Padre sol, madre tierra

Es una entrada vieja, que nunca termine, pero lo comparto no obstante.
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Hoy por primera vez fue soleada casi todo el día y hasta ahora (casi las 7 de la noche) no ha llovido. Me levantaron los espíritus hoy en la mañana cuando miré afuera y vi los rayos del sol acariciando los cerros y bosques que rodean mi pueblito, y haciendo sombras profundas y agudas en las paredes de los edificios y las superficies de las calles.  Soy una persona muy sensible y a la vez muy sencilla. Me conmueven las formas de las nubes en un cielo azul. Me emociona la aparencia del sol diariamente, y sobretodo cuando ha sido ausente varios dias en seguida. Entiendo, de mi manera, el concepto de padre sol, una presencia familiar (y aqui quiero utilizar la palabra como 'de familia'), necesaria, no menos valorada por su cotidianidad.
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Aunque comence esta entrada hace un buen rato, ahora, en agosto, estamos pasando otra temporada de lluvia, aunque hoy (ahora el 31 de agosto) si habia sol en el dia, seguido por truenos, rayos y luego, la lluvia. Uno siente, a veces, prisionera de la clima. Hay que cambiar planes con amigos o amigas, cancelar actividades, inventar estrategias de llegar de un lado o otro, en funcion de la posibilidad o la presencia de lluvia, lodo, y todo aquello.

Visita de relámpago a Radio Doble Via//Lightning quick visit to Radio Doble Via

Uno de los resultados de mi participación en el movimiento de radios comunitarias es que he acumulado un gran grupo de amistades con productores y locutores y locutoras de radio en varias partes del país. No pude conocer a todos quienes estuvieron en el Encuentro pero reafirmé unas amistades y si, conocí unos otros. Ahora me toca ir a visitar a varias de estas radios; por un lado, para la investigación (para tener un base de comparición), y por el otro lado, para ver a mis nuevos amigos y amigas. 


Había un gran contingente de la radio Doble Via, de San Mateo, Quetzaltenango -- como 3 kilómetros fuera de la ciudad de Xela en la carretera que va para  San Marcos. Yo conocí unos de ellos hace un tiempo, y conocí más en el Encuentro. Y decidí a buscar como visitar. 


Bueno, casualmente, tuvimos que ir a Xela para recoger unos equipos para la radio. No sabía exactamente que cosa (o cosas) era, pero ofrecí por varias razones. Uno, me gustó Xela y sería chévere visitar otra vez, aunque sea muy breve. También, sería una justificación a llevar una de mis compañeras de la radio a ver la radio en Xela. En mis esfuerzas de asesorar el proyecto de radio Ixmukané, me pareció que las compañeras pudieran ganar mucho si tenían algunas experiencias con otras radios -- sobretodo radios que cuentan con menos recursos. También, parte de mi agenda es integrar Radio Ixmukané mas en el movimiento de radios comunitarias. Yo sugerí eso en una reunión que tuvimos hace una semana, pero fue rechazado. Me dijeron que no existieron los recursos económicos, y también había una actitud de que ya el tiempo de asesorar y observar ha pasado; hacemos la radio por hacerlo. Entonces, esto sería la manera de al menos visitar una radio sin gastar recursos (porque el viaje para recoger los equipos fue presupuestado -- parece que las organizaciones en Guatemala viven bajo la tiranía del presupuesto). 


El viaje pasó más rápidamente que la otra vez que manejé. Solamente que salimos más tarde porque el cheque y el papeleo para la compra no estaba listo el jueves y entonces tuvimos que pasar por la oficina en Chichicastenango en el camino. Jeanet, mi compañera de la radio, fue conmigo y entonces ella subió a la oficina mientras yo quedé en el carro. 


No solamente el viaje pasó más rápido, pero la entrada a la ciudad fue más fácil y realmente lleguemos al sitio sin problemas. Pero las cosas que necesitábamos no eran listas todavía. Fuimos a almorzar, volvimos y no había nadie en la tienda y entonces fuimos a la radio.  Encontremos con unos compañeros allí -- unos conocidos de mi participación en el Encuentro, otros nuevos. Impresionante porque la radio es mayormente dirigido por jóvenes, hombres y mujeres -- aunque ese día solamente vimos compañeros y no compañeras). Particularmente impresionante fue la participación de un muchacho de 10 años. La radio pertenece a todos y todas!!!

