So How Does This Work, Anyway?

ANTIGUA, Guatemala--Hundreds of people come to Antigua each month to study Spanish. Should you?

I'm biased--I've done this twice and I love it. It might or might not work for you. Obviously, there are plenty of other places to study, but I know only Antigua.

First thing to understand: You're not going to come here for one week and leave fluent, even if you took Spanish in high school. This can be a lot of work. Most people will study for a month or more, and will just end up kicking themselves that they aren't better and smarter than they are, and that they don't have more time. However, there are also people here for a week or two, just learning enough to survive before they launch themselves into a longer trip south. That's fine, too.

Most schools seem to work the same way. You are assigned a teacher and study together one-on-one, for four or more hours per weekday. The content of the classes depends on your level, which can be anywhere from absolute beginner to practically fluent. Studying involves grammar drills, but also a lot of conversation. (There's homework, too.)

You can live with a family, who will provide room, board and more Spanish practice. But you can also live in a hotel, a dorm-like guesthouse or your own apartment. (The last seems to be a common choice among longer-term visitors, or those who are here with spouses and family.) Some people complain that the meals the families serve are stingy--tortillas, beans and maybe some chicken. I guess that happens with some schools, which pay the families miserably. But I have been very lucky. Both times here I have lived with great families that served excellent food. Yes, I have lost appreciable weight, not because I'm being starved, but rather because I'm eating a portion-controlled fruit-and-veggie heavy diet.

The studying style here is called immersion, but just about everyone realizes that true immersion is difficult in Antigua. There are too many other students, not to mention tourists. I've also concluded that if you just study and laze around, you're not forced to use other language muscles, the way you would be if you worked or hung out with local friends. Working in a situation like mine--volunteers at the project generally speak together in English--is not going to improve your adult Spanish vocabulary, either. (Now, your ability to ask a 9-year-old whether she needs help with a jigsaw puzzle--that's going to skyrocket!)

You can pay once a week, in advance. Prices seem ridiculously cheap by North American standards, but they do vary. Spot-checking a few reputable schools gives me prices for room, board and 20 hours of class varying from $170 to $310 per week. If you don't like a house, it's cool to ask to switch. If a school doesn't click with you, you can switch that, too. The guidebooks all say you can just drift into town, visit a couple schools, and pick one. I've never done it that way--I've followed the recommendations of my U.S. Spanish teacher. It has worked for me.

Most students seem to study four hours a day, 8am to noon. That means their afternoons are free for whatever--relaxing, studying, writing, working. Others study for six or seven hours--that leaves almost no brain cells available for other things. (An 8am class start means you are up at 6am, but that's easy in Antigua, because church bells, fireworks and even the occasional rooster seem to observe that schedule.)

Life in a family homestay may be more regimented than you are used to. Meals are at set hours. You develop routines on study times and the like. You're not part of the family, but they do keep an eye on what you're doing (especially with younger students.)

If you are considering this and have specific questions, feel free to ask!

And if you're wondering, the photo above is the devil. He's on display in one Antigua square this week. Next week, he's going to be burned in a much-anticipated ceremony/party. No, I don't understand it either, yet!

Mi Ahijada

SAN GASPAR, Guatemala--The younger, shorter woman in the photo is Aura, my ahijada -- that is, my godchild or sponsored child.

The sponsor system is a common way for nonprofits here and elsewhere to attract contributors. You establish a direct link between the sponsor and the child, who exchange letters, photos and the like. That emotional link helps insure that the sponsor won't stop giving. I'm not a great madrina, or godmother. That is, I don't write a lot of personal letters. But I do keep writing the checks.

Now, no matter what the ads from some charities say, my $2 a day doesn't actually feed Aura or anything like that. It doesn't go directly to her family. Rather, it goes to a fund that pays for things such as her high school scholarship, her school uniform and the salary of the social worker who regularly visits her family. As far as I'm concerned, that's a good thing. It spreads the money out. Also, I don't think a direct cash payment would be the best way to insure that things such as tuition get paid--other priorities would likely come first, like food.

That's because Aura's family has a monthly income of less than $300. And while life is less expensive here than up north, that's not enough for anything that most Americans would consider acceptable.

It's an intact family, with an employed father and a supportive mother. But there are eight kids, which means it is something close to miraculous that all the little ones are actually enrolled in school.

I visited the family for an hour this week. The littlest girls were smiley and shy, speaking in near-whispers, in a way common with Guatemalan girls. The mother was friendly,  gracious and obviously proud of her kids. The house was small, especially with that many little children around. There was a main room that serves as living room, kitchen and dining room. Three bedrooms were curtained off. I know from the social work report that there's electricity and a bathroom with running water. I know from my experience that there's a dirt floor. Oh, and chickens pecking around on that dirt floor, six adults and three chicks, all at various points in the food production process.

