Museo del Cafe

Dos entradas en una dia, que suerte! I just got back from our afternoon activity and I'm sitting on a rocking chair in the courtyard watching the sun go down behind the mountains. And to help smash the mood of this delightful noche tranquila, someone's setting off what sounds like grenades in front of the school. They set off fireworks for EVERYTHING here! Festivals, birthdays, communions, well-cooked dinners; if it makes you happy, its cause for una celebracion grande. I don't mean to sound like a party pooper, if it were my birthday I'm sure I'd be demanding that the loudest and largest firecrackers available be set off in my honor too, its just that they go off all. day. long. I video taped a small segment so you can hear the noise level:



And yes, I just looked like a dork video taping the lawn like eighty times while I waited for a firecracker to go off.

SO I know you must be waiting on the edge of your seats to hear all about our activity today. As you should! Today's activity was muy divertido! First we went to a museum dedicated to Mayan music. It was a really nice looking museum, lots of cool exhibits. First we watched a short video that showed how the instruments are used in festivals, then we walked through a few rooms while a guide showed us how the instruments are played. It was pretty cool. Here's an instrument that's like a xylophone but it has these gourds on the bottom. It sounds really nice.

During festivals they make these large "floats" that they carry around, I think they're dedicated to the saints but I'm not sure. I don't claim to be a good tour guide.

Ok, here's something cool. So in some Mayan towns there is an old story about a man called Maximon. One day while all the men were in the fields working, this man came into the village and slept with all their wives. The men returned and in their rage, they cut off his arms and legs. Well somewhere down the line this guy became a sort of folklore for them and they began to have shrines to Maximon (also called San Simon). For those of you who watch Breaking Bad, you might have seen mention of this (its where those scary twin guys from the drug cartel leave the police sketch of Heisenberg). So a village will have a shrine to Maximon which is basically a large torso of a man. Each family takes a turn "taking care" of him; his family placement switches once a year during holy week. People bring him money, gifts, cigarette and booze in hopes of having good luck, health, etc. This isn't a "oh Maximon is so nice, lets give him lots of things" its more like "Maximon will kick our asses and bring us bad luck unless we do these things." There's a hole in his mouth so people can literally pour alcohol into his mouth. I wish I had a better picture but you can google more if you're interested :)

Here's another cool tradition. People make and fly these HUGE kites in cemeteries because they feel its a way to connect with the dead.

Here's a representation of how people hand weave their blankets.

Many Mayan shops sell little tecolotes (owls) because they feel that they're good luck! (Me too!)

Ok, I dont know what the name of these things are so I'll just call them really scary puppet people. Folks carry these on their shoulders and run around with them during parades. Freaky.

And I couldn't resist souvenir shopping here. I bought a book mark and a little owl bank :) Did I mention how CHEAP everything is here?? I paid $1.50 for each of these.

After the Mayan museum we went to a coffee plantation!

I've been looking forward to this. Coffee is a HUGE export for Guatemala, you see coffee plants all over the place. Coffee ALWAYS gets me sick at home but out of sheer politeness I drank a cup that was given to me here (black, no less) and I found that it's not crazy acidic like in the US. Its actually friggen delicious here. I've been drinking it black every morning for breakfast, but today I added some cream and sugar and almost died. It's without a doubt the best coffee I've ever had. So I learned a TON about the coffee production process today. First of all, here is a coffee plant:

It takes a long time for a plant to produce coffee. The baby plants need to stay in the nursery for one year, then they can be transplanted to the ground. After four years, the plant will be able to grow coffee. The first big rain storm will come in April, after that the plants will flower. The flowers only last for four days, after which the plants will start to grow berries. The berries will eventually ripen and turn red sometime in December, at which time they're ready to be harvested.

Most of the harvesting in Guatemala is done by hand. This keep leaves and twigs out of the coffee and improves its quality. A lot of these workers bring their young children to the fields as well, and they help to pick the coffee beans. It was really bizarre to see like four and five year olds carrying around buckets of coffee beans. A lot of them were just playing tag while their parents worked though. (btw that dude is my afternoon Spanish teacher, Hugo)

After the berries are picked they're sorted. All the unripe and bug-eaten ones are put into one pile and made into instant coffee (eek!) and the better berries are pitted. The pits inside the berries are the actual coffee beans. They look yellow/green when they're separated because they have a film on them. Once that film is removed they are a light brown. They're usually transported in this form and then roasted once they reach their destination based on costumer preference. Here are the beans in their different stages:

Here are the beans drying in the sun, waiting to be packaged and transported

Here's the pile of crappy beans for the instant coffee. Notice all the leaves and twigs :/

Gross fun fact: the most expensive kind of coffee is civet-processed. The civet is a cat-like animal in the mongoose family. Growers feed the berries to the animal, it poops them out, they're washed and then sold. No thanks.

Here's a cool little model of the type of house a Mayan person would have lived in in the past.

There were really beautiful flowers here, here are some random shots.

The view was really great too. Check out these mountains. I've seriously asked every Guatemalan I've met about hiking. I think I'm going to try to find some hiking trails next week.

Did you know that Guatemala is also a huge exporter of jade? Check out all these different types! And yes mom, my eyes are pealed for beads! I've been asking around :)

I got two great shots of the volcano near Antigua today, El Volcan de Agua. The peak is always cloudy because its so tall.

Everything else was really nice tonight. For dinner I had tacos which were unlike any tacos I've had in the US. They were basically tortillas that were filled with cheese, wrapped into a tube-shaped and then deep fried. They were served with cabbage on top of them, kind of like a sauerkraut. During dinner the German girl Brita who is living with the family invited me to go out for drinks with her and her German friends. I went and had a lovely time, there are SO MANY tourists in this place! Everyone was speaking English in the bar, it was a little bizarre. I ended up leaving before them since I have school early in the morning and I jogged home to avoid trouble. I'm glad to report that I made it home without altercation :) Not looking forward to a 6:30am alarm!