Lagniappe: country of contradictions

I know that those of you who have been reading my blog over the years may find some of this repetitive, but each time I come to Guatemala I am struck by the many contradictions --between how the privileged sectors live, and how the rest of the population lives, between official rhetoric and reality, between urban life and the vast expanse of the country where the majority of the population lives that is lumped together under the label of la area rural. Of course there isn't one single "rural area"; while there are some common features to life in rural Guatemala (official neglect, deep-seated poverty, lack of services, underfunded schools and hospitals, crumbling or non-existent infrastructure -- and by this I mean sections of highways that literally collapse, droughts that have gone on for years, chronic malnutrition) it's also a mistake to not understand some of the particularities of different areas of the country (those that have seen foreign investment in export-oriented plantation agriculture, those that have ravaged by the expansion of biofuels, particularly palma africana, those that have seen mining and hydroelectric licenses granted). 

One small example -- and this is absolutely a "First World problem" is the difference in the types of bus service available, depending upon where you are heading. If you are heading to one of the popular tourist destinations, such as Panajachel, Antigua, Chichicastenango or Xela, you can ride in a fairly comfortable air-conditioned shuttle (usually seating 15-20 people). There are also "first class" and "second class" full-sized buses that travel between Guatemala City and Huehuetenango (not quite sure why Huehue gets nice buses and Xela doesn't), and a few other destinations. These leave from the bus company's headquarters, you get a reserved seat, there are bathrooms on the first-class buses, and the bus makes a 20-minute meal stop about halfway through. There are baggage compartments underneath (like in a Greyhound or even Bolt bus in the U.S.), and the seats are fairly comfortable. The buses generally only drop passengers off at the company's terminal at the other destination, or occasionally they will drop someone off at the main bus terminal if he or she has to make a connection to an ordinary bus or van.

Of course, there are what we Americans typically call "chicken buses" that go to these same locations -- converted school buses that typically squeeze three adults into seats designed for two children, sometimes four, with people standing in the aisles.  Baggage gets strapped on top of the bus (sometimes there are tarps pulled over if it rains but they don't always cover everything). Guatemalans call them camionetas  or buses de parrilla (buses with a rack).There are no bathrooms, no bathroom stops. Vendors get on the bus before it pulls out of the terminal (which is really just an open area with buses and vans jumbled around and hawkers calling out trying to gather passengers for whichever driver is paying them) with trays of fruit, tamales, sandwiches, bags of nuts. Some are hawking vitamins or when it stops in one of the cities along the route buses stop pretty much when a passenger calls out that he or she wants to get off, or when someone standing on the side of the road flags a bus to stop. 

By contrast, if you are traveling from Guatemala City to anywhere in Quiché other than Chichicastenango, you have no choice but to ride a camioneta. There aren't other options. Which says something about how some parts of the country are viewed from the standpoint of the capital city, and the companies that run the exclusive bus lines.