Space to Dream -- Lake Atitlan, Guatemala

I'm starting this post from Shambala Cafe in San Marcos la Laguna, Guatemala. I'm relaxing in a comfortable hammock chair, but trying to keep most of my weight on my left side (which is a tricky thing to do. In a hammock chair), because the entire right side of my body is remolacha red with sunburn.  My empty Tibetan butter tea sits on the wooden stump in front of me. A tea I purchased with 15 of the 60 quetzales I made teaching a Power Yoga class in town this morning.

I'm really integrating into the community now. Not only am I needed at the Forest for yoga, spaceholding, and photography, I have a place in town where I'm expected at 10:00 on Saturday mornings. 

It's nice to be expected places. To be needed. To feel useful. 

It's also nice to use the money I earned teaching yoga to pay for my Tibetan butter tea. 

Other than the sunburn, my health feels pretty decent these days. And by these days, I mean these past two days. I woke up Thursday morning at two am feeling grumbly, sulfur-y and gross. 

Fuckballs. Do I have giardia again? 

"Aimee, are you awake?" Tammo's voice drifted across the tent.

"Yeah."

"I think I have giardia," Tammo moaned.

"I... I... uh... think I have it too."

"Are you sure?"

"Yeah," I grumbled.

Fucking parasites. 

So we both ran up the hundred stairs to the composting toilet, relieved ourselves, and then stumbled down the hundred stairs back to the Submarine. Where, after I'd vomited up my dinner of roasted root vegetables, we both took a dose of antibiotics (the Submarine is the home of all the anti-yogic things. Alcohol, brownies, cigarettes, and antibiotics). 

Jonas is going to ask why I didn't just sit with the parasites for a few days. Drink papaya leaf tea, take grapefruit seed extract and give my body time to, err, heal itself. Which is fair. I would sit with it if I could sit with it in my own home. Where I could take a few days off work to heal. Where I would have a bathroom right next to my room and I wouldn't have to gallop up a hundred stairs to take my many runny shits.   

Also, I have to teach yoga in the morning. There's one other yoga teacher here, and he has plans tomorrow. I could wake up Jonas and ask if he could teach for me because I have giardia, but that would suck for him. Especially since he's moving out of his house today. 

So. Antibiotics really feel like my only option now.  

I taught the yoga class at six thirty that morning. And although I felt weak, I managed to lead a proper power flow. Which I would not have been able to do without the aid of antibiotics.

Thank god for Western medicine.  

Tammo and I trundled down to Spanish that day, exhausted and head-achy.

But at least I'm not vomiting or singeing everyone's nose-hairs with my burps that would make hellfire smell like roses.  

My second week of Spanish was challenging in that it took me further than I've ever gone in any language thus far. In French, I've got a decent (with plenty of room for improvement) vocabulary and I can sometimes hold a conversation in present tense. If the person with whom I'm conversing possesses miraculous patience and can read minds a little bit (very helpful). But my Spanish has progressed to a level wherein I can speak (staggeringly slowly) about the past and future. And not continuously in first person or infinitive.

Magda, one of the local Guatemalan women who works in the kitchen, asked me last night to check whether or not any of the new guests have allergies.

I was able to tell her in SPANISH, "Yes, I will ask the guests during dinner so that you will know before breakfast tomorrow."

YES. Hopefully after two more months of Spanish, I will be faster and more confident... but I'm already so happy with this improvement. Holy bananas.  

I've kept myself so busy during the last few weeks with painting --

-- yoga, and Spanish, that I haven't given myself much time to dream (and Maile did an astrology reading for me the other day, and said that dreaming is an important part of my life. Who knew), so after Spanish yesterday, Tammo and I took our backpacks to the pier and splayed out in the scorching sun. Without sunscreen. Such was our hubris.

I miss Europe, I scribbled in one of the few remaining blank pages of my tattered Spanish notebook. I miss the food, the culture, the ease. I love it here on the lake, but I'm getting tired of all the little things being hard. Like, having to actually plan when I can charge my phone and my dinky speaker from Mexico. Like having to constantly worry about whether or not the water I'm drinking has parasites or bacteria. If it weren't for expensive plane tickets, I think I would go back to Europe this summer. Just to give myself a few months of respite from these worries. 

