No More Tamales & I Smoked A Cigar

My first announcement is that I have broken up with tamales. It's over. We're through. I'm so sick of them that I will probably never eat them again. Blech. Take your wet, flavorless, mushy balls of undercooked corn and rice with your bones and chicken skins and go assault the taste buds of someone who appreciates you. And don't come back!

Friday night, I heard what sounded like a marching band on the corner, so I ran outside to see. As I was headed back inside, I saw Mari, my host family's live in housekeeper, headed out. She said she was headed to the market to get some stuff for dinner so I tagged along. It was fascinating to see all of the different places she went for each thing because to me it looked like they all had the same stuff.  Then she took me to some stands that sold traditional dress outfits for women and we talked more about possibilities. She walked SO fast I thought I was going to die.

I took advantage of this opportunity to hang out with Mari because I really like her and am interested in getting to know her more. My first day in the house, host mom offered her up as someone I could speak K'iche' with, but when I try, Mari stays pretty quiet. There have been a few nights when host fam is gone and it's just me, the two other students and Mari. In these moments Mari is a completely different person. She's lively, talkative, excitable and happy. I started to suspect that maybe host mom doesn't really want her to interact with us.  My suspicions were confirmed last week when I came up for breakfast and Mari was the only person in the kitchen. So I struck up a conversation with her.  She quickly shushed me and whispered that host mom doesn't want us talking. Really disappointing.

Saturday morning I hit the road for Santa Cruz del Quiche with my teacher. After a fantastic lunch at the local market we headed to the Mayan ruins of Q'umarkaj.  This was the political headquarters of the K'iche' people from 1400 to 1524. This site is absolutely beautiful. Peaceful, serene, hundreds of pine trees decked with Spanish moss.  The smell of warm pine needles in the air. A few young couples making out here and there, but other than that, nobody around.

The K'iche' people have been reluctant to allow anyone to rebuild any of the ruins. None of them have been rebuilt with the exception of the hand ball court, that started to be rebuilt by a Guatemalan doctor who died before he could finish it. His kids scrapped the whole thing after his death.  It is estimated that 15,000 people lived here at its height.

The underworld is very important to Mayans. It is important for them to create balance between the energies of the earth, the underworld and the heavens. As such, they often build caves under important spiritual sites.

This cave was maybe a block long, and had several offshoots, each of which led to an altar. It was hard to breathe in the cave because of all the candles burning.

Later that evening, we traveled to Chichicastenango to visit some artist friends of my teacher's. Juan and Miguel Leon are twin brothers. They are K'iche' and are painters and muralists. I got to see one of their huge, beautiful murals on a public building in the market place in Chichi. We went to their home, which is also their studio, for dinner and a Mayan spiritual ceremony. I got see a bunch more of their artwork in their studio. It's complex and beautiful and includes scenes of the Mayan cosmovision as well as scenes of syncretism, the union of Mayan spirituality and catholicism. The twins got a grant from Dr. Hans Guggenheim and they teach art classes to local children. 

Apart from being artists, they are also spiritual guides. Jaime, my teacher, asked we could do a ceremony after dinner. They said of course. We had to go to the market to get all of the provisions. We got red and green candles because the day on the mayan calendar called for those colors. We also got cigars and pom, incense balls that also serve as fire starters.  This ceremony was very involved, elaborate and fascinating. We all had to sit in a certain spot around the fire pit according to what day we were born, to even out the energy.  With granulated sugar, they drew a representation of the earth, its four corners and cardinal directions in the firepit. And then put down the incense balls and piles upon piles of tiny candles. They lit the fire, and did a lot of talking to mother and father and the grandparents. This was all in K'iche' and I could only understand a few words. They would pose questions and the fire would rise up, and twist around and reach out.  We were to supposed to suck the cigars really fast without inhaling, and then spit a lot. This is to cleanse us of evil spirits. When you are done, they look at your cigar and tell your future based on how you smoked it and how it burned. I didn't get far enough on my cigar to be able to do this. They gave me a lot of feedback at the end about the things they had asked for me. It's too much to include here so if you're curious just ask.

You can read more about the twins and see some of their work at this link

http://blacfoundation.org/juan-and-miguel/

The next morning, my teacher picked me up at my hotel in Chichi, and we headed back in the direction of Santa Cruz to attend the quarterly meeting of the K'iche' municiple delegates for the Academy of Mayan Languages.  This meeting was the whole purpose of the trip, a six hour meeting entirely in K'iche'. The pic above is of one of the many altars in the building.

This was the altar at the meeting. All K'iche' meetings must start with an invocation to honor the directions, just like we do in my class each day.

We did a fun activity at the meeting. Part of the meeting always includes a writing lesson because although K'iche' is widely spoken here, not very many people know how to write it, or at least, they don't know the rules of the standardized writing that the academy decided on a few years ago.  I actually understood quite a bit and it was a fascinating time. I was never bored, the building we were in was absolutely gorgeous and they fed us quite well. Except for the tamales. Ha!