I had to go to the school yesterday to sit in on class before training next week. i got sidetracked talking to one of the employees here at the hostel so decided to take a cab to save time and guarantee my arrival. Walking down the street, i hail the first cab i find and give him the directions and landmarks necessary for the school. after a little while, he asks me where i learned to speak spanish and then begins speaking to me in english. I reply that i really dont know how to speak spanish and everything i know comes from high school years ago.
An awkward silence assumes the cab so i then ask him where he learned to speak english. he looks at me very seriously and say, "I really shouldnt be telling you this, so you will have to keep a secret. I used to work for air force one."
I quickly smirk and then cover it up by wiping my nose. "really?" I question, "what did you do for air force one?"
Without looking back at me and keeping his eyes firmly fixed on the road, the slender built middle aged cabby replies, "I was the number one security for the president of the united states."
At this point my smirk is unconcealable and i am wearing it loudly and proudly on my face. I give him a few "wows" and "thats a pretty cool dudes" before i sink back into my chair i then proceeded to ask him once more where he learned to speak english and was answered with the same bewildering story. He then asked him if i believed him which i promptly replied no. "no, im sorry, i really dont believe you." when asked for reasoning, i told him, "first of all, your english is good, but its really not THAT good and secondly, i dont know if you have seen the bodyguards that work for the president, but theyre pretty big guys and youre pretty thin."
He laughs and then shrugs off my rebuttal and lets the silence resume. I then go foreward and ask, "which president did you work for?"
He looks up to the corner of the car and then replies, "kennedy" and brings his attention straight back to the road. he was also going an astonishingly slow speed the whole ride and consequently running up my tab.
"oh you worked for kennedy?" i repeat, thinking then you must have just done a stand up job on that one, but keep those thoughts to myself. I then ask, "do you guys still keep in contact?"
this time he diverts his attention from the road looks me square in the eyes to answer a very confident, "yes. I do."
at this point i burst into laughter and i think he even cracked a smile out of mild confusion due my amusement. Unfortunately, before i could break the heartwrenching news to him, we arrived at the school and i had to leave. All in all, it was probalby one of the better cab rides i have had to date in costa rica... even if was a little more pricey but hey, he put on a show.
Friday, January 8, 2010
Tuesday, January 5, 2010
2010
Here at galileo, we had a masquerade ball for new years. it got a little crazy and was a fantastic way to bring in 2010 so here are some photos from the affair. I also now for the record do work here and tend bar at night. its a lot easier when you are working primarily in beer and with a selection of about three crappy liquors. Here goes nothing...
These are the people i am now working with. Its a little frightening.
Diego, new friend to the hostel, but wouldnt dress up
Where did that hat come from? and that tie?
These are the people i am now working with. Its a little frightening.
Diego, new friend to the hostel, but wouldnt dress up
Where did that hat come from? and that tie?
Busking for Bums
My last night in the hotel, I searched online for a hostel that i had spent the previous day looking for. With address in hand, i found it no problem and decided to stay there the next night because although i was going to meet my friend, I still had to spend one more night in Guatemala city. This place was called Pension Meza and was actually an old haunt of the famed Che Guevara. Decked out with age old red and orange tile floors and murals covering many of the walls, Pension Meza looked and felt like the complete antithesis of what Guatemala city was supposed to be.
The next morning i carted my backpack and guitar the ten blocks or so to my new habitation. I promptly got a bed, set down my backpack, picked up my guitar and started to head out. after the ordeal with thinking i lost my backpack, i decided to never again leave my guitar unattended (however, this resolution didnt last too long). On my way out, i passed by a room with some flamenco coming from it. i peered my head in the door and saw a blond dreadlocked man strumming and singing with one of the most raspy voices i have ever heard. we made eye contact and through a series of hand motions decided that tonight when i return, we would jam. after that I was out the door and back into the mayhem of guatemala city. Pushing my way through the droves of people eyeing me up and down from my dirty feet to bearded face and begging me for every last cent, i finally hopped on a series of chicken busses that took me to a place called san jose pinula where i was to meet my friend.
Before I go on, I want to say how suprised, delighted and amazed I am to have come into contact with so many great people during my time in the czech republic. This group of people have over the past two years managed to stay in contact and meet up with eachother all over the world while seemingly still carrying the lust for adventure that we all had when in prague. Today i was about to meet up with yet another friend i made during my time there who i had not seen since leaving europe two years ago. we both happened to be in the same area (roughly) and she had some time off to travel, so with a little bit of initiative, we were reunited.
The day was spent catching up over coffee and getting a small tour of where she had been for the past few months. Anne was volunteering at an orphanage and happened to leave a few articles of clothing there, so she took me back and gave me the grand tour. All in all it seemed like she had made a very dramatic and positive impact on the place and would clearly be missed.
Shortly before the sun went down, we said our goodbyes and planned to meet up in antigua the next day. I hopped on another chicken bus to take me back into guatemala city, or guate as the call it and then caught a cab to get me the rest of the way home.
I was planning on heading to bed early because i knew it would be no easy task to get to antigua, but i heard the dredlocked guy playing again in his room. I stuck my head in and he motioned for me to get my guitar and come back. After that, we shook hands and introduced ourselves. his name was mateo and he was from france, but had been living in guate for a number of years. We really didnt have too much to say to eachother due to a little language barrier so we just got down to playing. we jammed for a good few hours and eventually got a tico guy who staying there and a guatemalan girl banging on pots, pans and bottles for percussion. after a good hearty dose of playing, we all said our goodnights and retired for the evening.
The next morning I underwent a series of comical events while carting my backpack and guitar throughout town following direction after direction given to me by the locals to the bus station. I then boarded yet another chicken bus and was on my way to antigua, the former capitol of all of central america.
Before i go on, i think i need to answer a question. what is a chicken bus? well, a chicken bus is basically a pimped out school bus with crazy colors, drawings, bling bling, and jesus stickers. I believe that the busses a privately run and it seems that the owners take great pride in making thier bus as flashy and fly as possible. There is also a rule for the chicken bus and that rule is "the bus is never full." There is always... always, room for one more person. On my way to antigua, we crammed as many people as physically possible into the bus to the point where youve got people sitting on your lap, the aisles were flooded and the entire bus gains a thick and pungent odor that reeks of perfume, working man, and stinky baby. If you google chicken bus, the images there will paint a decent picture.
