Guatemala 6/29/2019 - 7/13/2019

Sunday, 6/30/2019 - San Lucas Toliman, Humberto's Birthday

Today is Humberto's birthday. We woke up to firecrackers and Happy Birthday music. After breakfast (oatmeal with bananas, pancakes, fruit, orange juice, and coffee), Eddy asked if he could use my "other camera." The kids have always enjoyed using my camera to take photos, and I got into the habit of bringing an older model for them to use whenever they want. Demand has lessened now that most of them have cell phones with cameras, but sometimes they still like to use the camera. I am all for it, as they often are able to get photos of their siblings that I could never capture. Case in point: Ian. He avoids the camera like the plague, unless Eddy is the photographer. He idolizes his big brother like crazy.

I got the camera out of my luggage. As soon as I handed it to Eddy, he was teaching Ian how to use it. He put the strap around Ian's wrist (a rule that we enforce so to reduce the likelihood of dropping it), and showed him how the controls work. Ah, passing traditions along to the next generation!

Last year, when our dear friend Tyson had visited with us, we had done some shopping on Calle Santander, the main tourist strip in town. We had seen a carved wooden dog that he had liked in a shop crowded full of similar treasures. We didn't have enough cash on us, and it was the very start of the trip. Tyson decided that he would wait and see if he really wanted to buy it or if it was just a momentary impulse. After a couple of days, he decided that he did indeed want to purchase it. Except that, for the remainder of the trip, we were unable to find the shop again. We scoured Santander from end to end in the hot sun day after day to no avail.

I was determined to find this store if it killed me, and bring the wooden dog to Tyson. It had been a weekend when we saw it last time, so I decided that this being a Sunday morning, it would be a good time to look. Eddy accompanied me.

The family's tourism business (Lago Aventura) now has an additional small office on Calle Santander, where it gets more foot traffic. We stopped in at the office to see Yoselin, who was working the morning shift.

I led the way, and Eddy followed behind me with the camera. As we walked up and down the street, I looked carefully into any shop which even somewhat vaguely resembled my memories...a long, narrow, dimly lit shop with a glass display counter down the center. But...no luck.

We said good morning to Paulina's sister Olga selling fresh squeezed juice on the street corner, as their father did in years past.

We stopped at the ATM and then headed back to the house.

The family decided to take an excursion to the piscinas (pools) today for some swimming. Humberto, Paulina, Aracely, Eddy, Yoselin, Yasmin, Ian, Craig, and I got into the van, and Humberto drove southeast around Lake Atilan.

As we headed out of Panajachel, we passed a place where, in the past, we had walked over a temporary footbridge because a landslide had washed the road away. Craig recognized the family farm land in San Gabriel as we passed by. We had visited this land with Humberto's mother in 2011

Kids and adults were fixing potholes in the road, and as we passed, Humberto would slow to a stop. Yasmin would fish a quetzal out of her bag to tip them for their efforts. This is something that Humberto likes to do to show his appreciation, and it is nice that he is passing the tradition down to his kids. Mudslides and washouts wreak havoc on the roads, and, if not dealt with, the roads would become impassable.

On the ride, Ian asked to see the photos of our cats on my phone again. He really seems to be obsessed with cats. Later on in the day, when we were back at the house, we would hear cats screeching and making an awful ruckus on the roof. Maybe that is why he thinks about them so much.

We drove to Patulul. As we passed the entrance to the El Manantial pools, Ian got agitated and kept telling Humberto that he missed the turn. Humberto explained that we were going to get some ice cream first, at which point Ian settled down.

We stopped at Parma, a dairy bar owned by an Italian man who married a Guatemalan woman. They sell dairy products, ice cream, light lunch food, etc.

We sat at a picnic table outside, with a view of Volcan Atitlan. We started off with nacho chips and melted cheese sauce. It was delicious. They had bought some extra (non-melted) cheese. They squeezed some onto Ian's fingertip. He was running around and fell down on the cement. We waited to see if he would cry, but he started to giggle, with his finger full of cheese held triumphantly aloft.

A family at the next table had their white dog Leydi with them. Ian and Aracely enjoyed petting her.

It started to thunder as we ate, which didn't bode well for the swimming. We followed up our nachos with a soft serve ice cream cone.

After our snack, we headed to the pools. Humberto parked the van and we were walking to the entrance when the heavens opened up. There was soon lightning too. We all turned right around and went straight back to the van. So much for swimming!

We got back into the van, and on the way home, we took a short detour to San Lucas Toliman, a Kaqchiqel Mayan village that we had not visited before. Like Panajachel, it is also on the shores of Lake Atitlan. It had obviously rained hard here, as some of the roads were flooded. Humberto had thought we might take a dip in the lake if the weather cleared, but it didn't.

