--Kiss me, I´m drunk--

--- and other tacky tee shirt slogans from the package tour paradise of Playa del Carmen, Mexico.

After a 12 hour bus journey I´ve landed in another world. Actually Playa looks strangly similar to the Gold Coast (even down to the salespeople pushing time-share condos) but with burritos and marriachi music (and drunk American 16 year olds).

It´s been raining constantly for the last two days. Lots of annoyed Americans wandering around in ponchos and eating at MacDonalds. It´s quite a shock to the system after Belize, but a good cultural experience none the less. Still, I´ve had the experience now and I´m quite happy to move on.}

Moving on should be fun and easier than I expected cos I´ve run into 2 women I met in Guatemala. Sue (from South Africa) and Michelle (from New Zealand) are travelling together for the moment and were planning on going to Cuba as well. So we´ve decided to go together. Now its just a question of finding flights (and an open travel agency) and hopping a Cubana Fokker Friendship over to Havana for some Cuban rum and revolutionary fever.

Can´t wait.

--Jah loves you--

-- or so the graffiti on the way back to my hotel says.

Another day in paradise (why are tropical islands always described as paradisical, and snow covered mountains or meadows of golden corn never are?). It's nice here. There's the water (though not much beach), and sand and palm trees, and it's warm. But its also quite scruffy and the sand is not neccessarally a good thing, and its warm in a lot of places. And then there's the presence of the 13 member American Evangelical Mission who set up an electric organ in the bandstand past the basketball court and played Jesus-loves-you-karaoke for 4 hours last night. Definitely not included in my definition of paradise.

Not that I'm having a bad time, but the world is complex and even paradise has its mosquitos (and evengelical christians)

This blog entry really isn't going anywhere is it? Seems I've succumbed to the island groove already. Can't keep my thoughts on track enough to write a serious entry. That and I haven't actually done much. Spent yesterday wandering around the town, then sitting in the hammock at the end of my hotel's private dock (yes my hotel has a private dock!) singing loudly to Ani di Franco and writing my diary. Doing my washing was the most chore-like thing I did all day.

It poured with rain last night and was incredibly windy. Got an idea of what a hurricane might be like (but obviously 100 million times worse). This morning then all the other people who were going to go Manatee spoting on the tour I was planning had pulled out (pity cos the weather's fine now). So no mannatees for Bec. Oh well.

It's been nice to bum around for another day. There's worse ways to spend your time (like the bus ride I'll be taking tomorrow for example)

--UnBelizeable!--

Sorry, I had to do it. The above is the current tourist slogan for Belize. Whatever overpriced ad agency thought of that should be shot!

Went snorking yesterday. It was cool, saw lots of colourful fish and stuff.

Caye Caulker is nice, although the Rasta-man (my term) mentality is getting on my nerves. This is one place where being a woman with dreadlocks can cause unwanted hassle.

Sample encounters as a walk down the street:

Random Rasta-man lounging by the side of the road: Hey Rasta!

Me: (various responses including: ignoring them, "Hey man!", nods and, Belizean style one finger waving - like your grandma used to do when you ate too much chocolate cake.)

What ever the response:

Rasta: Come over and talk to me/Lets get together woman!

Me: (various expression of the negative)

Rasta: then you ain't no Rasta baby! (did I ever say I was?) If you a rasta then we gotta do it three times a day... etc. etc.

Repeat above conversation every 10 metres or so.

It's always just talk, but can put a damper on relaxed enjoyment of the day.

I'm off to eat some lunch now.

Cheers

bec - the non-rasta woman

right now rasta!

(or "Hey girl with dreadlocks, I'll get to that sometime in the next 100 years, if I can be bothered")

I'm on the island of Caye Caulker, Belize (actually its redundant to say island when you say Caye but hey!).

It's very relaxed here, sand streets and wooden buildings (god help them in the - frequent - hurricanes). It's expensive though, have found a hotel room for $50 Belize (same in Australian) oh well, how many times in their life does the average Aussie get to Belize. Am going snorkling in half an hour, determined not to waste any time. I stayed last night in Belize city. Had been warned that it wasn't very nice and basically to go straight through it as quickly as possible, but I found it ok. It's very run down and decrepit but has a certain charm, There's still a British colonial charm to parts of it, and it feels very caribean - what I imagine parts of Jamaica would feel like. It's only about a foot above sea level. Very scary to walk along the sea wall and see how bloody useless it is.