I got off of the bus in antigua, the locally proclaimed "most beautiful city in the world" and headed to the central park where i was to meet up with anne. We had arranged to meet up at a certain building in the center at 1230 and then i was to check back each half hour if she hadnt shown. My day was lost waiting for this girl.
Around four in the afternoon, I was waiting in the meeting place and there was a ranchero band down the hall waiting to play in the center. A woman had come up to them and asked to use one of their guitars to play and sing a song. I heard her voice carrying down the hallway and walked over to get a better listen. After she played a song or two, she pointed to my guitar and said, "you play." without hesitation, i pulled out my little geetar and played the only song in spanish that i know. we shared light conversation in two languages but every few minutes she would look at me and go, "again" and this went on for four or five more songs. On the last two songs, the group of people she had been waiting for finally arrived and before i knew it, there about ten to twelve guatemalans in high spirits dancing, clapping, and singing the words to the beatles tunes i was playing. it was quite a happening and they were turning heads from all around our part of the central park. afterwards, they all gave me hugs, kisses, and handshakes and were off to their next destination.
5:00 rolls around and anne still hasnt arrived. A few trips to the internet cafe, a few cups of coffee, and multiple circles around the center with backpack and guitar in tow were useless. I began to wonder if they were just held up in traffic or what, so I finally went on a hotel hunt to find the cheapest room available. after arguing for a few minutes with a stiff businessman of about 10 years old, we finally came to a consensus on a fair price for a room. with that squared away and finally not needing to haul my backpack everywhere, i set back out for the central park and on my way, was confronted/befriended by a local drunk. He was pressuring me for money at which i refused to give the man and offered to play him a song instead. He asked me if the song was worth more than two quetzales and i told him it was good for his heart. After playing a tune, this business minded guatemalan decided he was going to busk me in the park and collect all the earnings. I really had nothing better to do and i figured if anne did come by, she might hear me playing, so i went along with it. sure enough, about fifteen minutes later, she appears out of the masses of people. It turned out that she had thought we were meeting in a different section of town so there we both sat for hours on end waiting for the other to show up. Together at last, we booked it back to the hotel, had a drink or two and then crashed for the night before we were to head to lago atitlan in the morning. this is truly where the adventure begins.
The next morning i carted my backpack and guitar the ten blocks or so to my new habitation. I promptly got a bed, set down my backpack, picked up my guitar and started to head out. after the ordeal with thinking i lost my backpack, i decided to never again leave my guitar unattended (however, this resolution didnt last too long). On my way out, i passed by a room with some flamenco coming from it. i peered my head in the door and saw a blond dreadlocked man strumming and singing with one of the most raspy voices i have ever heard. we made eye contact and through a series of hand motions decided that tonight when i return, we would jam. after that I was out the door and back into the mayhem of guatemala city. Pushing my way through the droves of people eyeing me up and down from my dirty feet to bearded face and begging me for every last cent, i finally hopped on a series of chicken busses that took me to a place called san jose pinula where i was to meet my friend.
Before I go on, I want to say how suprised, delighted and amazed I am to have come into contact with so many great people during my time in the czech republic. This group of people have over the past two years managed to stay in contact and meet up with eachother all over the world while seemingly still carrying the lust for adventure that we all had when in prague. Today i was about to meet up with yet another friend i made during my time there who i had not seen since leaving europe two years ago. we both happened to be in the same area (roughly) and she had some time off to travel, so with a little bit of initiative, we were reunited.
The day was spent catching up over coffee and getting a small tour of where she had been for the past few months. Anne was volunteering at an orphanage and happened to leave a few articles of clothing there, so she took me back and gave me the grand tour. All in all it seemed like she had made a very dramatic and positive impact on the place and would clearly be missed.
Shortly before the sun went down, we said our goodbyes and planned to meet up in antigua the next day. I hopped on another chicken bus to take me back into guatemala city, or guate as the call it and then caught a cab to get me the rest of the way home.
I was planning on heading to bed early because i knew it would be no easy task to get to antigua, but i heard the dredlocked guy playing again in his room. I stuck my head in and he motioned for me to get my guitar and come back. After that, we shook hands and introduced ourselves. his name was mateo and he was from france, but had been living in guate for a number of years. We really didnt have too much to say to eachother due to a little language barrier so we just got down to playing. we jammed for a good few hours and eventually got a tico guy who staying there and a guatemalan girl banging on pots, pans and bottles for percussion. after a good hearty dose of playing, we all said our goodnights and retired for the evening.
The next morning I underwent a series of comical events while carting my backpack and guitar throughout town following direction after direction given to me by the locals to the bus station. I then boarded yet another chicken bus and was on my way to antigua, the former capitol of all of central america.
Before i go on, i think i need to answer a question. what is a chicken bus? well, a chicken bus is basically a pimped out school bus with crazy colors, drawings, bling bling, and jesus stickers. I believe that the busses a privately run and it seems that the owners take great pride in making thier bus as flashy and fly as possible. There is also a rule for the chicken bus and that rule is "the bus is never full." There is always... always, room for one more person. On my way to antigua, we crammed as many people as physically possible into the bus to the point where youve got people sitting on your lap, the aisles were flooded and the entire bus gains a thick and pungent odor that reeks of perfume, working man, and stinky baby. If you google chicken bus, the images there will paint a decent picture.
I got off of the bus in antigua, the locally proclaimed "most beautiful city in the world" and headed to the central park where i was to meet up with anne. We had arranged to meet up at a certain building in the center at 1230 and then i was to check back each half hour if she hadnt shown. My day was lost waiting for this girl.
Around four in the afternoon, I was waiting in the meeting place and there was a ranchero band down the hall waiting to play in the center. A woman had come up to them and asked to use one of their guitars to play and sing a song. I heard her voice carrying down the hallway and walked over to get a better listen. After she played a song or two, she pointed to my guitar and said, "you play." without hesitation, i pulled out my little geetar and played the only song in spanish that i know. we shared light conversation in two languages but every few minutes she would look at me and go, "again" and this went on for four or five more songs. On the last two songs, the group of people she had been waiting for finally arrived and before i knew it, there about ten to twelve guatemalans in high spirits dancing, clapping, and singing the words to the beatles tunes i was playing. it was quite a happening and they were turning heads from all around our part of the central park. afterwards, they all gave me hugs, kisses, and handshakes and were off to their next destination.