...

Bourget, maybe you should buy an expensive plane ticket and go to Europe. Pay attention to your needs and do your best to meet them -- isn't that what you tell everyone in your yoga classes? You still have enough money for a trip to Europe. And probably even for a return flight to Central or South America, if you want to keep studying Spanish. Which you probably will. 

So. My dreams for now. 

Go to Mexico for from the 22nd of February to the 6th of March. 
Stay at The Forest from the 6th of March to the beginning of May. 
Take Cathy and John on a tour of Guatemala from the 6th of May to the 21st of May. 
Study scuba diving in Honduras from the 21st of May to the 1st of June. 
Return to the Yoga Forest for the first two weeks of June. 
Spend the second half of June and all of July traveling through El Salvador, Nicaragua, and Costa Rica. 
Fly to France. Hang out with friends for a month, then start the Camino in September. 
Fly to Argentina in November. Try to find work. Keep studying Spanish. Become a brilliant Tango dancer. All that jazz.

...

Eh. 

They're dreams. Some people have dreams with deep roots. And they grow into strong, massive, beautiful forests. 

My dreams are like rainbows. They're beautiful, vibrant, effervescent, and change based on the weather. 

Which is okay. 

Tammo and I left the pier (el muelle) a couple of hours later, and I felt the telltale prickling of my skin that let me know an excruciating sunburn was imminent.

Wise choice, Bourget. Sprawling in the sun for two hours straight with no sunscreen. 

We spent the evening helping out with Pizza Night at The Forest (I have become an expert slicer of pizza. And Tammo rocks the pizza oven). We chopped, diced, sliced a mountain of vegetables and grated not nearly enough cheese (but that's because there's never enough cheese). Then we helped clean up after the nearly thirty guests and collapsed into our beds in the submarine, wincing, groaning in pain as our charred skin rubbed against the sheets.

So unnecessary, Bourget, I thought as I heard Tammo lamenting his misfortune from across the Submarine. There are enough things in life that suck and are unpreventable. 

You don't need to indulge in the things that suck AND are preventable. Jesus. 

Slowing Down -- Lake Atitlan, Guatemala

February and March are going to be slow blog months, I've decided. I would like to focus more of my limited time and attention on painting, studying Spanish, and becoming a super-crazy-fit-yoga-ninja (have I mentioned that life at The Yoga Forest is making me ridiculously buff?). 

I wish I could focus on everything. All the time (which seems to be antithetical to "focus", but I don't care).

Unfortunately, I can't focus on everything. All the time (maybe one day). So I'll let go of writing two or three times a week, and try to be satisfied with a minimum of four blog posts per month. Also, as this is a travel blog and I've been quite settled in "mi carpa", as of late, I don't have much inspiration anyway. Which is what it is. I'm not gonna judge it. I'm also going to try my best to not stress out about the dearth of blog entries (something I'm not very good at. Stressing out over unimportant things is a specialty of mine). 

This last week flew by in a flurry of painting --

 

-- and more painting. It felt wonderful to take out my brushes again, after about a month of ignoring them in my backpack next to the just-in-case spoon I stole from the Forest kitchen. I spent hours at Shambala the other day, working on a psychedelic tortoise.

"Did you... did you, uh... order anything?" John, a British chap who makes a sublime Tibetan butter tea, asked me politely and pointedly.

"Yes, but I finished it a while ago," I said, purposefully leaving "a while" up to his imagination.

"Okay, no problem, thanks," the British chap backed away apologetically.

That probably means I should order something else now...

So I ordered a hot lemon ginger tea and returned to my psychedelic tortoise.

 

Worried that I'd wear out my welcome at Shambala, I decided to paint my chipmunk at Del Lago the next day. Where I tried to appreciate the lack of internet as something that kept my focused on my art. And not a monstrous (and unrelenting) inconvenience.

