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Visiting the El Carmen ruins folkart market is among the top things people do on the weekends and holidays in La Antigua Guatemala.

Here’s a little secret. One of things on my to do list is to capture through time-lapse photography the contrast between the stark, almost monochromatic muted colors of the El Carmen ruins and cobblestone streets and the colorful handicrafts sold at the market.

Can you imagine watching the time-lapse video beginning with just the ruins and cobbled streets as backdrop and then how the color is added as each new vendor sets up shop and displays the colorful Guatemalan handicrafts?

Oh, I don’t think I will ever get tired for the abundant fresh produce available in el mercado of La Antigua Guatemala from the regular permanent stands or the ambulant produce sellers. Either way, you’re guaranteed fresh and colorful vegetables and fruits everyday. Life is good!

San Felipe de Jesús is just a small town next to La Antigua Guatemala, which has its own particularities. San Felipe’s church is gothic, its market is cozy, there are many options to have some delicious food… So, why not pay a visit to San Felipe on a Saturday or Sunday? I guess I am becoming a bit obsessed with Sundays, as there is plenty to do Don’t forget to tour around all the villages of La Antigua Guatemala; there’s more to come. Stay tune!

text and photos by Arturo Godoy

A few days ago Susanita was asking herself about rambutan and loquats tropical fruits.

Rambutan, or licha as it is known in Guatemala, is a red, plum-sized tropical fruit with soft spines and a slightly acidic taste. Lichas are now a staple of the mercados in Guatemala. Lichas (rambutan) are new comers and that’s why some Guatemalans living abroad might not be familiar with them.

Loquats, on the other hand, has been a staple of the Guatemalan fruit repertoire for as long as I can remember. “What the hell are you talking about?” Guatemalans maybe asking just about now. That’s right, loquats are nisperos or misperos, depends who you ask. As always, follow the white rabbit to see nisperos and read the background information.

Okay, I have solved the mysteries of rambutan and loquats tropical fruits. Now, which one do you prefer?

I know that one can go every day to the mercado, market, in La Antigua Guatemala for fresh produce and that if one goes Monday, Thursday or Saturday, one can find the find the largest selection and quality of fruits and vegetables. However, I had never seen the produce delivery trucks; I guess I am not up when the market gets restocked.

How many vegetables can you see inside the truck?

Sweet. Refreshing. Natural. Licuados are one of those treats that truly define a Guatemalan experience. The blended fruit drinks can be found most anywhere in La Antigua from fancy restaurants to local, hole-in-the-wall comedors… and I absolutely LOVE them. They are nothing more than fruit blended with your choice of water, milk, yogurt and, sometimes, orange juice. Often, sugar is added but I always ask for mine to come “sin azucar.” Usually fruit here in Guate is so perfectly ripe (as you can see from the pics) that any added sweetner would be too much… at least for me. So what is it, exactly, that makes licuados so addictive?

The idea of what are essentially smoothies is certainly nothing new to me, a U.S.-native. But, where I’m from in the Midwest, they just aren’t so prevalent. Here, in Guate, there is truly a licuado culture, a licuado craze even. It’s just as common to suggest to a friend to “let’s go grab a licuado” as it is to suggest meeting for a coffee. And this licuado culture has taught me to be more creative with my own smoothie concoctions. Never had I heard using papaya, honeydew or watermelon in a blended drink before coming to Central America… and now those are my top three favorites. Just the other day, the woman whom I rented a room from threw starfruit mixed with orange in her own, homemade version. It tasted quite “rico” as well.

It’s safe to say I’m addicted to these treats. I used to go hunker down to work online at Rainbow Café just so I could sip on a papaya-yogurt licuado while tackling my “to-do list.” It didn’t take me long to find the cheapest licuados in town though. At the market, you can usually order a licuado with water for Q7. At El Merendor it will cost you Q8. Looking for a spot more “oriente” go to Cookies where a licuado with water also costs Q7. Just add a quetzal or two for anything blended with milk or yogurt. Anywhere else, licuados usually cost around Q15 to Q20.

text and photos by Laura McNamara

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Market day in La Antigua Guatemala is much more than just getting your weekly produce or enjoying a photo moment of local Guatemalan life. To me it’s a sneak peak into the hard lives of the market workers and their families. The markets of Guatemala are full of little kids that have to spend their whole days sitting amongst fruits, vegetables, flowers and anything else that is for sale. Without beds, mothers have to get creative as to where to lay their children down.