5:00 rolls around and anne still hasnt arrived. A few trips to the internet cafe, a few cups of coffee, and multiple circles around the center with backpack and guitar in tow were useless. I began to wonder if they were just held up in traffic or what, so I finally went on a hotel hunt to find the cheapest room available. after arguing for a few minutes with a stiff businessman of about 10 years old, we finally came to a consensus on a fair price for a room. with that squared away and finally not needing to haul my backpack everywhere, i set back out for the central park and on my way, was confronted/befriended by a local drunk. He was pressuring me for money at which i refused to give the man and offered to play him a song instead. He asked me if the song was worth more than two quetzales and i told him it was good for his heart. After playing a tune, this business minded guatemalan decided he was going to busk me in the park and collect all the earnings. I really had nothing better to do and i figured if anne did come by, she might hear me playing, so i went along with it. sure enough, about fifteen minutes later, she appears out of the masses of people. It turned out that she had thought we were meeting in a different section of town so there we both sat for hours on end waiting for the other to show up. Together at last, we booked it back to the hotel, had a drink or two and then crashed for the night before we were to head to lago atitlan in the morning. this is truly where the adventure begins.
Saturday, December 26, 2009
A Galileo Christmas
Ahoy,
Right now i dont have the time or energy to begin the next part of my saga, but i thought id share my holiday experience. A day or two after my last post, the hostel i was staying at decided to jack up their rates for the holidays and didnt grandfather in existing guests. on top of that, they turned out to be fairly strict about check in and check out policies among other things. with my rate deadline coming up and fifteen minutes before i had to let them know if i was staying another night, i made a split second decision to ditch san juan and their tyrannical ways and head back to san jose. i quickly packed my things and headed out with a couple i had met that were also leaving. 11 horrific hours of border cross, taxi, bus and hoofing it later, i arrived at the very familiar hostel galileo where i was greeted with excitement, hugs, and a little dog. It was actually a great feeling to be back and it seemed like my homecomming was equally anticipated. a few days later it was xmas. xmas eve was spent with the hostel owners, workers, and a few guests consuming many appetizer dishes and drinking wine (a treat here) and a bottle of rum that somebody gave us which seems to always make me very sleepy.
the next morning was xmas morning. the hostel put together little gifts for all of its guests which was really nice. once everybody was awake, we hit the tree with yuletide joy and opened gifts. the rest of the day was spent perusing the cable for festive movies but no luck was had. a relaxing day all together. following this are some xmas pics along with a few santa gems to tide you over until more travel adventure is written about. happy holidays!
Right now i dont have the time or energy to begin the next part of my saga, but i thought id share my holiday experience. A day or two after my last post, the hostel i was staying at decided to jack up their rates for the holidays and didnt grandfather in existing guests. on top of that, they turned out to be fairly strict about check in and check out policies among other things. with my rate deadline coming up and fifteen minutes before i had to let them know if i was staying another night, i made a split second decision to ditch san juan and their tyrannical ways and head back to san jose. i quickly packed my things and headed out with a couple i had met that were also leaving. 11 horrific hours of border cross, taxi, bus and hoofing it later, i arrived at the very familiar hostel galileo where i was greeted with excitement, hugs, and a little dog. It was actually a great feeling to be back and it seemed like my homecomming was equally anticipated. a few days later it was xmas. xmas eve was spent with the hostel owners, workers, and a few guests consuming many appetizer dishes and drinking wine (a treat here) and a bottle of rum that somebody gave us which seems to always make me very sleepy.
the next morning was xmas morning. the hostel put together little gifts for all of its guests which was really nice. once everybody was awake, we hit the tree with yuletide joy and opened gifts. the rest of the day was spent perusing the cable for festive movies but no luck was had. a relaxing day all together. following this are some xmas pics along with a few santa gems to tide you over until more travel adventure is written about. happy holidays!
Monday, December 21, 2009
Life On A Bus
This morning i awoke at the ripe hour of 530 to hop into a range rover stuffed with nine other liquor stinking surf rats to head to a place called playa yankee. For the past few days, i have found myself in san juan del sur, nicaragua, a supposed surf community but without the surf. to surf, you have to hit a shuttle about a half hour away to where there is actually a break. this morning a friend of mine from santa and the brother of my musical love interest who now works at the hostel of which i am staying, organized a trip to the heavily secluded and rarely surfed playa yankee. It was a beautiful beach with misty rocks on each side of our break, and some picturesque waves. the craziest part though was that the ten of us had the place to ourselves. Because of a mishap I had with a board the other day, i had rented an 8 foot sail boat, the largest i have ridden to date, but amazingly enough was able to surf pretty well on the thing. Yes, i am seriously surfing now. dropping in, riding... still falling, but really riding as well. we surfed for a good four hours in utter bliss before the bus had to take us back. We all ended up taking our lumps as well, because you cant just get a few good rides for free, but with some luck, we will be back at the crack of dawn tomorrow.
because of this adventure this morning, i have been in a lazy fog ever since so i am going to attempt to begin the trails and tribulations of my journey into guatemala. It all started on december second where i found myself along with about eight other people waiting at the bus stop in front of the backpackers hostel in santa teresa. seven of us spent our last night enjoying the good company with beverages and dancing. we were all in various different stages of fatigue and hangover. the eighth person and clearly the smartest, spent his night taking it easy at the hostel and packing himself a breakfast of hearty sandwiches for the journey ahead. needless to say he was chipper and ready to go in the morning. about forty-five minutes late, as we were about to abandon hope, we hopped onto the first bus that would take us to paquera the port city where we take a ferry to another port city called puntarenas. I have definitely experienced more pleasant things than an hour and a half ferry ride at eight in the morning with a light hangover. i spent my time at the bow (i think) of the ship talking to a french canadian trucker turned vagabond and letting the salty breeze keep the thoughts of seasickness out of my head. others were not so lucky. one of my crew, omer, an israeli surfer seemed to be completely down for the count while others were spotted puking into little sandwich bags while keeping blue in the face. Rob the sandwich man was perfectly content with his breakfast and ken, one of the hungover 7 decided to prolong his agony and crack a few more beers on the trip. we got to puntarenas and quickly lost a percentage of our crew for they were going elsewhere.
