Waking where?
It´s dark, very dark. The warmth of the bed covers encourages eyes to be closed. Breath against my skin tells me I´m not alone. The noise of a huge mosquito begins to pearce the stillness. An Atari Space Invaders arcade game kicks into life. The metallic sound of a tranny radio tuned badly and turned up far too loud seems a million miles away and yet beside my head. And it´s still dark. Or is it?
Stumbling from the bed (that would easily sleep four people), I make my way gingerly towards the bathroom. The light from my watch casts a faint glow in front of me, as toes scrape against chair legs and a rush of memories of a room in Lima one year ago come and go as quickly as each other.
What time is it? Where am I? Where´s the mosquito gone to? Not wanting to spoil much needed sleep, but unable to resist peeking behind the curtains to see what this new world looks like, I navigate around the bed and find the edge of the curtain. What I see I do not expect.
A city scape bathed in a warm hue of early morning light, with towering volcanoes far off in the distance, their peaks a crimson splash of colour against the concrete and greenery of the city in front of me. The mosquito has gone, but here comes another one – a 737 taking off in front of me, it´s engines whining as it powers off into the sky. The Atari is no longer an arcade game, but a car alarm, while the latest latino hits blurt out from the workman´s radio far below on the street corner. This is Guatemala City at 6.15am, and it looks great.
Too awake now to go back to sleep, and with a thought on adjusting the body clock as quickly as possible, I creep back into bed and whisper “Are you awake?” to a snoozing Em. “Yes, but I´m not getting up yet” comes the reply, and so, unable to resist a quick exploration of the hotel´s rooftop (17 stories high and the highest in the city), I set off with camera to get a few shots of the vista before the smog comes down.
Here the world is already about its business; great hulking school buses (without school kids but ordinary Guatemalans) belch their way along avenues far below; the ubiquitous McDonald´s sign stands guard over yet another parking lot filled with polysterene cartons and wrappers; a bright DHL plane comes sailing down to land on the runway; and this city is surprisingly green, with great trees pushing up towards where I stand, trailed with creeping growth, gigantic flowers and humming birds flitting between them.
Returning with two cups of coffee (as a peace offering), and tales of a roof top jacuzzi, I show Em the pictures and persuade her she should shake off the covers and come to breakfast. The day is young and we´ve got stuff to do, not least find our way to Antigua in the Guatemalan Highlands.
Tags: Guatemala
mihai
December 17th, 2005 at 12:59 pm
Hope you have a great time and enjoy their festivities. xx