1987 Travel Journal: Purple Shirt and Miss South Carolina

    The most memorable event of the day came when the bus was forced to a stop at an army checkpoint.  A soldier got onto the bus with his automatic rifle (every soldier I have seen in Guatemala carries one).  Facing the passengers, he declared that everyone had to get off of the bus, so everyone did.  

    As we stood outside the bus, he started to collect everyone’s passports and papers.  The soldiers were not very thorough, they overlooked me, so I got his attention and volunteered my passport to him.  As I handed it to the soldier, the girlfriend of the purple-shirted South Carolinian, said in that most grating of accents, “I heard sometimes they don’t give the passports back.”

    This seemed a bit ridiculous to me for a soldier in this kind of situation with so many passengers standing on the side of the road, to do, but I didn’t say anything.  The officer walked away with the big handful of papers and passports to a large tent.  Then all of the males were hand-searched.  A soldier turned us around, wedged his foot between my feet, and proceeded to frisk me.  He found nothing, not even the pocket knife I had in my pocket.  

    He proceeded to search all of the other male passengers in this way, which took quite a long time.  At first I found the whole episode interesting, but after a while I became bored and eager to get back onto the bus.  The soldier with the passports returned and passed them back, and as we received ours, we were then allowed to re-board the bus, relieved that the experience was over, or was it?

    I noticed that Miss South Carolina was still outside.  She said she didn’t get her passport back.  The officer didn’t know where it was, and so Purple Shirt climbed back off of the bus to rescue his damsel in distress.  The soldiers didn’t know what to do.  They were clearly puzzled.  The girl demanded her passport back, and Purple Shirt pulled out his US passport, showing it to the soldiers, trying to explain to them that her’s looked similar.

    The soldiers were very flummoxed by this novel situation, and the head officer, re-boarded the bus, and demanded everyone get back off again to be re-searched.  Miss South Carolina who was being questioned, couldn’t remember who she had given the passport to.

    “Just a soldier.” She explained.  

    “Before or after, Purple Shirt?” The soldier asked.

    The girl didn’t that remember that either.  The rest of the passengers were all beginning to mill around, discussing the situation in small groups.  No one knew what to do.

    Purple Shirt got back on the bus to see if he could find a copy of Miss South Carolina’s birth certificate in his pack and as he rooted around in the backpack, guess what?  He found Miss South Carolina’s passport— She had never turned it in!

    The soldiers all rolled their eyes, as did I, and all of the Guatemalan men and women standing around outside the bus.  The soldier playing the official role, walked toward Miss South Carolina with a stern look on his face.  I felt tension beginning to arise.  He reached into the breast pocket of his uniform and pulled out a pencil, he stood very close to Miss South Carolina, and then affectionately, conked the brain-dead girl on the head with the eraser-end of his pencil, in mock punishment.

    This drama having been concluded, everyone piled back onto the bus, and the bus once again resumed its weaving back and forth from one side of the dusty jungle road to the other, toward Belize.  The only change was that a new “Most Embarrassing Moment” had been established in the life of a South Carolina Miss.

You can view my paintings at:  davidmarchant2.ca

 

1987 Travel Journal: Bus to Belize

    Foolish me, I thought I could skip the 5:00 AM bus out of Flores, so I could sleep in, then catch the 10:00 bus.  However, the 5:00 bus made its presence known by stopping right outside my hotel room with its loud diesel engine roaring away for 15 very long minutes, just to make sure I was fully awake and not sleeping in until a reasonable hour.

    Once up, I thought I would treat myself to a Mexican-style breakfast.  I passed on the Huevos Rancheros and went instead for the Huevos Frijoles with Queso.  I prepared myself for a treat, but unfortunately that was not what the waitress placed in front of me.

    The eggs were nothing special, the frijoles looked like something out of the back end of a cow, and the cheese resembled a small packet of moist plaster.  I accepted my fate, and ate what I could.

    Yesterday afternoon when I was re-hydrating with a Coke at Tikal’s Jungle Lodge, I met a tall, guy with frizzled gray and brown hair, wearing glasses, and a purple shirt, who, with a Southern accent, generously told me I could store my suitcase in his room, incase a room became vacant later in the day.  He and his nondescript girlfriend, who also spoke with an irritating southern drawl, had been able to secure a room at the lodge.  I thanked them, but by that time, I had already decided to head back to Flores for the night.

    Well today, Purple Shirt and his girl got off of the morning bus from Tikal, and were waiting to catch the 10:00 bus out of Flores.  They were also headed for Belize.  I inquired about their night at the Jungle Lodge, and they told me it had been terrible.