four of us remained and i quickly flagged down a cab to take us to a bus station. this cabby ended up speaking perfectly fluent english, and he told me he spent some time as a driver in not new jersey, but new joisey. no joke. He also said he could get me to managua and my friends to san juan del sur (where i am now) by that night. we crammed four guys, four backpacks, a bodyboard, a surfboard, and a guitar into the little sedan and we were off. He immediately whipped out his cell phone and started making some calls. he told us he was going to drop us off at the ¨cruz¨and there a guy would be waiting with a ticket for me to get to managua. also at this same spot, the bus for my friends to get to san juan would also swing through. he held up his end of the bargain and sure enough, i bought a ticket from a strange man and we all sat and waited for our respective buses.
For all that know me and know me well... well not even that well. I am more often than not wearing a shirt that was given to me for donating blood. the bloodsource furnished my clothing throughout college and beyond. as the beginning of this little anecdote, today was no different. I dawned my favorite, and by this time lightly stinky ¨life is unpredictable, give blood¨t shirt provided by the blood source.Now, this ¨cruz¨was in the middle of nowhere and there was a little store there with snacks and some more than subject looking sandwiches. Behind the counter was a surly tico about middle aged and missing a number of teeth. tightly pressed against his body was a bloodsource ¨trust me, i´m a blood donor¨t shirt. absolutely dumbfounded, i showed him mine and asked him where he got it. to my suprise, he said california. i still cant help but wonder if he actually dontated blood.
Moving on, about ten minutes later, my bus arrives and my ticket guy starts yelling at me to get on. quickly i throw my backpack in the compartment below and drag my guitar onto the bus. It was full of nicaraguans and i was hard pressed to find an open seat. there! about three quarters back in the bus, there was an open window seat covered with backpacks and sweatshirts. I asked the guy next to it if it was available and he started clearing it off for me. a few hours later, we hit the costa rica border. we got off, showed our passports, got a quick stamp and were back on the bus. we drove two hundred feet further to the nicaraguan border and got off once again. i had a funny feeling about this but grabbed my guitar and followed the masses. also in that two hundred foot drive, a currency exchange guy came on board and exchanged some of my costa rican colones for nicaraguan cordoba. im pretty sure i was grossly ripped off.
We get off the bus and get in a line snaking back and forth in the sweltering heat. i happened to fall in line right next to my seatmate and started asking him questions about what we were doing. that was my first introduction with nicaraguan spanish. I couldnt understand a word. well, i could understand one word, pasaporte, but everything else was a mush. to my credit, this guy spoke very soft and fast.
The line ceased to move. i wondered what was going on many times and as the beads of sweat rolled down my forehead, the mayhem and traffic around the line only grew as well. I pulled two apples from my guitar case and offered one to my seatmate. He accepted it and I was relieved to have a friend in the psychological mess that i was about to endure. while we were waiting, i watched our bus, with my backpack move ahead of us a little ways. once again i nagged my new friend making sure we were in the right line and that the bus would wait for us. he gently and subtly nodded and told me we were in the right place. lightly further in line, i watched our bus drive off around a corner out of my sight. at this point i looked at all the people around me and didnt recognize anybody from the bus outside of my new friend. i started to panic a little thinking my backpack and bus left me in this pit of purgatory between two countries. clutching my guitar, i probed my friend again and received the same effortless and tiresome answer. frankly, i didnt believe him one bit. I resigned myself to the fact that my backpack was gone and my only traveling possessions left were my guitar and passport. after about a minute of pondering this, i realized that maybe it wasnt so bad. i would have freaked out if i had my backpack without the guitar, but having the guitar and no backpack was quite allright.
finally, we got to the immigration office, got passports stamped once again and i walked back outside to begin my next logical step. find the bus. there was a bus behind the line that looked just like ours, but i was sure it was from another group. a moment later, my seatmate walked out, flagged me down and brought me to that bus. for some reason, they did a full circle around the office and stopped behind the actual border line. why? ill never know, but i´m damn glad i gave that guy an apple and started a friendship.
we then drove another two hundred feet and they made us all get out again. I grabbed my guitar and went outside. they were taking all the luggage out of the storage underneath the bus. i grabbed my luggage and followed the masses to get in line. I hadnt noticed it before, but there was one other gringo on the bus and i happened to get in line right in front of him. His name was todd, he was a forty-five year old guy from mississippi worriedly sucking down a cigarette and looking cautiously from left to right. ill be honest, i was about as worried at this point as he was. there were just too many stops and checks for anything to make sense. we introduced ourselves and shared our utter confusion about the situation. this stop was strictly to open up and look inside your luggage to make sure you werent trafficking any contraband between countries. about a half hour later, we were back on the bus and headed towards managua.
three hours later, we arrived, at about seven at night in a grimy and dimly lit bus station in yet another dangerous capitol. Todd didnt speak any spanish so we ended up setting out together to find a reasonably priced hotel. By this time, my travel guide had also disappeared so we picked a place out of his and told the cabby to take us there. the cabby had other plans. he took us to his buddies hotel of which he kept saying it was the same place. we were a little put off so we told him we wanted to look at a room. they brought us into a dorm room and as soon as the lights came on, I saw a cockroach scuttle across the bed. Since i have been here, i have been in close quarters with many bucks, roaches included, but the one place that is absolutely off limits is the place where i lay my body down to rest. thoroughly disgusted i changed my list of demands when dealing with the cabby. now, along with close to the bus station and cheap, i emphasized clean as well. after that, he rounded the corner and took us to the place where we had initially asked him to take us. we gave the rooms a quick lookdown and since they were clean and the bus station we needed for the next morning was a block away, we obliged and settled down for the night.
after such a day, the two of us also braved the dimly lit streets for about two blocks to grab a few beers to cut the tension of the day. after that, we said our goodnights and hit the hay.