Instead we went to look at the town's namesake church, San Lucas Evangelista. The church dates back to 1584. In its well-manicured garden was a large poster of Father Stanley Francis Rother, a priest from Oklahoma who served in the Lake Atitlan area for 13 years. He was based in Santiago Atitlan, but he also said Masses and performed sacraments at other area churches. He translated the Bible into the Tzutzujuil Mayan dialect, and created many social programs to help the local indigenous peoples. He was beloved by his parishioners. The Tzutzujil language does not have an equivalent for "Stanley," so they affectionately called him "Apla's", the Tzutzujil version of "Francis" (his middle name).

Father Rother provided sanctuary for indigenous peoples during the genocide despite death threats. He was advised to leave his parish for his own safety, but he refused to leave his flock. He was ultimately murdered in 1981.

People here revere him as a martyr, and he was beatified by Pope Francis in 2017. Although his actual parish was in Santiago Atitlan, It is obvious that his memory is precious to all parishes in the area.

This particular church also has its own American priest who devoted his life to helping indigenous peoples of the area. Monsignor Gregory Schaffer from Minnesota served as priest at San Lucas Evangelista for 52 years. He founded the San Lucas Toliman Mission, which has created many social programs and land distribution. There was a statue of Monsignor Shaffer in the garden.

We were quite self conscious entering the church. We were dressed for the pools! Craig was wearing a T-shirt and shorts, and I was wearing a tankini with skirt (luckily I had a cardigan to cover my shoulders). We like to be very respectful whenever entering any house of worship, be it a church, temple, mosque, or synagogue. I always make sure that my knees and shoulders are covered. But there were only a few people inside, and it was dimly lit.

We passed a poster of Monsignor Shaffer embracing his parishioners. A small poster for Father Rother's beatification hung on a bulletin board.

The center aisle was festooned with gold and red draperies. A large carved wooden altar held effigies of saints, with namesake St. Luke in the center, in a lit glass case with purple fabric background. There were other effigies along the walls of the church. One was clearly of a farmer, a nod to the traditional occupation of the indigenous communities.

Aracely, Eddy, and Ian Ivan also explored the church. Humberto and Paulina had remained outside. This seemed a bit curious to us, but we figured that they had just wanted to show us a new village that we hadn't ever visited before.

On the ride back to Pana we ate paninis that Paulina had bought at Parma. They consisted of tomato sauce and melted mozzarella on fresh soft bread. Yum!

Humberto once again stopped to show appreciation to those fixing the pot holes in the road. They were out of quetzales, but handed out bananas. Older men accepted the banana graciously, while the younger ones complained that they didn't want food; they wanted money. I guess there are some entitled millenials in every culture.

When we got back to Pana, we stopped at Dispensa Familiar supermarket to buy some food for Humberto's birthday celebration tonight, and then came back to the house.

We sat with Paulina and Humberto and had some Clos Cabernet Sauvignon and cheese curls (wine and cheese, right?) toasting his birthday. Ian asked me "Stephanie, tu camera?" so I got it for him and he acted as our photographer for the evening.

Paola and Cristian arrived, as did Vanesa and her boyfriend Danny. We all gathered around the kitchen table (all 13 of us) and enjoyed chicken noodle soup, chicken drumsticks, black beans, and tortillas. Tyson (who had visited with us last year) was sad that he couldn't be here this year, so he had instructed us to purchase the cake on his behalf.

We sang Happy Birthday to Humberto, and he was subjected to the Obligatory Latin American Cake Face Smash, while Ian Ivan gleefully photographed the whole thing.

Humberto's birthday cake

Partway through the celebration, one of the framed photos on the wall (featuring Humberto's late parents) started to shake side to side as though there was an earthquake. Nothing else was shaking, all other wall hangings next to it were stable. If something had hit the wall, you would think all of the framed items would shake. Plus, the shaking went on for far too long. The oscillation did not decrease, even as Humberto tried to stabilize it. Despite our skeptical natures, we have absolutely no explanation for what we saw. Humberto suggested that maybe his parents were trying to send him a happy birthday message from beyond the grave. It was as likely as any other scenario we could envision.

The mysterious moving picture

Tomorrow is a work / school day. Guatemala is 2 hours behind Eastern time, so that means that I have to get up very early for work. Though Aracely and Eddy are on summer vacation, Paola and Vanesa have to work, and Yoselin and Yasmin have tourism classes. So everyone went to bed at a reasonable time.

Parma