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

Sunday, 7/7/2019 - Ian Ivan's Baptism

We woke up early this morning, and had cornflakes and coffee for breakfast. We left the house at 7:30 a.m. to walk down to the docks on Lake Atitlan. Rather than drive to San Lucas Toliman for Ian Ivan's baptism today, Humberto decided it would be fun to go by water. We hadn't yet been on the lake this year, so this was a great idea. Humberto had hired a lancha (boat) for the day. The whole family, including Cristian and Danny, boarded the lancha, and we enjoyed a sunny ride across the picturesque lake.

We arrived in San Lucas at around 8:15, and climbed the hill to get to the church. Along the way, we passed some very beautiful and colorful Mayan street art. When we arrived at the church, an earlier Mass was just finishing up. It was standing room only, with many people standing outside. This is obviously a much larger parish than the family's church in Panajachel. This church has enough of a congregation to perform baptisms every Sunday, as opposed to the monthly schedule at San Francisco in Pana.

After the recessional, the priest and an altar server proceeded outside and the priest blessed a family's new pick-up truck.

We bought a rosary for Ian from a vendor outside the church. A family approached us and asked us to be the godparents of their toddler Lena. We felt empathetic toward the family as we tried to imagine what hardships would cause the desperation to approach complete strangers and ask them to become compadres. We were impressed that the young mother wasn't too shy to ask. Although some gringos agree to be godparents, give the family a bit of help, and then never see them again, we never take the relationship that lightly. We truly become an extension of the family. There is no practical way that we could start a lasting relationship with this family who live so far from our compadres. We thanked them for the offer but explained that we were sorry that we couldn't accept.

Ian got changed into a long sleeved white collared shirt along with black trousers and a black vest. He looked styling. We entered the church, and, along with Humberto and Paulina, kneeled and lit a candle for Ian Ivan in front of the altar. We then took a seat in the pews for the 9:30 a.m. Mass.

There were a good dozen altar servers, some more experienced than others. It was adorable to see them shuffling en masse, especially at one point when they solemnly approached the altar too soon, only to have the priest politely shoo them away.

After the Mass, a female parishioner led a baptism class. There were an astonishing 36 children to be baptized today, and they numbered each pew. We were #16, and we moved to our designated pew. Unfortunately, there was not enough room for our whole party (13 people). So the girls, along with Cristian and Danny, waited outside until it was time for Ian to be baptized. It would be a while.

After the woman finished her lecture on the spiritual duties of godparenthood, the priest entered and performed the baptism ceremony. Eddy agreed to be our photographer, and he did a great job.

This church operates as a well oiled machine. The priest went up and down the aisle, anointing a baby as he passed each pew. He asked the name of each child as he did so. They wheeled a mobile font up to the front of the church. In succession, each family approached the font. The priest used a pewter pitcher to pour the holy water. Ian was uncooperative, and eventually slept through most of the ceremony. The godmother is supposed to hold the child during the baptism, but we knew that he would have none of that. So Paulina carried him up as he awoke. He handled it pretty well.

The girls had reappeared, and, along with Eddy, took photos and videos. Craig and I lit the baptism candle and then we walked back to our pew while the priest moved on to the next child, and so on. We gave Ian his rosary. Although he wouldn't look at me when I tried to photograph him, Vanesa and Eddy had better luck.

The children being baptized ranged in age from tiny infants to 4 and 5-year olds. After 2+ hours in church, most of them had had just about enough, and there was a lot of crying and chaos.

After all of the children had been baptized, the priest walked up and down the aisle one final time to anoint the children again. Then the service was over and we took some photographs at the front of the church.

By now, everyone was overheated and hungry, so we went to Flor Dulce for lunch. It was a tiny little restaurant, and our party of 13 took up the entire back room. We got plate lunches served with pasta salad, black beans, and tortillas. I had chorizo and Craig had steak, and we had Mirinda to drink. We celebrated a successful and rather spontaneous baptism. We now have 6 godchildren in total, three girls and three boys.

We walked back down to the docks, where many people were enjoying picnicing on the lake shore on this sunny Sunday afternoon. Ian approached an ice cream vendor and ordered himself a cone, then came back to Dad to ask for a quetzal. Sneaky guy! He brought the quetzal to the vendor only to be told that it cost 2 quetzales. We all got a good laugh as he returned to Dad for more money.

Some of the other kids got snacks as well. Craig and I were stuffed from lunch and couldn't imagine getting something else.

We boarded the lancha which took us back to Pana. Ian had shed his fancy shirt and vest and was now rifing at the bow of the boat in a white wifebeater.

Everyone was quite tired after last night's party and today's adventures. We arrived home shortly before 3 p.m. and everyone took a little siesta before regrouping on the patio. All except for Humberto and Paulina, who took a full-fledged nap.

Paola asked if we wanted to play a board game. She brought out Chutes and Ladders. Neither Craig nor I had seen this game in years. The game pieces were missing, so we used two doll heads (which I think originally came from the dolls in their quinceañera cakes) and a head from a Lilo and Stitch doll. It was surreal to play a preschool game with severed doll body parts.

Afterwards, they broke out a deck of cards, and Aracely and Paola taught us a game. It was a kind of rummy, but it took us a while to get the hang of its nuances. Whereas in most rummy games we are familiar with, you can play off of other people's cards, here, you can't. This sometimes leads to stalemates. Also, the ace is not high. Both of these rule variants led Craig and I to make some very stupid moves during the first few hands, but we soon learned the strategy. We played for hours, with various people rotating in and out (Yoselin, Eddy). It was a lot of fun.

Paulina and Humberto joined us outside after their nap, and we enjoyed wine and chips together. We had a delicious pesto pasta for dinner.

San Lucas Toliman