The next morning we awoke by 415 to go grab a ticket for our bus to el salvador, our next destination. I bought the ticket with the last of my nicaraguan cordoba and figured i would get money from an atm when we stopped next. this is where many of my troubles started. we stopped in another town in nicaragua for lunch and my atm refused to work. we stopped at the boarder from nicaragua to honduras and my atm refused to work. this was a problem because there was a departure and entrance tax for the two countries. A very nice attendant in the bus who actually gave me a pillow to use earlier in the ride told me he would cover me and then take me to an atm when we stopped in el salvador for the night.
The hours breezed by on the air conditioned ticabus. beautiful countryside stretched for miles upon miles and illuminated my daydreams. there were also a few movies played and because ticabus is more of a tourist bus, the movies were in english, or with english subtitles. nonetheless, they were awful films. i think the proposal was one of them and if you havent seen it, you can gladly go about your life knowing you missed a blundering piece of hollywood baloney.
around five or six that night, we arrived in san salvador, the capitol of el salvador. we got rooms at the bus station and then the bus attendant took todd and i to find the atm. he took us to a gas station which had two atms and once again, neither of them worked. fortunately, this is where todd stepped in to become my sugar daddy. he fronted me a few bucks to pay the bus attendant, pay my hotel fee for the night, and grab a small dinner from the gas station. we also grabbed a few of our now traditional end of the bus day beers to wind down before going to sleep.
The next day, we wake up at 5 in the morning again to get our tickets to guatemala. the bus was unfortunately full and we had to wait untill 1230 for the next bus to leave. in that time, we got some coffee, a light breakfast and shot the shit until our next bus stint. Oh yeah, once again, my new sugardaddy paid my way and bought my bus ticket. my bill was stacking up. for the record, i wasnt exactly useless during these times. My little bit of spanish was perfected pretty quickly when it came to matters of money, not getting ripped off by cabbies, finding reasonable hotels, and getting us on and off each bus every day. Id like to say i was pulling my weight.
another six or seven hours of bus time passed and by new i was impervious to boredom and insanity. that or i was so bored that i had reached insanity and just didnt know it. we got off at what was my final stop in guatemala city. from what i have read, you dont go out in guatemala city at night. no way, you will get mugged, injured, killed, blah blah blah. i took it seriously. we hit a cab across town to another place we had read about in the travel book. booked ourselves a room and hit the downstairs restaurant for a number of celebratory drinks. the worst of the travel was over, but I still needed to find a place where my atm card would work. on the homefront, my parents assured me that they spoke with the banks and my card was NOT frozen.
The next morning we went on a hunt. we hit three different atms and on the third try, it worked. I once again had cash in my pocket and it put an end to a couple day long scare. I payed todd back and then set out to the bus station to get him squared away with his bus ticket to flores so he could then jump over to belize. Everything passed simply and quickly in the daylight. before i knew it, we were saying our goodbyes. each was very thankful for the other during this three day trek and were glad that everything turned out just fine. after Todd was gone, I chilled out in my hotel for the rest of the day before meeting up with my friend anne the next morning. Little did i know that this was only the beginning of being penniless in a foreign country.
because of this adventure this morning, i have been in a lazy fog ever since so i am going to attempt to begin the trails and tribulations of my journey into guatemala. It all started on december second where i found myself along with about eight other people waiting at the bus stop in front of the backpackers hostel in santa teresa. seven of us spent our last night enjoying the good company with beverages and dancing. we were all in various different stages of fatigue and hangover. the eighth person and clearly the smartest, spent his night taking it easy at the hostel and packing himself a breakfast of hearty sandwiches for the journey ahead. needless to say he was chipper and ready to go in the morning. about forty-five minutes late, as we were about to abandon hope, we hopped onto the first bus that would take us to paquera the port city where we take a ferry to another port city called puntarenas. I have definitely experienced more pleasant things than an hour and a half ferry ride at eight in the morning with a light hangover. i spent my time at the bow (i think) of the ship talking to a french canadian trucker turned vagabond and letting the salty breeze keep the thoughts of seasickness out of my head. others were not so lucky. one of my crew, omer, an israeli surfer seemed to be completely down for the count while others were spotted puking into little sandwich bags while keeping blue in the face. Rob the sandwich man was perfectly content with his breakfast and ken, one of the hungover 7 decided to prolong his agony and crack a few more beers on the trip. we got to puntarenas and quickly lost a percentage of our crew for they were going elsewhere.
four of us remained and i quickly flagged down a cab to take us to a bus station. this cabby ended up speaking perfectly fluent english, and he told me he spent some time as a driver in not new jersey, but new joisey. no joke. He also said he could get me to managua and my friends to san juan del sur (where i am now) by that night. we crammed four guys, four backpacks, a bodyboard, a surfboard, and a guitar into the little sedan and we were off. He immediately whipped out his cell phone and started making some calls. he told us he was going to drop us off at the ¨cruz¨and there a guy would be waiting with a ticket for me to get to managua. also at this same spot, the bus for my friends to get to san juan would also swing through. he held up his end of the bargain and sure enough, i bought a ticket from a strange man and we all sat and waited for our respective buses.
For all that know me and know me well... well not even that well. I am more often than not wearing a shirt that was given to me for donating blood. the bloodsource furnished my clothing throughout college and beyond. as the beginning of this little anecdote, today was no different. I dawned my favorite, and by this time lightly stinky ¨life is unpredictable, give blood¨t shirt provided by the blood source.Now, this ¨cruz¨was in the middle of nowhere and there was a little store there with snacks and some more than subject looking sandwiches. Behind the counter was a surly tico about middle aged and missing a number of teeth. tightly pressed against his body was a bloodsource ¨trust me, i´m a blood donor¨t shirt. absolutely dumbfounded, i showed him mine and asked him where he got it. to my suprise, he said california. i still cant help but wonder if he actually dontated blood.
