Last night I slept with don pancho
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- Chapter 3: Guatemala - Meet the Family
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LAST NIGHT I SLEPT WITH DON PANCHO A love affair with a man, his country and its cuisine
Michele Peterson Chapter 1It wasn’t the most auspicious meal for a first date. A chunk of grey meat, the size of my fist and veined with yellow tendons, sat in the middle of a pool of broth in a bowl in front of me. “It’s sopa de pata de res,“ said my date, who was spooning the liquid up with gusto. “A special Guatemalan dish.” I tried to force myself to pick up the spoon. After all, not too long ago, I’d been quite keen to go on this date. Had I done some advance research, I might have learned that a meal involving traditional Guatemalan cuisine could include soup made of beef hooves and tripe, a gummy substance scraped from the honeycombed insides of a cow’s stomach.
“Bienvenido a Tierra de Primavera Eterna – Welcome to the Land of Eternal Spring,” said the man at the booth, in rapid Spanish, not noticing I was missing half of what he said. “Uh, thanks, ” I nodded, accepting the travel pamphlet he handed me but really taking a closer look at him. He had bronze skin and wore cowboy boots embedded with a strange cinnamon dust. Not classically handsome, but definitely intriguing. The pamphlet, filled with glossy images of emerald volcanoes and mist-shrouded valleys, made Guatemala look like paradise. Apart from some gruesome images of human sacrifice I’d seen in books on Maya and Aztec civilization in the library, I knew nothing about Guatemala. For me, it was one of the mysterious “G” countries of the world – Guyana, Guam, Ghana, Guinea, Grenada. I’d heard of them but had no real idea where they were. “It’s called Land of Eternal Spring because the temperature is fresh year-round,” he said, unfurling a poster. I looked dutifully at the posters but was really taking in his brown eyes and slim hips. He met my eyes for a deliberate moment. “Want to try some of our food?” he asked, “I’m just closing up the booth.” “OK, but I don’t have much time,” I said. We ate and we talked. I told him I’d just ended a decade-long marriage. He told me he was Catholic and had never married. As he spoke, I could see the Guatemalan village he came from, hear the clump clump of cattle hooves on their way to pasture and feel the heat of the sun as it shone down on the wide valley plain. It reminded me of my own childhood on the prairies, a memory as warm as a cornfield in late summer. We talked until the festival doors closed and the parking lot emptied of cars. He kissed me goodnight under a tall elm tree. In summer, Winnipeg’s gnarled old elms create a leafy canopy that invites privacy. I leaned against the tree bark and he drew me close. It felt natural to be in his arms. He lowered his face to mine, blocking out the rest of the world. When we finally said goodbye at 2:00 am, I was sure I heard him whisper Te amo - I love you.
“I must have imagined how he felt,” I thought. Feeling miffed, I decided to call him. I waited until late on a Sunday night, but almost hung up before he picked up the phone. “How are you?” he asked, his voice low and warm. No mention of the dancing or the elm tree or the imagined whispers. I wasn’t even sure he remembered me. “Would you like to come to my friend’s house for a bowl of soup?” he asked, after a long silence. “A bowl of soup?” I wasn’t sure I’d heard correctly. “Perfect.” Now, it was soup night. “It’s really popular when you have a hangover,” he said, with a smile that suggested he knew I wasn’t keen on the meal in front of me. As he turned to reach for a drink, I took a closer look at his profile. High cheekbones and a straight nose hinted at Mayan ancestry while wiry shoulders seemed to contain boundless energy and enthusiasm. He looked as good as I remembered. “It does smell tempting, ” I said, lifting a spoonful of the broth to my mouth. It tasted wonderful—beefy with a splash of a minty herb. “Make sure you eat the meat,” he said, gesturing with his spoon at the piece of rubber in my bowl. I thought of my sister who had married an Italian. Her first dates had consisted of picnicking in olive groves and hand-tossing pizza dough, not eating what looked like Gumby. “Mama used to make this for us if we were feeling weak,” he said. “It’s full of vitamins.” She was likely right. The gelatin found in animal tendons is full of amino acids good for building muscle and strengthening nails, skin and hair. I used to soak my hands and hair in lemon Jello with my girlfriends during sleepovers. It probably made sense to eat it. I tried to look enthusiastic, but the thought of eating it made me shudder. My childhood meals generally involved Campbell’s Cream of Tomato soup, grilled cheese sandwiches and celery sticks. Nasty bits of meat got stashed in my apron or slipped to the cat. I took a wizened piece in my mouth and chewed trying to separate