AntiguaDailyPhoto.Com

The venerable colonial pila from Guatemala is often in my focus, don’t you agree?

Now, if you can tell exactly how many pilas, washbasins, have appeared in AntiguaDailyPhoto since May 1, 2006, I will mail you a post card made from the washbasin photo you choose. Good luck to all players!

[gmap]

Last Friday night at 7 p.m. AntiguaDailyPhoto guest contributor and professional photographer Arturo Godoy, Kara Andrade from HablaGuate and I attended the conference La verdadera estructura del Calendario Maya, or The True Structure of the Mayan Calendar, given by Mayanist David Stuart. Dr. David Stuart refuted the modern visions of the end of the world of the 2012 Mayan Calendar as false and lacking any base in the old Maya civilization. The conference was centered around the Mayan Calendar from a new perspective based on the latest research done by Dr. Stuart of the true internal structure of the Mayan Calendar. This was the first time Dr. Stuart gave this conference. In other words, the 2012 Mayan Prophecy is a hoax!

Luckily, Kara Andrade, a new media journalist, took notes and broadcasted them in real time at the new citizen-based and contributed journalism HablaGuate web site as Demystifying 2012; follow the white rabbit if you want to read her notes of the conference. Arturo Godoy and I, on the other hand, took the opportunity to document the conference through photographs. Okay, I will you guys in a little secret, the entire conference was video-taped and the audio recorded by both Arturo and Kara; hint, hint, if you bug them long enough, they will provide links for the video and audio.

This was also my first time at Casa Herrera, a wonderfully restored colonial house. I was delighted with the results of the restoration and I promise I will make the time come back and photograph the entire house and so a series about it.

For now I bring three snapshots taken with the aid of the fish eye attachment donated by Michele and Eddie from Toronto through my Amazon Wish List. Let’s thank them both for their continued support!

Here’s a little overview about Casa Herrera:

The Casa Herrera is a research, conference and teaching facility located in the heart of La Antigua Guatemala that focuses on the varied and inter-related disciplines that contribute to the study of Pre-Columbian art, archaeology, history and culture.

Since 1977, The Maya Meetings at Texas have been at the cutting edge of research into the culture of the ancient Maya of Mexico and Central America. This annual conference draws scholars from a wide spectrum. (source: Facebook Casa Herrera page)

Basically Casa Herrera is The Mesoamerica Center of the University of Texas at Austin.

David Stuart speaks about the myth of 2012 by hablaguate

[gmap]

The Maya represent a culture that demonstrates how tradition and technology can thrive together. This Maya woman, dressed in the traditional Mayan falda – or skirt – fills the tank of her scooter at a local gas station: Guatemala truly is the “Land of Contrasts.” I love what it symbolizes… progression without losing the rich attributes of the past.

text and photo by Laura McNamara

Have I told you how much I love the dry season in Guatemala (November through April)? Well, I do for so many reasons, like the dry season is also the cooler, even chilly, time of the year. The quality of light is superb and thus the sunsets are incredible almost every day. Because all the winds blowing from the big white north, the skies are clear and the volcanoes are bare naked (without the fluffy clouds). And Volcán de Fuego begins its relentless activity sending smoke signals several times through the day. I believe this picture encapsulates quiet well the reasons why I love the dry season.

So, what are you waiting for, pack your luggage and come to La Antigua Guatemala before the rains come again!
(more…)

Guatemala’s National Registry of Persons, Registro Nacional de las Personas, RENAP began retiring the old Guatemalan identification card known as Cédula back in September 2009. The RENAP only has until December 31, 2010 to switch the old identification booklet documents since by law the cédulas will be rendered invalid and useless on January 1, 2011.

The new Guatemalan identification card goes by the name of Documento Personal de Identificación, DPI for short. The DPI is a plastic card, similar to the driver license, with three levels of security and a chip with a microprocessor. The DPI will also incorporate the Códico Único de Identificación, CUI for short, which will be an universal unique identification number, the equivalent to the Social Security Number.

Of course, turning all the paper records into digital files for +13 million people is a colossal undertaking; one with still many wrinkles. So for now, the process of switching the old cédula for the new DPI is taking over two months with long lines forming around many of the RENAP offices. Such is the case of the RENAP office in La Antigua Guatemala, although if you go to Jocotenango or Ciudad Vieja, there are no lines.

If you’re interested and let me know in the comment area, I will explain the process of actually acquiring the new DPI.

[gmap]

I don’t know about the rest of Guatemala, but in and around La Antigua Guatemala it seems there is at least one procession every week. The picture above documents the San Pablo, Saint Paul, procession from two days ago in San Pedro Las Huertas.

I am completely ruined. After having spent so much time around rich, intense colors, textures, idiosyncrasies, how could I ever live again in places with muted colors, muted lifestyles, where everything is the same old, same old.

How could I? How could you?

In La Antigua Guatemala we are so lucky to be able to get excellent coffee just about everywhere. Cafetenango in Finca Filadelfia is such a place where one can drink an amazing coffee grown, harvested, dried and roasted in the premises. At Cafetenango there are baristas on site who like to draw all kinds of figures over the milk foam. I really like the views available from Cafetenango with all three volcanoes, Agua, Fuego and Acatenango, breaking away from La Antigua’s skyline. If you come to Finca Filadelfia for the Antigua Canopy Tours, make sure you make time for coffee; you won’t regret it.

[gmap]

Trust me, do no trust your nostalgic memories; they will mislead you.

Today’s sign of al Macarone is a very good example how the signage regulations of La Antigua Guatemala can actually improve a logo and brand graphics. Take a look at al Macarone original logo and compare it to the transformed logo appearing above. I really like the texture of the mothy logs.

[gmap]

Yo creo que es hora de regresar a nuestras clases de español (I think it’s time to come back to our Spanish Classes).

What question and answer can you invent for this photo?

[gmap]

Beauty in things exists merely in the mind which contemplates them. —David Hume’s Essays, Moral and Political, 1742 (source: phrases.org.uk)

I agree completely, what about you?

[gmap]

Split a life in two; then in decades; the decades in years; the years in days and so on. Life is just a string of fleeting moments; like a necklace of beads strung together. Life is good the moment one begins appreciating the brief instants that occur everyday; that bring happiness, peace or perhaps a tear. Short lapses of time like a sunset can bring good feelings if one is ready to accept them. Break often to smell the coffee, to hear the fountain, to appreciate the falling leaves; a passing cloud over a lit park.

If we were the least as Funes the Memorious, we could perceive everything in full detail and remember it all. If we were the least as Funes el memorioso, we could feel, shiver really, with the form of a constantly changing flame. Instead, most us have poor memory like René from the film Wintersleepers, so we need take advantage of every opportunity to capture those distant instants. Life pues!

That’s what I do; I take pictures of the quotidian life of La Antigua Guatemala to share with you. In the process, I focus on the fleeting moments and sometimes I am able to capture some of them. Like René, one picture at a time I build my life puzzle, my memory, my good life.

To close this incoherent entry, I would like to share with you this tender and thought-provoking melody by Rockdrigo González entitled Distante instante. I would love to hear your impressions, your pondering, your feelings pues.

I wander what those dog figures are guarding. What do you think?

We continue with tortillas con carne adobada and longanizas. I can easily explain longanizas as Guatemalan white sausage which has chopped onions and yerba buena, mint, along the ground meat. However, carne adobada is a little more difficult since I don’t know what’s in the adobo mixture, except for achiote (annatto).

Can anybody help explaining what carne adobada is or how it is marinated?

Tortillas con carne could be the Guatemalan equivalent of the Mexican taco. Tortilla con carne is basically a piece of charbroiled steak of beef, adobo marinated pork steak, chicken, chorizo (Guatemalan red sausage) or longaniza (Guatemalan white sausage), served over two or three grill-heated corn tortillas and top with chirmol (Guatemalan tomato-based salsa), guacamol (Guatemalan style avocado sauce) and cebollines (baby onions or chives). I use the term carne, meat, as umbrella term for all the different cuts that are charbroiled.

I say that tortillas con carne could be the equivalent of the taco because they are omnipresent in every little corner of Guatemala. There are tortillas con carne at every town fair and market. There is at least one booth charbroiling meats in every street food stand plazas. Chuparrascos, the weekend and holiday get-togethers, are organized around tortillas con carne. There restaurant chains based on tortillas con carne as their main menu. All Guatemalas, from the Maya to Ladinos, from the less fortunate to the wealthy, enjoy tortillas con carne.