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If you keep your savings in one this owl banks, you will not have to make the long lines at the modern banks to withdraw cash. Too bad these owl banks are not for sale; only their replicas are on sale. According to the clerks at La Dulcerí­a de Doña Marí­a Gordillo (candy store), these owls are over hundred years old and they are NOT for sale.

Believe it or not, many people in Guatemala still used this type of piggy-banks made from ceramic. Have you ever used a similar bank?

The problem with old trees is that they are too tall; trimming the old branches becomes an ordeal. Here two employees of Hotel Antigua can not reach the branches even though they are using scaffolds. They need the help of a third employee who is on the tree.

Can you spot the third employee on the tree?

This is the shot of a Guatemalan house at the very early stages of construction. I know this is not what you guys were hoping for, but it is a start. I promise I will do the interior of a House Antigüeña soon… No! you don’t have to wait until this house is completely built, just let find the victim, oops, I mean a nice house to photograph.

The construction worker is known as Albañil, roughly translates as mason or bricklayer (thanks to La Gringa and her blogcito). They build “walls,” doorways, window frames, and antique-looking houses too. I take my hat off to them!

In Mesoamerica, albañiles celebrate their day on May 3rd, also known as El Dí­a de la Santa Cruz, or The Day of the Holy Cross. Normally, they post a cross somewhere in the construction site and have a Catholic Father or Priest pour some holy water and say some prayers. After that, it is party time, well, most of the time.

I do not know the whole story and the tradition, can somebody else fill in the missing details?

Under normal circumstances you build a new house and you expect it to look new. Here in Antigua the opposite is true. You want your spanking-brand-new house to look old and aged. If you can find them, you buy used and old doors, window frames, lamps and locks. Maybe even expose some of the wall and hope that the rainy season will eat up your brand-new paint job.

Welcome to the “new” aesthetic values of an old town!

What’s your take on this subject? what is your preference new-looking or old-looking houses?

Agua Pura Salvavidas is Guatemala’s first and largest bottled water company (Purified water Lifesaver in English). Matt Bokor describes it like this: With no taste, no color, no smell, water is so boring that it’s sometimes called the neglected nutrient. To read the whole article Yes, you can drink the water, just follow the link to Revue Magazine, where Mr. Bokor gives us an overview of the Salvavidas bottled water.

Trivia: what is the Spanish word for a 5-gallon bottle?

Bicycles are among the most-widely used vehicles in Antigua. One the reason is that you can move faster with a bike than with an automobile.

Do people use bicycles as transportation or just for leisure in your part of the world?

The money movers of the world are everywhere and yet they are invisible, very much like the undocumented worker who feeds it. Western Union moves money, lots of it, and I mean LOTS OF IT. Money transfers are known as Remesas in Spanish and it is a word that was not very popular or widely known until recently.

Remesas represent a large source of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) for Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua and Mexico just to mention a few countries. Remesas are also a good measurement to see how a country has failed to its citizens. More remesas mean more people forced to leave the native country in search of a better life.

Warning, extremely politicized side note (you may skip the reading):
Last week, Mr. Bush promulgated the law that supports the construction of 700-mile wall along the US-Mexico border. The so-called “fence” by the bill is being touted as a way to keep undocumented immigrants from crossing the border. I believe this is stupid and a waste of money. It is also a shame for any country to build walls nowadays; it is especially shameful for the United States. They should also send back the Statue of Liberty or at least turn it 180° so it gives its back to immigration. I still remember the Berlin Wall and all the money that the US spent in propaganda to bring it down. Will the new “fence” include barbed wire and mines?

Can a wall stop undocumented immigration? The short answer is no. The long answer is that the empire will have to build two BIG walls: one in the US-Mexico border and another in the US-Canada border. They will have to build a WWII-like fleet of ships to patrol the East and West Coasts. All airports will have to deny the entry to airplanes coming from abroad. Even then, immigrants will find a way into the low-wage jobs awaiting for them in the United States. The problem with immigration is the same as with drug trafficking: As long as there is a huge demand for them, they will find a way.

The best way to turn undocumented immigration into documented immigration is through laws and regulations. Give the immigrant a legal way to come to work and go home afterwards. You can not scream and yell about the American Dream throughout the world and expect people to be deft about it. Why stop the immigrant who wants to fulfill her American Dream?

Why should the United States be responsible for all those worker from the “Third World”? Well, the empire is young, a little over two-hundred years, but old enough to have caused havoc in many parts of the world through wars, invasions, coup d’etats, guerilla-warfare, assassinations, terrorist acts, massacres, embargoes, and a very long et-cetera. It is harvest time. The same goes for Europe.