It was the first time that I have met Aura, who I have sponsored for four years. She's in high school, an admirable feat here. She's studying for a career in tourism administration--accounting and the like. She's not tiny and cute, like many of the other ahijados affiliated with the project. (OK, maybe she's tiny--compared with me, most Guatemalan women are--and obviously she's cute, but not the way that the six-year-olds are.)

Instead, she is a well-spoken, polite young lady who very soon will be able to help support the rest of her family, and will have a very good chance of breaking the cycle of poverty. I'm proud to have met her.

Getting In Deep

PANAJACHEL, Guatemala--Even now, Lake Atitlan is one of the most spectacular places imaginable.

The big high-altitude lake, tucked under three picture-perfect volcanos, is suffering. There's a huge brownish algae bloom floating on the once-clear water. This impossible-to-ignore development has kicked folks into gear as they begin to debate how to rescue this treasure.

The reason for the degradation of the lake, of course, is human development. Plenty of folks are to blame. The towns ringing the lake have grown without any thought of environmental impact. Both the tourist town of Panajachel and the many smaller indigenous settlements that ring the lake pump raw sewage into the water. People wash their clothes directly in the lake, using phosphate-rich detergents. Untold numbers of small farms produce fertilizer-rich runoff.

For years, the deep lake has absorbed this abuse. But back in 2005, Hurricane Stan added an additional twist by washing plenty of toxic junk into the lake, and more important, severely damaging the water-treatment plant.

Not surprisingly in this country's corrupt system, millions of dollars donated or set aside for environmental improvements have simply disappeared into the mountain air.

My visit this weekend was my third time at the lake. I feared the worst. And indeed, when we were out in the lancha (small boat) that acts as a ferry among the lake towns, we got a good whiff of the ugly brown algae bloom. But from the shores of the lake, it wasn't too horrid. The optimist in me concluded that the lake isn't yet dead, and that possibly the algae bloom could alarm people enough so that they actually do the right things. Like they say here, Ojala que si...

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(Travelers' note: Once you get to Guatemala, it is easy to visit the major tourist attractions such as the lake. There's a surprisingly functional system of tourist minibuses that take you where you  want to go for reasonable prices. I can already hear the hardcore shoestring travelers jumping in to harangue me about how much cheaper and more authentic it is to use the chicken buses. Yes, it is. But, hey, dudes--the tourist shuttle from Antigua to Pana is $25 roundtrip. Your cab fare to and from happy hour back home is more than that.)

These Kids Today!

ANTIGUA, Guatemala--Judging by the little hearts and the smiley faces, the letter was written by a young teenage girl.

It was a slow afternoon in our library at Common Hope, so I was keeping busy by translating a few of the letters that the kids write (in Spanish) to their (generally English-speaking) sponsors. My Spanish is far from fluent, but it's certainly up to the level of translating a letter from a kid, right?

Maybe.


Most of the girl's letter was straightforward--affectionate greetings, grateful thanks and the like. But I was stumbling on a few things, so I asked my colleague, Lynn,  if she could help me a little. She has lived here for nine years, so her Spanish is fluent.


The first mystery was the letter "x," which showed up several times in the middle of sentences. In context, it should have been the word "por," Spanish for "for." But "x?" Lynn puzzled for a few minutes, then pointed out that the "times" sign in Spanish multiplication problems is pronounced as por. That made it easy for me to determine that "xq" meant "porque," or "because."


The next mystery was a scrawl that looked sort of like "100pre." I wondered if it was just some sort of handwriting problem. After a few more minutes, Lynn figured out that one, too. In Spanish, the number 100 is  "cien." Thus "100 (cien) pre" sounds a lot like the word "siempre," or forever. Think about signing your high school yearbook "4ever."


The next one stumped us. "TKM," our young correspondent had written--three times in one letter. We tried different ways of pronouncing it, jumbled the letters, whatever. Nope. Eventually, we turned to Google. (That can be a painfully slow process, so it certainly wasn't our first choice.) That crutch helped us figure it out: "TKM" is teenager-ese for "te quiero mucho." (Quiero is pronounced kee-air-oh.) Again, think of your high school yearbook.


It means "I love you very much."

That's My Final Price!

PASTORES, Guatemala--Sometimes a girl just needs to shop. And as long as we're going to deal in stereotypes here, sometimes a girl needs to buy shoes.

Well, boots.

