On the Road: Tackling language numero cuatro
By Jacob Wheeler
Sun international correspondent
XELA, Guatemala — Doris, my new host mother, calls me down to breakfast in her tiny, open-air courtyard that is surrounded by bland, concrete walls but beckons just enough mountain-high sunshine to make me smile. The meal is yet another plate of plain eggs and soupy beans to go with a cup of weak coffee, and we struggle to hold a conversation given that my Spanish is limited to a few palabres. El gato joins us and hops up on my lap for a bite of huevos. Her daughters are off at school, her son is working at the tienda, and her husband died 10 years ago. This much I comprehend from the conversation. Today is my first morning in this dreadfully simple, yet sufficient, abode in the city of Xela – called Quetzeltenango by the Spanish conquistadors, and the maps followed along – in the western highlands of Guatemala. Our elevation is 8,000 feet and so the evenings are as frigid as the days are pleasant. I donned my Nordic stocking cap last night as I drank cheap, nearly transparent red wine in the central parque with my Michigan friend, Maya.
On September 8 I began an intensive Spanish course at a nearby school for international students, called Proyecto Linguistico. The five consecutive hours of Spanish drills with an instructor, one-on-one, every afternoon already have me begging for mercy, but witnesses believe I may attain proficiency in a matter of weeks, not months. The school is also a springboard for all kinds of cultural treks and excursions into the mountains. One day a trip to nearby hot springs just outside this city of 100,000; the next a seminar about the likelihood that El General Rios Montt, the former dictator will seize the upcoming election in November, and thus continue a frightful trend of oppression that hasn’t really subsided even though peace accords were signed in 1996, ending a hot-cold conflict that lasted most of the Cold War. An estimated 300,000 people (mostly Mayans, the indigenous, poor farmers) have been slaughtered and 50,000 gone “missing” since the United Fruit Company convinced the Eisenhower administration to sponsor a CIA-led coup to topple Guatemala’s democratically-elected, leftist president in 1954, and install a dictator.
Ah yes, in the meantime this country is beautiful. The bus broke down for two hours on the trip from Antigua, but it couldn’t have happened in a better spot. I disembarked, and stared off the mountain at rolling green hills, grazing cows and locals picnicking, and below them still, clouds. Time is a virtue here, so I turned my man-sized backpack into a comfortable seat and talked baseball with a Californian until another bus arrived from Guatemala City with spare parts to help us on our way. We sat on the roadside and marveled at the overwhelming smell of diesel and gas leaks in developing countries. The aroma made me dream of other such places I’ve been: Ghana, Damascus.
Before beginning my language course in Xela, I spent three days with Maya in Antigua, a tourist Mecca swarming with gringos and aristocrat holdovers from the Spanish occupation 400 years ago. Antigua made my immersion into Central America a gentle one, but three days of Cuba Libres at posh clubs and hearing English everywhere were enough. So I left Disneyland for the highlands and this working class city. The locals look more like Mayans, or indigena in Spanish, as they are short and olive-skinned, and they don’t accost white tourists to pawn their burned CD’s and colorful trajes just because they know we have money. There appear to be only a few dozen ex-patriots here, and we’re treated like everybody else.
I plan to study here for the next month or two, and then travel somewhere like Honduras or Belize where I can become a certified scuba diver in just a couple days. I may write an article about this amazing country, maybe even cover the election if my Spanish is up to par and if the situation is still relatively safe. In the meantime, I plug away at verb tenses, and stomach more eggs and beans.