Chichicostenago

Yesterday morning, we woke up high in the mountains in the town of Chichi. After slipping on our crumpled dress shirts, after a very early wake up. we struggled out of bed and headed into the city centre for catholic mass. At the church there were many different rituals being performed that would not be found at a mennonite church. Apparently a lot of their rituals were rooted in the local indigenous culture. One example of these rituals visible in the Catholic church was the men who stood at the front of the church. In the traditional Mayan village these men would have been the Elders. Another difference was that instead of playing an organ all the music was traditional Mayan music with an instrument that sounded a lot like a xylophone. Also the service was in both Spanish and Quechi (the traditional language of the Mayans).

After mass we went to the infamous Chichicostenango market. It was absolutely insane, if you even glanced at something a vendor would start shouting random prices at you or even begin chasing after you while shouting things like "THIS IS BUSINESS!". At first a lot of us were kind of reluctant to bargain but when we realized they were way overcharging us we really started bargaining and made some really good deals. Thankfully I didn't keep any money in my pockets because if I had it would have certaintly been stolen because at every busy section (which was pretty much everywhere) I felt people feeling my pockets to see if there was any money in them. One thing that was very hard for many of us were the kids that would continue to follow us everywhere begging us to buy something from them or even if they had nothing to sell they would ask us for money. At the end of our market buying most of us ended up with some pretty cool purchases but also some stupid ones just because we got so into the bargaining.

After these past few weeks there are many things that I have discovered about the Guatemalan culture. I'd love if our Canadian way of life could incorporate more of the friendliness, and openness that I have expereinced here. I am really looking forward to the places we will be visiting after CASAS such as climbing the highest volcano in all of Latin America!


Hasta Luego!
Joel