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Monthly Archives: December 2010

Not So Silent Night

www.jimmccluskey.com Posted on December 28, 2010 by JimDecember 28, 2010

Virtually every event in Guatemala is celebrated with fireworks–mostly noise makers. And Christmas is the biggest celebration of the year. Whatever Christmas bells there may have been were drowned out, but our ears are still ringing.

We left the lake a week or so ago to spend Christmas with the family of my godchildren in the highland city of Quetzaltenango. Though it is Guatemala’s second largest city, it feels relatively sane and safe…except at Christmas.

Suicidal Santa

In the days leading up to Christmas we had roamed the streets of the city, past gaudy decorations, sparkly christmas trees, inflated reindeer, and sidewalk Santas shouting “Ho Ho Ho, Feliz Navidad!” In the central park was a giant snowman (sort of) probably created by people who had never seen snow. Central American Christmas is mostly a transplanted version of North American Christmas, and it feels a little surreal.

The day before Christmas was a frenzy of activity as people shopped and prepared for the evening ahead. The markets here are spectacular anytime, but more so around the holidays. Vendors overflow the market onto the sidewalks with large baskets of beautiful fruit, veggies, bread and all kinds of other goodies. The markets here make the produce sections of grocery stores at home look quite anemic.

The family of my godchildren live several blocks from where we stay, and late evening on Christmas Eve the three girls, Sarita, Yessica and Angelina came to walk us to their house. We dodged fireworks and people full of Christmas cheer (or whatever their beverage of choice).

It is a Mayan tradition to make tamales on special occasions. We don’t get them often, but they are delicious. They are made of corn flour, usually filled with chicken or some other meat. But to accommodate me the family made vegetarian tamales, filled with chilies, carrots, potatoes and other goodies. I don’t know if everyone else thought they were better than usual, but I did!

Tamales and hot chocolate with the family

As the kids have gotten older–they are between 13 and 22 years old now–it has become harder to get together with the whole family. But aside from their father, who is still working as a laborer in the US, everyone was there, including a new baby just a week old. It was a real treat for us to be able to spend Christmas with them, and an honor to be considered part of the family.

We finished up just before midnight, the hour when the pyrotechnics reach a crescendo. I went out into the ally with the boys to light off a 20-foot string of firecrackers (if you can’t beat ’em, join ’em!) while Faye huddled inside with the girls, no doubt casting aspersions on our maturity.

Across the city the explosions continued for most of an hour. The boys walked us back to our lodgings, past people with better arsenals than we had. Rockets flew past us, and firecrackers exploded all around us. Personal safety did not seem to be much of a concern and we did our best not to appear cowardly.

The next morning, Christmas Day, the city was blissfully peaceful. Late morning we wondered downtown looking for someplace open to have breakfast. Nearly everything was closed, and the streets nearly empty. It seemed the whole city had taken the morning off.

At noon the city came alive again with another round of explosions. It was hard to imagine anybody had anything left over, but there was enough to at least partially relive the excitement of twelve hours before.

Costumed Dancer

In the afternoon the girls came over and we watched a troupe of elaborately costumed dancers performing in a street nearby. The dancing was somewhat lethargic, but the costumes were amazing. We were told each one cost about $3000, which is a fair amount of money in this part of the world. In traditional folkloric dances most of the costumes depict Spanish Conquistadores. I don’t know what these costumes were supposed to represent, but they were very cool.

We haven’t quite figured out where we’ll be going next, but it will be someplace warmer. The temperatures here in the Guatemalan highlands have been decidedly Christmasy.

Posted in Guatemala, TRAVEL

Getting There

www.jimmccluskey.com Posted on December 17, 2010 by JimDecember 17, 2010

We arrived in Guatemala after a long but uneventful trip. The flights were bilingual all the way–on the first two legs Air Canada announced everything in both English and French. We got a TACA flight out of L.A., and everything was in English and Spanish. Not very good English, either. We were two of just a handful of gringos on board and even the flight crew spoke English only reluctantly. I am happy to report that we sailed through security with only cursory inspections. The closest either of us came to one of those dreaded TSA pat-downs is when I … Continue reading →

Posted in Guatemala, TRAVEL

Travelin’ Shoes

www.jimmccluskey.com Posted on December 12, 2010 by JimMarch 15, 2012

Time flies when you’re not doing anything worth writing about. But that is about to change. Faye and I are on our way back to Guatemala for a couple of months. As I have noted before, Guatemala is familiar territory for us. But things change, sometimes for the better, sometimes not. The rainy season this year was particularly bad. Mountainsides collapsed, wiping out roads, covering homes and killing people. The little village Faye and I met in was hit pretty hard, and the main road has been closed for repairs the past couple of months. So it is with some … Continue reading →

Posted in Guatemala, TRAVEL

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Guatemala Gazette

a travel journal...
I started traveling to Guatemala in the mid-80s. When the internet became commonly available there a dozen years later I began writing a travel journal and emailing it to friends and family. This is the archive of those journals. GO>>>

Unpublished Articles

  • October Surprise - Did the Reagan Legacy begin with deceit?
  • Fool's Gold- The Legend of the Lost Dutchman Mine
  • That Sucking Sound-History of the Vacuum Cleaner
  • Women of the Wild West-It wasn't all cowboys.
  • History of the Motel

Published Articles

  • Who was Deep Throat? Answer: Mark Felt. Relive the speculation.
  • Smells Like Murder- The Death of Kurt Cobain
  • One Giant Hoax- The Apollo Moon Landing
  • Death, Drugs and Rock'n'Roll-Who killed Jimi Hendrix?
  • History of the Banana- More interesting than it sounds
  • Microcars- Smaller than compact
  • Death of a Princess-Was Diana Murdered?
  • Uncle Sam's Other Islands-Some your travel agent has never heard of.

Misc. Writing

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