It was awesome to have our own private lancha! We first headed to San Juan, a community almost directly across the lake from Panajachel. In San Juan, we walked to a Women’s Textile Cooperative and learned all about the process of weaving.
First, they take wads of cotton and spread them out into flat sheets, connecting many wads by kneading the material together.
Then, they use a spindle sort of tool to create a yarn from the sheets. They are made from a special material that helps them to perfectly balance the spindle, and this allowed them to create a equally thick yarn throughout.
Natural dies are used to make colors in the yarn. These are a few examples of what they use to make the bright colors. They first boil water with the herbs or plants that they wish to use. Then, they put the yarn in and let it soak for a good 24 hours. After, they add chopped corn stalks to the water and boil again for about 3 hours. This step helps the color set in the yarn and keeps it from fading through multiple uses.
They use this contraption to create the correct outline with the yarn.
They use this waist loom to create the fabrics they make. We learned all about the exquisite designs. It takes about 2-3 days for one women to finish a piece that is 5 inches wide and your typical scarf length. The works were so detailed and exquisite! The cooperative consists of 85 women and exists to provide women with work and continue the tradition. Not all the women work at the location, many work in their homes and bring their work to the cooperative in order to be sold. We bought some cool stuff, including an extremely soft and beautiful scarf that I am super excited to wear!
Us in San Juan, with the beautiful Lake in the background.
) Next, we headed to an art gallery and saw some beautiful oil on canvas paintings. This too was a cooperative, composed of 15 people. We saw some gorgeous works. This painting is of a Mayan farmer with a broken leg. The healer is re-setting the broken leg, and you can see the special herbs and medications on the side table that are typically used. That face looks quite painful!After San Juan, we got back on our Lancha and headed towards San Pedro. I had been there before, but we actually didn’t overlap one place where I had been, even a street, which I found quite interesting.
We fist headed to a coffee shop where in the back yard, coffee plants were growing. We learned about the coffee process (which I had already learned from visiting the Finca, but it was a nice review course). Then we tasted the coffee, which was pretty good! These pictures are some of my favorites from the trip:
This is the entrance to a church in San Pedro. I chose to highlight the steps because there are 12 steps that represent each community surrounding the lake.Inside the church, Thomas told us about the Mayan wedding tradition. He spoke it in a very broken English. I think it might have been easier for him to speak in Spanish and have me translate to mom and dad, but I thought it would be rude to tell him that. We learned that “dating” starts at the age of 14. Up until this age, the boys learn how to work in the fields and the girls learn how to cook and clean and take care of the house. At 14, a boy finds a girl he likes. In order to “ask for her hand in dating” he takes his entire family and a judge to the house of the girl. In front of all these people, the girl must decide if she likes/approves of the guys and wants to “date” him. If she is happy, she will say she is ready to cook, but if she is not, she will say she is not ready to cook. If she is not ready to cook, the boy is not allowed to “date” her. If the boy is lucky enough to get a “yes, I am ready to cook” there is a 6 month dating period in which the boy must bring gifts to the girls family each month, such as a chicken, food, woodwork, etc. The boy and girl are only allowed to hang out under supervision. At the end of the 6 month period, the boy must present a grand gift to the family. At this point, the girl has one more chance to say “yes” or “no.” If she says no, all the work the boy did is for nothing. If she says yes, the girl moves to live with the guy’s family and help maintain the home. Only if there are not many men in the family of the girl will the guy will move in with the family and do manual labor. Actual marriage does not occur until the age of 18. Quite a process, huh?!
After San Juan, we headed to Santiago de Atitlan to have lunch at a rather touristy place. It is a little funny that I have been to Santaigo twice yet have not really seen the town. The first time, we walked straight to the Hospital to do our volunteer work. This time, we went to the other side of the community and at lunch at a beautiful hotel. We had a delicious bass from the lake… which makes the third day in a row that I ate fish :-)We were going to look at some more places in Santiago, but we didn’t have much time left so we headed back to our lancha and returned to our hotel to gather our bags and pick up our transport to the Guatemalan airport. We were supposed to be picked up at 1, but Byron didn’t actually show up until 1:45. Turns out that because of election day, there was a lot of traffic. We were starting to get a little concerned because we had a flight to catch, but everything worked out well.
In the car on the way to Guate airport, I realized I only had a copy of my passport… no ID, no passport. I started to get a little scared, and was super angry with myself! It is common knowledge that you need an ID to travel domestically in the United States, so why wouldn’t you need one for domestic travel in Guatemala?! We were all pretty uptight the rest of the ride as we headed into Guate.
My charming face and horrible Spanish speaking must have been enough to convince airport security that I didn’t need a real ID, because after speaking with three airport officials, they finally let me through! We breathed a sigh of relief, but only a small one. We got to the gate and nobody was there. In fact, the airport was rather empty. Luckily, there was a sign that said “Taka -- Flores,” so we knew the flight existed. Eventually three other people showed up, but that was it!
The plane was a small one, and we walked out on the tarmac to board. We were pretty nervous… the skies were look pretty treacherous and the plane did not look all that strong. But, we made it safely to Flores, on time! Although I have flown countless times in my life, something about flying a Guatemalan airline in Guatemala was slightly more exciting. I entered a drawing to win a free flight, but I haven’t heard from them yet so I think I didn’t win… too bad!
Our driver Edwin was at the Flores airport to pick us up and take us to our next awesome hotel, nestled in the Peten forest, named Villa Mayan Hotel. It was an awesome place… we had never seen anything like it, except for maybe Disney, except this was real (and there were no smokers, crying babies, complaining people, etc.)!
We had dinner at the hotel restaurant (still unable to buy alcohol which was a huge disappointment to all of us after the stressful flying experience), and went to bed early. The sounds from the rainforest were a great lullaby.
Picture of the inside of our room at Villa Maya Hotel.
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