Sunzal Beach, El Salvador

Taking advantage of our three weeks off from school, not to mention needing to renew my passport, we spent two nights at El Salvador’s Sunzal Beach, just outside of La Libertad. The five hour drive south down Careterra Salvador took us through a more desolate, arid landscape, but the road was good. And compared with Mexico, the border at Villa Nuevo (and La Hachadura heading back up the coast, on El Pacifico) was a piece of cake. We were through in no time, and no bribes either!

We arrived at the Roca Sunzal hotel a couple hours before dark, with time to hit the beach. Like Guatemala, the northern beaches of El Salvador are black, but unlike Guatemala, there are a ton of surfers. In fact, Sunzal Beach is peppered with seedy little bungalo hotels for extended stay surfers who were out every morning. I assume it’s more the consistency of the surf—every day the waves were perfect—rather than the size that draws them. It could be the warm water too. In any case, the atmosphere was easy-going. There were locals boys casting nets into the morning surf, lone snorklers with miniature float tubes, and day trippers renting cabanas with huge hammocks drink beer for breakfast. Strangely, there were more Americans than locals, and so we heard more English than Spanish. Oscar, the owner of the Roca Sunzal, in fact, spoke perfect English, though he never finished high school. He said, “Here, you don’t need pants. You leave all that behind. Here you can relax, wear shorts, and just live.”







Oscar left El Salvador as a kid, managed to pick up English in the States, landed a couple jobs, and eventually returned with enough cash and investment (from a friend in L.A.) to purchase some property on the beach (three years ago it went for only $40,000 he told us). He said he left the States because of the insane pace and bustle of life there. “Here,” he said, “you can live on less, and live well.” He had found, from what we could tell, easy living.

Predictably, I warmed to the national beer immediately. Kristin and I agreed that Pilsener makes Gallo taste (even more) like carbonated piss-water. The restaurant was mediocre at best, but eating your meals on the beach to the sound of the ocean covers a multitude of culinary sins.


(the happy couple of eight years)

We stupidly left food on our balcony one night, and found a little capuchin rascal biting a hole in our Cheetos bag. The nerve. (see below).


(Kristin giving a capuchin monkey the business)

Mallory and Cristian, I’m proud to report, have formed a deep and (I hope) lasting love for the ocean. There is nothing, nothing quite like it, and I am determined to find, someday, some corner of the world with room enough for easy living.


(Mallory eyeing the surf)


(Sunzal Beach sunset)

Las Posadas

For the nine days preceding Christmas, posadas (processions) are commonly seen just after dark ambling down neighborhood streets to turtle shell drum beats, firecrackers, and figurines of Mary and Joseph. Each night we’ve watched them pass from our terrace, a rag tag bunch of kids bearing the Holy Family, as it journeys from Nazareth to Bethlehem, to houses of friends or family. A ritualistic dialogue occurs at each house before Mary and Joseph are invited inside to the nacimiento (nativity) to rest for the night. Here the Holy Family remains until the next night, where they will be taken once again to look for shelter, and come to rest in another home.

Tonight, on Christmas Eve, a figure of the Christ child will be added to the nacimiento for a final resting at the last of the nine houses. Here, all those who have participated these nine nights in the posadas will come together for tamales and ponche and a celebration. At midnight, the whole city will erupt with fireworks.

I am writing this having just finished our own tradition of meatballs and lasagna, and will soon head off to church for the Christmas Eve service, then back with friends for the fireworks. We should have a hell of a view from our terrace if the haze or firework smoke doesn’t cloud it out.

Spending our first Christmas in Guatemala, while not like home exactly, has been good. Still, I’m wishing we were under a heavy snowfall right about now, with mulled apple cider on the stove, and the rooms noisy with family.

Iximche

Last weekend we spent a beautiful Sunday afternoon in Tecpan with brother Lucas, one my co-workers. Tecpan, the initial capital of the Spanish (though it was quickly abandoned for the Almolonga valley where the city of Antigua lies) is right off the Pan American highway, and boasts the closest Mayan ruin site to Guatemala City. The ruins of Iximche (pronounced ee-sheem-chay), a former Kaqchikel stronghold, are not nearly as dramatic as those of Tikal, but it has numerous plazas and mounds, and is situated on a pine and oak mesa surrounded by ravines and mountain ridges. It’s beautiful. The few altars where human sacrifices once took place were a little unnerving if you think about it, but it was one of the only public places we’ve found where our kids could run around at will, climb the mounds and low platforms, and enjoy the sunlight out in the open.







We saw no tourists, just local Mayans spending the afternoon, like us, with friends or family, enjoying the sun and light breeze. A few prayed by the ceremonial fire pits, and a priest Kaqchikel priest performed various ritualistic hand gestures over the smouldering fires, and spoke with some of the locals.


(Cristian in front of sports arena where the Kaqchikel used to play a game similar to basketball, with ground-level baskets, but players could only use their hips to play the ball. Losers, according to Lucas, were executed.)




(Cristian with brother Lucas)


(A Kaqchikel priest)

Back at Lucas’s mother’s house, we ate pepian (traditional Guatemalan chicken dish), and Mallory and Cristian played with Lucas’s cousins, all beautiful little kids that spoke both Kaqchikel and Spanish.


(Mallory holding a kitten with Lucas's cousins)

Leaving the over-crowded and polluted streets of Guatemala City, even for an afternoon, was hugely refreshing.