Sunday, January 11, 2009

Public and Private Spaces


Friday 12th December - Friday 19th December

Another tumultuous week, this time more testing emotionally. Not that anything's really been that stressful until now actually. I'm beginning to wonder when I'm going to get down to doing something useful beyond my own horizon expansion and experience gathering. As I sit in a cafe in Antigua Guatemala writing this, it's a good time to reflect on the last week or so.

I feel a bit strange too airing my innermost emotional feelings in the most public way, about stuff that intimately affects my girlfriend and our relationship. I guess that's the more revolutionary aspect to blogging: transcending the boundaries between public and private issues and spaces.

I never was a disciple of the clarity of distinction between public and private spaces, be they discursive or physical. I think at home, in Britain, there is a real distinction between physical public and private spaces, evidenced in a number of ways. First, by the culture of "Public Houses" (pubs) and entertainment licensing that is derived from this. Related to this is public liability, and the [legal, suing] culture, perhaps more acute in the U.S. but certainly prevalent in the UK. Being in Central America, with critical distance from home, I can see how spaces in the UK are hypermanaged and defined as public or private. Going into an eatery here, you walk through someone's home to get to the toilet, shared by the family whose home it is. Or someone invites you to stay with them in their house. Without going into too much more detail right now, I won't overplay the distinction, but I think there is a difference in the way spaces are managed and controlled. Perhaps wealth has something to do with it too, being unable to afford another 'customer' toilet.

Wow, I don't know where that came from. But the point I was about to make was that my girlfriend wanted to break up, on Saturday, soon after arriving in Xela to meet her after 3 weeks going our own ways. I guess independent travel suited her pretty good. Love never being straightforward, the complicated part was what happened after. As I came to terms with these revelations, she did say she wanted to spend Christmas with me. I couldn't answer whether I wanted to as well, but left to think things through. We agreed to meet for dinner. The long and short of it is that we're gonna spend Christmas together. Things are now good, but a bit more complicated. We'll see what goes down.

Between here (Antigua) and there (Xela), we made a couple of stops. The first, shorter stop at the hot springs of Fuentes Georginas, the next at the Lago de Atitlan, a big ol lake in the middle of Guatemala. Tori didn't reckon she could make it to the Bay Islands anymore, her flight being from San Pedro Sula, just inside Northern Honduras, in 2 days time. So the last few days have been more relaxed, spending 3 nights in San Pedro (de la Laguna - on the lake).


The hot springs on Sunday were as lush as they get. Xela had been pretty chilly, one of the coolest places in Central America. So going up a windy mountain road to find a 20ftx50ft hottub, with 3 smaller, less bakingly hot pools below, was blissful. The cabins up there were pretty steep - 90Q (£9) a person. So 2 of got the cabin, and 2 paid for camping, next to the cabin (for 15Q each)! That brought the costs down nicely, we even put the tent up for full blag effect. There was a log fire inside the stone cabin, and a barbeque outside. And a jolly nice evening was had.


On Monday we left by noon and drove the couple of hours to the lake. 10km long and 3 km wide, the lake is surrounded by steep hills dotted with villages and a couple of towns. We avoided Panachel (the busiest), going for San Pedro, a little smaller with less, but still a fair few, tourists. Arriving just before dark, we stayed at Hotel San Francisco, Damian and I paying 5Q (50 pence!) for use of the roof to string our hammocks, with a glorious view of the lake interrupted only by the steel re-inforcement bars (reebars) poking out of the concrete pillars and the chicken wire fence that I don't think would have broken a fall. Damian won at spoof so got the lakeside spot. We ended up contributing 5Q a night to the girls' room's cost for use of their bathroom too.


One the 2 items on my checklist of things I wanted to do on the road (the other being breakfast on a rooftop terrace) was spend a day on a lake in a canoe. That day was Tuesday, hiring canoes and sailing over to the 'beach', 45 minutes away, and generally larking about on the water. The only thing lacking was ganj, I guess you can't win 'em all.


So yesterday we left San Pedro, and drove to Antigua Guatemala, a colonial town a little removed from the capital of Guate, and found the cheapest digs in town. 38Q each, for a fairly uncomfortable bed in a basic hostel in the middle of town. With a rollmat it was very bearable. Last night as I walked to the super to get ice for mojitos, I passed through a street that was cordened at one end and screened off at the other. Inside, things were setting up for a kids Christmas show. Sadly, the melting ice beckoned me away, but I heard lots of firecrackers from inside our hostel courtyard suggesting fun was had. Then Jordan turned up, having bumped into Damian in the street. He'd made his own way from Xela, and is down from our Krimbo plan...

So, next week, Christmas in the Bay Islands. We need to find somewhere in La Ceiba, the Honduran mainland port to access Utila, to park the car for a week. And stock up, as I hear it's expensive out there. I wonder if Amanda and Mega, who we met at Lanquin, or Julia (in Antigua), or Jay will make it. I hope so.

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