the wiry gristle from the soft meat with my teeth. I imagined I looked like a cow chewing its cud. “That’s the way,” he said with encouragement. When his attention turned to his own bowl, I removed what seemed to be an elastic band from my teeth, buried it inside a paper napkin and reached for another tortilla. Tucked in a wicker basket and wrapped in a woven napkin, it was freckled with toasted corn; its crispy crust hiding a soft fluffy interior. It fit my hand like a warm mitten. “Why didn’t you call me?” I finally asked. “You seemed like a busy person.” I hadn’t thought I’d looked busy under the elm tree but I guess I was. I’d just been promoted to vice-president at a local mutual fund company. The first woman hired in the company’s investment banking division a few years earlier, I’d risen quickly through the ranks. A degree in Economics and ability to ”think outside the box” had earned me a corner office and invitations to golf tournaments where being the only woman meant I always won the trophy for “Best Lady Golfer.” With my studious glasses, salon-tinted hair and propensity to wear black, I looked like the banker I was. But on our date, J seemed more concerned about getting enough food on my plate than my career. The more I ate, the happier he seemed. “Te gustas?” he asked, leaning close as I bit into what seemed to be a caramelized banana topped with thick rich cream. “It’s platano (plantain) con crema.” Each morsel of food seemed a metaphor for his country. Did I like it? Did I like him? I knew I had to be careful what I asked about or more wiry tendons or chicharron, a wizened fried pork rind that resembled a dog’s chew toy, could end up on my plate. But I nodded an emphatic yes to the sweet plantain, which was sliding enjoyably in my mouth. “Mas por ella,” he shouted, calling for another dish of food from the kitchen. Although embarrassed by the attention, it was fun to watch someone who was so enthusiastic about food. After we ate, he introduced me to his friends. There was Carlos – el loco - named for his dancing style not his mental state and Rolando, a burly security guard who arrived with a bag of perfect tomatoes. They were just a few of the one million Guatemalans in exile. Thousands of political refugees had fled northward from Guatemala in the 1980s and 1990s many settling in Winnipeg as part of the government’s regionalization policy, aimed at spreading the “benefits of immigration” across Canada. A graduate student with a degree in agriculture, he’d been active in a student association, the Asociacion de Estudiantes Universitarios (AEU) when government and paramilitary death squads began targeting union organizers, Maya peasants and others involved in reform. “One month was so bloody, the newspapers called it Black August,” he said. Twenty-two of his friends had been assassinated or abducted, their bodies found by the side of the road – one with his tongue cut out, a message that dissenters would be silenced. Others were never found. First hidden in a church safe house in Guatemala City, he’d escaped to Canada as a political refugee. “They told me I was going to Windsor, Ontario and I thought “Great, I can grow tobacco there,” he said. “But when I got off the plane it was Winnipeg.” “Oh my God,” I said, wondering what it would be like to be whisked from the jungles of Guatemala to a city that’s colder than Novosibirsk, Siberia. The wind chill in Winnipeg often reaches - 47 Celsius, a point where exposed skin freezes in less than a minute. “The first time I saw the Red River frozen solid, I climbed down the riverbank to touch it to see if it was real,” he laughed. He was friendly in a courtly, formal way, and seemed to treat me more as a sister than a prospective girlfriend until the music began and we danced a slow bachata. Our hips in rhythm to the music, its tone mournful rather than fiesta, my hand moved up his shoulder until it rested against the warmth of his neck. My fingertips traced the beginning of a scar. “When I was eight years old and taking the cows to pasture, my horse got spooked by a snake and threw me,” he said, placing his hand over mine. “My head hit a rock.” “It’s hard to believe you were working on the farm that young,” I said. “Now we have ranch hands but then my job was taking the cows to pasture and back,” he said. “Our crew calls me Pancho, short for Francisco.” “You’re known as Pancho? The same as Pancho Villa, the Mexican revolutionary?” I asked, barely stifling a smile. “Don Pancho is a sign of respect,” he said, puzzled by my reaction but going for a flirt. “You could be Doña Panchita.” He lowered my hand to his waist, twining my fingers through his belt loops so I could draw him close. I leaned into his chest and drew in the unexpected fragrance of fresh-baked bread and spice. He touched my cheek and then my lip. I realized there was a real possibility I could get serious with this definitely different man—assuming I could avoid any more cow stomach soup.
