La Antigua Guatemala Daily Photo

The typical Guatemalan camioneta (public transit bus or chicken bus for those who like the colourful derogatory term) is based on an old looking Blue Bird school bus. How the Blue Bird insignia became a Green Quetzal beats me. But I guess this sort of transfiguration is what makes the Guatemalan idiosyncrasy; don’t you think so?

Does one have the right to change his/her mind? I ask because the first time I posted the use of wood as fuel, I was against it. By the second time I showed a photo of wood being used as fuel, I had learnt that not all instances of the use of wood as fuel were bad from an article that appeared in National Geographic en español. Recently, I learned about the benefits of finding renewable sources of fuel, like biodiesel (Can you see an entry on Biodiesel coming up pretty soon?). So, I can change my mind, right?

Well, we are not going to talk about wood as fuel anyway. No sir, no. We actually are going to talk about the colonial measurements which are still in use the 21st Century Guatemala. How you may ask yourself we moved from renewable fuel sources to colonial measurements in the same photo of a truck full of wood logs? Easy, my friends, that’s how easy it can be done. Let me explain. See, the photo above is about fuel home delivery and the transaction that occurred there. The amount of wood missing from the truck, which was delivered to the lady in delantal (apron) is a colonial measurement known as una tarea (one workload). Workload or tarea (also known as homework) is the best word I can think of to translate the word tarea. The lady in the apron bought una tarea of wood logs, which, she said, was enough fuel for two weeks for her household. She paid Q180/US$24 for una tarea of wood logs.

Other colonial measurements still in use in present-day Guatemala are: Una mano (one hand or five of anything), un manojo (a bunch), una libra (a pound; this one may hurt many of you, but for sure, the civilized world now uses the kilo), una picopada (a truckload), una fila de frances (a row of french rolls), una arroba (@ or 25 pounds) un quintal (100 pounds), una cuerda (a cord equals 1/6 of city block), una medida (a measurement of whatever fits inside a small can or basket), una penca de banano (that’s a banana cluster), et-cetera or basically that’s what I can remember right now. I am sure the Guatemalans visitors will share other colonial measurements being used in Guatemala. There was a recent article about colonial measurement in Prensa Libre’s Revista Domingo under the title of Costumbres que pesan {ñ}.

Semana Santa in Guatemala City Side Note: For those of you who did not have enough Holy Week photos, here is a link to Slide Show of Holy Week photos in Guatemala City by the Guatemalan photojournalist James Rodríguez of MiMundo.Org. If you have the time, I recommend his photo stream at Flickr and his website very highly.

One final post scriptum: Today’s entry can be also called the Boeing 707. Do you know why?

Well, between precessions, a jazz festival and a Central American meeting for Harley-Davidson motorcycle riders, La Antigua has been anything but a quiet place. The roaring of hundreds of Harley-Davidson choppers from all over Central America was deafening. The long row of motorcycles overcrowding the 7a avenida sur was something to be seen.

Boy, I wished you were here!

The cobblestone streets of La Antigua Guatemala were originally designed for horses and horse-carriages. So, it is no wonder that even light vehicles, like cars, create a lot of damage to the streets which, therefore, need constant repairing. Now you can imagine that huge and heavy trucks like the ones pictured above not only damage the streets, but the foundation of the houses and the city itself.

It is sad to see a city like La Antigua Guatemala go through a daily process not because its enchanting beauty, but because a living monument, patrimony to humanity, will for sure disappear. Does anyone care? you may ask yourself, like I do.

I don’t know who had the bright idea to rent the clean body of almost-new vehicles for advertising, but many vehicles receive a monthly quota for allowing advertisement on their cars while they drive around the country in their daily routines. I sure think they’re ugly and offensive to the eye, but everybody wants to earn a buck whichever way possible.

Like Manolo said, with Marimba music as the background for many parties and celebrations around La Antigua Guatemala and the rest of the country, I can almost smell the pine needles under my feet and the tamales and ponche (fruit punch) in the air. Oh what memories… sometimes I even wish I could like this type of music.

I dedicate the song Un vals para mi madre to my mother who’s visiting me at the moment.

Post cards request update: I forgot to mention that the last set of post cards I receive came from Flor and Sompopo in Atlanta, Georgia; Gail and Diego (age 3) from Long Island and a home-made post card from Mark from onewayphotoblog.com from Southern England. You guys are awesome and I REALLY appreciate all your post card and kind words. If you don’t know what I am talking about, please do read the entry Postscript.

