Ommmmm...

So this past week was spent on gorgeous Lake Atitlan, the part of the trip where we practice yoga every morning and meditate in the lotus position, looking out our third eye and chanting "ommmm" for hours on end in a huge wooden temple shaped like a pyramid, complete with incense, candles, and a guru with long black hair wearing flowly white robes. It's another world. Not your everyday experience and not for everyone, but it's one of my favorite parts of the trip. Balancing chakras, reading auras, lucid dreams, holistic medicine, and astral travel are all normal breakfast conversation around these parts. Welcome to San Marcos and The Piramides Meditation Centre. You have to see this place to believe it. In the past 20 years, this tiny little indigenous lakeside town as become a veritable hippie Mecca. People from all over the world have settled here to soak in the energy of this place and do spiritual exploration. They actually claim that San Marcos holds a unique energy and vibration due to energy meridians crossing at this very spot on the planet or something or other.

Who knows? But I do feel something special when I'm here. San Marcos is one of my favorite spots on earth. I started coming here on weekends every chance I could when I was a teacher in Antigua in 2003, usually by myself with nothing but a book and a single change of cloths, and with no other agenda than to soak in the energy of this place, read, eat great vegetarian food, and not talk to a soul, surrendering to my closet hermit inclinations.

Particularly interesting is that San Marcos is a random hippie Mecca against the backdrop of a intensely evangelical indigenous village. The two very distinct communities co-exist quite peacefully for the most part. However, the numerous churches around here have taken to broadcasting their daily services over loud-speakers that canvas the entire valley with competing congregations of a capella singers with excruciatingly poor pitch, piercing the otherwise exceedingly peaceful atmosphere several times a day. I guess a place can't be perfect.

I got to see my friend Nicola from England who was part of the fantastic group of people Nate and I met here on our first trip and have stayed in touch with since then. Nicola loves San Marcos so much she stuck around and now calls it home.

The Lovely Nicola

We absorbed a couple other members into our group this week, Nate's friend Tom and my old friend Neil who came to check out what all the fuss was about the Pyramids as well. Great having them along.

I ended up doing another show at this great venue in town, Blind Lemon's, a repeat gig from when we passed through here last October, lights, sound system and all, which is a rare thing around these parts. We packed the place out again and it goes down as another great memory. The owner of Blind Lemon's, Carlos Funk (whose "real" name is Charlie Smith or something mundane like that) pulled out his bass and accompanied me for a bit, very fun.

Doing my thing with Carlos

We even had a surprise guest appearance from Pieter and Chris at the show (courtesy of Nicola), our good buds from the last time we were here...in the form of a blown-up color photo taken at the last show.

Actual publicity for the show, funny.


The boys of the San Marcos dock, loading the lancha

A local fisherman on Lake Atitlan.

Now we've bid Guatemala farewell and just landed in Costa Rica. We head out tomorrow for a week working with endangered leatherback turtles, helping protect their eggs as they come up out of the ocean onto the beach to lay their eggs. Sounds pretty romantic, but in reality it means a lot of downtime in a really isolated place during the day and four hour shifts patrolling the beach back and forth, back and forth in the in middle of the night. Eh, not my most favorite part of the trip, but here we go. Then off to Nicaragua for a week of free travel!

Lahar

lahar (lä'här') n.

1. A wet mass of volcanic fragments flowing rapidly downhill. Lahars usually contain ash, breccia, and boulders mixed with rainwater or with river or lake water displaced by the lava flow associated with the volcano.
2. An avalanche of volcanic water and mud down the slopes of a volcano.
3. A destructive mudflow on the slopes of a volcano usually brought on by massive amounts of rain.

I would like to amend the statement proffered in my last blog, that in Guatemala when you see an erupting volcano, you go towards it instead of away from it and no one will try and stop you. I have officially experienced an exception to that rule.