I actually always wonder, where do they go after the market, what do they do?

This child is still to young to walk or talk, however, I’ve seen little kids as young as three years old selling stuff while walking through the market. They might not know how to say complete sentences but they can certainly say ‘eight quetzal or one dollar’. The biggest heartbreak is that you become immune to it. Even if you try not to!

Whenever we see these kids anywhere around Guatemala and on some of our travels through Nicaragua my husband constantly brings up that they have absolutely no childhood. They go from sleeping in their mother’s cloths to selling on the streets or cleaning in the house or caring after their siblings without a moment of happiness or childhood.

When we lived in Costa Rica, the landlord of a property I lived on hired a young Nicaraguan boy. He couldn’t have been older than 20. On the same property lived other families with kids. We always left the toys, tricycles and scooters outside. Every free moment he had he used to take these for rides, or you could find him playing with the toys that a five year old would play with and he was having the time of his life! Sheer happiness exuded from him. My husband’s observation was, this is him making up for his lost childhood. I’m sure his life wasn’t much different than the boy in the picture. So maybe these kids can grow up and still make up for their lost youth.

An interesting article describes how these children let out their energy as they get older, even when they are working the streets or at the market. Culture Unshocked: Toys and Play. It gives another point of view into the same culture, but with a different approach from mine.

However, one thing I do agree is, they certainly don’t take anything for granted and even the smallest things that people of different classes overlook, could bring a wonderful experience to them.

text and photo by Marina K. Villatoro

About Guest Contributor: Marina K. Villatoro has been living in Central America for over 7 years and her site Travel Experta is all about traveling in Central America. Marina loves to help people plan the perfect vacation to this amazing part of the world! At her website, you can sign up for her RSS feed and join the fun on her Facebook fan page and follow her on Twitter at @MarinaVillatoro.

Sweet. Juicy. Succulent. Happy. Fresh. Inviting. These are just some of the words that come to mind whenever I spy the overflowing mounds of fruit at the market. With such a flood of rainbow colors, I find the market is an excellent spot for a quick pick-me-up! But it’s not just the colors. It’s the hustle and bustle and the everyday bargaining. There are days that I just love to be caught in the middle of it all! I remember the first time I encountered the true market bartering game in Thailand. Used to the fixed prices of immense supermarkets in the U.S., I was a bit frustrated as I attempted to try and figure out what I should pay for various goods. At first, I didn’t even like the business of bartering. ‘Just give me a fair price!’ I cried out inside my own head. But now, I LOVE IT! It has become a fun game of battle-of-the-wits to see who can out-charm the other… vendor or buyer?? And still, it’s more. Market bartering offers a window of opportunity for me to better communicate with, learn about and learn from the Maya.

More photos of succulent fruit to come!

text and photo by Laura McNamara

As you can see in the picture above, most flower shops are working really hard to have a large inventory of flower arrangements for the Day of Dead celebrations around Antigua Guatemala.

This picture was take at Floristerí­a Perpetuas Rosas (Perpetual Roses flower shop) inside the Antigua Guatemala’s market. Some of you may already know why the name perpetuas rosas is such fitting name for a flower shop in La Antigua Guatemala, right?

By moving from one section of the mercado to another, we find that las floristerí­as (flower shops) are preparing the flower arrangements of the Dí­a de los muertos or Dí­a de los difuntos (Day of the Dead) celebrations. Above you see the round arrangements called coronas (crowns).

Dí­a de los muertos is celebrated in Guatemala on November 1st and 2nd. In previous years, I focused on the once-a-year delicacy called fiambre. I even set up a fiembre slide show, so you can see how it is prepared.

