NOTA #2: LOS ÚLTIMAS DÍAS EN LA FINCA and BEFORE THE STORM

Shalom, y'all.
I'm facing the daily afternoon showers/thunderstorms, very sunridden and pretty beautiful today, while writing these lines and uploading the following pictures from the last week up in the hills, close to the Pacific Ocean. Well, meanwhile fog has covered the new view from the terraza de la pasada - new because I spent quite some time this morning with cutting down the little bamboo forest that prevented us from enjoying this boa vista.

Rita just entered the scene, rather exhausted-looking, I'd say (to put it mildly). She had been to a Guatemaltecan marriage this morning which sounds like a great idea at first, but on second thought I'm rather happy I didn't join (now) - the whole thing had been evangelistic which means: dull worship ceremonies, no alcohol and no dancing. Cutting bamboo and doing laundry then! (Granted, surely highly interesting from a cultural-anthropological approach.)

I don't want to bore you with too detailed descriptions of what has happened here over the last two weeks - and pictures (below!) tell certainly more than any words, right? What they might not tell you, however, is e.g. that I very much enjoyed my stay on this farm, the work in the macadamia shelter, talks with the locals, cooking sessions with Rita and Tara. And I would even stay longer, but - surprise! - the eternal urge to keep on traveling and seeing new places is (still) stronger. So I'll be heading off to discover what Guatemala and the surrounding countries have to offer - all for myself since Rita will stay here until we will, hopefully, re-unite in late September. For this reason I put this map of Central America right below the paragraph (so that everyone eventually knows what is where, geographically). My rough itinerary for the upcoming week looks like this: Quetzaltenango (Xela) - the Maya ruins of Tikal - Belize City - Guatemala's Carribean coast. Starting this Monday, 6:30am local time. If I don't miss the bus which happens to depart rather unreliable.

Still, some additional remarks to my stay here over the last days: we had some more visitors in the hotel, rather spontaneously, though: a very sympathetic couple from London (him being a genius guitar player). They'll be heading to the Islas de la Bahía in Honduras (so do I), and maybe we'll see again, but nothing is certain on that trip. Then, my good-bye talks with Tara further revealed a pretty Twin Peaks-like atmosphere in the community and I could indeed imagine an intelligently created TV show about the existing social conditions, tensions, decays and developments. Definitely better than other ongoing local television crap (See Rosalinda for more). Also: 18 (that spells 'eighteen') days without alcohol until now. Liver, you owe me one.

One last thing that I have discovered in the July edition of my Spanish revista ECOS: a special kind of dictionary, published by a Colombian teacher called Javier Naranjo. The book is called "casa de las estrellas. universo contado por los niños".

Unos ejemplos estarían:
ADULTO.
"Persona que se obsesiona por hacer el amor."
"Niño que ha crecido mucho."

AMOR.
"Que mi mamá no se muera y mi papa no se muera."

BORRACHO.
"Es una gente más o menosque quiere matar."

DIOS.
"Es una persona que le clavan clavos."

MUJER.
"Es una persona que se enamora de alguien."

PAZ.
"Es para unos que matan mucho."

SOLEDAD.
"Tristeza que le da a uno a veces."


GALERÍA DE IMÁGENES

01)

Puesta del sol
y más pollos.

02)

Mientras jugaba al fútbol.


03)

Rapi, our tarantula.
Food or money?

04)

Compras en Retalhuleu.


05)

A doña Fidelina.


06)

Farm impressions.


07)

Welcome to our kitchen!


08)

Rita, mientras fregando platos.


09)

Repairing the estufa.


11)

Watching "The IT Crowd".
Sunset colours.


12)

Little Sarita.


13)

Finca football games.
Very muddy.

14)

Mighty magic thunderstorms.


15)

Esperando el autobús en la mañana
frente de la iglesia.


16)

At Retalhuleu market (bus station).
And our bus.


17)

More buses and campaign posters.
(There are presidential elections in Guatemala on September 11.)


18)

Vista del techo.


19)

Chiquitas.


20)

Dream journals and learning vocabulary.


21)

Mi tecolote.
Cortando bambú.