Wassup Taliban!

Hey all. This is the greeting most often heard on the streets of San Ignacio, Belize. I asked people if they ever got offended being called the name of a repressive fundementalist cult and they looked at me like I was insane and said 'it's just a joke'.

I've been told that my blog was too short last time. I was just tired. I'll give you all more detail today. So over the weekend I decided to stay in San Ignacio and see some of inland Belize. THis was mainly because I'd forgotten that Belize doesn't have any ATM's and since it was the weekend I couldn't get any money out of the bank so I was virtually penniless. I found a nice health food, coffee, internet and tour place that takes visa card though so I did some souvenier shopping, webbing, and booked a tour all on my visa.

This was on Saturday night. I hung around the shop till it nearly closed and then went out looking for something to eat. I'd decided on Chinese and was heading to the resturant when I heard someone call my name (a very rare event when you're travelling on your own). It was Miriam and Eff from the health food shop. Turns out they were also heading for the same Chinese restaurant and they invited me to join them. Miriam is originally Dutch and has moved out here with her whole family - sister, husband and parents. They own the shop and a real estate business in town (anyone want to buy their own island, you can have a slice of Belize on the Carribean for only $250, 000 US). Eff is 17 and originally from El Salvador. He's a lot of fun. After dinner they were going to the movies. The movie theatre is one of only 2 in the country. Actually it's more like a bare concrete room with folding chairs and a big screen TV. It's boiling hot in there and so there's about 5 fans going at full blast so you can hardly hear the film. We watched Antwone Fisher, which unfortunately is very talk heavy, but it was fun. Not even the mouse scuttering around on the floor was a problem.

Then went to a bar called the Culture Club for a drink. Listened to reggae music and avoided the rastafarian hustlers looking to sell dope. It was a really nice night out. Miriam and Eff were so friendly.

Yesterday, I went on a tour of the countryside with a nice Canadian couple from Saskatoon (on the Prairies) and Gonzo, the very knowlegable guide.

Belize is really beautiful but like most majority world countries it is being eaten alive by private companies and unscrupulous dealing. Gonzo was telling us that everything is privatised, even the caves and stuff like the marine terminal, so that when the cruise ships dock they pay a corporations and the country gets nothing. He was also telling us that much of the land we were passing through (rainforest) is going to be flooded for a huge (and obviously unneccesary) dam project. Grr.

On the way to the Bartons Creek cave we passed an Amish community. Apparently there's lots of Amish and Mennonites in Belize, tehy moved here in the 1950's. It was fascinating to see all these people and the simpler life they lead (although the differences in orthodoxies was interesting - the Mechanised Mennonites will use motorised vehicles like tractors but will often put iron wheels on them, whilst the Amish eschew motors and use horse and buggy, but put rubber tractor tires on them!).

It was sunday so when we passed through they were all at Church. The churched has a hat rack outside and all their straw hats were lined up in rows. They don't like their picture being taken (understandable) and they ask that people passing their land dress 'appropriately' but they were also very curious about us, at the church door as we passed were 20 or so blond, germanic faces watching us go.

The cave was beautiful, we paddled in on inflatable kayaks. Sometimes the roof is 100 metres over head and sometimes you have to crouch right down to get through. The stalatites and other formations were just spetacular, you can't imagine that rock could be so fragile. There were also some Mayan relics in the cave including pots and a skull. It was really incredible.

After this we had lunch at a really fancy resort called the five sisters and then went to a waterfall called big rock falls for a swim. I was really nice. On the way back we passed the resort owned by Francis Ford Copala (of 'Godfather' fame) and its private airstrip. It looks like it's pretty spectacular. Would have been more so I've sure before a bug-born disease killed most of the huge pine trees in the forest. THe hills look pretty bare now. I wonder what Copala thinks of that.

Lots of big stars come to Belizze apparently. Everyone has stories of seeing Camran Diaz on the street or taking Robin Williams on jungle treks.

So now I'm back in the health food shop. Have got some money out of the bank so I feel liquid again. Have to go back to the hostel and pack my things for the beach.