Well, well, what we have here… what’s up with that, why are Guatemalans so enchanted with the infamous chicken bus. I mean what makes Guatemalans take on the crappy junk and retired school buses from up north and give them a second life as public transit chicken bus, mobile libraries chicken bus and now as a marimba orquesta mobile unit chicken bus.

Now this is too much! Come on, who came up with the bright idea of mixing the chicken bus and the marimba orquesta. If hell existed, this would be it.

By the way, chicken bus is the derogatory term used in many guides to refer to the rural public transportation buses in Guatemala and in many parts of Latin America. The marimba (pronunciation) has to be Guatemala’s most popular musical instrument.

If you don’t know what marimba music sound like, I leave you with a sample of it with Tristezas quetzaltecas below. You can also check out the entry Marimba Music at Calle del Arco in Antigua for more background information and two more marimba music songs.

From the Guateflora series we take a different road to show you the lush roads around La Antigua Guatemala. By the way, the roads that communicate La Antigua Guatemala with the rest of the ‘real’ Guatemala are some of the best in the country, if not the best; they are kept in better conditions than the rest of the roads around Guatemala.

Some of the readers have tried to pegged me with a specific color, which I think, is more their liking than mine. I have said nothing. For instance, Lessie thought that my favorite color was yellow and Manolo mentioned that I was in my red period. But if you come often to this site, you will know that I am a Panza Verde at heart, even though I am from GuateCity. See it is impossible not to like green in Guatemala, especially when there are a million shades of green.

The etymology of the name Guatemala has the source for all this greenery. I have touched this subject a couple of times in Wood used as fuel in Antigua and Wood Handicrafts and the Mahogany Side Note. Here’s a quote from the original entry on May 25th, 2006.

The name Guatemala derives from the word Goathemala which was given by the Spanish conquistadors and it derives from Quauhtlemallan a word from the Nahualt language spoken by the Tlaxcala’s natives that accompanied the conquistadors. Quauhtlemallan was a direct translation from the Mayan language’s Quiche or Iximche which more or less translates to the land of many trees or forests. This was long-winded explanation to bring forth the fact that this land has been a powerful lung for earth for a very long time; thanks to its many forests.

As you can see, green is the most prominent color in the Guatemalan rainbow and my favorite color; heck! I even use it in this site (but not for long).

Would you share with us what is your favorite color from the color palette of La Antigua Guatemala and why?

Unless you have taken the path of La Marche de l’empereur, you haven’t heard about how everyone is living a virtual second life through a community web site. Well, old and retired school buses from the U.S. get to live a real second life as camionetas (the street name for public transit buses in Guatemala). Revue Magazine had an in-depth article about The Birth of a Camioneta (available as a PDF download) which detailed step-by-step how an old retired school bus became a powerful camioneta ready for the curvy roads of the mountain ranges of Guatemala. It is a great read and I recommend that you download the PDF to learn about the shops that make the miracle. The article is between the pages 1-33 in case you don’t want to download the whole magazine.

It is at one of this reconstruction shops, that an old and retired school bus from the use get its powerful second wind to ride in the roller-coaster roads of Guatemala. Interestingly enough, there are quite a few shops around La Antigua Guatemala that make the miracle of transforming the old yellow buses into the colorful exotic rides known derogatorily as chicken buses.

Calzada Santa Lucía gets overcrowded with all the stands of the 11 candidates for the La Antigua Guatemala City Hall or Muni as we call it here. They all have their booths, their chants and songs, their promises, their colors, their flyers, their visual and hearing pollution, their trash, et-cetera.

They all tell us that they will change La Antigua Guatemala and/or Guatemala. I hate how all of them over use the word change and they leave it empty-ended. Does change really equals better? I don’t know where they get they dictionaries and thesaurus. Was the change from the Clinton to the Bush administration a change for the better? Is the world better now or even the U.S?; Just put an example that may be more obvious to all of us.

Nevertheless, a change is necessary in La Antigua Guatemala’s Muni. I just hope the change will bring a better administrator and politician to the mayor’s office. La Antigua Guatemala in an urgent need of better administration (ES).