Chapter 2 After our first soup date and a series of outings around town, he began spending more time with my two daughters and me. Soon, he had planted a garden in our tiny scrap of a yard. He could edge the lawn, prune a tree and trim a wayward vine with a paring knife. I once saw him hoe a row of vegetables with the toe of his cowboy boot. He could read the sky, predicting rain, wind and clouds like a road map. Tendrils of squash, peas and tomatoes wrapped their way up the stairs and into our home. Despite my growing interest, I was filled with doubts. In addition to language barriers, J was rich in land (back home), but poor in cash. All he owned was a bicycle, not much of an asset in a city where it snowed for six months of the year. And while I knew my employer espoused the merits of workplace diversity, J was well outside the corporate mould. Although innovative thinking was expected, it was still the middle of the Canadian prairies and a very proper place, where pantyhose, a well-cut charcoal suit and executive manners expected. Protocol was key - I could seat guests according to rank and company position, knew which fork to use when dining and carried a good handbag. I knew about the importance of a good corporate spouse. There was only one mixed race couple in the whole company, none in the executive ranks. None were political refugees. I wondered if I would be risking my job by going any further with this relationship in the future. If Javier would be considered an unusual choice in my corporate world, I knew I wasn’t likely the girl his family was hoping for. The eldest son in his family and the first to get a university degree he was the catch of his village and Catholic. I was divorced, hardly a vestal virgin. Was I even ready for a new relationship? Shouldn’t I spend more time single? Hardly a day went by that I didn’t wonder about our future. I spent hours itemizing our differences – I was tall, he was short, he was spirited and I was serious, he was perpetually optimistic, I was a sceptic, his skin was brown, mine was white. I listed each difference as though it were a brick in a wall of insurmountable challenges. The prognosis for our relationship wasn’t good. With 200 ethnic groups in Canada and one in five Canadian singles in a cross-cultural relationship, statistics showed that only 3% got married. According to the experts, family disapproval, differences in value systems and communication styles created problems. I wasn’t convinced he made a long-term match until one hot summer day at Grand Beach, a stretch of white sand on Lake Winnipeg. The sun was shining, children were splashing, hundreds of people jockeyed for space to lay their beach blankets as far as the eye could see. Shortly after we arrived, my 11 year old daughter went missing. “Have you seen H?” I asked. I looked around in panic. Suddenly the laughs of the children sounded like screams. “Is that her?” I asked, running to the edge of the sand. My eyes scanned the surface of the water. The lake’s blue waters were flat. They seemed to hide beneath its opaque surface a body sinking to the sand. Every wet bobbing head looked like a child drowning. None were her. Lifeguards, neighbours, friends, everyone near me began combing the murky waters. J assigned friends to scour the beach in a grid pattern and then struck out on his own, like a bloodhound, for some independent tracking. I hyperventilated in panic and paced the water’s edge. Is that her calling for help? I wondered, turning at the sound of a child shrieking. I imagined hearing the lifeguards’ ominous alert “everyone out of the water” and seeing a line of people shuffling their feet across the lake bottom waiting to bump up against her body. Then I saw J. leading her by the hand from across a pile of rocks from the edge of the bay. “Where was she?” I asked, tears springing to my eyes in relief. “She was over by the rocks looking for sparkling stones,” he said. “She’s OK. Don’t worry.” “I was only gone for two minutes,” she sulked. She wasn’t even aware we were looking for her. “How did you find her?” I asked. “I’ve been harvesting crops, leading cows to pasture and looking for lost livestock since I was six years old, “ he said with a smile. “A lost child, no problem.” I knew right then that not only did I love him but I could depend on his calm strength. His take-charge approach to life was born from an upbringing of hard physical work and heavy responsibilities. I also had to admit that he was the only man I enjoyed being with. I decided to take a leap and resolve the matter by taking our relationship to the next level. I showed up at his apartment with a casserole. “Can I come in? I asked, my stomach in knots but my heart ready. Soon I was sleeping with Don Pancho.
All our cooking together was a way for me to see if we worked as a family. I wanted to be sure of that before we lived together. I wondered if he might find my two daughters overwhelming. Maybe the girls would hate him. Perhaps he’d have annoying habits. The opposite proved to be true. In spite of my doubts about our cultural differences, we “fit.” Life together was easy. We reached a happy state brokered by our love of food. My girls drew comfort from the cultural diversity and positive activity in our home and developed insatiable appetites for refried black beans and fresh tomato salsa. While I dove into Guatemala’s world of comida tipica (everyday food) gleaned from cookbooks and friends, he learned to live in a house filled with girls. Between mysteriously disappearing hairbrushes, thongs that got tangled in our toes in the laundry room and the conga line of teenage boys winding their way through the backdoor, life was full—and happy. Even my career was on the upswing. I imagined our new future--simple and full of everyday moments--stretching out before me. What I didn’t know was that he planned to return to Guatemala. And I’d be going with him. Chapter 3: Guatemala - Meet the Family
