For people who are interested in these things, our itinerary was as follows: a week in Utila (an island off the north coast of Honduras) learning to scuba dive; then a day in Copán Ruinas, some of the Mayan world's best preserved ruins; New Year's Eve in Antigua de Guatemala; and finally some quiet time relaxing and hiking around the spectacular Lago de Atitlan. At the end of 3 weeks, Simp joined me for a week in Tegucigalpa, where I worked, and he cooked and checked out the city. I've invited him to guest blog on his experience of the above.
I know a decent number of readers of this blog have been in some or all of the places listed above, and I don't think any of them have been here in recent years. So I'm interested to know if my observations ring true with any of you. Here, for your comments and consideration, are my observations:
- Have there always been this many gringos in Central America? I learned more about American culture in my travels than about Guatemalan. Here's the profile of the majority of gringos I met - and we struck up short term travellers' realtionships with about 7 of them: West Coast (California or Oregon) intellectuallish (teachers, movie people, events managers) left wing, well-travelled, tedious in their descriptions of their previous travels, jewish or zionist (no less than 4 of them had travelled to Israel, one for his HONEYMOON), middle class (if that wasn't obvious). Have you heard of Trader Joe's? They all shop in Trader Joe's. I think that's kind of equivalent to Waitrose. Which, at a stretch, is kind of equivalent to Superquinn. When I was backpacking here 5 years ago, the people I met were almost entirely European. Dutch, Swedish, Danish, and Canadians from British Columbia (now they're all Quebequooise.. what gives?). The vast majority of Americans I met were working here, mainly as Peace Corps. Has there been a sea change in American attitudes to Central America as a tourist destination.. or have I slipped into a different class of travel this time, the one the gringos always occupied?
- You see, before, I (or rather, me and Luce) had a very floppy time schedule and we travelled mainly by chicken bus. It was Very Much the case that the journey was the destination. This time round, we only had three weeks, and we were covering what are in fact fairly substantial distances, and doing them as a loop rather than a straight line getting ever closer to our destination. So we took a lot of tourist buses, and a few flights. This altered our experience of travel massively. Instead of having your head tucked into the armpit of a man with a white hat, gold teeth and a big machete, you're bored silly by a Lonely Planet wielding kiwi asserting that Tikal is "just like Angkor Wat". As though everything can be reduced to a giant National Geographic picture book, the ruins, the jungles, the handicrafts, the native peoples - completely without any political or social context. Sitting on those buses with those people (and they were nice people), I was struck again and again by the fact that they didn't even know Guatemala was poor. I swear they didn't. Just pretty.
- Shit - it's getting dark outside, and we all know what that means in this town. I should either be drunk and oblivious to personal safety, or safe at home. I'll return to this theme again though. If you know this part of the world at all, please comment. Is it changing, becoming more commodified - or am I just seeing different things now I'm not as broke??
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