Belize

In Belize. - I know most of you don't know where it is. Should look it up.

Its a great country, and a perfect holiday destination. Multicultural, english-speaking, Carribean in feel. Heavily focused on eco-tourism.

I like it a lot. I didn't mind speaking spanish all the time, but it's so relaxing not to have to bother and I get to meet more people and have meaningful conversations with them.

Am going on a tour of some caves tomorrow, then swimming in a waterfall which should be nice. Love to all....

Flores

Still in Flores. I went to the ruins of Tikal yesterday. Very nice. Not a patch on Angkor Wat (or Ayuthaya or Sukhothai) but then comparisons are mostly meaningless. I really liked that it was in the jungle. Saw spider and howler monkeys and lots of other animals. It started raining in the afternoon and I got absolutely soaked in the 2 minutes before I could find shelter. Have met 2 Irish women, Emir and Podragan (spelling?) who are very nice.

We went today to a conservation area and walked in the forest, which was very nice.

Tomorrow I head for Belize.

Flores Bound

I´m now in the town of Flores, easiest homebase for visits to the Mayan ruins of Tikal.

It was very hard to leave the Finca, I loved it so much and met some lovely people. Yesterday I hiked up a mountain called the Pyramid. An hours hike up (as in pretty much straight up) a narrow jungle path. Most of the climb was pulling yourself up with vines and stuff, and coming down was basically just slinding down on your bum. The views from the top were amazing though.

This morning as I was getting ready to leave one of the monkeys escaped and had a great time playing around the farm and eating everyone´s lunch. It was very cute.

I´ll head to Belize in a couple of days. Yay, English speaking country! More relaxing, even though I love Guatemala.

Definitely want to come back to Central America, there´s so much to see!

Surfacing...

... from the wilds of Guatemala's backwoods to send you all an update.

I've been away from Internet access for a while but when you hear what I've been doing you might be glad you weren't told about it in advance!

I left Coban with Tim and Eric, a nice Swedish couple I met. We took a minibus to Fray Bartholomew de las Casas, a tiny, nothing town in the middle of nowhere. The bus was ridiculously crowded. We had 23 adults and 4 children in a minibus designed for 16! but it was fine, and the scenary was very nice. It's great to see rural Guatemala. Lots of forested hillsides and tiny houses in the middle of nowhere. It really is very beautiful. We got to Fray after 4 hours and checked into a cheap hotel cos the bus we wanted to take to Poptun (our next stop) leaves at the ungodly hour of 3 in the morning. Spent the afternoon wandering around Fray and being the hotest attraction in town - Fray is a very small place and we were the only foreigners in town that day. Got up at 2:30 and stumbled out to the bus stop only to find the bus driver and his helper still asleep in hammocks strung up in the bus. The bus leaves when they wake up. So we had fun experiencing what a tiny Guatemalan town looks like at 3:00am for a while until the bus finally got moving.

The road from Fray to Poptun was very nice, but I was asleep for most of it so I only caught glimpses. Just before Poptun I took my leave from Tim and Eric. I wanted very much to go to a travellers retreat thingy called the Finca Ixobel and I couldn't convince them to come with. So I jumped (not literally mum, don't worry) off the bus at the front gate and ended up at the Finca which is where I still up.

It's a lovely spot started by an American couple 20 years ago. It's in the jungle on lots of land and its a very relaxing place to hang out and meet other travellers. They have lots of trips and tours going as well.

Two days ago I went inner tubing down a river. It was very fun but the water was too low (the rains haven't really hit here yet) to do serious white water stuff. Mainly we just floated along looking at the jungle and the river. Occassionally we'd float past a group of Guatemalans doing their washing. We must have looked ridiculous, 7 foreigners on innertubes with bright orange life jackets and helmets floating past. We got soem very strange looks!

Yesterday I went on a big trip to a cave system. It was very adventurous. First you walk for 2 hours through the fields and jungle to the cave mouth and then 2 hours in the cave, which has a river running through it so sometimes you swim and often you wade. It's pitch black inside and the only light comes from your torches. After walking for an hour in the cafe you come to a 4 metre high waterfall which to get down from you have to jump. You have to me careful where you jump cos although the right spot is very deep, there are hidden rocks.