It had been five years since he’d fled Guatemala but the country’s political situation continued to be explosive. Attempts to negotiate a lasting Peace Accord had been derailed and serious human rights violations such as assassinations and extrajudicial executions were still taking place. Despite the 1992 Refugee Accord, returning refugees were being murdered. Details on what was now being called a holocaust were emerging – security forces had destroyed more than 600 Maya villages, killed or “disappeared” more than 200,000 people and displaced an additional 1.5 million, many who had fled the country as refugees to Mexico, Canada and parts of South America. “I’ve got to go back,” said Javier one evening, after talking with his mother on the phone. “Crops, cattle, feuding neighbours and flooding, it’s impossible to deal with all of this by phone.” San Vicente had only one telephone and it was shared by the entire village which meant whenever he called a messenger would be dispatched to pick up Mama Tayo from the ranch and bring her to the tienda, a small shop with the community phone. A crowd of neighbours usually gathered to share in the excitement of an international call so there was virtually no privacy. Plus, the connection was poor. I knew in my heart Javier would return to Guatemala one day, but that day had seemed for in the future. Not now. Not this very month. “Can’t you talk to your father and get an update? I asked. “Then go in person when it’s completely safe.” “Guatemala will never be completely safe,” he said. “We’ve been at war since the 1960’s. Plus, my father never talks on the phone.” With rumours circulating that military officers were seizing large tracts of land across the country, Javier wanted to assess the situation in person and he wanted to go soon. “If you’re going, “ I said, sounding braver than I felt. “I’m going.’ I consulted with a Canadian couple who worked for Project Accompaniment, a solidarity program that paired returning Guatemalans with westerners who served as human rights escorts. They had just returned from Guatemala and had some helpful tips. “Enter any vehicles last and exit them first to prevent abductions,” they said. “What about the army?” I asked. I’d read Rigoberta Menchu’s book and knew that safety precautions weren’t always successful. Jennifer K. Harbury, an American attorney was on a hunger strike because her husband, Efrain Bamaca Velasquez, a Maya resistance leader had been kidnapped by the military and was feared dead. “If you’re confronted, don’t cross your arms, keep them at your side,” they said. “You don’t want to look resistant.” First, I needed to buy gifts for the family. I began with his parents and five brothers and sisters. “How many nieces and nephews?” He started counting on his fingers and soon ran out. “19,” he said. “But that doesn’t count godchildren. Add another five to the list.” I dutifully recorded each of their names, gender and age in a column on the left side of ledger. Manageable I thought. “Don’t forget about my tias and tios (aunts and uncles),” he added. . “How many uncles and aunts do you have?” “Tia Maria, Tia Bertha, Tia Milagro, Tia Agusta, Tio Juventino,” He started naming them and then paused. “Should I count the matados?” “Murdered ones?” I asked, thinking I’d lost something in the translation. “Two uncles were shot during the 1950s revolution,” he said. “They were murdered while sleeping. One grabbed his pistol from under a pillow and fought back but died anyway. I was named after him.” That came as a surprise. Not the murders or that people in Zacapa slept with pistols under their pillows, but that he’d never mentioned these uncles. “Let’s just focus on the living ones,” I said, making a mental note to learn more. Little did I know I’d be sleeping in the bedroom they’d been murdered in. We stopped counting at 16 aunts and uncles but by the time we finished with neighbours, our list had 100 names on it. J would look after shopping for his three brothers while I got the rest. Instead of studying the latest U.S. State Department Travel Advisory for Guatemala, I went shopping at Walmart. A few weeks later, as we began our descent to Guatemala’s La Aurora International airport, I peered out the window, eager for my first look at the country. American explorer John Lloyd Stephens had vividly described his first sight of Guatemala in his 1941 book Incidents of Travel in Central America, Chiapas and Yucatan saying “the great plain of Guatimala appeared in view, surrounded by mountains, and in the centre of it, the city, a mere speck on the vast expanse, with churches and convents, and numerous turrets, cupolas, and steeples and still as if the spirit of peace rested upon it…and the general aspect reminded me of the best class of Italian cities.” Since then, Guatemala City had expanded, filling in the valley and spilling up the slopes of the immense mountains that circled the plain. But the sight of the great volcanoes of Agua and Fuego nearly 15,000 feet high looming over the Valley of “la Ermita” was still a thrilling sight. Veiled in cloud they towered over a ramshackle collection of abandoned airplanes lying on the runway. Then one of the planes took off, with a shudder, into the air. Once inside the arrivals area, I decided to have a surreptitious cigarette before meeting Javier’s family. A secret smoker, I knew no-one in his family smoked. Although he had cultivated tobacco on the ranch and I’d seen him rolling cigars between his fingers to release the tobacco leaves’ pungent aroma, no-one in his family smoked. “What about people in the neighbourhood?” I asked, envisioning myself sneaking off to a neighbourhood café. “Maybe some of them smoke?” Javier laughed and shook his head. “The prostitutes do.” Just as I was taking a drag of my cigarette behind a large pillar, Javier said “Look up and wave.” A dozen members of his family stood on the observation deck above us, waving their arms, hats and bandanas in excitement. I later learned that my prospective mother-in-law’s first words when she saw me were “Ella fuma? She smokes?”