Massacres, justice and impunity

In recent weeks, there have been some important developments in cases that date back to the armed conflict. A few weeks ago, some men were sentences to 6,060 years (yes, that's the right number) for a massacre at Dos Erres, committed in the early 1980s. Then there were some captures of men who allegedly committed genocide in a massacre at Plan de Sanchez in Alta Verapaz in 1982. Today's paper carried a story that a fifth man was arrested in connection with the Plan de Sanchez massacre. Here's the article (in Spanish)  Another arrest for Plan de Sanchez Massacre.


This is all good; that is, it is good that the wheels of justice are turning slowly and that cases are being brought forward. 


And still... none of these convictions bring back the dead. And still ... the people charged and the ones convicted are not the intellectual authors of the crimes. Those ones, the men who designed the scorched earth strategy, who had the big picture who ensured that it was carried out, who gave the orders and made sure they were followed, they are still walking free. They are running for political office, and one of them seems likely to be the next president. So justice moves slowly, creakily.


I had a long conversation via email with a Guatemalan friend who expressed sympathy for the families of the men who were convicted and sentenced to 6,060 years. I decided not to reply publicly to her post on Facebook about this, but write to her privately. She is Guatemalan (or part Guatemalan) and I am not, and I wanted to be circumspect. On the other hand, another Guatemalan friend had reacted to the convictions by saying that the people who were convicted meant nothing to him, only the ones who had been killed.  


So the friend who had empathized with the families told me a lot about what she had experienced, witnessed, and heard about. That fleshed out the original commentary, because my reaction to her was based in part on having heard a lot, in the past six months, of responses along the lines of "Well, everyone suffered in the war," or "Well, the war was awful and we all suffered but now we have to put that behind us and move forward."  And I wanted to see if that was the message behind what she had written. 


I won't do justice to her thoughtful and detailed commentary, and I don't have permission to quote it here, although I might ask her. But it was a good and an important exchange.  


And still, there are people who deny that what occurred in Guatemala was a genocide, or want to minimize the extent of the suffering and slaughter, or the racism that is so clearly reflected in the statistics (over 80% of those killed were Maya).

Conjunctural thoughts/Pensamientos coyunturales

The news has been full of discussion of the disappearance of a woman, Cristina Siekavizza, a few weeks ago. Recently there was an interview on one of the morning programs, "First Hour", with Norma Cruz of the organization Survivors (Sobrevivientes) who declared it seemed pretty clear it was a case of femicide. Then the paper today carried stories about two armed attacks, one of which left two women dead and the other killed one woman and left one survivor -- the victim's sister.  Just everyday news here. It is hard not to become hopeless, or to simply become inured, desensitized to this kind of story, since it is everyday fare.  There is a death, or a disappearance, one feels sick, depressed, and then one has to go about one's work and other commitments and other than posting a bumper-sticker against violence against women and airing announcements on the radio, there seems to be little concretely that one can do.


The political process and the impending elections are another area of concern. The signs seem clear that the genocidal former general, Otto Pérez Molina, will win. My friends in the left party seem to think that he will win on the first ballot. It is a situation that does make me feel somewhat helpless and useless as a foreigner. It's not my country, I can't vote, I don't really feel I have a lot I can say to people. It's an awkward position; probably I am supposed to stay out of electoral politics although it is hard not to have passions, opinions, strong feelings. I drive around and the visage of Otto Pérez Molina confronts me at nearly every turn; of course, the visages of other candidates as well, all over the city, the streets, the highways, the roadsides.  It is hard to restrain myself, sometimes; I am conscious that I am a gringa -- not just any outsider, but someone from a country that has a particular history of involvement in Guatemala, and a country whose well-meaning citizens are often fond of telling other people what is right for them and what they should be doing (even those of us from the left). So I try to steer clear of the patronizing do-gooder attitude, the position that I can see what is really going on and I can tell you what is wrong with your country and what you should do to fix it... or the candidate you should support. I also have to live in a small town where the right-wing party (I have dubbed them "the Death Eaters" although obviously not everyone in the party has blood on their hands) is strong, right across from their headquarters, in fact, and I need to not be run out of town on a rail (I actually do not have any idea how strong their support is here, and whether their mayoral candidate is likely to win).


I don't believe in the neutrality of research or the researchers are or should be neutral. Yet we need to be able to talk to a wide range of people. I know some people locally who are supporters of the Patriota. One is a person I met two years ago on one of my first trips; however, I have steered clear of him since arriving this time and understanding more fully what his political alliances meant (he didn't hide them from me; just the first time he told me what party he belonged to, it didn't mean a whole lot to me; now it does). Another woman I know, someone who has attended meetings and workshops of Ixmukané, was out in the market a few Sundays ago handing out Patriota literature. I smiled, greeted her, and then moved on. 


