found myself engaged in two animated ¡Gracias a Dios! for all that has and will pass conversations, compelled to join to the fervent nodding and gesticulating toward the heavens. And I bow my head premeal and mumble thanks for Obama and the success of various sports teams and the wonder of peristalsis, continuing to thwart my strict diet of bowel cloggers if somewhat irregularly, and sometimes just strings of gibberish, my brand of speaking in tongues.

I'll admit, it feels wrong. But funny too. Like the other day when Melida and Melani decided to click buttons on my iPod and split earbuds. I started them on Smashing Pumpkins, unconcerned they could unwittingly navigate to Project Pat's X-rated glamorizations of Memphis street life, their English vocabularies limited to a short game of point-and-mispronounce-this-facial-feature. When they air-guitared my way, mock headbanging toward whiplash, I was a little startled they had discovered Aborted, a Belgian death metal band every bit as brutal and inappropriate for children as the name implies. I redirected them to Mountain Goats, locked the iPod, and found myself spewing sincere thanks to a subject unspecified: that Mama Melida wasn't around to witness the pumping of Satan into her angels' heads, and at eardrum rupturing decibels to completely destroy my credibility as a responsible guardian.

For the Babies

Families in Central America accumulate children like I used to collect baseball cards. Like babymaking is a pastime. This is partly due to religious condemnations of contraception and, I think, to a severe lack of education and foresight which allows the poverty-stricken to ignore the enormous costs of raising children for the money-making potential inherent in every breathing body. But every American adult knows there's only one good reason to birth a barnful of tots: more goodiebags to riad come Halloween! There's no Halloween in Central America, however, and as far as I know cannibalism is still condemned by Christianity, so I'm not witnessing some widespread stockpiling of protein snacks the way disaster-wary Americans load up on canned goods. But maybe the Mayans are taking those 2012 catastrophe predictions a bit more seriously than I'd realized...

Feeling Desserted

Despite the fact that I've compiled a pagelong checklist of foods I intend to gorge myself upon in a self-inflicted binge that might well end like a particular scene in 7even, I'm hardly dissatisfied with Central American dining. I still love the tortillas that appear fresh from the comal the moment the cloth-wrapped and basketed stock tablecenter begins to dwindle. My hostmom's version of tomalitas, essentially surfboard shaped bars of ground maíz moistened, compacted and cooked, are a delicious sometimes substitution, though I do prefer tortillas.

I've enjoyed chuchitos, which are small tamales, thus made from maíz, filled with a tomato-based sauce and chunks of meat wrapped and cooked in corn husks. Paches are phenomenal, papas-based cousins of tamales, thickly mashed potatoes mixed with a tomato sauce then packed around combinations of meats, vegetables, and the mandatory hot chili, then wrapped in giant green leaves and cooked. And dobladas are a deep fried delight, fried tortillas stuffed with, in Mama Meli's kitchen, papas o arroz, then served smothered in shredded cabbage, salsa, and jalepeños.

But Mom's carrot cake, thickly spread with rich cream cheese frosting, Grandma's Thanksgiving strawberry pies, and Aunt Lily's skyscraping Pineapple-Coconut cake, not to mention Landmark Diner's entire dessert case and Cuz Jamie's Michigan blueberry pie, are never far from my mind when I attempt to appease my sweet tooth with snackpacks of cookies.