This is Tammo on pancake day at The Forest.

I've also spent fifteen hours in Spanish class with my friend Joe (the random bloke I volunteered with in Germany over four years ago). 

I WILL LEARN ANOTHER LANGUAGE. IT WILL HAPPEN. I WILL FINALLY NOT BE A STEREOTYPICAL MONOLINGUAL AMERICAN.

My brain hates Spanish. So much. But Joe and Evelin (our teacher) make learning hilarious. Because of Joe's incessant mistakes and bromas pesadas and Evelin's sassy sense of humor. 

But if I continue to spend fifteen hours a week in class between now and May... I think I'll be able to make myself understood in most situations. 

Which would be a beautiful thing. 

After two years of pining for short hair, I decided to finally chop off all my locks. All of them. Nary a lock is left on my head. 

Tammo and I went to San Pedro last Thursday. Where a British chap with excessively long dreadlocks and at least seven barking furballs running amok around his studio, cut off all my locks. And blew them onto the furry specimen curled at my feet.

"Chickpea doesn't mind, does she now?" Ross crooned to his donut-ed (that really ought to be a word) dog.

An hour later, I emerged from the hostel/hair salon feeling lighter, happier, freer, and much more like my outside was in tune with my inside.

I asked Tammo to take a photo of my hair. And he skipped the actual hair bit. But it gives you a general idea.

 We celebrated the haircut with...

umm...

...

... with deep-fried oreos served with chocolate syrup and vanilla ice cream.

(This is what happens after spending almost four months at a yoga retreat. You begin to crave things that would normally make you gag)

The longer I stay at The Forest, the more I feel like this place has the potential to become a seasonal home for me. A place I can return to for three months every year, brush up on my Spanish, teach yoga, maybe teach English and share art at some of the children's schools...

What would my life be like if I had this place as a home I could always come back to? 
 

If I set aside three months every year wherein I knew I could be here? 
 

Here to reconnect with natural rhythms of life -- like waking up with the sun and eating mostly seasonal, local food.
 

Here, wherein I can meet and connect with people from all over the world.
 

The issue for me would be expectations. I think I'd probably return to this place and want the magic from the year before (but with less giardia and fewer scorpions). I would have such a hard time letting each new season stand alone. 

We'll see. Maybe that's a practice I need to invite into my life. Learning to let memories exist in a space that doesn't influence my appreciation of the present. Because my memories of my time here thus far are (for the most part) fucking amazing. And I want to enjoy these memories. But I want to be able to come back and not let those memories interfere with the next experience. Whatever it happens to be.

But that's a long time away, Bourget. As Jonas says, you'll have to actually LEAVE the Forest, before you start planning to come back. 

Pure, Unadulterated Cake -- Lake Atitlan, Guatemala

I'm starting this post from Shambala Cafe in San Marcos la Laguna, Guatemala. My corner of the cafe smells like dog shit (most of San Marcos la Laguna smells like dog shit) and internet is dead (as it usually is). I'm embracing the perpetual dearth of wifi (not the dog shit), as the lack of wifi keeps me from browsing the web when I should be writing. Or painting. Or doing anything more productive than checking nose ring studs on Etsy (which is just about everything). 

Tammo, Bodo, and I hiked another volcano yesterday. A volcano much closer, much smaller (but still a 1300 meter elevation climb), and much better maintained than Acatenango. 

We hiked San Pedro. Our friendly, dormant, neighbor volcano across the lake. 

Bodo met Tammo and me in front of the Submarine at 6:30 yesterday morning. We zipped up our home and happily tumbled down the trail into town, air still slightly chilly, but the clear sky promising a warm day. 

"A volcano a week, Tammo," I commented as we glimpsed San Pedro looming in the distance."That's pretty badass." 

I need to make it down to town in the mornings more often. This is gorgeous...

Everything is so quiet. No random bombs going off. No obnoxious church music blaring loud enough to wake the drunks who've passed out on the side of the road. No barking dogs... 
 