On the other hand, I have to speak my opinion if anyone asks me.  And sometimes even if they don't. I've always been a person of strong views, although electoral politics has not always been a passion. Here the stakes seem high and it seems so clear to me, and some of the people with whom I talk, that the front runner is someone guilty of mass murder and whose platform promises a "strong hand" (mano dura), whose party symbol is a clenched, muscular fist -- an image that reverberates with historical significance throughout the region.


But the victory of this right-wing party seems nearly inevitable, and therefore I feel relatively useless. I am doing what I can to help support people whom I think can make a difference; that seems to be appropriate and reasonable. I don't know what more I can do, or if there is anything more that I could or should do. 


A friend wrote recently to ask if I were planning to stay in Guatemala forever; the country and the people, in her view, were in my heart.  And yes, Guatemala and its people have become part of me... and I say that with humility and the recognition that I will never truly be of this place. I can grasp only faintly how friends whose family roots go back long before the conquest view the country. I am moved by a swath of countryside glimpsed from a steep mountain road, the clean white spire of the church, the dun colors of adobe houses, the rich greens of the milpa, and the red and ochre tones of the earth, and understand, for a second, why people have been willing to die for this place.  


The election is only a few weeks away.  I was originally going to see if I could be qualified as an international observer, but then decided to talk to my friends in the left alliance to see if they thought there were something more useful that I could be doing. So, I have been asked to just be around the two Maya women who are running for congress from this area (both of whom were active in Ixmukané), and do whatever they might need me to do, and especially stay close to them on election day. I have a car, so that might mean I could help take them places in the department that they need to visit.  My friend told me that this was one instance where being a foreigner might be useful -- that although I am hardly an intimidating person (all of 5 feet, 1/2 inch tall), my presence might help guarantee the safety of the candidates. So, it promises to be an interesting (if not always uplifting) couple of weeks.


When I was commenting to another friend about feeling kind of useless or impotent, she responded, "Well, at least you are documenting this." I suppose so, although I don't think I've done such a terrific job of reporting. 

Not fun

This has been a week of crazy weather. Wednesday leaving Guatemala City in the afternoon, we got caught in the midst of a flash hailstorm. The hailstones were large and plentiful; some were the size of golf balls. It felt for a time as though the car roof was going to get dented or the windshield would crack. The hailstones came at all angles and with a lot of force. The rain was heavy and the periférico (the "ring road"), which is low-lying in areas, was flooded in places. Not fun to drive in.  


Then today the rain was coming down in sheets in Antigua and was worse on the highway. Driving was very exhausting as the road was also very foggy and I had to do all I could to strain to see more than 50 feet ahead.  So sometimes driving here is just miserable. And then other times it's just no fun.

Otros encuentros: las radios comunitarias/Other encounters: the community radio stations

Durante el tiempo que he estado aquí, uno de los movimientos sociales que me ha interesado más, y el movimiento con lo cual siento más identificado por varias razones, es el movimiento de las radios comunitarias. Hay radios comunitarias y radio comunitarias; o sea, radios que son verdaderamente dirigido por y operado en los intereses de las comunidades, mayormente las comunidades indígenas que han sido sistemáticamente excluidas de los medios masivos de comunicación en Guatemala. Y otras radios que se llaman comunitarias o que son llamadas comunitarias pero son de carácter religioso y/o comercial, aunque son "locales". No tengo tiempo ahora -- soy un poco agotada -- para dar una historia del movimiento. Pero hoy en día hay un movimiento, un esfuerzo para organizar las radios comunitarias -- y estoy refiriendo a las que yo considero realmente merecen este título -- y juntamente presionar el gobierno para un reconocimiento legal.


Sabía de las luchas de las radios hace unos años pero no lo fijé mucho cuando vine porque era un poco afuera del ámbito de mi investigación en este momento. Ahora, cambiando mi enfoque, me encuentro plenamente involucrada en este movimiento y me siento muy feliz de haber encontrado tantos compañeros y tantas compañeras tan valiosos y valiosas, y tan luchadores y luchadoras. 