In person, his easy-going smile, short stature and slightly splayed feet, made him look like Barney Rubble of the Flinstones, a deceptive impression given he was a university art professor who was well-respected not only for his teaching reputation but for his remarkable recall of statistics. His prodigious memory had even garnered him a win at the Guatemalan TV equivalent of Who Wants to be a Millionaire. “What do you think of our airport renovations?” he asked launching into a detailed outline of the architectural plans – in Spanish so rapid it washed over me in a wave of rolling rr’s. As he talked and I struggled to make sense of what he was saying, we made our way through the terminal. The other passengers fell into one of three categories – returning Guatemalans, backpackers or missionary teams. The latter wore matching colour-coded T-shirts with slogans like “God’s Dream Team” or “Paving His Way for his Holiness.” One earnest group of teens held hands in a prayer circle before leaving the terminal building. I felt like joining them. Jostling through taxi hawkers and idling pick-up trucks, we climbed inside a white Datsun, fitting six adults, three kids and our luggage inside and were off. Looking out the smeared window of the car, my first impressions of Guatemala weren’t positive. The city’s entire population of two million people seemed to be on the road driving at the same time. Traffic fumes filled the car and my eyes watered as though I was crying. “Is everything OK?” Javier asked, looking at my red and swollen nose. “Yes, yes,” I managed to choke out, waving my hand as though having the time of my life. Truth was, I was crushingly disappointed. All I could see were grey factories, industrial parks and long lines of traffic. Brightly painted school buses called “chicken buses” belched black smoke and semi-trailers kicked dust up from the shoulders of the grey pavement. What happened to the “Land of Eternal Spring” I wondered. Far from the lush, green landscape I expected, it looked more like Sarnia’s Chemical Valley. Where were the green hills and verdant valleys? Where were the palm trees? Guatemala City’s setting in a deep valley meant the smog had nowhere to go. It sat, low and poisonous as far as the eye could see obscuring factories producing textiles, metallurgical goods and plastics. At a busy gas station, we turned off the highway and into San Jose Villa Nueva where we inched our way through narrow streets lined by walled properties, each window shuttered like eyes squeezed shut. “Street gangs make it unsafe to go out at night,” said Javier. Organized street gangs such as Mara Salvatrucha, a criminal gang that originated in Los Angeles and spread through Central America brought drug dealing, contract killings and armed robbery. But behind the metal gate locking out the rest of the world, Daniel and Thelma’s home offered peaceful seclusion. High concrete walls circled a terrace with a gurgling fountain surrounded by fragrant jasmine. Avocados hung from a tree in the corner of the patio. The smell of barbecued meat rose tantalizingly from the patio. “Thank God,” I thought as we unloaded our luggage. I was hungry and tired and wanted to wash the exhaustion off my face. Thelma led us through a wrought iron doorway into the dining room where at least 50 people stood to greet us. Within an hour, the house filled with even more people, food and drinks. Wondering what time it was, I dug in my purse for my watch. Everyone immediately assumed I was reaching for cigarettes and lunged to be the first to help. “Sit, sit,” said Thelma, grabbing the best dining room chair and hauling it outside to the patio. Someone scrambled around for a side table. Another held out an ashtray the size of a turkey platter for my use. “No really, It’s not necessary. I don’t smoke that much,” I protested. I sat on my “smoking throne” and a gaggle of children congregated to watch me smoke. As transfixed as though it was Shark Week on the Discovery Channel, their eyes grew big as they watched my every puff.
By the time J joined me on the patio, I was dizzy from the whirlwind of good-byes. “Isn’t this great?” asked Javier, flushed with happiness. I nodded and bent to kiss a woman who was walking past me on her way out. “Vaya con Dios,” I said, air-kissing her on both cheeks, proud I’d mastered a few perfect phrases. May God go with you “Who was that?” I asked, watching as she let herself out the gate. “I have no idea,” said Javier. “She just came to place a cake order with Thelma.” By midnight, most of the visitors had left and, overwhelmed by my evening of kissing and hugging, I retreated to our bedroom, put on a nightgown and began to read a paperback. J still had his boots on, a sign that the night was still young. “Que pasa?” worried his sister, leaving a platter of peeled mangoes outside my door in case I felt faint. Her two daughters knocked on the door and sat on my bed to keep me company. When they discovered I slept with earplugs and a sleeping mask, I became even more of a mystery. “Think of her like Zorro,” laughed J when someone commented on my collection of sleeping masks. I was still in my nightgown and almost asleep when J entered the bedroom a few hours later. “I want to show you something, cielo” he said, taking me by the arm. We tiptoed through the dark hallway past the living room to a set of stairs and then climbed together up to the rooftop, where a large patio overlooked the city. It was a dark, perfect night. I pushed aside a clothesline and was rewarded with an unobstructed view of three volcanoes silhouetted against the moonlit sky. Neon red molten lava poured from the cone of the nearest. “That’s Pacaya volcano,” said Javier, standing behind me, wrapping his arms around my waist. “It erupted in 1965 and has been active ever since.” A cool breeze had picked up but the warmth of J’s body helped ward off the chill of the evening air. We stood watching lava creep like thick blood from the dark cone. It was both ominous and beautiful. I felt warmed as though I was exactly where I was meant to be. The next morning, he was up early, dressed and at the kitchen table tucking into a plate of tortilla de berro, a watercress omelette with a side of refried beans, by the time I had made it out of bed. Thelma had been up since 5 a.m. baking cakes. I’d barely slept. After our rooftop sightseeing, the neighbourhood dogs had started barking. That was followed by a round of gunshots and what sounded like a rooster crowing competition. I had slept maybe one hour and my eyes were puffy and red-rimmed. I was surprised to see Lorena, open J’s suitcase and begin ironing all his clothes -- even his underwear and his socks. I was a bit embarrassed by the wrinkled state of his clothes. Back home, Javier did his own ironing. More often than not, he just splashed water on a shirt and pulled it down to stretch-dry the wrinkles out. Since we’d arrived, I’d seen a different side of Javier’s personality emerge. With his mother, sister, aunt and three female cousins ready to do his every bidding, he didn’t do any household duties. In fact, he dished out orders as though running a NATO command centre. There was already a line-up of people asking advice. “Study computer science,” he said to one cousin. “Sell the truck and build an addition to your house,” he said to another. “Switch to soybeans from corn.” Everything from the condiments on the table to banking was dealt with in lightening-fast efficiency. He’d obviously been the boss his whole life, except for in Canada where we shared decision-making authority. I began to wonder how I’d deal with this new Don Pancho. “Don’t tell my family I wash dishes,” he said, heading out the door.