    The room was very expensive, and the food, even more so.  They had ordered spaghetti.  It was outrageously expensive and tasted awful.  Then everyone, even the Tikal bus driver tried to “rip them off”.  After hearing of their woes, I figured I lucked out by not being able to get a room at the Jungle Lodge last night.

    The bus to Belize was another one of those well-worn old coaches.    I had to sit on a small sliver at the edge of a seat beside the aisle.  The road was extremely bumpy, so the bus driver spent most of the trip weaving the bus back and forth across the road, from one edge of the road to the opposite side of the road, trying to avoid all of the many pot holes that pockmarked the middle of the road.

    The bus just about hit a daydreaming motorcyclist, who kept drifting toward the bus as we tried to pass him.

    A peasant farmer who was sitting on the engine hump directly in front of me, had a 15-20 lb. plastic bag of sugar wedged between him and the driver.  During one of the bus driver’s sharp pot hole maneuvers, the bag of sugar shifted, springing a leak, and sugar began pouring out of a hole in the bag.

    The poor farmer didn’t know what to do about it, except to try to hold the bag awkwardly with the hole at the top.  I was able to save the day by giving him a big, white plastic bag that my laundry had come in, back in Antigua.

Take a look at my paintings:  davidmarchant2.ca

 

Eclipse of the Sun Cancelled, Due to Weather

    In a couple of hours, somewhere over the solid cloud cover blanketing the Robson Valley, there will be a partial eclipse of the Sun.  Like most astronomical events that I hear about and want to see, I won’t be able to, because of thick, overcast, clouds.   Like clockwork, clouds anticipate interesting cosmic events and move in to obscure them.  

    I guess when it starts getting dark later in the morning, we will know that thousands of miles above us the Moon will be slowly moving across the Sun, and our partial eclipse is happening. For us it will just seem like a cloudy evening is approaching.   Whoopie-do ! 

View my paintings:  davidmarchant2.ca
 

1987 Travel Journal: Tikal, Thirsty Work

Temple One and Two are the main fully restored attractions at Tikal, but the huge site featured a  lot of other pyramids still semi-hidden in the huge surrounding jungle.  I enjoyed climbing Temple Four, because it made me feel like an early archeologist (something I had dreamed about as a child).  I had to hold onto roots and stones to get to the top, because the pyramid hadn’t yet been fully reconstructed.  Once on top of the main platform, I was able to squeeze myself around the corner and climb up to be right under the “roof comb” (the decorated structure atop the pyramid).  

While I was up there I could overlook the vast expanse of the jungle that surrounded the pyramid, spotting several other pyramids that jutted out above the jungle trees, and I began hearing ferocious roaring emanating from various spots below me.  My first thought was that the roaring came from panthers or jaguars, but I later realized it was from Howler Monkeys.  It was hard to imagine that such terrifying and fierce roars could come from monkeys.

The torturous heat and terrible humidity made exploring Tikal, sweaty, exhausting, and very dehydrating.  It was tiring just walking from ruin to ruin, not to mention climbing the various pyramids.  In Mexico and Guatemala, water and ice cubes could lead to a case of tourista, so I relied heavily on bottled drinks (this was before bottled water became common), I had had a Coke as part of my breakfast before taking the bus to Tikal and  second one after visiting the Great Plaza.

After climbing up Temple Four, I had yet another.  This one was particularly memorable because it was hot, not warm, hot.  Then a bit later I had an Orange Crush at Tikal’s Jaguar Inn, a Mineral Water at the Jungle Lodge, a Pepsi, when I got back to my hotel room at Flores, a Coke with my ham sandwich supper, and then, after which, to quote my journal:  

I’m going to get another mineral water right now.  Wrong, they were out, I got a Cream Soda.

I felt like I had seen most of what there was to see at Tikal.  There were a lot of piles of rubble of overgrown and unrestored structures in the jungle, but those weren’t too interesting, and by the end of the afternoon, I was pretty burned out.

After my exhausting day at Tikal admiring the immense and intricate pyramids built by the Mayans, I was even more impressed.  The jungle heat and humidity was stifling and energy sapping.  I couldn’t imagine how any physical work could be done in those conditions, let alone building the huge rock structures.  The Mayans had no beasts of burden or even wheels to lessen the work.  It made me realize that the building of Tikal was a really amazing achievement.

I didn’t want to spend another day at Tikal, so I was just as happy to get back to the Hotel San Juan in Flores.  (I was lucky to get the same room for the night.)   I took a cold shower, (Boy, did it feel good, almost as good as a swim.)  

I bought a long, handmade sash at the souvenir shop, because I didn’t want to be stuck with Guatemalan money, as I headed out the next day for Belize. 