Voy a comentar sobre el evento que se llevó a cabo en estos días, de una manera fragmentada, porque tengo sueño.  Brevemente, el 8 o 9 de agosto (o sea, ayer y hoy), fue el primer Encuentro de las Radios Comunitarias, en el Museo de San Carlos (MUSAC), en la Zona 1 de la capital. No tengo las cifras precisas porque no era una de las organizadores, pero docenas de emisoras de varios departamentos del país participaron: San Marcos, Huehuetenango, Sololá, Quetzaltenango, Totonicapan. Baja Verapaz, Sacatepéquez, Chimaletenango, Jalapa, Quiché, y probablemente otros. 


Se escogieron estas fechas precisamente porque hoy (9 de agosto) es el día internacional de los pueblos indígenas, y casi todo de las radios aquí son fundados en comunidades indígenas, sobretodo mayas. La culminación del encuentro fue un plantón frente al congreso de la república, para presionar a los diputados a tomar acción en una ley -- 4087 -- que legalizará las radios comunitarias, que hoy en día sufren de estar en un limbo, y frecuentemente son criminalizados por el estado. 


Yo pocas veces pongo traje típico. Admiro mucha la ropa de las mujeres mayas, y tengo gran aprecio para la variedad de diseños y la especificad de los patrones que representan y identifican distintos pueblos. Hay una crítica entre mucha gente maya sobre la apropiación del traje típico por gente no maya. Por ejemplo, en una fecha determinada en diciembre, como parte de las festividades navideñas, muchos ladinos visten a sus hijos como "mayas".  Ahora en la temporada de las elecciones, varias candidatas femeninas se visten en güipiles para mostrar su "tolerancia" o "simpatía para los pueblos mayas" o algo así. Y esto ha provocado una respuesta muy fuerte de mujeres mayas. Vi a un volante en el muro de la oficina de Ixmukané criticando las candidatas y demandando que dejan de usar traje típico. 


Pero paso mucho tiempo con mujeres mayas y frecuentemente me preguntan si voy a poner traje, me suplican a ponerlo. He comprado unos güipiles y en ciertas ocasiones cuando voy a un evento con mis compañeras, pongo un güipil encima de un vestido o una falda normal. Seleccioné dos güipiles para el encuentro. Ayer puse un güipil de Coban, y para hoy seleccioné algo muy específico: un güipil de Chajul, un municipio en el norte de Quiché. Lo seleccioné porque Otto Pérez Molina, quien según las encuestas es el próximo presidente, fue autor de un masacre en este pueblo. Hoy en día él insiste que no hay evidencia de genocidio, aunque participó o dirigió varios masacres. Entonces, aunque el día de los pueblos indígenas es un momento de celebrar la resistencia y la determinación de estos pueblos, también es oportuno a recordar las injusticias y violencias cometidas contra los pueblos mayas. Y decidí que, en el día en que íbamos a presionar al congreso sobre una ley que podría legitemizar las radios comunitarias, que ropa sería más significativa que traje de un pueblo que ya fue media-exterminada por las esfuerzas estatales. Pero sobrevivió. Entonces, era importante a mi que mi ropa cargaba algún mensaje, aunque nadie realmente reconoció el mensaje inmediatamente.

Encuentro con las Patriota y otros escenarios/Encounter with the Patriotas and other scenarios

It seems this is turning into a blog that is as much about the Guatemalan elections as it is about community radio or my research. And actually the elections are turning into part of the larger picture of the research since they dominate the landscape and the preoccupations of the people closest to me.  So the drama about Sandra Torres continues. I don't want to get into a thoroughly byzantine discussion of the electoral system here, but her candidacy was denied on the grounds that she divorced her husband just to avoid the constitutional proscription against family members of presidents running for office. Since that denial, her backers have taken the case to the courts, but simultaneously have gotten their followers (one of the terms used here is "co-religionarios" or correligionists) to take to the streets in great numbers. So traffic has been a mess in many places. You can hardly drive anywhere in the country on the weekend without having to stop and let some cavalcade of political supporters of one or another party pass by.  This morning I was picking up Doña Fermina to go to Santa Cruz as I had an entire truckload of campaign material for her, Doña Mati and the other Winaq/Frente Amplio candidates, and she mentioned that she had heard that Sandra was gathering a large concentration of women in Santa Cruz, principally women who had been beneficiaries of one of the social programs she had championed, Mi Familia Progresa (My Family Progresses), which is basically a handout of either Q300 or Q600 to women in needy families. 


