3/15- Gillian worked all day so we were on our own in Antigua. I woke up and said, “I want juice!” Maryse said, “I want pain au chocolat!” and we instantly got into a fight about unclear communication. Sorting ourselves out, we agreed to communicate more clearly. Even after four years, we still sometimes get stuck in linguistic difficulties. I’ll blame it on her being raised speaking French, but I’m probably just an insensitive jerk as well. In any case, we got back into a good vibe and went about our day, hopefully with a deeper understanding of ourselves and each other…
Went to the market first, and found a juice stall. On the menu were fresh orange juice and fresh carrot juice. I ordered an orange, and Maryse ordered mixed carrot and orange. For some reason, this provoked total disbelief on the part of the juice ladies. They checked twice that she really wanted it, then made it while all the while casting suspicious glances at us. The juices arrived, and we tried to convince them that Maryse’s mixture was good. They were having none of it. Probably still talking to their friends about the weird gringa who mixed her juices, although I have no idea why the idea was so shocking to them.
The place with the pain au chocolat was closed, but a block later we saw a place that said “Dulces Tipicas” which got Maryse’s attention. She has a bit of a sweet tooth. We bought a selection of odd looking treats at random, and walked to the park to give them a try. They were so incredibly sweet that we couldn’t eat them at all, so Maryse suggested coffee. We got espresso to cut the sweet, and nibbled away on a park bench in the beautiful plaza of Antigua.
Right about then, a crowd gathered around a ranting guy in a revolutionary beret and an Osama bin Laden t-shirt who was staging some sort of demo in front of the government palace. We wandered over, and managed to gather that the protest was against the TLC (Tratamiento Libre Commercial or something similar) the free trade agreement with Guatemala that a lot of people think is going to hurt the poor and especially indigenous groups even more. Well of course it will. Isn’t that what “free trade” is all about? I took pictures, and the guy next to us said he worked in the building, and we could go in and have a look around when the demo petered out, which happened right about then. Apparently, the day before and that day there were major demonstrations in Guatemala City about the same thing, complete with clashes with the cops, but in Antigua it was tranquil.
The majestic double-decker front of the building is rather famous, and we poked around for a bit, took some pictures, and then went back into the square to wander aimlessly in the beautiful and tranquil park.
One of the things we noticed was that the high school boys would sit on park benches sort of draped over each other, hugging, and generally physically close. Not like gay or sexual, just really close and comfortable. You’d never see that in homophobic America, where we barely touch our loved ones, let alone our friends. I like that closeness, and even though it’s not a feature of my culture, I feel like I miss it. It’s nice to touch people.
Couldn’t get a shot of Agua, the famous volcano that towers over Antigua, because of all the smog. Antigua sits in a bowl, which doesn’t help, but it seems like all over Guatemala people just burn trash, including lots of plastic, all the time. Hello, compost, anyone?? The country is beautiful but damn, all the burning garbage is not only unsightly but unhealthy and disgusting. I think someone seriously needs to start a compost education program there. People don’t seem to be putting two and two together to figure out that if everyone burns trash, the air gets really nasty… Seems gratuitous to me.
By the way, the reason that the volcano is called Agua is because at one point its crater lake filled up with water and then the wall of the volcano gave way, totally deluging and destroying Antigua. ¡Agua! Antigua has a history of being destroyed by volcanoes, flooding, earthquakes, etc, which is why the Spanish finally abandoned it as a capital. After hearing all that, I reconsidered my brief flirtation with the idea of living there. It’s just a matter of time before it happens again…
I didn’t get a picture of the volcano, but I did get a picture of the beautiful and rather shockingly sensual main fountain in the plaza. It depicts several nude women holding their breasts; from the right nipple of each gushes forth a stream of water. Hmmm, I thought the old Spanish were Catholic prudes? Pretty titillating fountain, excuse the pun.
