You know you’re in Latin America When…..

Once I get to the airport, I stand in line. Line is not too long. I’m the next one to be called. Not even exaggerating, the guy that is checking people in literally takes 20 minutes with the guy in front of me. So I wait, and I wait, and I wait and all the lines around me are moving at a decent pace. Finally I get called into another line, and I finish and look over, the guy that was in front of me is STILL there. What was going on with this guy? It was driving me nuts.

I get in the terminal, and my gate is pitch black. I wait, I wait. Still pitch black and we were suppose to start boarding 20 minutes ago. Am I at the right gate? I walk up to an airport employee and say: Hi, just want to make sure I’m in the right place, it says boarding time is 5:10. Guy: Yes, you’re in the right place, the airline employees usually get to the gate around 6:10 or 6:20. Me: But the flight is suppose to leave at 6:10. Guy: Yes I know.

Hahahah. No further comment.

Last day in Guatemala

Was a really, really hectic one. I left at 8:30 to get prices for cars, and got stood up after returning to the hotel at 11 am for a realtor meeting. After many phone calls, to the delinquent realtor and to get some more prices, I made it to three malls during the rest of the day before calling it quits at 8:30 pm. Yep that’s a full 12 hour day. Though, even still I had a phone full of prices that I needed to get into the book, and I wasn’t about to waste my last “celebratory” day of being done with that survey. I wanted a good meal. I found Kakao, a typical Guatemalan restaurant just one block from the hotel and went there. I had a really good salad (I was done worrying about eating fresh veggies) and an awesome smoky tomato based broth with meat in it accompanied by rice. Very yummy. There was a couple American guys a few tables over from me and as is typical, they were being really loud and one guy was talking about how much he hated his job and wanted to tell his boss to go F himself. And then, he was going to move to the mountains where he would grow a beard and his own food. Goodluck buddy. I quickly walked the block back to the hotel. The men with machine guns were everywhere, and I guess that made me feel a little better, but I had just read a story about a shooting that happened at the restaurant just across from one I had eaten at the day previously, where 3 people were killed. I think I’m glad I’m out of Guatemala.

Once back in my hotel, I packed up, got ready for bed, and then went to bed; preparing to only sleep for… yep I’m serious… 2.5 hours. I needed to wake up at 3:30 am for my flight! What a pain in the ass.

For the love of Boston sports

Today was a whirlwind. I met with Luis the realtor who is totally obsessed with Boston sports. Out of the 3 hours I spent with him, we talked about rentals for 30% of the time, personal stuff for 10%, and sports 60%. I was really happy I decided to get him a Patriot’s shirt, he was very appreciative of it. Not that he doesn’t have enough. From the key chain, to his coffee mug, and his Boston ringtones I think it’s pretty clear where his loyalties lie. My co-worker Patrick came to Guatemala and met with him. He’s a Yankees fan, God forbid. I’m surprised Luis didn’t really kick him out of his office. Luis goes to Boston to see a game every year. What a crazy guy. He was fun, and he took me to a really nice outdoor steak lunch at a high-end restaurant. It was lovely. You could tell just by the cars parked in the lot what kind of people were hanging out there. No joke for sure.

After lunch I scrambled to get phone calls done. The business center helped with some, and it was great, especially being able to sit back, relax and listen to the melodic sound of the Spanish language. But then, I attempted some of them on my own. It didn’t nearly go as well. Especially when I had to call some guy to tell him my e-mail 3 times and he still didn’t get it. No one does when I try to tell them my e-mail address. It’s a pain in the ass to try and get people to understand. I called Audi by accident, which turns out I would have needed to anyways, but the guy came to my hotel after work to drop off the quotes that I wanted. Which was kinda good, until he tried to get me to come into the dealership tomorrow so he could show me more cars, which turned into him coming back to the hotel again tomorrow for a reason I wasn’t sure of, and he kept trying to get me to explain to him what I did over and over because he didn’t get it and thought I was going to buy 10 cars from him. I was really struggling with my Spanish but I was trying really hard, but when I had to say it 10 times it was becoming more and more of a pain in the ass because damnit I had a lot of work to get done.

Finally, I had had enough of this car business and I didn’t even get very far with it. I walked to the mall, very cautiously (trying not to get mugged like you almost did, Tom) and tried to hide discretely from the pains in the asses in the store as I copied prices. It wasn’t as bad as I had imagined it would be. Though I didn’t get nearly as far in my work as I had wanted to. I almost attempted to walk home, but then decided not to when I saw dark streets in front of me and not many people. So, I took a cab from the mall to the hotel. All 4 blocks or so. When I went out after dinner, I looked right, and hiding in the shadows was a man dressed in army gear with a machine gun. I looked left in the dark corner where the hotel driveway met the road and there was another one, gazing at me as I walked in boredom. Creepy. Oh and then, there were 4 pickup trucks in a row, all full of men and women in uniform with machine guns out and ready. Should I feel more secure or more nervous? Eh I felt OK about it. I just thought it was pretty entertaining to see such wild security measures. It made me feel a little better about walking around the block safely. I guess there was a shooting in October at one of the restaurants a block from the hotel in which 3 people were killed. Since then security has been stepped up. After all, it is the Zona Viva, (alive Zone). If people can’t come there for fun, where can they go.