Later in the day I was talking with some friends about the likely outcome of this legal process -- and what those boded for the governability of the country. One of my friends had noticed what she took to be a veiled threat in a statement by Sandra Torres referencing the armed conflict and saying that there had been enough blood already. My friend thought it was possible that the there could be some kind of coup attempt, staged (I think this was her scenario) by the UNE, the party in power, leading to a Honduras-type situation. 


Most people think that Otto Pérez Molina will be the next president, although my friends in the Frente Amplio are campaigning vigorously and folks were very energized when the nominees of the party received their credentials as candidates. Therefore, the compañeras in Ixmukané have decided that they need to find ways of working with the Patriotas. So, they have invited the candidates for congress to a working meeting in a few weeks (and they very much want me to be there which means cutting short the trip to Tikal with my daughter and brother), and made a tactical decision to present the invitations in person. Which meant going to an event organized by the Patriota in Chichicastenango. There we were in a sea of orange shirts (the color of the party), listening to speech after speech by the candidates for congress and also Mayor of Chichi. I will report later on the content: hard to fault their description of the poverty, violence and uncertainty that characterize Guatemala today. It was an uncomfortable hour and a half, however. I felt very out of place and a bit uneasy, given that the party is headed by a genocidal war criminal. Doesn't exactly inspire a warm and secure feeling inside me.

Justice served?/Justicia servida?

This is in response to today's news, that the Kaibils who were responsible for the massacre of 201 peasants at the Dos Erres aldea in the municipality of La Libertad in the Peten, were found guilt and sentenced to a total of 6,060 years apiece -- 30 years for each of the 201 victims.  So this is, relatively speaking, "good news". And this is significant, I think, in a country where judges and lawyers who are involved in such cases are subject to threats and attacks.  So the judges' actions need to be applauded. However, impunity still rules the day, there is no "rectification" for war crimes and genocide, and while 201 victims had their "day in court", so to speak, that leaves... I don't know. 249,799 deaths that haven't been adjudicated? 


A Guatemalan friend, who lived through the war years, commented that what was important was the people who had been killed, those who suffered for the acts of these and others, not the people who were sentenced.  And so, I'm not quite ready to break out the champagne or rush into the streets and celebrate. There is nothing to celebrate, really. 201 people -- and many thousands more -- were killed. Some one -- some ones -- have been held accountable for 201 of those deaths, three decades after the crimes. That is correct and proper (although a bit delayed). But no sentence -- whether 6000 or six hundred thousand years -- will bring back those 201 people. No court can restore fathers and mothers to orphaned children, or give husbands back to their widows. The people who lost loved ones will not be made whole by this sentence, and the dead will not be brought back to life. We have to keep this in mind.  


And it also remains to be seen whether the sentences will actually be carried out, or whether there will be some other maneuverings that keep the condemned out of jail.. or that give them what one of my friends called the "narco-luxe treatment". So I'm not yet ready to go into the streets and celebrate. Lighting candles for the dead seems a more appropriate response.


At the same time, the country seems poised to elect an ex-Kaibil as president: Otto Pérez Molina. The newspaper polls -- which of course are not infallible -- show Pérez Molina still far ahead in most polls, although in some categories of voters, Winaq also seems to be gaining.  So there seems to be a serious disjuncture here, between the need to have justice served, to end the culture of impunity, to break the silence, and a willingness to ignore the past, sweep things under the rug, or simply go along with what seems to be "the flow". I know all this on an intellectual level. But still, when I see truckloads of Maya campesinos in El Quiché, the department that experienced the most massacres, at least one of which -- in Chajul -- seem to be directly linked to Pérez Molina -- waving the orange flags of the Partido Patriota, I want to scream. Or do something.  . 

Darkness at noon

I couldn't think of a better title. But that is how I look upon the upcoming elections, as all the polls show that Otto Perez Molina -- responsible for numerous massacres and other abuses during the armed internal conflict -- is leading in the presidential race.  I hope that the Frente Amplio de la Izquierda (Broad Front of the Left), the alliance for which Rigoberta Menchú is the presidential candidate gains some support at the national level, enough to make it a political force that can be considered, and taken seriously. But I don't think there's any serious challenger to Pérez Molina, although we all know that polls are not always the best way to judge or predict an outcome of a political race. But I see people all around in Quiché handing out literature for the Partido Patriota and flocking to the local headquarters. Perhaps they are all just doing because they were paid or promised something or because they are scared of not supporting the Patriota. Regardless of their reasons, the support seems widespread (if not necessarily deep).