This year, I am planning to take you to see the giant kites of Santiago Sacatepéquez. This is one of the most colorful and rich celebrations in Guatemala. We will have leave the valley of Panchoy and drive up to the high lands of Santiago Sacatepéquez, about 30 minutes from La Antigua Guatemala. Are you up for the trip?

There’s no coming back. I was surprise to see a computer being used among all the fresh produce in the mercado (market) of La Antigua Guatemala. Sure, Lucky, my favorite vendor, supplies fresh fruits and vegetable to many restaurants around Antigua, but I was startled to see the computer in there.

I think for now they are using the computer for inventory and accounting. But I am sure, soon they will discover that if they attach a little nebulous thing called The Internet to it, they will be able to receive orders from all those restaurant via email. Afterwards, they might even call me to set up a semantically-structured, web-standards complaint, search-engine-optimized web site to fulfill their online orders. What if Lucky decides finally to tie the databased-backend inventory with the incoming online orders to create a just-in-time supply of the freshest vegetables and fruits. Wow, I am telling you, there’s no coming back.

You can go every day to el mercado (market) of La Antigua Guatemala, but if you go Monday, Thursday or Saturday, you can find a larger market (about twice as big) and the best selection and quality are available in dí­as de mercado (market days). You also find a crowded market on those days.

In the picture above was taken at the fresh produce area (well, one of the areas). I really enjoy the sights of such an abundance of fresh fruits and vegetables, some just harvested the day before.

WANTED: Blenders are needed to process all the tropical fruits in the market stand above into licuados, smoothies and milkshakes. Experience is not required, but you should be able to name as many fruits as possible. As bonus you are encourage to eat all the fresh fruit you can handle. All interested, please call our hot line 555-1944.

Are you up for a healthier lifestyle?

Holiday/Political Aside: On Monday, October 20, Guatemala celebrates its Dí­a de la Revolución (Revolution’s Day) and everybody gets the day off. Well, almost everybody, I am going to be working.

… On October 20, 1944 by a coup d’état led by Major Francisco Javier Arana and Captain Jacobo Arbenz Guzmán, the country was led by a military junta made up of Arana, Arbenz, and Jorge Toriello Garrido. The Junta called Guatemala’s first free election, which was won with a majority of 85 percent by the prominent writer and teacher Juan José Arévalo Bermejo, who had lived in exile in Argentina for 14 years. Arévalo was the first democratically elected president of Guatemala to fully complete the term for which he was elected. His “Christian Socialist” policies, inspired by the U.S. New Deal, were criticized by landowners and the upper class as “communist.”

In 1954, Arévalo’s freely elected Guatemalan successor, Jacobo Arbenz, was overthrown in a coup orchestrated by the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) in the 1954 Guatemalan coup d’état. Colonel Carlos Castillo Armas was installed as president in 1954 and ruled until he was assassinated by a member of his personal guard in 1957.

The operation was preceded by a plan, never fully implemented, as early as 1951, to supply anti-Arbenz forces with weapons, supplies, and funding, Operation PBFORTUNE. Afterwards there was an operation, Operation PBHISTORY, whose objective was to gather and analyze documents from the Arbenz government that would incriminate Arbenz as a Communist puppet.[3]…

Source: Wikipedia

With this little summary as backdrop, it is very difficult for me to comply to some requests for me to NEVER voice my opinion in regards to the political campaign going on in the U.S. right now as a courtesy to the people living there since I am quite possibly rude, presumptuous, uneducated and uninformed.

The fresh produce available at the Farmers’ Fair and at the market are so irresistible. As you can see in the picture above, many people took advantage of the produce available at the fair instead of going all the way to el mercado.

Diversify is very sound advice for any business. Patsy, who loves chicken, would say, don’t put all the eggs in one basket. So, it is no surprise to find stands, like the one pictured above, in La Antigua Guatemala’s market which sells all kinds of items. This photograph gives me an idea for a new easy game (we haven’t got a game for a while) for this weekend.

The game is very simple: identify as many items as possible from the market stand above and leave your inventory in the comments. You can also leave your questions for the things that are unknown to you. Let the game begin!