Moving on, about ten minutes later, my bus arrives and my ticket guy starts yelling at me to get on. quickly i throw my backpack in the compartment below and drag my guitar onto the bus. It was full of nicaraguans and i was hard pressed to find an open seat. there! about three quarters back in the bus, there was an open window seat covered with backpacks and sweatshirts. I asked the guy next to it if it was available and he started clearing it off for me. a few hours later, we hit the costa rica border. we got off, showed our passports, got a quick stamp and were back on the bus. we drove two hundred feet further to the nicaraguan border and got off once again. i had a funny feeling about this but grabbed my guitar and followed the masses. also in that two hundred foot drive, a currency exchange guy came on board and exchanged some of my costa rican colones for nicaraguan cordoba. im pretty sure i was grossly ripped off.
We get off the bus and get in a line snaking back and forth in the sweltering heat. i happened to fall in line right next to my seatmate and started asking him questions about what we were doing. that was my first introduction with nicaraguan spanish. I couldnt understand a word. well, i could understand one word, pasaporte, but everything else was a mush. to my credit, this guy spoke very soft and fast.
The line ceased to move. i wondered what was going on many times and as the beads of sweat rolled down my forehead, the mayhem and traffic around the line only grew as well. I pulled two apples from my guitar case and offered one to my seatmate. He accepted it and I was relieved to have a friend in the psychological mess that i was about to endure. while we were waiting, i watched our bus, with my backpack move ahead of us a little ways. once again i nagged my new friend making sure we were in the right line and that the bus would wait for us. he gently and subtly nodded and told me we were in the right place. lightly further in line, i watched our bus drive off around a corner out of my sight. at this point i looked at all the people around me and didnt recognize anybody from the bus outside of my new friend. i started to panic a little thinking my backpack and bus left me in this pit of purgatory between two countries. clutching my guitar, i probed my friend again and received the same effortless and tiresome answer. frankly, i didnt believe him one bit. I resigned myself to the fact that my backpack was gone and my only traveling possessions left were my guitar and passport. after about a minute of pondering this, i realized that maybe it wasnt so bad. i would have freaked out if i had my backpack without the guitar, but having the guitar and no backpack was quite allright.
finally, we got to the immigration office, got passports stamped once again and i walked back outside to begin my next logical step. find the bus. there was a bus behind the line that looked just like ours, but i was sure it was from another group. a moment later, my seatmate walked out, flagged me down and brought me to that bus. for some reason, they did a full circle around the office and stopped behind the actual border line. why? ill never know, but i´m damn glad i gave that guy an apple and started a friendship.
we then drove another two hundred feet and they made us all get out again. I grabbed my guitar and went outside. they were taking all the luggage out of the storage underneath the bus. i grabbed my luggage and followed the masses to get in line. I hadnt noticed it before, but there was one other gringo on the bus and i happened to get in line right in front of him. His name was todd, he was a forty-five year old guy from mississippi worriedly sucking down a cigarette and looking cautiously from left to right. ill be honest, i was about as worried at this point as he was. there were just too many stops and checks for anything to make sense. we introduced ourselves and shared our utter confusion about the situation. this stop was strictly to open up and look inside your luggage to make sure you werent trafficking any contraband between countries. about a half hour later, we were back on the bus and headed towards managua.
three hours later, we arrived, at about seven at night in a grimy and dimly lit bus station in yet another dangerous capitol. Todd didnt speak any spanish so we ended up setting out together to find a reasonably priced hotel. By this time, my travel guide had also disappeared so we picked a place out of his and told the cabby to take us there. the cabby had other plans. he took us to his buddies hotel of which he kept saying it was the same place. we were a little put off so we told him we wanted to look at a room. they brought us into a dorm room and as soon as the lights came on, I saw a cockroach scuttle across the bed. Since i have been here, i have been in close quarters with many bucks, roaches included, but the one place that is absolutely off limits is the place where i lay my body down to rest. thoroughly disgusted i changed my list of demands when dealing with the cabby. now, along with close to the bus station and cheap, i emphasized clean as well. after that, he rounded the corner and took us to the place where we had initially asked him to take us. we gave the rooms a quick lookdown and since they were clean and the bus station we needed for the next morning was a block away, we obliged and settled down for the night.
after such a day, the two of us also braved the dimly lit streets for about two blocks to grab a few beers to cut the tension of the day. after that, we said our goodnights and hit the hay.
The next morning we awoke by 415 to go grab a ticket for our bus to el salvador, our next destination. I bought the ticket with the last of my nicaraguan cordoba and figured i would get money from an atm when we stopped next. this is where many of my troubles started. we stopped in another town in nicaragua for lunch and my atm refused to work. we stopped at the boarder from nicaragua to honduras and my atm refused to work. this was a problem because there was a departure and entrance tax for the two countries. A very nice attendant in the bus who actually gave me a pillow to use earlier in the ride told me he would cover me and then take me to an atm when we stopped in el salvador for the night.
The hours breezed by on the air conditioned ticabus. beautiful countryside stretched for miles upon miles and illuminated my daydreams. there were also a few movies played and because ticabus is more of a tourist bus, the movies were in english, or with english subtitles. nonetheless, they were awful films. i think the proposal was one of them and if you havent seen it, you can gladly go about your life knowing you missed a blundering piece of hollywood baloney.
around five or six that night, we arrived in san salvador, the capitol of el salvador. we got rooms at the bus station and then the bus attendant took todd and i to find the atm. he took us to a gas station which had two atms and once again, neither of them worked. fortunately, this is where todd stepped in to become my sugar daddy. he fronted me a few bucks to pay the bus attendant, pay my hotel fee for the night, and grab a small dinner from the gas station. we also grabbed a few of our now traditional end of the bus day beers to wind down before going to sleep.
The next day, we wake up at 5 in the morning again to get our tickets to guatemala. the bus was unfortunately full and we had to wait untill 1230 for the next bus to leave. in that time, we got some coffee, a light breakfast and shot the shit until our next bus stint. Oh yeah, once again, my new sugardaddy paid my way and bought my bus ticket. my bill was stacking up. for the record, i wasnt exactly useless during these times. My little bit of spanish was perfected pretty quickly when it came to matters of money, not getting ripped off by cabbies, finding reasonable hotels, and getting us on and off each bus every day. Id like to say i was pulling my weight.
another six or seven hours of bus time passed and by new i was impervious to boredom and insanity. that or i was so bored that i had reached insanity and just didnt know it. we got off at what was my final stop in guatemala city. from what i have read, you dont go out in guatemala city at night. no way, you will get mugged, injured, killed, blah blah blah. i took it seriously. we hit a cab across town to another place we had read about in the travel book. booked ourselves a room and hit the downstairs restaurant for a number of celebratory drinks. the worst of the travel was over, but I still needed to find a place where my atm card would work. on the homefront, my parents assured me that they spoke with the banks and my card was NOT frozen.