Last weekend my housemate and I broke free of any gringa-guilt and went shopping in two absolutely fab locales. The first was Pastores, a little town about 20 minutes by chicken bus from Antigua. The main street there is lined with dozens of boot shops.

Make that bootmakers. These boots don't come in by the crate load from China. Rather, men whose families have likely been making boots for generations craft them by hand. You can buy boots off the shelf or custom-made. (What the Brits call bespoke.) The photo at left shows my bootmaker, with a horma, that is, a shoe last, that he is going to use to make me a pair of black leather cowgirl boots with light blue accent stitching. Right now, I'm wearing another pair of his boots, in slouchy brown leather. Each pair will cost me less than $50, and he and I are both happy about it.

The next day, we headed to the town of Chichicastenango, the site of a near-legendary twice-weekly market. It's a few rather dull hours by tourist shuttle bus from Antigua, but so worth it.

After an initial near-compulsory but still fascinating visit to the church of Santo Tomas, where the locals practice a syncretic blend of Catholicism and ancient Mayan religion, we dove into the market. It's alley after alley of indigena craft booths selling fabric, jewelry, handicrafts and more fabric. Again, this stuff isn't from China. The thing about Guatemala is that unlike in the United States, local labor is cheaper than the overseas kind. And in the case of the people who make this country's stunning tela, or cloth, it's a lot more skilled.

Buying anything in Chichi requires 10 or 15 minutes of energetic and somewhat ritualistic bargaining, which is a wondrous test of your ability to think in Spanish numbers. After a few minutes, I get into this completely and am actually able to walk away--for real!!!--if a vendor won't come down enough in price. (My bargain-seeking Polish grandmother would have loved this.)

When we started the day, we had planned a bit of civilized shopping, then maybe a leisurely lunch. But my housemate and I eventually had to face reality. After a little more than three hours, we had to stop buying because our shuttle bus was about to leave. Oh, and because we could no longer carry any additional stuff.

Be It Ever So Humble

CIUDAD VIEJA, Guatemala--Context is important. If you saw one of these houses in the States, it would probably be under a highway overpass.

But here, the senora was simply glowing and said she couldn't find enough words to thank all those who had helped her family to improve their situation.

I tagged along for an afternoon with a Common Hope volunteer brigade that was going to the blessing/celebration of the house they had helped build. These houses are one room, about 12 feet square, with no plumbing and with walls of what seem to be cementitious panels. (They look kinda like drywall, but are more sturdy and weather proof.)

In this case, two of the little houses sit side by side in one walled yard. They will be home for 10 people who used to live in one room. As the senora explained, the adults earned the houses by working 340 hours in jobs such as cleaning and construction.

The walls are important, of course, but it seems to me the roof and floor are even more so. The roof keeps off the rains. The floor is of concrete tile, replacing dirt. Dirt floors are bad. They get muddy. They get dusty. The dust causes respiratory problems for children.

At the blessing, the family members and volunteers crammed into one house to say the Our Father in Spanish. Then everyone had a slice of the carrot cake the volunteers had brought along. Two little girls sat on the one bed giggling shyly and eating cake.

Afterward, I chatted with a couple of the volunteers for a few moments in the yard. The question was obvious: So, where do people go to the bathroom? There was no latrine--so, probably a corner? Probably.

However, there was running water in the yard, through a standing pipe over a galvanized metal washtub that seemed to function as a pila--that is, a sink for washing dishes and clothes.

And in the house itself, the family had rigged up some electricity. The exposed wires went lord-knows-where and would make a U.S. housing inspector go apoplectic, but the light bulb worked.

Fin de Semana Fotos

ANTIGUA, Guatemala--That headline means "weekend photos." They're more like snapshots, actually.

What you'll see here are some basic Antigua street scenes; some pix from La Recollecion, one of the many many ruined churches; and then some pictures that simply do not do justice to a spectacular, somber procession through the streets. Hundreds of people, many of them in stylized costumes meant to resemble the robes of holy men from centuries ago, are escorting a statue of Jesus that is reclining on an elaborate bier. On the same float (bad description, but as close as you can come in English) as the statue there are several figures that look like black-clad klansmen. They are Nazarenos. In the ecclesiastical context, which these are, they are an ancient group of penitents. In the more day-to-day sense, they seem to show up as rather scary folkloric figures. And if I were a little kid, you could certainly get my attention by telling me these guys might come and get me.

Rain, Rain Go Away

ANTIGUA, Guatemala--Oh, ick. It has been raining all day. Gray, drizzly rain. This comes after a week of afternoon and evening rainstorms.

What makes it worse is that this is NOT the right season for rain. The rains should have ended a week ago at the latest.

