Palabra

The last week has been pretty uneventful really. I have been enjoying the weather, the swimming, the tanning, the sleeping and the food hear in San Pedro. It is really chill here. The restaurants are really cheap and the food is the best I have had in Guatemala. My teacher pretty much sucked last week, but other than that things have been awesome. And it seems like my teacher this week is very good.

This place is a very small town with a bunch of hippees. A bit too much english speaking going on for good spanish emersion. There are only two or three paved roads in the town. The other roads arent roads for automobiles, they are really just walking trails. Also, there is a pretty open drug culture here. All the hotel owners are dealers which seems to subsidize the hotel room prices (makes it cheap for me). Also, the cops are a real pain in the butt. I get searched pretty much once a day by the police here. They have been very thorough in searching my back pockets - yeah I have a great butt. They search all the gringos at will. Its really annoying but easier to just let them search then to cause a problem by telling them not too. I now have a strong appreciation for the racial profiling complaints that minorities have back home.

I have been hanging out mostly with Stefan, Jeanette and Jeremy. Stefan and Jeanette I know from Xela days. Jeremy is a dude from Minnesota. He has dreds and is pretty much a floater. But really cool and fun to hang out with here. I am enjoying meeting very different types of people. For example, Jeremy never went to college and instead went to live on the streets of Berkeley and Oakland after high school trying to eek out a living playing music. Obviously that didnt work out and he went back to Minnesota and was a waitor for a while. After Guatemala he is going to get his Dive Master's Certification and live on Utila for a while. Then he will return to live on the beach in San Diego.

Last thursday night there was a big party for the full moon. The full moon over the lake was amazing and the party was a lot of fun. To get to the party you had to take a boat over to a beach on the lake - a 20 minute ride. Nice opportunity to hear some good music. There was a very open presence of drugs at this party as there is throughout this pueblo. Also, there were some disgruntled partiers complaining that the acid dude took a bit of his product and dropped the sheet on the beach somewhere so no one was able to purchase any from him. Don't worry mom, I am sticking to the booze.

Over the weekend I was in Antigua for Mary Ann's going away party on Sunday afternoon/evening. It was awesome. She rented out an open air bar and there was a band from guate which was really good (the Chupacabras). There were about 150 people there. An interesting mix of extranjeros and Guatemaltecos. Also, many of the young girls from the school that Mary Ann teaches at were there. They are 10-14 year olds. RJ seemed to be very good friends with many of them and was working the dance floor.

Also, while in Antigua I got my plane tickets arranged for South America. I am flying into Lima on January 4th through Panama (where I will spend one night and see the Panama Canal - on the 3rd) and then I return to Guatemala via Chile on June 14th. The tentative plan is to spend a week in Peru at the start of the trip (hope to see Machu Pichu and Lake Titicaca), live in La Paz for about 5 months working and then spend a week in Chile at the end of the trip. I am fired up to have this part of the trip arranged (tentatively).

Graff is claiming he may come down this weekend (although I think this is pretty unlikely) which would mean I would go to hang out in Antigua for a night or two this weekend. I have to stop by there regardless to pick up the plane tickets from the travel agent. Then I head off to the Peten Region in North-Eastern Guatemala. I will spend two or three weeks up there studying spanish and checking out the jungle. This area is a rain forest type of landscape; home to the Tikal Ruins, tons of wildlife, waterfalls, hot springs, and other natural wonders. I am going to buy a hammock so I can sleep outside in the open air of the jungle and wake up with the monkeys. Also, I hope to go rafting and try out caving for the first time.

Only three weeks til Xmas now. I am probably going to return to San Pedro to spend Xmas and New Years before leaving for America de Sur. Hope that know one expects any presents. Its really expensive to send stuff from here and I am broke. But if you want to send me stuff feel free to send stuff to:

Flaco Gringo sin Pelo, Casa Elena, San Pedro La Laguna, Guatemala

The kid at the hotel that deals drugs will most likely steal anything that comes.