A couple days ago our crew embarked on a popular two-day trek to one of Guatemala’s most active volcanoes, Santiaguito. As the volcano is far too active to summit, we camp at the base, the culmination being waking up in the middle of the night after the clouds have cleared to watch the fireworks show above as Santiaguito erupts every 20-30 minutes. If only we'd made it to base camp.

At the beginning of the seven-hour hike to our camp, we crossed over a frighteningly deep gorge that our guide Deek told us was formed 20 years ago by a massive lahar that ripped through the valley (see definition above). To give you an idea of its power, the lahar’s warpath tore straight through a church that still stands, now in two parts, on either bank of the gorge. (see photo below)



A few hours hiking through the grasslands, then uphill into thick, thick jungle towards Santiaguito. The skies began to open up after stopping for lunch. More thick jungle, more rain, more uphill. Finally only an hour to go, the skies were dumping buckets, we were exhausted and very ready to arrive at base camp and change into dry clothes. Still under cover of jungle, we couldn’t yet see the volcano, but started hearing short explosions every few minutes, informed by our guide Deek that it was the volcano doing its thing.

The rain continued beating down on us, and the uphill path we were scaling started looking more like a small waterfall at times. (And this is where I have to admit, I did kind of imagine I was Kate out of a scene from Lost, desperately tramping through the jungle in search of a secret hatch or running from the bad guys. Alas, Matthew Fox was nowhere to be found.) As we got closer to our destination at the base of the volcano, the intermittent bursts from the volcano changed to steady rumbling and eventually I could feel the ground vibrating beneath me. The bursts from the volcano seemed normal enough, but was this normal?

We finally approached a clearing at the ledge of the 50-foot gorge that separated us from Guatemala's most active volcano in the not-too-far-off distance, our first peek at Santiaguito. Deek was at the front of the group surveying the scene as we one-by-one gathered at the ledge before making the final 30-minute hike up the edge of the gorge to base camp. As I approached the clearing, I peered across the gorge and could see several small landslides tumbling down the steep terrain just across from us. Hmmmm. Suddenly, a usually extremely calm and collected Deek turns around and yells over the increasing rumbling and pouring ran, “Go back, go back! Go, go!” gesturing frantically with his arms and making for the trail we had just climbed up. I think the unnerving rumbling of the ground underfoot was enough to know something was not right, but especially considering Deek's usually collected manner and the new tone of urgency in his voice, none of us asked questions before turning on our heels and booking it straight down the mountain, 35 lb. backpacks and all, running on pure adrenaline.

Suddenly it didn't matter that we were exhausted and soaked to the skin. Rain was beating down harder than ever and the small trickle of water we had contended with on the way up just five minutes earlier was now a raging river that we had to basically wade through on our way down. It was a miracle there were no injuries.

We continued to hear the menacing rumbling for a good half hour as we distanced ourselves from whatever it was were were running from. We finally stopped and found out that there had been a live lahar approaching fast just around the bend in the gorge, apparently the first time in 10 years of doing these treks that a group has come upon one. Deek had seen it coming around the corner, a dark, angry cloud of mud, rocks, and water sweeping through the gorge. One of the other guides Landon had stayed behind for a few minutes out of a morbid curiosity and reported back seeing landslides from across the gorge and watched as a bizarre mixture of mud, water, ash, steam and rocks filled the 50 foot gorge in a matter of minutes, splashing up over the sides where we had just been. He said the power was unbelievable and that the ground underneath him was shaking so hard he doubted the ledge we had just been standing on moments before was still standing.

The even more frightening thing was that we were an hour behind schedule given a glitch when we stopped for lunch. We should have been at base camp by that time, with an almost non-existent escape route. Still kinda gives me the heebie-jeebies to think about.

The rest of the story is not quite as exciting, we finally reached a good distance, night was falling, and we somehow found a decent place to set up camp in the middle of a mountain covered with thick jungle where there really shouldn't be much clear, flat ground. But there it was, and there we stayed for the night. No volcanic fireworks show from this camp, but I think we'd just had plenty of excitement to make up for it and didn't mind a bit.