And even worse: During the proper rainy season, there was very little rain, which means most of this agricultural country experienced a horrible drought and is in the midst of a food crisis. (Crisis as in people in rural areas are starving or living on international food aid.) And the late-season rains don't help the farmers; they just make harvesting whatever's there  more difficult.

For a dramatic contrast: The photo at left is the new luxury hotel that seems to be opening this week on my block. The lights are glowing warmly in the gray mist.

And to brighten things up elsewhere, today I stopped at a little stationery store to buy some glittery gel pens. We used them this afternoon to decorate graduation cards for some of the Common Hope kids.

Putting the Pieces Together

ANTIGUA, Guatemala--For most of the kids who frequent the library where I am volunteering, the favorite activity seems to be working on jigsaw puzzles, or in Spanish,  rompecabezas  (headbreakers).

Some choose coloring books, others like to read to themselves or with an adult. But rompecabezas--a quiet activity you can work on alone or with a big sister--definitely are the big winners. The ones with a dozen large pieces are great for the littlest kids. Older kids like more complex puzzles, the ones with the little pieces and the prettiest pictures. (Evelyn, at left, finished this 300-piece puzzle in about an hour.) It school vacation time, so there's no homework to do, after all.

The library is part of the Family Development Center run by Common Hope (Familias de Esperanza), a proyecto--project--just outside the touristy center of Antigua. The main goal of Common Hope is to break the cycle of poverty by helping poor kids get an education.

Here, you don't do that by putting up posters with Stay in School slogans. To support the kids, the project helps with school fees, uniforms, supplies and the like. (Primary school here is technically free and mandatory, but in reality it's neither. In the school year that just ended, the government for the first time forbade public schools charging enrollment fees. These fees were small change by U.S. standards, but huge for a peasant family with next to nothing. Enrollment throughout the country soared.)

To support families and thus keep the kids in school, Common Hope also helps with medical care (there's a clinic at the center) and employs social workers. In addition, there's a popular program that builds houses through a sweat equity system somewhat similar to that of Habitat for Humanity.

There are about 2,600 affiliated kids, that is, children who are enrolled in the program. Most of the money comes from people (generally foreigners) who sponsor individual kids by paying $30 or $60 a month. Sponsors receive occasional updates on a child's progress and notes from him or her. Many of the sponsors first come in contact with Common Hope through regular tours the group gives to people visiting Antigua. (That's how I fell into it several years ago.)

Of course, the organization always welcomes new sponsors. But if you're headed down this way and have a little extra room in your suitcase, the kids would also appreciate any jigsaw puzzles you happen to bring along.

From the Inferno to the Heavens

There are certain things every visitor to Antigua needs to do. High on the list is to climb Pacaya. That's a live volcano about an hour away from town. By live, we mean live--hot lava, explosions, etc.

The last time I was here, I wimped out on the climb, making it about three-quarters of the way up. After all, this is an 8,000-foot-plus mountain, so I didn't feel too bad.

What a lie. I felt just horrendous that I couldn't do it. So I tried again this time, and with the help of an extremely placid horse named Temerario (ie, "Reckless," ha!) I made it yesterday. The horses go about three-quarters of the way, leaving just 25 minutes or so of lava-rock-scrambling in order to reach the highest point the guides will bring you. This being Guatemala, where U.S. ideas of safety and legal liability don't quite hold, that's right up to the point where you can see hot red lava, roast a marshmallow over it, and smell the soles of your shoes melting. Note the glowing red stream in the photo. Woo-hoo!

Today--Sunday Nov. 1--is very special in Guatemala. It's All Saints Day. Families everywhere go to cemeteries, decorate the graves with flowers, and spend some time with the departed. They also fly kites, as a way to send messages to heaven.

In some places they take the kite tradition to extremes. One of those is Santiago Sacatepequez, a town about 45 minutes from Antigua. There, thousands of people descend every Nov. 1 on the cemetery (where the graves of course have been decorated.) Locals picnic there with great-great-grandma, as they do everywhere. But the kite flying has evolved into a competition with immense, beautifully made giant paper-and-bamboo kites. The biggest are too big to fly--it takes a crew of more than two dozen strong young men simply to get each one to stand up so the crowd can see it. (Applause, applause.)

While folks are waiting for the big kites--there were eight of them this year--they also cheered on smaller crews of folks flying medium-sized kites, each about six feet across. All the little kids tried to fly little kites, too. This takes place against a background of noisy bells on ice cream carts, shouts from jewelry vendors, and plenty of folks selling noisemakers. Even in the heavens, they should be able to hear this, and smile. Here are a few photos: