AntiguaDailyPhoto.Com

La Antigua Guatemala is full of hidden treasures which are visible at plain view. One must be ready to look for them though. The Santiago emblem tiles from yesterday are a very good example. Today’s baroque niche is another good example.

Do you know where one can find this architectonic baroque detail in La Antigua Guatemala?

Fifth Anniversary Aside: On May 1st, AntiguaDailyPhoto.com will be celebrating its fifth anniversary.

Everyone is invited to stop by to sing the happy birthday song. Feliz cumpleaños, feliz cumpleaños; ya queremos torta aun que sea un pedacito, pero queremos…

There will be Marimba and Mariachi music, tamales, hot chocolate, atoles, and the whole enchilada.

Sometimes you must be ready to look in all directions to find new vistas from La Antigua Guatemala. These Santiago (Saint James) tiles are a very good example. Unless one looks up at the end of Portal de Las Panaderas, right in front of Casa Gómez Ovalle (5a avenida norte and 4a calle poniente) one will never find out about these Santiago tiles.

This Saint James emblem would make a nice logo for its simplicity, clean lines and rustic hand-drawn style. Can you see a hotel or travel agency in La Antigua Guatemala with this logo?

You’d be amazed on everything that might be for sale on the streets of La Antigua Guatemala during Lent. This time while walking on the streets during the Procession of Jesús de San Bartolo, we happened to run into these candles, I think they’d make some great souvenirs for your house, and the price is reasonable. What do you think?

text and photo by Arturo Godoy.

The Santo Domingo del Cerro hosted a Baroque music concert on Palm Sunday, and well, after Nelo’s wonderful work on Processions, perhaps it is just a different post this time.

Going to these kinds of concerts is always an experience, and more so when you know one of the Concertistas. It was Carolina Palomo the one I knew, a good friend and for random reasons I had never ever heard her play. When music was about begin, I closed my eyes and let the music open them. Some minutes later I found myself grabbing my camera and to just shoot. I didn’t want to use flash because the concert was being videotaped, and most importantly the flash could distract the concertistas. Even so, some people were still using flash, so the decision of sacrificing ISO versus flash was not hard to make.

The music was life in every single breath, meaning the performance and the ambience of the place, was almost surreal. Some kilometers away I bet Nelo was taking photographs, and I thought that next time I’d photograph a procession, my ipod would make good company, so perhaps the music could help me get some cool shots like Nelo’s.

After the wonderful concert, we shared some lovely conversations with the musicians and some of their friends. All of them are just amazing and lovely people; they enjoy being part of the Ensamble Antiqua (yes, with a “q”).

How many times have you been in a baroque music concert?

text and photos by Arturo Godoy.

Water matters to a lot a people. Now I understand the importance of awareness campaigns like World Water Day, which we discussed here about a month ago.

This was a town hall meeting to discuss the contaminated water that is being served by the Municipality. It was and interesting and weird meeting. I believe the people were called to assembled by the City Hall government in order to let know that the Public Health Ministry was going to shut down their water reservoir. Interesting enough, the Health Ministry officials were there to explain why they were going to close the water reservoir and distribution system. They said it is their obligation to shut down water distribution systems when the water is contaminated and this is particular water reservoir is contaminated and they were asking the people to demand chlorination of the water in order to receive purified water from the Antigua Guatemala municipal government. The people did not trust the intentions of neither the Municipality nor Health Ministry. People were enraged at the possibility of losing their tap water. You see, water matters.

Here’s the water series published before to clarify the water situation in Guatemala. As always, follow the white rabbit to the water series to see the photos and read the researched information.

1. Who owns the water in Guatemala?
2. Public Water Faucets Are Today’s Fountains
3. Water Tanks and Colonial Style Social Networks
4. Local Bottled Water Station Hunapu
5. Abundant Water for Fountains Around Antigua
6. The Venerable Colonial Pila is Now Used as Decoration
7. Guatemalan Water Wells Wet Wealth

What kind water issues are there where you live?

Arturo and I found a great place to have some of the best hamburgers in La Antigua Guatemala at La Esquina (The Corner). La Esquina is located on the corner, one block south from Parque Central. The hamburgers are huge and the meat is charbroiled. Furthermore, they have a large patio and awesome music playing all the time. I profiled La Esquina’s Oriental Chicken with Coconut Curry as part of the Antigua Cosmopolitan series last year; do you remember it?

What are you having for lunch today?

I want to publicly thank my dear friend and colleague Nelo Mijangos for sharing his wonderful Lent and Holy Week photography with us. Also, I want to praise his fabulous new angles and less traditional perspectives for the Holy Week photos.

Norman Ávila, the brains and enthusiastic person behind ClimaYa (Guatemala’s real-time weather reports), sent me these images of Nelo at work hanging from an electric pole. Later on Nelo sent me a photo he took from this vantage point with his iPhone 4. Thanks to Norman Ávila we get the real-time weather reports in AntiguaDailyPhoto, GuatemalaDailyPhoto and XelaDailyPhoto.

If you appreciate the Lent and Holy Week photos shared with us by Nelo, please do let him know in the comments.

Last but not least, remember that you can check out what happened during Holy Week in XelaDailyPhoto and GuatemalaDailyPhoto.

Photos of Leonel Mijangos by Norman Ávila. Vantage point photo by Leonel [Nelo] Mijangos