A week of Antigua

The famous arch, a must for photos of Antigua

We have been here in Antigua Guatemala for a little over a week and what a full week it has been. I have joined a semi-outdoor gym, run to the next pueblo over, eaten my weight in aguacates (avocados), learned how to make Mayan chocolate, bought papaya and bananitos at the market, and purified raw fruits and vegetables with a solution that is likely more harmful to my health than any bacteria hidden on the fruits itself.

Making chocolate powder. Everyone agreed, I am terrible at it.

We have taken a chicken bus to a small town (San Juan del Obispo) and a zippy, bumpy, rickety tuk-tuk back to our slightly far, but charmingly convenient apartment. We have learned some new moves, and improved some old ones, in one group and one private salsa class. And most importantly, 40 hours later, I have learned the present, past and imperfect tense of Spanish and the meaning of words like madrugada (early morning), hiciste (you did) and albondegas (meatballs), random words that have floated around in my head for years, most likely thanks to a J. Lo or Ricky Martin song... I am sorry to admit.

The weather here is perfect: 75/24 degrees, every day, cloudy or sunny, and it has yet to rain. You can wear open-toed shoes with a button-down sweater and be entirely comfortable. They call Guatemala the “land of the eternal spring”. To me, this is what the temperature in heaven must be like.

El Sol

The people we have met here are some of the most polite and nicest I have met anywhere. Canada has competition. And thankfully, the Spanish spoken here is very clear and easy to understand (perhaps a useful outcome of mass tourism?).

We have bought an exprimador (squeezer) for lemons and a separate one for garlic. Our fridge is filled with local favorites: limas (limes), cebollas (onions), ajo (garlic), queso fresco (fresh cheese), the local favorite beer Gallo, and fruits whose English names mean nothing to me: loquats (in Spanish nispero), a type of fruit like a sourer apricot and sapodilla (zapota in Spanish) a fruit that strangely enough tastes like pumpkin pie.

These market fruits I know. Most I do not.

Thanks to my husband’s multiple visits and chatty personality, we regularly run into people we know in the streets.

We are locals to the extent that light-skinned, debutante Spanish speakers can be. But for the price we are paying for our apartment, or for pretty much anything we buy at the markets and restaurants, we are definitely not locals. Nor are we expats. As is our MO, we are tourists, but ones who like to live in the countries we visit.

Ah, tourists.

As people living here, I still need some time to understand Antigua; its outer layers are filled with scenic photos, organized tours and tourism talk. I want to pull away some of the glossiness and see the place for itself. Hopefully, my next post will convey my findings.

As a plain tourist though, it is easy to see why Antigua’s popularity is growing. La Antigua Guatemala is certainly charming.