So for dinner, I ate at a typical Guatemalan restaurant. Pork and sausage, beans and rice. And a doroda draft, which wasn’t actually draft, but that’s ok. De-licious!!

Antigua for the day

I took the day off. Hopefully I can still get everything done that I need to in the next two days, but I think I’m in decent shape. Anyways, I’m suppose to have Sunday off. Since I’ve been working my ass off, I definitely deserve it.

I intended on getting up super early today which would have only granted me 4 hours of sleep. Subconsciously I definitely wasn’t having it. I could have gone through a hotel tour that way, but instead I opted to sleep in and take a taxi to Antigua instead, which worked out just fine. The way there was long and windy, mountainous, with lots of greenery. Very pretty. Though the pollution was brutal; it smelled especially of gasoline for most of the ride. Not to say I don’t like the smell of gasoline, haha. But it did burn my lungs. On the ride there, me and cab driver (Carlos?) talked, he told me that it was currently summer in Guatemala. Huh, that I wasn’t aware of. I thought it was winter here. He also told me that his son was living in Jacksonville Florida illegally working construction, for 6 years. Very difficult he said. But, you can’t blame a guy for wanting to get out of living somewhere where there is little future I suppose.

We arrived in Antigua and there were cobblestone streets all over. It was beautiful, greenery, flowers, mountains in the background, handicrafts being sold everywhere. We walked through the streets into and out of hotels and their summery patios, into a jade museum where I bought a cute pair of earrings, into and out of handicraft markets which I never would have found on my own if I didn’t have my taxi driver guide with me. One thing I like about being here (versus India, for example) is that people aren’t too pushy. Yes there were tourguides hanging around looking to make a buck, but all you had to do was say ONCE that you were fine just walking around and they would leave you alone, instead of other places where you would be chased around. It made me stop and think that maybe I did want one! There were church ruins all over, and all sorts of cute little restaurants and bars that wafted of delicious food. Carlos and I stopped for a quick bite and I ended up with bread and fondue cheese which I didn’t really mean to get, but that was OK it still was good. Who can pass up cheese fondue anyways? Definitely not me. Carlos got a postre of some sort of cheesecake with fruit on top and some coffee. We were seated at a window and people wandered in and out of our sight, people of all nationalities, and time to time children would appear. One little girl with just knobs for hands approached, I was totally taken by surprise. I gave her a little bit of money cause I felt terrible. After I passed it over to have Carlos give it to her, I was curious how she was going to accept the money without hands, but I turned away and didn’t look. Wow that was sad, I can’t imagine not having hands. One little boy just stood there and stared at me. I asked him if he wanted food but he shook his head. I have no idea what he wanted, he seemed content just standing there and staring, didn’t even open his mouth once to say anything. I tried to be careful of who I took pictures of after my taxi driver warned me that you should ask first.

The sun played beautiful games with the brightly colorful walls that lined the cobblestone streets, and inside held amazingly beautiful patios which one would never guess from the outside. After wandering the streets and the markets for hour after hour we headed back to Guatemala City, and got stuck in quite a bit of traffic on the way. I found it interesting that when we were approaching traffic, my driver would put on his hazard lights to warn the people behind to slow down. I was mesmerized by the passing sights and slowly passed out, over and over and over again. When I got home I couldn’t help but jump into bed for a nap; which lasted me until 9:30 pm. Oops. It was a nice down day Sunday.

Tacos are better in Mexico

Ended up going to bed late last night. Didn’t set an alarm for today, and woke up after 11 am. Yikes! Quickly I got going to visit the second grocery store which went a little faster than the first. I arrived and they had me wait around forever cause the manager was busy, apparently. So, after about 20 minutes I just accidentally slipped away until I got stopped by a guard about an hour later. I just gave him the authorization letter I had which he gladly accepted and kept on truckin. Oh, it’s just so much better to have permission and be able to relax. So much better. And even awesomer to flash a permission letter in everyone’s face. Hell, I didn’t even really mind when I got approached by person after person at Paiz (owned by Walmart) so I could shove that permission letter in their face. Ya that’s right bitch, I’m walking right past you. Adelante, you got that one right.