I like to think a little life-threatening experience every once in awhile builds character. At least that's my best attempt to frame this into a "teachable moment" for the kids. Right.

Some less-eventful parts of the trek...

And on a completely different note, photos from Semana Santa...

Liquid Hot Magma and Mayan Shaman

We attempted to summit Volcan Pacaya last week, but the volcano had other plans. The usually mildly active volcano has been making up for lost time over the past few months and we had a pretty gnarly up-close-and-personal encounter with the angry beast.

This being Guatemala, when you hear about an erupting volcano, you go towards it instead of away from it, and no one will try to stop you. The landscape surrounding the cone of the volcano, which you can usually climb to the top of and look over into the crater, was completely changed from when I was last here two years ago. We got as close as we could to the top, but encountered a few live rivers of lava meandering down the cone that put a stop to our progress. I got about 10 meters from one of the rivers before having to turn back for fear that the soles of my shoes would melt right off my feet. Check out the video, kind of trippy. (Kids, do not try this at home...oh go ahead, just make sure your parents aren't looking.)

A sadistic highlight would have to be when Johnny was hot-shoting it and getting a little too close to the approaching river of lava, not noticing the glowing lava just underneath some of the recently cooled stuff, tripped, and literally burned his foot on molten hot lava. Hurt like hell, but for crying out loud, how many people can claim they burned themselves on liquid hot magma? Johnny agrees, it was well worth the pain for story rights.

We passed through my old home turf of Antigua for a few days last week, which is always fun. Semana Santa (Holy Week/Easter) is upon us and we were lucky to be in one of the world's biggest hot spots for part of the holiday.

You can find these alfombras (carpets) all over the streets of Antigua during Semana Santa. They're hand-made of all-natural materials, are veritable works of art, and only exist for a few hours before being trampled by the Semana Santa processions as they go by.

My Mayan scholar friend Ed arranged for us to have a private ceremony with a Mayan shaman while we were there. We burned incense and candles and sent prayers to Maximon, a Mayan saint who is memorialized as a wooden box draped in a robe and wearing a Stetson hat. He particularly enjoys his rum and cigarettes, you therefore pay homage to him by gifting aforementioned products...a highly suspect practice designed to feed someone else's bad habits, you might be thinking? Hey, you gotta have an open mind... :)


One of the highlights of being back in Antigua was getting to visit my friends, The Dubons. Some of you may remember hearing about this extraordinary family from when I worked as a computer teacher in Antigua in 2003 and got to work with their kids and became close with the whole family. They're part of an experimental project by an NGO, a very at-risk family that was pulled out of one of the poorest areas in Guatemala City called the dump (literally a dump where people live and make their livelihood off of forging through the trash for items of value). They are getting a leg up to attempt to start a new life, they live in a decent place, the kids are getting a good education, the single mother of five, Miriam, now has a sustainable career as a nurse. All of the kids now speak pretty good English and have a chance at sustaining a decent quality of life on their own in the future. Yonatan (my favorite :), who I met when he was just a boy of 13 is now a man of 17, is as tall as me, and has a deep voice and a girlfriend, so strange for me. He's working as a waiter at one of the best hotels in Guatemala City, which is a big deal. He actually waited on the King and Queen of Spain who were in town last week, so he's officially met more famous people than I have.

Erik's abrazo de oso (bear hug)

We're now in Xela doing another couple of weeks of Spanish school. The whole town has virtually shut down for Semana Santa and the streets are alive with Catholic tradition...incense, bobbling Jesus statues on procession floats followed by somber band music that sometimes makes me want to slit my wrists. Look for pix next time.

Jessica put my hair in pigtails yesterday. Perhaps "nubs" would be a more accurate term. It's my latest attempt to stave off the mullet that is quickly becoming my hairdo. I did just get mistaken for being one of the high school students by someone, that was great fun.

Armen, Johnny, Jessica, and Amanda's future album cover