Which makes me anticipate September 11, election day, with some dread, and even more dread for the aftermath. I don't want to sound apocalyptic; I don't expect the country to turn into a police state immediately on September 12. But we are already living in an ugly, tense, violent situation -- I should rush to add, my personal safety is not threatened, my town is pretty chill, Quiché might be the poorest department but it is far from the most violent and I do not feel in personal danger. And I cannot imagine it getting better -- all of OPM's rhetoric about security to the contrary notwithstanding. I can only see repression, more disregard for and violation of human rights, and no real change in the level of violence or of poverty. He says he's in favor of concessions to the mining companies: so there goes the environment and land rights.

At the same time, there are some small positive steps regarding the genocide of the 1980s. In the past week or two, there have been some advances in legal cases regarding massacres that took place in the early 1980s - the massacre in the aldea of Dos Erres (Two Rs) in the Petén is one of them. And some people are actually being brought to justice (whether or not they will actually be found guilty is another story.  

Revelación y epifania: malas y buenas noticias//revelation and epiphany: bad news and good news

Hay días cuando parece que nada sale bien o, por lo menos, no sale como debe salir. Para un momento, lunes el 25 parecía como uno de estos días. No comenzó mal. Estaba trabajando en las materiales para el sitio de web que estamos montando para solicitar fondos para facilitar la participación de las mujeres mayas en el proceso electoral. Preparé mi programa de radio, o al menos seleccioné la música y escogí un tema. Almorcé y preparé a salir de la casa. Llegando a Santa Cruz, llamé a la compañera que tiene responsibilidad para la radio en las tardes para ver si estaba almorzando o si estaba en la cabina de la radio. 


Cuando contestó el teléfono, me dijo que no estaba en la radio, que la radio estaba cerrada porque ella tenía que ir a otra actividad y la otra compañera (actualmente son 2 quienes dividen las responsabilidades) había pedido licencia para ese día. Yo estaba brava; soy responsable en cuanto a mi programa, y si no voy a estar o si voy a llegar tarde siempre llamo antes, si posible unos días antes. Entonces, si ella sabía que yo iba a venir para mi programa, porque no me llamó? Ya había hecho el viaje desde Chinique; que iba a hacer yo, regresar a mi casa? 


Bueno, decidí a aprovechar de haber llegado a la capital departamental. Hace varias semanas, un colega norteamericano me hubiera dicho que cuando él venía a Santa Cruz, fue a un café que estaba localizado en un centro comercial en la calle principal entrando desde Chiché. Yo hubiera notado la presencia de este centro pero nunca hubiera pensado entrar allí; siempre cuando vengo a Santa Cruz es por un motivo especifico. O estoy solamente pasando por Santa Cruz para ir a Chichicastenango o Antigua, o voy rumbo a la radio. 


Entonces, decidí que iba a meterme en el café, tomar un cafecito y ver si tenian wifi. Llegué. Fue un espacio abierto al frente. Habían algunas mesas afueras, y otras adentro. Unas un poco altas, y los otros normal, y un juego de sofá y sillas. Parecía tranquila y agradable. Entré con mi mochila, pedí un latte y me senté a una de las mesas altas. El café no era mal (no el mejor latte que había tomado pero muy lejos de ser el peor).  Habían pocas personas cuando llegué -- unos niños, uno de unos 12 o 13 años que, por su manera de conversar con la señora del café, parecía que fuera hijo o familiar de ella. 


Pero después de un tiempo comenzaron a llegar otras personas. Evidentemente personas quienes tenían 15 o 20 quetzales para una bebida, o 30-40 quetzales para un crepe. Para mi es agradable estar en un café, no importa si no conozco a nadie. A veces estar solita en mi casa todo el tiempo me deprima. Chinique no ofrece ninguna diversión, y después de 6 meses viviendo allí no tengo muchas amistades en el pueblo. Entonces, más de quedar en mi casa y leer y escribir y pensar, no hay nada que hacer. Bueno, subir fotos. Mirar a las pocas películas que un amigo me ha mandado por internet. Lavar, cocinar, hacer ejercicio. 


Pero mas de esto, muy poco. Y entonces para mi fue una revelación: un lugar donde podría quedar un rato en las noches si ya estuve en Santa Cruz (no creo que vale la pena hacer el viaje de 20 km solamente para sentarme en un café), para hacer realmente cosas que hago en la casa (leer, escribir, subir fotos) pero en la presencia de otros seres humanos.