Snow! and: Volcanoes!

First things first: 

I've updated my photo album! Click here to see some pictures of the lake and the volcano.

And: please note that if you get the e-mail blast about updates to this blog (and if you don't, but you'd like to, let me know!), it only comes on Monday mornings, regardless of how many posts I've posted during the week. I didn't want to annoy people with e-mails every time I update. So check back frequently!


                                                                        *       *       *

Everything here is pretty darn great, except for one thing: I am lucky enough to have an infestation of what my landlord calls "house terorrists." These terroristas are spiders the size of my hand. And this is awfully ironic, since spiders (and large, multi-legged creatures in general) were an acute fear about moving here in general. So far, I haven't gotten (more than slightly) sick, and I feel very safe walking around, and, thanks to the friendly people I've met and my books and my trusty internet stick, I haven't been lonely. But this lifelong arachnophobe's worst fear has come true: huge, disgusting spiders everywhere in the house. It's gotten to the point where I am constantly nervous whenever I am home. (But, people ask: surely the cat— this animal that eons of evolution have supposedly developed into a fierce stalker of small prey— helps? No. No, she does not.)

As I try to explain the situation— and the severity of my anxiety— to my landlord in Spanish, I realize that situations like these are the ones that stretch my linguistic abilities to the limit. It doesn't help, of course, that while I'm desperately searching my brain for the translation of "caulk" I'm fighting off tears borne of frustration and fear.

So: my landlord has been trying to fix the problem by sealing off all the various entrances of the house with foam, which makes the place look like the set of a Christmas pageant designed by people who have some removed familiarity, but certainly not firsthand experience, with snow.

(When we were watching the process of sealing off the windows in my bedroom, my landlord's ten-year-old son asked me: "Is that really what snow looks like?" I said, yes, kind of, and then my landlord pointed to the litter box and remarked, "Wow, your cat really needs a lot of food!" I explained that that is the cat's bathroom, at which point both my landlord and his son looked at each other in amazement. The landlord then explained to me that he had assumed that the cat would just do her business all around the house, to which I responded that I was extremely grateful that he let me sign the lease, considering this was his assumption...)

*       *       *

In other news, yesterday I went wandering and I discovered a way to get to Lake Atitlán. (I was looking for el mercado, where Mayan women come from all over the region to sell textiles and food, so I can finally buy some fruits and vegetables— I've been eating out for every meal because I am afraid of my kitchen, both because of the spiders [where my landlord thinks he discovered two nests] and because I don't trust myself to properly disinfect the water or fruits and vegetables), but wound up stumbling upon the lake. I crossed the Guatemala-Korea Friendship Bridge (!), and found myself on a very long stretch of river and beach, on which there were many components of the juxtaposition of wealth and extreme poverty that characterizes this region.

I walked perhaps a mile or so toward the lake, and then wandered through winding streets lined with people selling ice cream, licuados (sweet, pulpy fruit juices), and textiles, and came upon an area catering to tourists, filled mostly with hotels and restaurants with stunning views.

I sat on the edge of the cement stairway leading to this restaurant for a while and drank from the liter of water I now know to bring with me everywhere. Then I meandered back into the main part of town, where, sweating profusely, I sat on a ledge for some time, drinking my water. I got out my book (Ann Patchett's State of Wonder, a fascinating novel about a woman who travels to Latin America alone and has some misadventures... I might have to put it down for a while until the point where navigating the everyday here ceases to feel like a grand and challenging adventure), and, within seconds, an older white woman wearing a ridiculously large hat and round purple sunglasses came up to me, paused, looked me right in the eye inches from my face, and yelled, "ENGLISH!?" I answered that, yes, I speak English, and asked her if she needed help. "Oh my goodness gracious, God has answered my prayers!" she exclaimed, her accent heavily Southern. She then explained that she was trying to get to San Marcos, and asked me how to get there; I said that unfortunately I didn't know, but I could talk to a tuk-tuk driver (here is a tuk-tuk, a little red three-wheeled vehicle, one of the hundreds of which roam around the town, and which cost five quetzales per person, regardless of distance traveled)

on her behalf. "Oh my Lord Jesus," she sighed, "my prayers have been answered." We went to talk to a tuk-tuk driver, and not much was clarified— he didn't know what ferry she was talking about— but she seemed hugely relieved nonetheless. As she got in and zoomed away, she yelled back at me, "Goodbye! Enjoy your life!"