“Javier,” she said, shaking her head. “He recorded the ages of the kids on the date he left Guatemala. Everyone is five years older now. ” She was right. For example, Julie, who had Sports Barbie beside her name, was now 15 and dating a Mario Lopez look-alike. All the gifts would need to be reassigned. “I’ll help,” said Lorena, who seemed to never tire. While she unpacked the gifts, I took a surreptitious look at her and was struck by how similar she was in appearance to Javier. Thirteen years his junior, she was his female double. With high cheekbones, straight nose, dark hair and amber eyes, it was easy to see how she’d won so many beauty contests in San Vicente. In personality she was more Judge Judy than Mayan princess, outspoken and utterly irrepressible. Soon we had an assembly line of women sorting gifts. Some people, like the nephew who got scented soap, got mismatched gifts while other gifts were not suitable. In Guatemala it’s considered bad luck to give people body products (suggests they have body odour), a kitchen knife (bad luck), North American food products like maple syrup (foreign food makes people sick), towel sets (see body odor reason above) or kitchen chopping appliances (an insult). When it comes to gifts, bottles of Johnny Walker (black), candy and clothing are top choices while microwaves and TVs are even better. For proper presentation, each gift should be wrapped in swathes of cellophane and ribbon until it resembles a plastic mummy. I also needed hostess gifts for each household we would visit. With six social calls a day, my meagre supply of gifts would soon be exhausted so for the second time in a month, I was headed to Walmart. “Today, we’ll go to the Mercado Central,” announced Thelma the next morning over breakfast. Our mission was to get the fixings for pepian a rich spicy sauce served on chicken or beef. “Ready?” she asked as we were about to head out. “Yes,” I nodded. I had my purse, a hat, a bottle of water. I was ready. She took one look at my purse and shook her head. “No purse. Too many pickpockets at the market. Put your money in your shoe.” “All of it?” I gasped. Guatemalan quetzals were large-sized bills. How was I going to fit them inside my loafers? I looked at Thelma’s wide sneakers and realized that the secret was to buy shoes a size or two large. A few minutes later I teetered out, a couple of inches taller, thanks to the wad of cash stuffed in the insoles of my Louis Vuittons. The world’s great cities are enhanced by their food markets. London has the legendary Borough Market, Istanbul has its heady Grand Bazaar and Madrid has the soaring art-deco Mercado de San Miguel where you can munch on chunks of Manchego cheese dredged in Andalusian olive oil. Guatemala has the Mercado Central. Don’t let its simple name fool you. Located in between 8th Street and 8 Avenue behind the Cathedral in Zone One, the site has served many purposes throughout history. Originally used as the city’s first burial grounds, it has also served as the city barracks and, when levelled by an earthquake in the early 1900s it was reinvented as an indoor marketplace. Thelma explained all this as she drove through the exhaust-fuelled traffic of downtown. A lung-blasting smog obscured any view of the volcanoes. “This is nothing. You should see the traffic at Christmas,” she said, swerving to dodge the vendors aggressively selling fresh roses, air fresheners and lottery tickets at the Trebol, Guatemala City’s main traffic interchange. The clouds of exhaust smoke were forgotten as soon as I stepped inside the market. Three sprawling floors, buried beneath a vast parking lot, offered a tempting array of items from wood carvings to Mayan weavings. Pungent cheeses, dozens of varieties of chiles and meats stewing in fragrantly spicy broth were all ready to be explored. The camaraderie of the vendors shouting “chuchitos!” and offering bite-sized samples of small tamales wrapped in corn husks. The two old men playing sentimental songs on their marimba, a rosewood xylophone stashed beside a towering tray of potatoes. The rich fabric of it all, the feeling I could spend every day of my life here and never see it all. I didn’t have time to stop and gawk. Thelma was single-minded in her approach to shopping, navigating the labyrinthine pathways at full speed until we reached the spice section. At each stall, Thelma inspected the goods with a scrutiny worthy of a diamond dealer from Antwerp. She eyeballed each seed for plumpness, sniffed for freshness (and no hint of rancidity) and squeezed for moisture content. Then she began negotiating the price. If the price was too high, we’d move along to the next vendor and begin the process anew. “What’s this used for?” I asked breathing in the heady aroma of an enticingly smoky chile from Coban. “We’ll toast it to bring out the flavour and then grind it with the rest of the spices and seeds,” she said, pointing at a nearby bin. The market vendor, a serious-looking Mayan woman who negotiated her transactions with five customers simultaneously, filled plastic bags with plump pepitoria pumpkin seeds, cinnamon and sesame seeds. We gathered tomatoes, a few springs of cilantro and squeaky fresh green beans. All that was just a preamble to the main attraction – the market’s fresh flower section. Rose production is big business in the Guatemalan highlands where the special alchemy of volcanic soil, cool temperatures and altitude creates perfect growing conditions for roses. Behind the counters of the market’s florerias, aproned florists briskly pruned, trimmed and wrapped roses as large as Frisbees into