In Guatemala Now

[Greg Malivuk]

As usual, there are probably new pictures (of San Cristóbal up through part of last weekend) at the usual place.

 

I arrived a couple hours ago in Quetzaltenango, Guatemala (also called Xela, pronounced SHAY-la).  I've done very little here so far, and after spending some time on the Internet (for the equivalent of US$0.52/hour, though if I wanted a private booth, for which I can't imagine any purpose other than viewing internet porn, I'd have to pay 2.5 times as much), I plan to go back to the hostel and take a nap.  I left San Cristóbal at 7am, after staying up somewhat late with people last night.  (I did elect not to go out, at least.)

 

As I mentioned before (maybe only in my Livejournal), Xela is an up-and-coming place for language courses (Antigua still being the most popular city for that).  I had thought before of doing a week of Spanish classes, since it would run me only about $125 (US) including a homestay with room and board.  (Of course I'm paying about $2.60/night now and I read there are street vendors where you can get a meal for about $1, so it'd be primarily for the experience of staying with a family that I'd choose that option.)  But now I'm thinking it might be more interesting (though decidedly less useful) to study a local Mayan language instead.  (It would be quite useful if all Mayans spoke the same indigenous language, but the one around here is very different from the two spoken around San Cristóbal and all three are different from the ones spoken in various parts of the Yucatan.)

 

According to my Lonely Planet guidebook, one of the language schools that offers courses in Mayan languages also has an English program for village children, so I may go there to check both about taking a class and about whether there's any money (or at least accomodation and food) available for teaching English.  I doubt there is, though, since the village children are unlikely to be paying students.  If I do decide to do volunteer work, I could afford to do so longer here than any of the places I've been (so far) in Mexico, but there's still the problem of no more money magically appearing in my bank account, so even if I decided to teach in Guatemala instead of Mexico, I'd be looking for some kind of paying job.  (Unless someone were to magically wire me some more money from time to time...)

 

Not much else to report at this point.  In the near future (possibly starting immediately after sending this) I'll be uploading more pictures, so check back there occasionally.  (I'm not going to email this entire group just to tell you there are some more pictures of cathedrals and mountains I saw on my trip.)

 

-greg

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