For those who are unaware that Guatemala will voting for new residents in the presidency and vice-presidency, city mayors offices and congress seats on September 9th, all I have to say is: Come on people read more Blogschapines or if you like dinosaur-blogs read La Hora, Siglo XXI, elPeriódico or Prensa Libre.

Guate, Guate, Guate… vamos vaciooossss!

That is what you hear the chicken bus driver’s helper yell out as the omnibus makes its way back into Guatemala City. But there are all kinds of yellings: Antigua, Antigua llega llega… dale, Chimal, Chimal, Chichi, Chichi, Xela, Xela and so on.

Guate, Guate, Guate… vamos vaciooossss! Guatemala, Guatemala, Guatemala, we are empty is what the driver’s ayudante (helper) would yell out if they are full, like this.

Instead of writing all the possible things the driver’s assistant of a chicken bus can yell out I leave you with Zacatenango; an electronic-genre song with samplings of many different call outs from chicken buses and sounds of Guatemala. Zacatenango is the third song in an awesome anthology by the name of Democracia Sonora (Sonic Democracy) which is a compilation of electronic songs made by Guatemalan DJs with the common thread of samples of street sounds of Guatemala and its public transit system. You can download Democracia Sonora from Electronik.net; a site dedicated to the work of Guatemalan DJs and their electronic creations.

Once again, La Antigua Guatemala Daily Photo is participating in the theme day of the Daily Photo community. This time the theme is about the color red. Here you can see the Compañía de Jusús building under care of the Cooperación Española which is a huge red building; one full block to be specific. This building has had many uses through history, like the home of Bernal Díaz del Castillo, home to the Jesuits of Central America in colonial times, thus its name, and more recently it houses a public library, culture center under the administration of Agencia Española de Cooperación Internacional. You can see the big entrance of the building, the interior gardens and arches and one the side wall of the ruins. I decided to photograph this building because it’s the biggest red thing in La Antigua Guatemala, but I was lucky to have a red motorcycle and a red jeep enter the viewfinder at the moment I snapped the shot; how lucky, indeed.

I had to break my coverage of the San Pedro Las Huertas town fair for this theme day. I will continue with other aspects of a Guatemalan town fair tomorrow and through the week. Come back tomorrow for the follow up. In the mean time, I leave you with the links to the other Daily Photo sites which decided to participate in the theme day.

Over 100 Daily Photo City sites are participating in the July 1st Theme Day: The Color Red, please use the links below to visit them.

Due to time zone differences and other factors, the theme photo may not be displayed until later if you are viewing early in the day.

Shanghai, China - Mumbai, India - New York City (NY), USA - Manila, Philippines - Albuquerque (NM), USA - Hamburg, Germany - Stayton (OR), USA - Los Angeles (CA), USA - Hyde, UK - Oslo, Norway - Brookville (OH), USA - Melbourne, Australia - Stavanger, Norway - Bellefonte (PA), USA - Bucaramanga (Santander), Colombia - Joplin (MO), USA - Singapore, Singapore - Selma (AL), USA - Cleveland (OH), USA - Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia - Chandler (AZ), USA - Stockholm, Sweden - Seattle (WA), USA - Boston (MA), USA - Arradon, France - Evry, France - Baton Rouge (LA), USA - Maple Ridge (BC), Canada - Boston (MA), USA - Grenoble, France - Cottage Grove (MN), USA - Greenville (SC), USA - Hilo (HI), USA - Nelson, New Zealand - La Antigua, Guatemala - Brisbane (QLD), Australia - Singapore, Singapore - Tel Aviv, Israel - Hong Kong, China - Sequim (WA), USA - Paderborn, Germany - Saarbrücken, Germany - Rotterdam, Netherlands - Tenerife, Spain - Kyoto, Japan - Tokyo, Japan - Sydney, Australia - Naples (FL), USA - Cologne (NRW), Germany - Wassenaar (ZH), Netherlands - Saint Louis (MO), USA - Cypress (TX), USA - Ocean Township (NJ), USA - Mainz, Germany - Toruń, Poland - Menton, France - Monte Carlo, Monaco - Singapore, Singapore - North Bay (ON), Canada - Jakarta, Indonesia - Montréal (QC), Canada - Tuzla, Bosnia and Herzegovina - Minneapolis (MN), USA - Baziège, France - San Diego (CA), USA - Prague, Czech Republic - Ampang (Selangor), Malaysia - New York (NY), USA - Kajang (Selangor), Malaysia - Sharon (CT), USA - Newcastle (NSW), Australia - Port Angeles (WA), USA - Nottingham, UK - Villigen, Switzerland - Chicago (IL), USA - Torquay, UK - Brussels, Belgium - San Diego (CA), USA - Mexico (DF), Mexico - Saint Paul (MN), USA - Cape Town, South Africa - Paris, France - Seoul, Korea - Manila, Philippines - Milano, Italy - Austin (TX), USA - Chennai, India - Madrid, Spain - Seoul, South Korea - Wailea (HI), USA - Toronto (ON), Canada - Ajaccio, France - Buenos Aires, Argentina - Silver Spring (MD), USA - Zurich, Switzerland - Sydney, Australia - Budapest, Hungary - Moscow, Russia - Auckland, New Zealand - Torino, Italy