Security is tight in this area which is good. Very tight. Armed guards all over the place with their big badass guns, pretty normal for Central America. I decided for dinner to take a walk out of the hotel to see what I could find, as long as the roads in front of me were well-lit and I could see people around. There were plenty of restaurants in that kind of walking distance, and men with large guns on every single corner. There was even one corner with about 10 of them dressed in army gear, I’m not sure what was going on. I ended up at a taco place with pretty decent tacos actually, and ended up with 4 margaritas… oops. I invited Jose to come for a drink if he wanted to, and of course he did. I actually had a good time with him, and realized that his English was better than I expected. It was funny to hear him say that no one does tacos/Mexican food like Mexico does it. I totally believe him, and I’m looking forward to trying that out. He had this way of staring which was actually an “I’m listening” stance, but it make me a little nervous cause I really felt like I was being stared at. Jose was nice, interested, but not over the top like his emails have been. A smart, educated guy who works for a company that makes prosthetics. He’s on the road more than I am. We spoke about how everyone thinks that Mexico City is so dangerous, but it’s not the part that’s having problems. The border of the US is where all the danger lies; but people don’t realize that it doesn’t actually stem from Mexico City. 2 people said that to me before I left to come down here.

I didn’t know that people still actually had these, but I’ve seen lots and lots of gold teeth. Or are they just made of metal now, I’m not sure. And many people that look like they have braces, but I’m not sure if that’s right. The people look so indigenous here. Like you would picture the Mayan people, or maybe the Indian people to look like. Speaking of indigenous, most of the people who live here are indigenous. I think 60% of the country, and within that amount, I was told that there are 22 different languages that are spoken within the country, indigenous tongue. Pretty impressive!

Mi Amor

Before I went to the grocery store, I picked up the permission letter at the Walmart head office. There I met Gaby who greeted me with a kiss and the permission letter. Nice way to start the day. What sucked is that I got stopped every 5 seconds by someone who wanted to read the damn letter. I was constantly losing my place. At the grocery store today, Mamas everywhere called their little ones “Mi Amor”. Pretty normal for Latin culture, but I loved it. How cute it was. Also, I saw a few instances of Mom, child #1 and baby #2, and maid #1 and #2. Maid 1 and 2 were all dressed up in their little maid outfits. Pretty impressive I thought, Lisa (below) told me that domestic help of all sorts was found very frequently, but I didn’t realize I would see that much of it. In uniforms, to boot! I didn’t even see that in India. The grocery stores here were somewhat comparable to what we are use to, with more local products like salsas and corn products. What you would expect in Central America.

I met with a realtor, or rather relocation agent today (Lisa). She was super nice, had a very interesting background with a Nicaraguan mother and a German father who is deceased 10 years. She grew up in Germany until age 12 where she moved to Guatemala cause Dad was offered a position in the embassy. Very interesting looking girl, definitely looked Central American but she was really very, very tall. Needless to say, towered over me; who tends to tower over the local women here, at least. She certainly was tall for local standards. She paid for my breakfast and gave me a little present of some local coffee. I love it! I gave her a Harvard cap and tee.
Frederigo was my taxi driver. And he speaks English. I will call Frederigo manana. The city is busy and trafficky and polluted. I think I may have bronchitis at the moment and the pollution definitely does not help. Thank God I have my inhaler. Busy, but not too exciting day. More tomorrow!

Admiral's club is not for me....

Off on my next trip. And sick again! Second time I’ve been sick this month, and both started right before I was about to get on a plane. Figures right? So, had some good (but mostly bad) things happen today. Sick = bad, 7am flight that wasn’t cancelled = bad (would have LOVED to sleep in!), girl on the plane on the way here found out her Dad had died suddenly = very bad, and very sad to listen to, cancelled flight to Guatemala = bad, talked my way into the admiral’s club = good. Since I’m sick I shouldn’t take advantage of the free booze, and not hungry so no taking advantage of the free food = why now? I’m currently sitting in a little corner, and I think I might take another nap. I have another 4 hours until I need to board for the 2nd attempt at getting to Guatemala City.

I don’t think the admiral’s club is for me. It’s full of snobby people. I was about to get off the elevator and made the first move and so did this other lady. So, I said oops, go ahead! She just stared at me. Fine, I’ll go first if you’re gonna be like that! Oh, and I may have gotten yelled at for talking on my cell phone in a quiet zone, oops. I didn’t know! And earlier there was some guy just chatting away on his cellphone in the same place I just was. I was just following the crowd. I had enough of the admiral’s club so I walked back amongst the normal people, got some food, and waited to board.

Practicing my Spanish again is comfortable. I don’t mind it at all. At the Guatemala airport I noticed some police with dogs sniffing the bags. Must be for drugs of course. Yep I’m in Central America after all, aren’t I. At times I just come to and realize, wow… I’m in “enter country”. This is nuts! Yep, I’m in Guatemala. And so it starts…

On the hotel shuttle, I meet Tony. We exchange a few words, I hand him my business card, and before I know it I get an e-mail from him, and then a phone call. He must have called the hotel with and used my name from the business card to reach me. WTF? Oh ya, I need to remember where I am. Latin customs. Ugh I am quite pressed for time here it seems. Time for some review and then bed.

PS this picture has nothing to do with my post, but I took it in Guatemala. And I love it. That all counts for something.