Tranquility such as this is a rare phenomenon in San Marcos. 
 

We boarded the first lancha for San Pedro (the village at the base of San Pedro. It's complicated), and hightailed it to the one cafe open and serving breakfast. Where we lingered until nine, then flagged down a tuk-tuk to take us to the trail head.

"Al volcan?" I tested out my Spanish on tuk-tuk number 82.

"Si, si," the driver responded enthusiastically.

"Quanto cuesta?" I made sure to agree on a price before entering the pint-sized vehicle.

"Diez por persona," the driver amiably replied.

"Perfecto, gracias," I nodded to Tammo and Bodo, and we clamored into the tuk-tuk's three person backseat.

"Mi llamo David," our driver smiled at us. "Como te llamas?"

"Mi llamo Aimee," I returned David's grin in the rear view mirror.

And for the remainder of the trip to the trail head, David tried to get us to accept his friend as a guide up the volcano, which we firmly and politely declined. And then our tuk-tuk driver gave us his number so we could call him when we finished the hike.

And while I definitely couldn't respond with anything close to respectable/acceptable Spanish, I understood just about everything.

Which feels really nice. 

David dropped us off at the entrance station and Tammo took his number.

"Muchos gracis, David! Hasta luego," I waved our driver goodbye.

Tammo, Bodo, and I paid our Q100 fee per person and entered the park. A guide named Jose led us for the first thirty minutes (to make sure we didn't stray into any coffee or cornfields), and then waved us on towards the peak.

This isn't exactly easy, I thought to myself as we climbed up, up, up. But compared to Acatenango, this is cake. Pure, unadulterated cake. 

Probably because I don't have a sinus infection this time around. 

... 

Yeah, that's probably all it is. My face is no longer bursting with pain. And mucus. Being able to breathe helps in the hiking of volcanoes.
 

So I traipsed up the stairs, Tammo and Bodo trailing behind me (I could say it's because I'm a faster hiker, but that would be a lie. An outright lie. Tammo and Bodo let me lead because I'm the "most easy-going" hiker).

At the second break area, we discovered a tire swing.

I haven't had so much fun on a swing since I was five.

We began our trek up San Pedro (the volcano. Not the town. Or the plant medicine. Just to be clear) at 9:20 and reached the peak at 12:40.

"Two hours and twenty minutes!" I high-fived my hiking buddies at the top. "That's fantastic."

We celebrated with a bit of acro. On a precariously situated rock (because I have to be more adventurous than Tammo this year).

We enjoyed the view for half an hour, reaping the full benefits of our hike (and wishing we'd brought some chocolate with us). Then we began the journey back to the trail head and tuk-tuk number 82.

I decided I didn't want to walk down. My body felt so energized and good and adventurous (I have to beat Tammo, remember?), that I decided to run down. With Tammo and Bodo in my dusty wake (and this time, maybe it wasn't because I was the most "easy-going" hiker), I hopped, jogged, tumbled down San Pedro.

And it felt divine.

I had knee surgery less than two years ago. And now I'm running helter-skelter down a volcano. Without any pain. 

If I hadn't been so focused on the path in front of me, I might have cried a bit. Might have cried some exquisitely happy, grateful tears.

I'm so lucky to be here. To be here doing this. 

Tuk-tuk number 82 was waiting for us ecstatic hikers in the parking lot, so we loaded in and zipped back to San Pedro (the village, not the volcano. Or the plant medicine. To be clear). Where we shamelessly indulged in nutella, oreo, banana smoothies.

What we didn't put in our smoothies.

We wandered around San Pedro for the rest of the afternoon, accomplishing little errands (I scheduled a haircut for next Thursday. Girl is going back to her faux-hawk. Mmmhmm), and relishing the precious moments spent away from Hippiedom.

But we shared the boat back to San Marcos with a rambunctious group of absolutely wasted Australians. And remembered how much we prefer spending time with people tripping on mushrooms/high on weed. As we overheard drunken stories of a broken coccyx and observed several blathered Australians spilling their beer all over the lancha floor.