After that the river disappears into an underground passage before the cave opens up again. To get to this bit you have to swim underwater for 3 metres in a flooded tunnel, there's no airspace above you, only rock, so you just have to swim until you get to the other side. It's not really that dangerous, there's a rope that you grab onto to pull yourself along, and the guide goes through first and then shines his torch under the water, so you just follow the light. It only takes about 5 seconds but it feels like forever when you're doing it. So after that there's a bit more caving and another waterfall and then back the same way you went in. Through the underwater passage again, up a rope next to the 4 metre waterfall and an hours trek out of the cave and another 2 hours walk back.

It was exhausting but very cool. I can't belive I did it all - and I'm not sure I would again. It was fun, but once is enough.

I like the Finca alot. I've met lots of people, including a lovely woman from St Kilda, and its nice just to hang out. I'll probably leave tomorrow for the ruins of Tikal and then across to Belize.

Busses

Just a short note cos I´m about to catch a bus. I had a fabulous time yesterday at Semuc Champey, a series of incredibly beautiful limestone pools in the jungle. Went swimming a lot and relaxed. I´ve met a lovely Swedish couple called Tim and Eric, we´re meeting up in a few minutes to catch the bus together to Fray Bartholomew de la Casas, the next leg on our trip north.

My email is playing up a bit on this computer so I´m afraid I can´t check it. If you´ve sent me emails I{ll have to reply to them at my next stop. There might be a few days between emails, cos the towns I{m going through are really small and might not have internet access but rest assured that I{m safe (and now have 2 big strong male protecters!)

love to all

waiting time

I'm wasting time at the internet cafe (the annoying one with spyware installed that interveres with the internet - one thing it does is prevent me from pressing [enter] in this page - so sorry no line breaks). All set for Guatemala (well, I'm broke, but apart from that). Don't really know much else to say right now. It's nice being back at the co-op, got a nice sleep in this morning - something that's nearly impossible in a hostel dorm. Weather is back to being nice again. Have to get prepared for heat I guess. I can't quite imagine it after so long with snow. I miss home - not that I'm not excited about travelling, its just that I've been away for so long and I miss you all. I got some mail at the co-op while I was away, most of it was junk but I also got a package from Sam (thanks Sam) with a little Pocket Travel Spell pack - it was so lovely - I'm really glad I got back to the co-op so I could get it. I'll do the spell tonight and think about what home means to me. Much love to all of you and happiness too.

Coban

Am now in Coban. This is a tiny rural town sort of north of Guatemala City for those of you who are following on a map (and Anne, yes I am waving back at you). There's not much to do in Coban itself - not that that's a bad thing - but relatively nearby are some beautiful caves and waterfalls. I might do a tour tomorrow.

To get here I did a bus mini-marathon from Antigua. Ordinary 'chicken' bus (named because of the main cargo or because of the drivers' favourite game?) to Guatemala city and then another slightly more classy (as in it was an actually coach rather than an old school bus) bus for the 5 hours to Coban. It was actaully easier than I expected. I'm totally used to crowed buses and invisible 3rd passing lanes from Thailand so that stuff doesn't faze me and what I thought would be the hardest part - getting a taxi from where the Antigua bus stopped to where the Coban bus left and not getting lost or ripped off - turned out to be easy. Once all the other passengers from the Antigua bus got off, the bus driver offered his bus as a taxi to the Coban terminal for the same as I'd been told a taxi would have cost. Pretty bizzarre taxi service for one person but hey, it made things very easy. We stopped for lunch at a comedor (resturant) in the middle of nowhere and I nearly lost my bus when it decided to leave when I was in the loo, but luckily it was stopped 10 m up the road for roadwork so I managed to catch it. Lucky, cos that would have been annoying.

I haven't been taking as many photos as usual. The pro-photo vibe isn't really there with most people. I don't think they'd appreciate me snapping away and I don't want to offend. That and there used to be rumours that white women were targeting indigenous children for kidnapping (and selling of their organs), a few years ago there were a couple of instances of tourists being attacked by outraged villagers after they showed too much interest in local children. That was way out in the villages though, and a long time ago. Still I'm keeping my photo taking low profile.

