Celebrating one year in Chivarreto

The last month has been full of milestones. Milestone 1: Lizzy and I celebrated one year of living in Chivarreto and went on an excursion with our host family to San Bartolo, a town famous for their hot springs. The whole family loaded into the truck, which had been outfitted for the occasion with wood crates to serve as suspension and blankets to pad the crates and allow for the kids to sleep for the duration of the trip. The town is only 10 miles away, but with dirt roads badly in need of repair, the drive took an hour and a half. We were excited to be in a new place seeing different sights and were also excited to swim and soak.

Brian and Melissa in the Truck

            I’m not sure what it is about my imagination and why it still hasn’t quite grasped the realities of life in Guatemala because when I imagined hot springs and a heated pool, images of relaxing (clean) pools of blue and green came to mind. I imagined lazily swimming in the warmth of a heated pool, protected from the normally brisk night air that is a constant when you live at 9,000 feet. The hot springs were quite the departure from my imagined world. First of all, we barely were able to make the entrance of the springs due to a recent washout of the road where we had to wait 20 minutes for a truck to be removed from its mired state. Of course we soldiered on, because if there is any attitude to be learned from living here, it is that “it will never happen to me.” We bounced through the rocks and mud and were soon in the parking lot.

The river, the bridge and if you enlarge the photo you can see the pool in background and possibly the diving board

            The lot was and today most likely still is a muddy, shack filled area without the painted lines that normally limit ones ability to park creatively, leading to all sorts of potential departure problems. We got out and the family unpacked all of their belongings; towels, inflatable toys, shampoo and soap, changes of clothing, etc. (wait…I thought we were just going to some hot springs to swim…why the shampoo and soap?). I was looking forward to swimming with the host family kids in the pool and hanging out with the family, but as we came to the ticket window and Tilo asked if we wanted a private cabin or if we wanted to use the public pools, imagined experiences once again changed. The family opted for a private cabin and Liz and I went for the public option (Private cabin 25 quetzales…about 3 bucks, public pools 2 quetzales…about 25 cents), we went through the entrance gates, crossed the bridge above the raging muddy river and then separated for the evening as they went to their private bath/cabin and we walked around and looked for a place to set down our things. We wouldn’t see the family again until it was time to leave.

Parting shot before they went off to their private bath.

            Almost immediately upon entering it began to rain and we were unable to find a suitable place for our bag of supplies; towels, camera, water bottle and hand sanitizer. We soon realized that the only safe place to leave our things would be with the family in their cabin. I braved entering the building with the private baths (all had doors with slats that should have slanted properly to maintain privacy but were apparently installed improperly and instead gave all passersby a clear view into your private bath.) and walked to their numbered compartment. I did my best to avert mine eyes since we had just learned upon entering the hot springs that we had actually stumbled into the new and exciting world of group bathing (this long explanation is here to explain why I don’t have any really good pictures of the area, sorry, the camera was in the bag in the private bath of our host family.).

The private bath where the family went, 4 adults and 2 kids + Pool toys

            I returned to the pool we had just jumped into to realize that the water was just a little bit warmer than the outside air and had a lovely gray color to it, much like gray water of plumbing fame. We realized that we were the only people in official swimsuits and the preferred attire was anything you happened to be wearing under your pants, be that boxers, boxer briefs or briefs…the whiter the better apparently. Soon we were surrounded by teenaged boys who hadn’t yet heard my very important lesson on personal space or about how much North Americans don’t actually appreciate being splashed by you and your friends as you grapple with each other for pool dominance.

            Liz and I inched our way along the pool walls away from the rambunctious youth until we were to a place where we could still touch but the locals struggled (cause they’re short). On this end of the pool we were dazzled by the impressive display of belly flops and what appeared to be flying frog dives coming off of the cement diving board. When the crowd of divers cleared I went to check the depth beneath the diving board (which itself was suspended some 5 feet above the water) and was worried that the water was just a few inches deeper than I am tall with my arms extended above my head (some 7 feet). This may have explained the lack of perfected pike dives.

            After enduring the pool for a good half hour, we braved the hot springs. These were basically a series of four cemented pools, each set up as a 10x10 foot hot tub. We again quickly learned not to look around too much, as the appearance of flesh was overly abundant. The pool we jumped into was practically empty, although there were almost 30 people around the sides of the pool. The water again was a lovely, murky gray color, but fainter than the swimming pool. Those on the sides of the pools had plastic bowls with them and poured water over their bodies, lathered up, rinsed and repeated. For many this would be the only bath of the week/month/season/hopefully not year. We now understood the grayness of the water, although there were signs posted all along the pools that prohibited bathers from entering the springs themselves completely lathered up, thus the lathering on the edge of the pool and the pouring of water with small plastic bowls. The signs made sense, especially since the majority of rural Mayans cannot in fact read.

            We eventually gave up trying to avoid staring at all of our near naked neighbors and observed the technique with which everyone was bathing. It was fascinating how often the buddy system was employed to really scrub those hard to reach places on the back and how many times this would have to be repeated until one was finally satisfied with their level of cleanliness. We met a young man by the name of Russell (good Spanish name) who wanted to practice his English while he bathed (multitasking!) and even kindly offered us his soap and shampoo to clean ourselves with. We watched as his mother scrubbed his back and then the backs of his three sisters before she went on to wash her hair and I wondered if I had somehow been shortchanged by my childhood Saturday night bathing rituals.

Pupusa Dinner

            After soaking for over 2 hours our host family emerged from their cabin and told us they were ready for dinner and to go home. We jumped out of hot springs as quickly as our very relaxed bodies could manage and changed in their cabin. We crossed the bridge again on our way out and went to one of the many fine dining shacks. We settled on Pupusas, a type of cheese filled fried tortilla covered in guacamole, cabbage and hot sauce. After engorging ourselves we were ready for the drive home. Lucky for us it had rained and the muddy roads were now nicely lubed. It was an enjoyable way to celebrate our first anniversary with our host family.         

Me and Grandma Carmen at the smoothie stand.

The family was tuckered out when we finally got home.