Year: 2010
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A day of cultura in Guatemala City
GUATEMALA CITY – My first day in the city, my couchsurfing host Cristina whisked me off to a day of culture, beginning with the beautiful Popol Vuh and Ixchel museums on the beautiful and modern Francisco Marroquin University and ending with a night of dance at the National Theater and lively conversation in an all-night…
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Surfing the couches in Guatemala City
GUATEMALA CITY – The city sparkled below me like a carpet of diamonds, flung carelessly over the valley and clinging to the surrounding mountains. This is probably as beautiful as Guatemala’s capital city gets, I thought, then scolded myself for the unwelcome thought. I only know the city from reading about it, and from a…
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Saying goodbye to an Ozark original
Oh come, Angel Band Come and around me stand Oh bear me away on your snowy wings To my immortal home, Oh bear me away on your snowy wings To my immortal home. ROSELLE, Iron County, Missouri – Redbud blossoms splashed the spring-green hills the day my mother called me home from Guatemala. The freshness…
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From Guatemala to Missouri: Swallowing the sadness
GUATEMALA CITY – I greeted the sunrise at the Livingston boat dock with a heavy heart, clambered aboard the lightweight skiff that passes as a ferry and braced myself for the sea-spray-slamming commute to Puerto Barrios, where I would catch the bus to the capital, spend the night in a hostel and grab the first…
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Holy Week Garífuna style: Where Jesus is Black
LIVINGSTON, Guatemala – I knew I had finally found the place when I heard the music. Completely unlike the punta drums and reggae blaring from the bars and restaurants a few blocks away, a dramatic instrumental selection drifted through the dusty streets. A crowd had begun to gather around the place they call The Minerva…
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Loving Livingston, Guatemala
Emancipate yourselves from mental slavery; None but ourselves can free our minds. –Redemption Song, Bob Marley LIVINGSTON, Guatemala — I arrived by boat five days ago to this half Garifuna, half Maya fishing village on the Caribbean. The only way to arrive, in fact, is by boat. The 45-minute trip from Punta Gorda was a…
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Dining with Gomier, The Rasta veggie man
PUNTA GORDA TOWN, Belize – The best meal I had in Punta Gorda was prepared by a Rastafarian vegetarian by the name of Ignatius “Gomier” Longville. And the conversation was even better than the food. I asked Gomier to explain to me how he came to be a vegetarian. generic cialis lowest price “I consider…
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Road to change for the Maya
SAN ANTONIO VILLAGE, Belize – The green school bus was already full when I climbed aboard in Punta Gorda. It was market day, and all the Maya ladies with their colorful satin dresses sat amid their purchases and their children, ready to make the journey home. As my eyes sought an opening, one of the…
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Hope for Toledo, Hope for the World
Author’s note: This is the first of a several-part series on Toledo, the so-called “Forgotten District” in the south of Belize. As for myself, I know I will never forget. PUNTA GORDA TOWN, Toledo District, Belize – White-capped waves are slapping the shore along Front Street, sparkling in the first light of day. Rhythms with…
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From one jungle to another: A modern-day pioneer
It may not pay for essay writing look like it at first, but Christopher Nesbitt has a big crew working for him here at Maya Mountain Research Farm. There are the chickens, who recycle kitchen scraps into eggs and meat. There are the soldier flies, who recycle what the chickens don’t want into larvae for…