Wandered around town a bit more and came to the general conclusion that maps are mostly useless, directions are usually unreliable, service at restaurants is amazingly slow, you must ask for everything and never assume that you will be presented with a bill just because you finished your food an hour ago, and street names are a matter of debate, even among locals. That established, we moved on to a photo exhibition.
I’m sorry I don’t remember the name of the photographer, but when I find it I’ll stick it in here. The exhibition was titled “En la Guerra, Nosotros Perdamos Todos.” It was about the Guatemalan civil war, or uprising, or resistance, depending on how you see it. The bottom line was that a lot of poor people suffered and died trying to live with dignity and without being exploited to death. The photos were stark and deeply moving, frequently featuring themes like families discovering their loved ones in mass graves, or never being able to find them at all. Grim, indeed. Somehow, those people could still smile in the midst of all that… Maryse, sensitive and delicate as she is, cried a bit. She has the voice of an angel, so I asked her to sing a song for the people, for the pictures… She sang “Quand les hommes vivront d’amour” which says, in her words, “What it means is when people will live of love- when mankind will be loving, there will be no more misery, it will be peace on Earth- but we will be dead, my brother.” The song is about 50 years old now. Maybe we’re 50 years closer to that day.
After that heaviness, we moved on to a salsa lesson. Racist as it may be, I must say that whiteboys can’t dance. The dance instructor was so suave, and the crowd of stupid gringos so dorky, that it was fully as embarrassing as I had feared. Maryse looked good, at least when she was dancing on her own, but I do believe I sucked pretty thoroughly. To top it off, there were like twenty people in the tiny studio, so I was sweating like a pig, and everyone was stepping on everyone else. Before engaging in public salsa dancing, I will need some serious remedial instruction.
Went to Casa de Leon to await Gillian, and argued with an Indian American guy (Gandhi, not Sitting Bull) about politics. Again, I maintained that we would somehow muddle through to a better world, and he thought that I was a dreamer. Yeah, total war and environmental holocaust is probably much more realistic than a sane and sustainable future. WTF?? Le monde est fou!
Met up with G and went to the best internet place in town, Connexion, and attempted to burn a disc of photos so I could free up my camera’s memory card. Of course, it took far longer than I thought, and the girls were hungry. The dueña had to burn the disc herself, so we said we’d come back in a while and set out for food. For some reason, Gillian picked Frida’s. Now, Frida was a painter who was in a horrible accident, and if you’re at all hip you know who I’m talking about. I am not at all hip, and the girls couldn’t believe that with all my learning and erudition I’d missed the memo that Frida was “in”. Mea culpa, but that’s the danger of autodidactivism. There are some holes in my education, it is true.
Anyway, we ordered some drinks and a plate of very expensive “Nachos Famosos” to share. Maryse had some minty thing, I had a beer. The nachos arrived, and let me tell you, they were the saddest excuse for a plate of nachos I have ever seen in my life. Not the heaping pile of chips, cheese, and salsa one would expect, but exactly one layer of chips, about fifteen in total, with some cheese. Period. On a 10” plate. Flat. For SIX DOLLARS! Dude, for five bucks at home, I get a pile of nachos at the local bar you’d be hard pressed to finish with two people, full of salsa, guacamole, sour cream… so WTF??? I noticed that the clientele of Frida’s was exclusively gringos, the kind who wear Tommy t-shirts and always talk too loud. The décor was painfully faux-distressed (in Antigua, which is replete with real architectural distress) and I suddenly realized that I was in the midst of a _big lame tourist trap_! I was pissed. The obsequious waiter came by and asked how everything was. I told him that it was terrible- the nachos were very small and very expensive. He smiled, and said something in Spanish about that being the size of the nachos, and walked off! Okay, now I am ready to force feed him his damn nachos, but the women try to calm me down. I try it again with another waiter, making it clear that I am not at all happy, and he repeats the blow-off. I’m adamant about walking out right now and not paying for this insulting pile of crap, but Gillian prevails, and not only pays for the ripoff nachos, but for some deranged reason, insists on leaving a tip. WTF?? A tip is for good service. We got the exact opposite of service. I got in the headwaiter’s face on the way out, and said, loud, “That _sucked shit_ asshole.” He smiled, as he had our American money in his greedy little pocket, which is clearly all he cared about…
Okay, I go to some cheap place and the service sucks, that’s a cultural experience. I go to some scam ripoff and pay _more_ than I would in the US for pretentious food, and I damn well expect US-grade food and service or better. Bottom line, whatever else you do in Antigua, don’t go to Frida’s! Ripping off the legacy of a dead artist to rip off stupid gringos who saw the trendy movie… There is some heavy karma in there, just waiting to pounce.