The next morning we went on a hunt. we hit three different atms and on the third try, it worked. I once again had cash in my pocket and it put an end to a couple day long scare. I payed todd back and then set out to the bus station to get him squared away with his bus ticket to flores so he could then jump over to belize. Everything passed simply and quickly in the daylight. before i knew it, we were saying our goodbyes. each was very thankful for the other during this three day trek and were glad that everything turned out just fine. after Todd was gone, I chilled out in my hotel for the rest of the day before meeting up with my friend anne the next morning. Little did i know that this was only the beginning of being penniless in a foreign country.
Tuesday, December 15, 2009
So It Goes
I know its been a while and since i am here by myself with nothing but time, i had planned on writing out in full detail the incredible adventure my friend and i had over the past few weeks. unfortunately for you, i ended up meeting some nicaraguan teenagers and spending the night walking around the city and talking with them. This saga will probably have to be compartmented and told over a series of posts. as soon as you think youve seen it all, something more incredible, rediculous, or both comes your way. example, i thought i had done a few pretty cool and maybe adventurous things until i met a thrill thirsty irishman who treked the amazon barefoot.
i´m just going to begin with the mild, but tiresome trip leaving guatemala and getting where i am today. Yesterday, I woke up early, said goodbye to my friend anne as she left for the US and wandered the smog laiden city of guatemala before boarding a bus to managua, nicaragua. the bus was to be an overnight bus and arrive the next morning. that would have been nice. we set sail around three in the afternoon and right off the bat i realized my chair didnt recline. not only did it not recline, but when it isnt reclined, there is virtually no leg space. my knees were squished like sardines against the seat in front of me. this feeling however has become commonplace as i have left the comforts of tourism for the nitty gritty of the chicken bus. more on that will be explained when telling the whole story. THis predicament however was a little bothersome because everybody else had working chairs and i knew the likelihood of sleep on an overnight trip would be nil if i couldnt recline. Anyways, we set sail and i hoped that there would be an open seat but my chances looked slim.
I also noticed once again with this new method of travel that i was the only gringo on the bus. the only difference here was that i didnt have anne with me. the funny part is that everybody i met remembered my name. Even the bus drivers i purchased the ticket from the day before remembered my name when i walked by the station hours before the bus was set to leave. The bus was packed full of nicaraguans, guatemalans, and an argentinian who were all very nice, helpful, and patient with my pidgin spanish.
i digress. about an hour or two after taking off, we hit our first boarder. they got us all out of the bus along with all of our luggage and lined us up in a row to be inspected. once the inspection process begins, it takes a matter of minutes, but we sat and cooked in the guatemalan heat for a good hour before they decided to inspect. after that, we had to get stamped out of the country by customs. post stamping, we pile back into the bus, drive thirty feet and do it all again at the el salvador boarder. i was sitting with a few new friends i had made and we were all in agreeance that the next two boarder crosses would be equally excruciating.
after the inspection, we crammed back into the bus and i was fortunate enough to find an open seat next to a larger nicaraguan man. The seat reclined and i thought there might be some hope to catch a wink of sleep. Unfortunately, this bus had television sets and they decided to play a movie at slightly outrageous volume. to make matters worse, the movie was that blacky wacky wayans brothers move white chicks... and it was in spanish overdub. it was awful... lightly traumatizing. after that, the hour was getting reasonably late and the drivers continued to blast music through the speakers. around the time sleep was finally starting to fill my eyes, BOOM! honduras border number 2. same process rinse and repeat only this time we got to add a little bit of exhaustion into the mix. I had to pay three dollars to get into honduras which put my funds down to 7 dollars for the remainder of my trip. I gave the rest of my american dollar stash to anne who needed it for the hefty exit fee for her flight. I had a few oranges and a bottle of water to get me through the trip.
After the luggage check on both sides of the boarder, i made my way into the bus and passed out. I woke up some hours later and realized that it was overly hot and that we had not moved at all. there we sat all night until the early morning when the sun rose. so much for an early morning arival with a country and a half to still travel. when we started going again, the blaring music kicked back in full force. despite my wildest efforts, i think i maged about an hour and a half of sleep the whole trip. it seemed like most of the passengers were also pretty bothered by the music. it was really unpleasant. some hours later, we hit the nicaraguan boarder and the tarif there took my last 7 dollars from me. Once again, i was entirely broke heading back to the country where my financial troubles began.
fortunately, we had a quick pitstop at a gas station and i quickly chanced the atm inside. without any hastle, it worked swimmingly and my poverty was no more. unfortunately there was not enough time to grab a bite to eat. with a belly literally rumbling on the bus for it had not eaten in over 24 hours, some of the passengers became bothered with its grumbling and gave me a few cookies that they had purchased earlier in the trip. it was very kind of them and very satisfying to put something in my aching organ.
the last few hours of the trip blew by in a daydream and before i knew it, i was in managua without a further destination than finding a computer with internet. I said goodbye to my travel companions and hopped into the disgusting city. instantly i realized that there was no internet anywhere close and the pushers were out in full force trying to sell youe verything fron knock off sunglasses to salty nicaraguan baked goods with honey on top. It took me a grand total of ten minutes to hop on another bus to granada. i lucked out in this chicken bus because i got the front seat and didnt have to deal with the droves of passengers compressed together in the back. you guys really cant even imagine what this looks like until you see it. the front however was roomy and cozy. forty minutes later, i was in the beautiful city of granada hunting down internet so i could get in contact with some friends in the country and find a hostel for the night. During the last few weeks, i lost my very handy central america guidebook and annes guatemala guidebook was stolen while we were sitting atop mayan ruins. more on that later, but for now i am without guidebook. once i found out where i needed to stay i put my pack back on, grabbed my guitar and started hoofing it in the mid day heat with shotty directions to find my new home. about a half hour later, i arrived safe and sound to a quaint little place called hostal mochilas. i think i am currently its only guest. with that obstacle tackled, i set out to find food and spent the rest of the day wandering the markets trying random street dish after random street dish. nutritional value is now officially a thing of the past. the new name of the game is sustenance. from there i ran into the two nica kids who i chased away the rest of the night with. tomorrow i head to san juan del sur to get in a few last jams with my musical love and to enjoy some more good surf. hopefully itll all go according to plan, but it really never does. as for now, i am in one piece and have food in my belly and a roof over my head. simple pleasures really.
