This old tree creates a magnetic shadow by providing shelter from the burning sun. You saw the old lady that did not care about the world, then you peeked at the indigenous Mayan girl taking a break and now you can eavesdrop in our dear friend JM Magaña while he takes a phone call.
We all need it by now.
Today’s entry marks 558 consecutive days of La Antigua Guatemala Daily Photo; 570 entries total. The tree above is the same tree that appears in the post I don’t care about the world on May 21st, 2006.
For some unknown reason, many Guatemalans opt for misspelled Spanish bastardizations of English words to name their businesses. For instance, the image above has the name Stilos (Estilos is the proper Spanish spelling) as a way to relate to Styles the English word for this barbershop (peluqueria in Spanish).
Central America and Guatemala especially have an abundance of water resources, many are groundwater. La Antigua Guatemala is located in a valley irrigated with over six months of a rainy season per year. La Antigua Guatemala is surrounded by mountains and volcanoes that collect even more water. Much of this collected rain ends up as groundwater.
The irony of life in La Antigua Guatemala, a tiny colonial town with hundreds of bed & breakfasts, luxury hotels, cozy posadas, 5-star hotels, and thousands of rooms for every kind of budget. Yet, the number of homeless people without a roof increases every year. Certainly, life can be tough in La Antigua Guatemala.
This picture is like a summary of the Guatemalan Idiosyncrasy. First we have the giant kite with all the Mayan motifs, which for a long time represented the pagan rituals as the dominant catholic church used to call them. Anything that represented non-christian religious rituals was denigrated and prosecuted under the pagan label
The Guatemalan word for kite is barrilete. Papalote is the most often heard word in Spanish for kite, but in Guatemala barrilete is what people use. The kites on sale at this convenience store or tienda are Q2/$.25. The kite that the little boy was holding yesterday was bought from this store.
With November come the strong winds (Vientos fuertes would say Miguel Ángel Asturias). With the strong winds come the kites. With the kites come the celebrations of the day of the dead and all saints day. With the day of the dead celebrations comes the fiambre, the food to share with our dead. Stay tune for background information on the kite flying rituals and its me
Okay with this last photo of people carrying umbrellas we can now declare the rainy season of 2007 officially over. Okay everyone, you are welcome to the most beautiful weather in La Antigua Guatemala; come on over now!
Touring around Guatemala can be tough during the rainy season, but it can be done… nothing a good raincoat and an umbrella can not solve.
Even backpackers have to add an umbrella to their arsenal while traveling in Guatemala during the rainy season.
Here is a little over-sharing, as Miss Jill would say. This is one of the views from our office window into the garden. Here we can see José, our green-thumb gardener waiting for the heavy rain to pass. By the way, rain is one of the most difficult things to photograph. Here I set shutter’s timing at two seconds, holding the camera over the window crate as a tripod, to try to capture the heavy down pour, yet I was only able to show silky lines. I’ve tried to do the same before in the entry Comtemplating the heavy rain with a little better success. We are about one to two weeks from the end of the rainy season.
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.
This is very simple image will allow us to play a creative game. Taking the two women as our characters we will write up one of many conceivable dialogues as the interaction between them. This would be similar to what we did in Opposite Ends of Life #2, which you should look at and read to get an idea. The apparent age difference could be used to set the pair as mother and daughter or sisters or simply co-workers of the newly opened Subway; it is up to you. I will submit the first plausible dialogue.
Here is a vertical shot of a biker doing a jump in the atrium of the Jocotenango church. Jocotenago is one of the communities very near La Antigua Guatemala. Jocotenango is so close to La Antigua that you might walk and cross over the municipal borders without realizing it. Jocotenango and Ciudad Vieja are the two municipios (counties) where most of the antigüeños moved after they sold their houses in La Antigua Guatemala. Some antigüeños sold their house under pressure from buyers and because the incredible prices buyers were willing to pay. Ciudad Vieja and Jocotenango is where most of the workers of La Antigua Guatemala businesses live. Jocotenango and Ciudad Vieja are ‘REAL’ Guatemalan communities, unlike La Antigua Guatemala. Soon I will post an entry with the following title: La Antigua Guatemala is not Guatemala (which I’ve been saving for a long while now). Stay tune!