You can see my paintings at:  davidmarchant2.ca

 

Sorry, Spider Plants

    We’ve had the spider plants you see in the photo above, for probably forty years.  They live in the house during the winter, then in the summer we put them outside to enjoy the warm summer months.   A week ago while they were outside, it seemed like it might frost overnight, so I hastily, aspen leaves and all, brought them inside and put them on the dining room floor.  There, they sat for a week, while outside, the weather changed again, giving us record-breaking, warm days.  

    It seemed crazy to keep the spider plants inside in the dark dining room, while it was so pleasant  outside, so two days ago, I carried them back outside to the deck, so they could once again enjoy the warm sunny weather.

    You can probably guess what happened next.  Yes, last night we had another frost, so this morning when I realized it, I carried the shivering spider plants back to the dining room floor, in hopes that they will recover.  The poor spider plants are terribly root bound, so if they have survived the cold, I vow to re-pot them as penance for my leaving them out in the freezing temperatures.

    The photo below shows what the day looked like this morning.  I have never seen the fog dispersed  in such a way, with a thick, dense fog hanging above the Fraser River, and a lighter, wispier fog spread out through the trees at the far end of my pond.

 

View my paintings:  davidmarchant2.ca

1987 Travel Journal: Climbing Down Pyramid One

Once I was atop of Pyramid One and had calmed myself, slowed my heartbeat, steadied upright stance, and adapted to its scary unprotected height, I was rewarded with an extraordinary view across the grassy Great Plaza toward Pyramid Two.  Being able to overlook the whole Plaza with Temple Two at the far end from this height, was well worth the dangerous climb.  As I stood there entranced by the view of these Mayan Ruins in the middle of the jungle, birds were soaring around my head, darting in and out of the little limestone room behind me, situated at the apex of the Pyramid One.  

    I walked inside the small room and found it amazing to see that the original carved wooden lentils above the doorway, still existed intact.  I would have thought that after 1,300 years in the moist jungle environment, they would have long rotted away. 

While I hadn’t given much thought to the steepness of the steps while climbing up the pyramid, going back down, was a totally different experience.  It was gulp-producing.  I kept a tight grip on the chain that lay beside the steep, narrow steps, that served as a “handrail” on the of the pyramid.  It was the only security provided to those brave (or foolish) tourists climbing up or down the pyramid’s steps.  

I survived my descent, however, making my way down the very steep stairway was not very enjoyable.  Once I had my feet solidly set back on terra firma, I walked across the lawn of the Great Plaza to Pyramid Two,  Climbing up to the top of Pyramid Two, which was not so high, was a piece of cake compared to what I had experienced climbing up Temple One.

 

View my paintings:  davidmarchant2.ca

1987 Travel Journal: Tikal

A very long and exhausting day.  I forced myself to roll out of the bed at 5:15 AM in order to be ready to catch the 6:00 bus to Tikal.  It was dark and foggy outside.  Along the way, the bus passed a lot of primitive huts, where the present day Mayans were living their lives very similarly, to the way their ancestors had done during Tikal’s heyday.  

I had planned Tikal as one of the prime destinations on my trip to Guatemala.  Tikal was designated as a World Heritage Site by the United Nations.  Between 200 to 900 AD it was the most powerful center of the Mayan Kingdom and the city had an estimated population of 90,000 residents.  Within a 16 mile radius of the core city, 425,000 people lived.  Around the year 900 a drought caused the city to be abandoned and it was then overgrown by the Guatemalan rain forest.

When we arrived at Tikal, I immediately made my way to the Jungle Lodge, the only hotel at the site, to see if I could get a room for the night, but unfortunately they had no vacancies.  Although I was disappointed, in the end it all worked out alright.  After leaving the Jungle Lodge, I began my wandering exploration of Tikal through the dark thick jungle fog.   The jungle birds were chirping and chattering away.

My first sight of the ruins was through the early morning fog, which added to the mystic of the place.  It was still fairly dark, hardly enough light to take photos.  There were hardly any other tourist, and I was pretty much alone in my wandering in the early morning.

The jungle trail opened up when I came upon the “Great Plaza” with Temple I at one end and Temple II on the other.  The two limestone pyramids jutted up strikingly from the plaza, at a steep angle with their tops towering above the surrounding jungle trees.  The view was just as impressive as I had hoped.  Full of enthusiasm and without a second thought, I began climbing up the very steep steps of Temple I.

“Whoa,” once at the top, I had to brace myself when I looked down.  Looking at the plaza from that height gave me the sensation that I was toppling over and loosing my balance, not the kind of feeling one needs when atop a narrow stone platform 180 feet above the ground, with no guard rails.  It didn’t help my balance that I had 20 lbs. of camera equipment swinging at my side.  

View my paintings:  davidmarchant2.ca