In a recent post I mentioned that Dra. Estrada (Wendi) had invited me to spend the Day of the Dead weekend with her family in Xela. We arrived at her house late Friday afternoon and spent the evening just generally lazing around and getting acquainted. Her father works as an engineer for Gallo, Guatemala’s national beer company, and her mom’s a school teacher. She’s got two younger brothers: Manuel, who’s my age and a medical student at the San Carlos University in Quetzaltenango, and Elimas, who’s 14. From the very beginning I could tell that they’re all just genuinely good people, and the dynamic reminds me exactly my real family.
The Estradas are very outdoors-y, so their idea of showing me around Guatemala’s second biggest city was escaping into the surrounding mountains, which is fine with me. We got up early Saturday morning and went on a rather vertical hike up a volcano, then straight down into the crater at the bottom. After erupting several thousand years ago the crater filled with a beautiful, crystal-clear lake, which is a sacred Mayan site. Visitors are welcome to come and enjoy its beauty, but no one’s allowed to enter the water. Mayan priests perform religious ceremonies along the water’s edge, where we saw burnt and wilted carnations lying along the bank; remnants of a recent ritual.
It was a somewhat vigorous trip, but wussing out wasn’t an option. Wendi’s dad, (also named) Elimas, assured me time and again that this was nothing compared to the Santa Maria volcano, which they’d be taking me up next. For most people the trek up Santa Maria is an all-day affair, requiring an overnight stay before coming back down. For Elimas, who’s closing in on 50 trips up, it’s to the top and back before noon. Just trying to keep up with these guys will get me back in shape!
After our morning hike, we went back to the house to eat heaping plates of the traditional Day of the Dead meal, fiambre. The dish is essentially a giant platter of meats, sausages, cheese, flavored hot dogs, meat, cow tongue, intestine, sliced meat, a (very) few vegetables and a bit of meat on the side. Any of those readers familiar with my dietary habits will appreciate how I felt about this. I don’t specifically object to meat, but it’s far from my favorite choice of foods. Unfortunately, since I have a general rule of always participating to the fullest when given new cultural opportunities, I didn’t have much choice beyond digging in with the fam. It didn’t help that their overflowing hospitality ensured that the honored guest (ahem, me, of course) was served the largest and most lavish plate. Gag. Actually, it was kind of funny – in order to ensure that I got a full fiambre experience, Wendi’s mother Isabel had me arrange one of the platters. Thinking that I was preparing my own dish, I was very careful to artfully arrange my plate in order to appear as if it was heaping with meat when, in fact, it was mostly vegetables. Much to my dismay, this crafty trick was foiled by Isabel’s superior hostess skills. As we sat down to eat, she made a great show of presenting me with a dish twice the size and with at least three times the meat as my own humble assortment. Curses!
Of course, I had no choice but to act completely and totally delighted with the distinctively Guatemalan meal. Sadly, that means that the entire Estrada family is now convinced that I’m an absolute meat fanatic, and will probably never believe that I’d much prefer not to eat dead animal.
After the fiambre we headed out to the Xela general cemetery, where festivities were in full swing. We wandered through the street fair which was set up outside the entrance, buying treats like Guatemalan-style marzipan and drinking warm sweet corn atol. We visited all of the family’s difuntos, admiring the graveside decorations and watching kids flying their kites over family plots– a symbolic way of communicating with the heavens.
Xela’s much colder than the lowlands of Mazate or even the mountainous Santo Tomas. The weather was exactly what you’d expect of Oregon in November – cold, with a drizzly rain gently dampening the atmosphere. I felt right at home. Night falls early in Guate, around 6 pm. As the evening turned dark we went to the city’s old plaza, where the remains of a colonial cathedral form an elegant façade for the newer building, rebuilt after an earthquake destroyed the original. We had Mayan-style hot chocolate – rich, almost spicy, and with a thick creamy foam on top – on a terrace overlooking the city’s historic center. That night, since we’d all filled our little bellies on cow intestine and blood sausage (again, gag.), we dined on the distinctive Quetzalteca parches. Although similar to the tamales served in other parts of the country, cooks in Quetzaltenango make their tamales with a masa (dough) of either potato puree or coarse ground rice flour. Everywhere else it’s tortilla dough – pure ground corn. Saturday was a very typical Guatemalan day, in every possible way.