bouquets. Colours and fragrances spanned the rainbow from fuchsia to pale green. One wedding arrangement was so large it took three men to carry it. An armful of roses cost just two dollars. “If we lived here, I’d buy you rosas every day,” said Javier as he watched me breathe in the fragrance of a perfect violet rose. His comment should have been a clue that this was more than just a family visit and that he was planning for something long term. But dizzy from the sweet smell of thousands of roses, the implication slipped right past me. Back at the house, I headed to the kitchen, where the conversation was as furious as the chopping underway. There wasn’t a cookbook in sight. For me, cookbooks marked life’s milestones: Starting with the chocolate brownie mix of my Easy Bake oven kit to my Grade 8 Home economics cookbook with its recipes for tuna noodle casserole to the Moosewood cookbook from my Vancouver commune days and Jean Paré’s Slow Cooker recipes from my days as a young busy mother. I loved flipping through my 3-ring Betty Crocker Everyday Cookbook (given to me by my aunt ) to find the grease-splattered recipe for chicken fricassee and dumplings. I collected recipes like talismans, creating menus and imaging what to serve and who to invite. Over the next few days, I plunged into cooking freestyle and in Spanish – learning to add ingredients al gusto (to taste) un manojo (by the handful) or how to make tortillas, a Guatemalan culinary staple, a mano by hand. I watched Lorena take a handful of masa the size of an apricot and flatten it in her palm. Then she patted it, turning it around until it was the shape of a drink coaster and no thicker than a business card. Then she popped it on the hot comal, a red clay griddle sitting on the front gas burner. Six tortillas were already cooking on the comal when I began. The flattening part went well but the “pat pat pat” motion that had looked so effortless in Lorena’s hands didn’t. The tortilla dough was soon as dry as old Playdough. “Add a bit more water,” suggested Mama Tayo, who wrapped Lorena’s cooked tortillas, now emitting a nice nutty fragrance, in a woven napkin. She’d made six in the time it had taken me to do one. I picked up speed and eventually produced a series of misshapen circles. In a display of acceptance, even though everyone was able to recognize my tortillas in a stack of hundreds, no-one refused to eat one. Even Daniel who said they looked like pata rajada or a “cracked heel of a foot” ate them with only a moment’s hesitation. Although I was slowly fitting into the rhythm of Guatemalan culture, I couldn’t get over my fear of insects. It was something I’d struggled with since childhood. In Winnipeg, we’d lived in a rambling 15-room Edwardian house which drew insects as effectively as a black wool suit attracts cat hair and I used to hand over my babysitting money to my younger sister for each spider she disposed of. In later years, I had invested in a Bug Vacuum, a battery-operated suction wand that extended to five feet and came with a supply of disposable cartridges to zap insects. Unfortunately, due to its unfortunate resemblance to a weapon, it had been confiscated by airport security. According to Professor Martin Antony of the University of Toronto Psychiatry Department, arachnophobia (defined as an inordinate fear of spiders) has roots in 10th century Europe, when spiders were associated with the plague. Arachnophobics can be classified in two categories: "monitors" and "blunters". Monitors search a room for spiders and if they find one, never let it out of their sight. Blunters do the exact opposite. They do everything in their power to avoid seeing spiders. I’m in the former camp. When I enter a room, my eyes automatically scan the surfaces of the wall, the ceiling and the floor, watching for signs of movement. If something moves, my eyes zero in on it like a homing device. In Guatemala, I was in perpetual full-on phobia, panting, my eyes darting around the room wildly. One day in particular, I was obsessed with a spider I’d seen earlier in the day. As wide as a saucer, it had slowly lifted each of its hairy black legs while walking as though fitting a hooped dress through a narrow doorway. “No te preocupes. Don’t worry,” said Javier standing at the foot of the bed barely hiding his impatience. He was eager to crack open a beer with his brothers in the kitchen. “There aren’t any spiders here,” he said opening his arms like a pontificate. “None. If there are any, they’re outside. Don’t worry.” Just then I noticed what looked like a large red shoe on his shoulder and squinted to see better in the dim light. “What’s that?” I asked He brushed his chest and the red shoe became a winged insect that took off flying, its glossy-shelled body aimed directly at me in bed. Before he could mutter “cucaracha” I started shrieking, an involuntary series of yelps that echoed throughout the house. His brothers rushed into the bedroom, chairs thrown aside in their haste to rescue me. There I was, standing on the bed, flapping the bed sheets as though they were on fire and shaking my hair like a complete lunatic. I spent the night fully dressed, with the covers pulled up to my neck, fretting about spiders, cockroaches and flying insects. The next morning, I couldn’t wait to get out of Guatemala City. Not only would there be no spiders or cucarachas in the truck, but we were going to Lake Atitlan, the honeymoon capital of Guatemala, before heading to the ranch. Things were about to get a lot better I said to myself. Was I wrong. We were about to have our first encounter with the army.