First of all, I want to thank all the people who got in touch just to make sure I was not under a ruin.

Guatemala was hit today at 13:29 local time (GMT -6) by an earthquake of magnitude of 6.8 (or 6.6, 5.9, 5.4 depends who you read) and duration of 49 seconds. Boy oh boy the land shook, the old houses roared for what seemed forever. Less than two minutes after the land finally stopped moving I checked Automatic Geofon Global Seismic Monitor which registered the earthquake’s epicenter just offshore, on the Pacific Ocean, with a magnitude for 5.9 (it was later updated to 6.6). In the news, they talked about numbers as high as 7.6; but one thing everyone got right it was extremely long: over 40 seconds and down here it felt even longer. According to the backlog, there have been three earthquakes in Guatemala in the last week.

I went to pick my wife at home for lunch and in my way there and back I did not see any damages. So I believe there are no casualties around the area. I haven’t got the chance to see the news for reports around the country.

The emergency services were in full alert and many people suffered panic attacks. Fortunately, no casualties have been listed around La Antigua or in Guatemala. So far so good.

Just about all the streets in La Antigua Guatemala are one-way venues and you can only park on one side of the street; the other side is marked on the side of the sidewalk with red paint. If you park on the no-parking zone you may have your vehicle immobilized by the cepo police (cepo are the big orange clamps that are put on the tires). If I am not mistaken, I believe a big orange clamp, or cepo as they call it here, will set you back about Q250 (US$1 equals 7.67 Quetzales, the Guatemalan currency name).

I feel for this poor fellow who was just cashing his check; he parked right across the bank. I know where his cash is going.

This reckless image can be seen often in La Antigua Guatemala, where motorcycles are fast becoming the most popular vehicle (thanks to Mr. Bush). I have seen four people, or even five people, in a single two-wheel motorcycle; two adults and two or three children. So as you can see in the photo above, a motorcycle is fine for a family of four.

Is this something you can photograph in your home town?

Economic/Political Side Note: In 2001 when we arrived to Guatemala the cost of a gallon of gasoline was around Q12 (Q is short for Quetzales, the Guatemalan currency) or about US$1.50 at the exchange rate of Q8 per US$1. Then, Bush took the U.S. to two wars (or invasions, depends who you read) and the price of gasoline began to climb. Today, in Guatemala the price of the same gallon of gasoline is around Q27 or US$3.56 at Q7.58 per US$1 (minimum wage in Guatemala is about US$5.25 per day). The world is less safer (remember Madrid and London). The U.S. has become one of the worst offenders and violators of Human Rights as seen in all the evidence in the Guantanamo prisoners and in Iraq. More than two hundred thousand innocent people have died in Iraq, and who knows how many more in Afghanistan. The same question for the number of dead soldiers from the U.S., Spain, U.K. and others. The whole planet is warmer and more catastrophic; The dollar has devalued against many currencies in Latin America, making the cost of fuels even more expensive. Okay, I know, Bush’s wars are only part of the cause; a big part I may add.

This increase in fuel costs are probably the main cause for the popularity of motorcycles, Tuk Tuks motor taxis and bicycles as means of transportation. I hope this clarifies to many visitor from the U.S. why your decisions at election time are so important to your neighbors down south and elsewhere. You vote, we suffer the consequences!

Tags: Antigua Guatemala Daily Photo / Antigua / Guatemala / motorcycle / Alameda Santa Lucía