First, Blame the trabalenguas, tongue twister, title on emromesco, who said that water will be the oil of the 21st century. Second, forgive the undramatic photograph; not much I can do with a working water well and its pumping warehouse. I compensate with all the wonderful researched information below. Third, a few Spanish-English word equivalents … Read more
The venerable colonial pila from La Antigua Guatemala finds a new use as decoration in a fast food restaurant. What’s a pila (pee-lah), I hear you ask? simple, the omnipresent pila guatemalteca is basically a water tank and one or two sinks or washbasins for doing dishes and washing the clothes. You have seen a … Read more
The Panchoy Valley, where La Antigua Guatemala is located, used to be a lake at the time the Conquistadores arrived and when they founded the second Santiago de Guatemala in the Almolonga Valley, now Ciudad Vieja which is about two miles from Antigua. Then the Panchoy Lake basin was fed by the Pensativo River. The … Read more
In Guatemala exists a near monopoly of bottled water called Salvavidas; surely you remember the photo of the pile 5-gallon jugs known in Guatemalan Spanish as garrafones, right? Until recently you had no choice, but to buy your bottled water from Salvavidas or some of the tiny competitors who deliver the 5-gallon jugs from far … Read more
Today, as in colonial times, these public water tanks and washbasins serve as the places for doing the laundry and for water distribution. Furthermore, public laundry washbasins (sometimes river or lake shores) serve as the gathering place for news, gossip and community building through the interactions that take place. Public washbasins could be considered the … Read more
These recently renovated colonial-styled public water faucets can be found in and around many of the villages of La Antigua Guatemala. Like I said yesterday, the presence of these chorros as the water faucets are called in Guatemala, is a sure sign that there are still houses in the villages without piped water service. The … Read more
All Guatemalans, of course, just like the air. Water belongs to the Guatemalan people and it’s managed by the government; national and local government. In theory, Guatemalans don’t pay for the water itself, but for the distribution system; that is the electricity to pump it and the distribution pipes. The water bill can vary a … Read more