Salpicón de res (shredded beef salad with mint) Serves 6 or more 2-3 pound blade roast 6 cups beef stock or water 8 stalks of fresh mint or hierba buena 2 limes 3 T orange juice (preferably bitter orange or naranja agria) 1 large onion 1 jalapeno pepper 4 tomatoes salt and pepper to taste Method: Simmer the beef in a slow-cooker for 6 hours. Then remove the beef and chill it in the fridge. You can save the beef broth for caldo de res soup, just adding vegetables and serving it with rice later. Remove the seeds and pulp and then dice the tomatoes finely. Mince the onion very finely. You might be tempted to use a food processor to speed things up but don't give into temptation as it will change the texture of the salad. Remove the mint leaves from the stalks and chop them finely. Discard the stems. Remove the seeds and interior of the jalapeno pepper and mince the pepper into tiny pieces. Once the meat has cooled, remove any fat and shred the meat into strips using two forks. Then dice the meat into as tiny pieces as you have patience for. Combine the meat and chopped mint, onion, tomato and jalapeno pepper in a large bowl. In a separate bowl, combine the lime juice from two limes, 3 Tablespoons of orange juice plus salt and pepper. Pour the lime juice mixture over the meat mixture and toss lightly with a fork. Chill in the refrigerator for at least one hour and then serve. Recipe: Pepian (Spicy stewed chicken or beef)Mirciny (Mishy) Moliviatis is a restaurant owner and celebrity chef who is known as Guatemala’s culinary ambassador. I met her in Guatemala City and this recipe is adapted from her popular TV series Sabor de Mi Tierra. Ingredients: 1 pound red tomatoes 2 red bell peppers 1 pound green beans 1 güisquil (chayote) 2 chiles guaque 4 chiles pasa ½ stick cinnamon 2 onions 1 garlic 1 bay leaf 2 ounces squash seeds 2 ounces sesame seeds 3 pounds pork, beef or chicken. If using pork, add one pork rib. 1 pound of potatoes 2 carrots 1 bunch cilantro Salt and pepper ¼ teaspoon achiote 6 tortillas Method Cut potatoes, carrots, green beans, and güisquil Cook the meats in a clay pot with a little water, 1 quartered onion, 4 cloves of garlic. Let simmer until the water is reduced by half. Add carrots, potatoes, green beans, and güisquil. Toast pepitoria (pumpkin seeds) and sesame seeds in dry skillet and grind on coffee grinder Grill tomatoes, peppers, remaining garlic, onion, chile pasa and tortillas until dark brown. Blend ingredients, add ground seeds and add mixture to pot and simmer. Season to taste with salt and pepper. Chile rellenos Directory: wp-content -> uploads -> 2015 2015 -> Police Militarization 2015 -> 2015 ihbb championships: hs history Bowl Round 4 – Prelims First Quarter 2015 -> Wrtp/big step · 3841 W. Wisconsin Ave., Milwaukee, wi 53208 2015 -> Rao bulletin 1 December 2015 html edition this bulletin contains the following articles 2015 -> Darton College 2015 -> Training Workshop on Planning and Implementation of Multi-Sectoral Development Programme (MsDP) in Bihar Date : 6th 2015 -> Rao bulletin 15 June 2015 html edition this bulletin contains the following articles 2015 -> Rao bulletin 1 September 2015 html edition this bulletin contains the following articles 2015 -> Rao bulletin 1 August 2015 html edition this bulletin contains the following articles 2015 -> Science, and transportation united states senate Download 7.12 Mb. Share with your friends:
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