Had a fun evening at Maia Papaya with Coon from Holland. He told me the story of how on December 5 they would have Santa Claus but with him are Santa’s elves. They all dressed in black face with red lipstick and gold earrings. And they would bring presents to the kids in the neighborhood. it was hilarious to hear him talk about this. They did techno dances down the street together. But there was some pushback against it obviously because of the black face. In fact, the Santa Claus with with the “black”kids would take a boat and there would be actual Africans waiting for them, and would like beat them up after they got out of the boat. 

At about 2 o’clock in the morning, I heard a tremendous bang on the roof. It sounded like somebody had crashed into it. I was convinced some kind of catastrophe just happened. Had seen that the room next to mine, which is where the sound came from had been empty all day long. So after about 10 minutes of thinking about it I decided I should get up just in case it was leaking something or somebody was hurt. So I went next door  and tried the door and it was unlocked. And I opened it up about 4 inches and then heard some girl Kinda go Oh! something like that. So I decided that maybe Everything was OK. The next day I found out that it was an avocado that had hit the roof that had made such a racket. And all during the night you would hear these big booms from these avocados clobbering the roof. I also found out that it was a special Weekend for the local Catholic church. That was just about a block for Maya Papaya. And they would shoot off lots of fireworks during the day.  It  sounded like a dead gum, gun battle.

I worked on Spanish in the morning and then waited for my minibus to pick me up at Maya Papaya around 1230. It was about a 2 1/2 hour drive through the mountains to make it to Ponajachel. Our driver was named Barcelo. I talked with him in Spanish for the whole time. Excellent practice. He is tribe of Maya Indians that are from this area and he lived in Ponanjachel. 

I got to my Airbnb which was this room on the second floor of this little house. My bag weighs nearly 50 pounds and trying to get it up this rickety stairway that was about a foot and half wide was quite a challenge. I’m not sure exactly how I’m gonna get back down with that thing. I got my key and talked with the lady who was in charge of the house. Everything was in Spanish. 

I was walking around a little bit. Got some extra local money so I could pay for things. And saw a place that made like quesadillas, which has been my favorite food items since I’ve been here. Made friends with the staff and got a Hawaiian quesadilla which had lots of different kinds of vegetables, as well as pineapple. It was delicious. I was walking around also saw there was a band playing at a soccer game so I watched them for a while and then when I got over here to this place, which is called El parzo. Watched the band play. As well as the soccer match. I’ll probably go home pretty soon take a shower and rest. I’m looking forward to going to the nature reserve Atitlan tomorrow morning. The lady who runs the place, said it was no problem for me to leave my bag there.