i´m just going to begin with the mild, but tiresome trip leaving guatemala and getting where i am today. Yesterday, I woke up early, said goodbye to my friend anne as she left for the US and wandered the smog laiden city of guatemala before boarding a bus to managua, nicaragua. the bus was to be an overnight bus and arrive the next morning. that would have been nice. we set sail around three in the afternoon and right off the bat i realized my chair didnt recline. not only did it not recline, but when it isnt reclined, there is virtually no leg space. my knees were squished like sardines against the seat in front of me. this feeling however has become commonplace as i have left the comforts of tourism for the nitty gritty of the chicken bus. more on that will be explained when telling the whole story. THis predicament however was a little bothersome because everybody else had working chairs and i knew the likelihood of sleep on an overnight trip would be nil if i couldnt recline. Anyways, we set sail and i hoped that there would be an open seat but my chances looked slim.
I also noticed once again with this new method of travel that i was the only gringo on the bus. the only difference here was that i didnt have anne with me. the funny part is that everybody i met remembered my name. Even the bus drivers i purchased the ticket from the day before remembered my name when i walked by the station hours before the bus was set to leave. The bus was packed full of nicaraguans, guatemalans, and an argentinian who were all very nice, helpful, and patient with my pidgin spanish.
i digress. about an hour or two after taking off, we hit our first boarder. they got us all out of the bus along with all of our luggage and lined us up in a row to be inspected. once the inspection process begins, it takes a matter of minutes, but we sat and cooked in the guatemalan heat for a good hour before they decided to inspect. after that, we had to get stamped out of the country by customs. post stamping, we pile back into the bus, drive thirty feet and do it all again at the el salvador boarder. i was sitting with a few new friends i had made and we were all in agreeance that the next two boarder crosses would be equally excruciating.
after the inspection, we crammed back into the bus and i was fortunate enough to find an open seat next to a larger nicaraguan man. The seat reclined and i thought there might be some hope to catch a wink of sleep. Unfortunately, this bus had television sets and they decided to play a movie at slightly outrageous volume. to make matters worse, the movie was that blacky wacky wayans brothers move white chicks... and it was in spanish overdub. it was awful... lightly traumatizing. after that, the hour was getting reasonably late and the drivers continued to blast music through the speakers. around the time sleep was finally starting to fill my eyes, BOOM! honduras border number 2. same process rinse and repeat only this time we got to add a little bit of exhaustion into the mix. I had to pay three dollars to get into honduras which put my funds down to 7 dollars for the remainder of my trip. I gave the rest of my american dollar stash to anne who needed it for the hefty exit fee for her flight. I had a few oranges and a bottle of water to get me through the trip.
After the luggage check on both sides of the boarder, i made my way into the bus and passed out. I woke up some hours later and realized that it was overly hot and that we had not moved at all. there we sat all night until the early morning when the sun rose. so much for an early morning arival with a country and a half to still travel. when we started going again, the blaring music kicked back in full force. despite my wildest efforts, i think i maged about an hour and a half of sleep the whole trip. it seemed like most of the passengers were also pretty bothered by the music. it was really unpleasant. some hours later, we hit the nicaraguan boarder and the tarif there took my last 7 dollars from me. Once again, i was entirely broke heading back to the country where my financial troubles began.
fortunately, we had a quick pitstop at a gas station and i quickly chanced the atm inside. without any hastle, it worked swimmingly and my poverty was no more. unfortunately there was not enough time to grab a bite to eat. with a belly literally rumbling on the bus for it had not eaten in over 24 hours, some of the passengers became bothered with its grumbling and gave me a few cookies that they had purchased earlier in the trip. it was very kind of them and very satisfying to put something in my aching organ.
the last few hours of the trip blew by in a daydream and before i knew it, i was in managua without a further destination than finding a computer with internet. I said goodbye to my travel companions and hopped into the disgusting city. instantly i realized that there was no internet anywhere close and the pushers were out in full force trying to sell youe verything fron knock off sunglasses to salty nicaraguan baked goods with honey on top. It took me a grand total of ten minutes to hop on another bus to granada. i lucked out in this chicken bus because i got the front seat and didnt have to deal with the droves of passengers compressed together in the back. you guys really cant even imagine what this looks like until you see it. the front however was roomy and cozy. forty minutes later, i was in the beautiful city of granada hunting down internet so i could get in contact with some friends in the country and find a hostel for the night. During the last few weeks, i lost my very handy central america guidebook and annes guatemala guidebook was stolen while we were sitting atop mayan ruins. more on that later, but for now i am without guidebook. once i found out where i needed to stay i put my pack back on, grabbed my guitar and started hoofing it in the mid day heat with shotty directions to find my new home. about a half hour later, i arrived safe and sound to a quaint little place called hostal mochilas. i think i am currently its only guest. with that obstacle tackled, i set out to find food and spent the rest of the day wandering the markets trying random street dish after random street dish. nutritional value is now officially a thing of the past. the new name of the game is sustenance. from there i ran into the two nica kids who i chased away the rest of the night with. tomorrow i head to san juan del sur to get in a few last jams with my musical love and to enjoy some more good surf. hopefully itll all go according to plan, but it really never does. as for now, i am in one piece and have food in my belly and a roof over my head. simple pleasures really.
Thursday, December 3, 2009
not a dollar to the name.
what on earth did my mother do to my ATM card? this is night 1 in Guatemala without a penny to my name. plaastic doesnt work, but somehow i am still here. must be a modern marvel.
-Scott
P.S.
Sorry mom, just giving you a hard time... but seriously, my card still doesnt work.
-Scott
P.S.
Sorry mom, just giving you a hard time... but seriously, my card still doesnt work.
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