Sunday, then, was themed a bit differently. On the road between Xela and Mazate is a giant theme park, the IRTA complex. Half of the park, Xocomil, is just like a Six Flags. The other half, Xetulul, is an elaborate water park with all of the slides, pools and artificial rivers which you’d expect to find in any American water park. Indeed, I saw in the newspaper the other day that Xetulul recently received an international honor from and American theme-park evaluation organization (such things exist?) for its general awesomeness. I’ll vouch for their designation: it was a blast. We spent the entire day climbing stairs and shooting down slides, getting slightly sun burnt and generally have a fantastic time. Isabel was a riot – she was ahead of us “kids” every time, literally running up the stairs to secure her spot at the front of the line.
Sunday evening Wendi, her husband Carlos (who’d met us at Xetulul after working an overnight shift at the hospital) and I went back to Mazate, where I stayed the night in their home. Before we left, the entire family emphatically expressed the fact that I was now an Estrada, and I needed to plan on coming to visit them again soon. I’d had a great weekend, so it was no chore assuring them I’d be back.
I didn’t realize at the time how soon they intended to see me again.
Saturday, I did a 24 hour shift with Wendi at the hospital. It was pretty slow –one cesarean, and I delivered a baby, but other than that it was a lot of sitting around. However, while we were at the hospital Isabel called, inviting me to join along on their upcoming family excursion. The next day, Sunday, they were planning on visiting her parents and sisters in Coatepeque (Co-ah-teh-peh-k). Since I didn’t have any better ideas for spending my Sunday, I agreed to tag along. I thought we’d just swing by, say hi, and come back to Mazate. Instead, we hung out for several hours, eating a delicious caldo de mariscos (seafood stew) prepared by Isabel’s sister and visiting the city’s expansive Sunday market in a fruitless, albeit exhaustive, search for curtain material.
I fell asleep in the car on the way back, and was somewhat surprised to awake in Xela once again. I’d been kidnapped! Turns out they’d decided that Wendi and I would spend the night in Xela, and head back to Mazate early in the morning. Once again I spent the night with the Estradas, feeling even more at home than the first time.
The funniest part of it all was when I mentioned the fact that I need to leave the country this month, in order to renew my tourist visa. I’d sort of assumed that I’d take a solo trip somewhere for a few days, probably to El Salvador or Honduras. The Estradas, however, were totally opposed to the idea. In order to avoid me spending a few days traveling alone, they actually offered to take a weekend trip to Mexico with me – the whole family! To be honest, I’m not sure what to do about it. I feel like there’s no greater definition of being imposing as a houseguest than prompting the entire family to leave the country for a weekend. It doesn’t help that I have no doubt they’d insist on paying for everything. I’d really feel quite uncomfortable accepting such a generous offer. However, they did come up with the idea, with out any sort of suggestion or anticipation from me at all, so they must not feel like it’d be a huge inconvenience. On the down side, I think that the weekend they’d want to go is the same weekend as a big medical conference here in Suchi. We’d probably take of Friday night, which is the closing ceremony, and it’s supposed to be a great big party with dancing, live music, an open bar, oh, and, er, lots of medical knowledge flying around. I’m thinking I may just run off to El Salvador or Honduras this weekend, but if I don’t get around to it I’ll consider their offer.
Other than that, things are pretty routine. I’m continuing to go to the hospital, plugging away on my med school essays and drinking lots of fresh fruit licuados. Nispero’s in season, and anyone who’s a long-term reader of this blog (reach waay back, to my Easter Island trip…) will understand how ecstatic that makes me. There are also plenty of jocote, a strange little fruit with a giant pit and a juicy bitter -sweet meat, strawberries, bananas, blackberries, pineapples, watermelon, grenadines, papaya (yuck) and apples galore. The only thing missing for total fruit paradise is an abundance of mangos, but we had that when I got here so I can hardly complain. Theoretically cherimoya (called anona here) should be coming into season any time now, so that should more than make up for anything lacking.
So. That’s my vida of late…sorry my descriptive journalism skills are somewhat sliding by the wayside, but I assure you that the lack of creative free time is good for my mental well-being. Once school starts up again, I wouldn’t be surprised to find a few more elaborate descriptions finding their way onto this blog…
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| Dia de los Muertos |