Do not be surprise! There will always be immigration in this planet and in others as soon as we humans can find the way. At present time, immigration, like justice, is blind and is concerned only with distribution and retribution. If most of the wealth is, right now, in the northern hemisphere, the workers will migrate to the north. This flow will continue until the wealth is better distributed among the North and South, West and East.

The concept above brings us back to today’s post. Immigration takes the workers to the North and the West; Western Union brings back the wealth to the South and the East.

The soundtracks for this post will be Welcome to Tijuana and Clandestino by Manu Chao.

This is the last of the transnational series. Tomorrow will move to another aspect of the daily life in La Antigua Guatemala.

One of out of three. DHL is the only private courier with an office in Antigua Guatemala. There are not UPS or Fedex offices in Antigua. Here we have a yellow wall, a yellow sign for a yellow transnational corporation.

Maybe, just maybe, Ringo Starr can come up with a jingle using the word yellow, what do you think?

PDV stands for Petroleos de Venezuela (Venezuelan Oil). To put the oil resources to the service and well-being of the country; to build a new economic and social model, ending inequalities… reads the introductory paragraph on Oil for the people section at the PDVSA site. SA part of the name stands for Sociedad Anónima, which is the equivalent of Inc. or Ltd. in the English-speaking countries. I am sure not many people will recognize this logotype or the name of this very large transnational corporation. PDVSA has many skins, one of them is Citgo in the land north of the Rí­o Bravo.

Che, the world is achaning! could be Dylan’s words.

Have you heard of or seen PDV or PDVSA in your part of the world? What you think of it?

The slogan for Esso is Put a tiger in your tank; here with a twist. Esso is one of the brands of ExxonMobil. I am sure most of you have heard of these two brands. Read the case against Esso and what Google found.

Wow! I can not believe the amount of web sites and organizations that have been created to oppose this transnational corporation; I leave you with three links: Stop Esso, Exxon Secrets, Exxon Crimes.

Also, Sompopo, one of the regular visitors to this site, wrote recently about a documentary called What if the oil runs out? on Discovery Channel. He recommends this program very highly and I am planning to watch it next time it comes to the Discovery Channel Latin America. It is not on yet.

I am most interested in what you have to say about Esso and Exxon! What’s your take on Esso?

Dr. Simi is Mexico’s transnational Farmacias Similares (Similar Pharmacies) mascot. Farmacias Similares has made their business to take generic medicine to the poor under the slogan: “Lo mismo pero más barato” or “The same but cheaper”.

Should generic medicine be more accessible?

That is right, the three-word slogan belongs to Guatemala’s transnational company Pollo Campero (Country Chicken) which is now in the United States, Mexico, Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, Ecuador and Spain (China is coming next). “Globalization isn’t just about McDonald’s going overseas; a number of international fast food chains are also moving to the U.S.” is the sub-title of Faces of Globalization: Pollo Campero at Global Envision. Here is a list of the Pollo Campero Restaurants in the United States as of today.

Have any of you had Pollo Campero yet?

Side note: This is what the soldiers and policeman were watching on the October 1st photo.

The clown moves according to Antigüeño’s urban legend. Actually, there had been “sightings” of the McDonald’s clown moving through Latin America. I leave you with a couple of google-translated stories: 1. McDonald’s Against the World? 2. The truth of the McDonald’s case

Are there such stories in your part of the world?

The laws regarding business signs in Antigua are very strict. I believe this is especially true for transnational companies which they have to adhere to subdue colors and the signs have to look like if they were made with old and traditional process like wood, metal, or ceramic. The outside walls also have to conform to Antigüeño architecture guidelines.

With this photo I will begin a series on transnational companies in La Antigua Guatemala. Domino’s Pizza is very popular here, as it is evident through the many motorbikes for delivery and on this opposing photo you can see the Domino’s Pizza sign and their very short order telephone number 1730. Guatemala’s telephone number system has 8 digits for the whole country, but they have a short number for those companies that can pay for it; sort of like those vanity license plates in the United States. All the numbers start with 17 and in the case of Domino’s they have 1730 for their 30 minutes or less promise/adverting campaign. Besides, the delivery bikes and the take-out restaurant, Domino’s Pizza has a kiosk in the Antigua’s market premises where they sell pizza by the slice (I bet, this you haven’t seen before).

I will have some surprises for you this week, don’t miss it!