The women thought I was a total dick, and said we should have just humbly submitted to the ripoff and left. I said that when people take shit, they are not only doing themselves a disservice, but dragging the rest of the world down with them by allowing lame people to perpetuate their scams. Everyone should demand excellence, and everyone should strive to excel. We continued arguing across the square in search of some real food, although I’d pretty much lost my appetite at that point. Turning a corner, we ran into Gillian’s friend Victor. We told him what had happened, and he told me I needed to let go of my negativity, which pissed me off some more. Let go of your own negativity if you want, bro, but my negativity is as much a part of me as my positivity, and I’ve got a lot of both. Furthermore, I plan to always call an ace an ace, a spade a spade, and a ripoff insult masquerading as a pile of nachos…just exactly that. So there. Victor did say, oh yeah, Frida’s is the most expensive and worst place to eat in town- lots of people get sick there. I can see that.
Victor then turned his attention to the ever-alluring Gillian, suggesting that he and she go off together to a bar while Maryse and I retrieved my disc and joined them later, but I was having none of it. I told him that we’d all go get my disc and meet him in a few. Perhaps sensing that this was not the moment to argue with me, he said he’d see us in a bit.
Got the disc and continued the argument with the ladies. I still maintain that refusing to take shit is the way I want to live, and that the world would be a better place if people showed more discernment. Whoever owns Frida’s is making a killing because people have no standards. They said I needed to mellow out. Whatever, we’re probably all right to a degree… I got over it, and calmed down, resolving to denounce Frida’s at every possible opportunity and leave it at that.
Meeting back up with Victor, he led us to the happening spot. Blaring music, no place to sit, yee haw. The previous tension was too much for Maryse, who started crying and had to go out in the hall. My psychic disturbance in the force was mostly to blame, and then the crowd, decibel levels… We reconvened at a quiet bar around the corner, and sat on the sofa with drinks and a veggie pizza on the way.
Both Victor and Gillian commiserated with the sniffling Maryse, Gillian saying that she’d cried every day of her trip down from the States for one reason or another. After much consoling and another minty drink, Maryse regained her composure, and we all settled in for a long talk from Victor about the realities he had experienced living in and running a business in Guatemala.
It wasn’t the most cheerful speech, as Victor’s take on Guatemalan culture was a bit pessimistic, or at least depressing. He said that they had no integrity, would steal from you, their friends, anybody, and that they were all disgustingly abusive towards women, to the point of groping women, or trying to rape them every chance they got. He told several lurid stories, and finished by dismissing “brownie” culture as simply inferior. Then he said that he could tell just by my body language that I basically wouldn’t take shit off of people, (probably true) and that I had to be careful, because it was hard to live in that culture with honor. Why? Because if someone wrongs you or your woman, you’re going to do something about it. And then if, for instance, you kick some guy‘s ass who just grabbed your girlfriend’s ass on the street, you now have a big problem, because that guy is going to get his friends together and at least jump you and beat you up, maybe get a gun and just shoot you next week when nobody’s looking. Very nice.
After this inspiring evening, Maryse and I went off to bed to try to get a couple hours sleep before our 4AM shuttle to Copan.