It's a pity though cos I want to show you all so much of this. It's so beautiful and fascinating and just cool. Oh well, there's lots of books out there with better pictures than I could take anyway.

Thinking of you all and having fun,

b

Casa de Mundo

Hi all,

Have just spent 3 days in a beautiful hotel called the Casa de Mundo (follow link on www.aititlan.com to see pics of it). It was lovely. Next to Lake Aititlan, which is an amazinginly beuatiful volcanic lake that's 360m deep surrounded by volcanos. Went swimming (in the lake) and read my book a lot and met heaps of people. Dinner was a communal affair with all the people in the hotel so it was easy to get to know people. There was even a cat that came and slept on my bed with me.

Happy Bec.

I'm heading to Coban tomorrow on the bus. Have received lots of local advice and this seems easy enough and safe. Don't worry about me I'm having a great time and being careful. I can't phone through. It's really not possible.

I'm back in Antigua at the moment. It's a nice easy stopover on the bus route. (and I like the place!)

I don't know how much time I have on the computer so if I don't get a chance to reply to you're emails separately I will soon.

Much love always

$%^@ Americans

I had breakfast this morning with an American backpacker called Jonathon. He was pleasent but kind of odd. I asked him how long he'd been travelling for and he said 3 years. But then it turned out that he'd only left American 3 weeks ago. He said he'd been in Panajachel 2 weeks but then said he'd only got here yesterday. We had an interesting (disturbing) talk about poverty and street kids. He subscribes to the 'spiritual' version of poverty. Basically the 'I as a rich westerner don't have to care about the poverty of the rest of the world cos they are just inherently different from us. Although it would be very difficult for an american child to be homeless, the kids in majority world countries really don't mind. They're happy, and they don't need luxories like food or shelter, cos they're just so spiritually rich.' He even told me that if [the particular street-kid who was trying to sell us stuff at the time] died tomorrow, he (the streetkid) wouldn't care! I asked him if that wasn't cos they had nothing left to live for and he looked down at me and said, no it was cos they were just living in the moment.

Sigh. Whatever gets you through the night I guess. Whatever lets a rich american feel comfortable slumming his was around the South without having to think to hard about the inequality you see everwhere.

--Panajachel, Lake Aititlan--

Hi all, I arrived by bus in Panajachel on the shores of lake Aititlan this morning. I seem to have found all those tacky tee-shirts that were missing from Antigua. I'm not sure I like Panajachel much - actually I know I don't - it reminds me of all the horribly tourist destroyed towns I've been to in Thailand. The poverty is much worse though and I'm completely sick of snobby "I'm so good for coming here I should get a medal, in fact by sitting in this cafe discussing the problems with the international development community - by which I mean the US Peace Corps, cos that's the only develpment group I, as an American have ever heard of, and no I don't think the fact that the the same country funding the peace corps work with war victims etc was the country that funded the war to begin with is at all ironic - I am single-handedly defeating poverty in the time it takes to drink my beer and shoo away 3 children selling bracelets", standoffish American 20 somethings.

And wow that was a long rant wasn't it? To tell the truth I think I'm experiencing a bit of culture shock. It'll die down in time. I don't think I'll stay here long.

Guatemala's a hard place to travel in. There's no shortage of other travellers but its very hard to meet them, (see above re majority of travellers' attitudes), there's lots to see and do but its hard to get anywhere. Without much more Spanish than I have the public buses are difficult and although there's lots of tourist shuttles, I'm not sure how safe they are. Have heard they can be a target for bandits and I don't really want all my stuff stolen, insurance or not.

The language thing is really interesting. Every traveller here speaks some spanish - most of them, since most of them are American and Americans learn it at school - speak it almost fluently at least for travel purposes. On the other side, very few Guatemalans, even those involved in the tourist industry (like the people running my guesthouse) speak any English at all. There is thus a real need to know Spanish. This is, of course, a bit difficult for me (although I'm getting there, I can now understand "The entrance fee is 30 quetzales unless you have a student card in which case it will be 15" although I couldn't possibly say that myself.) But it's a welcome change from traveling in Asia. Before I came here I'd tell Canadians where I was going and the first thing they'd ask is if I could speak spanish and then look variously pitious, dismayed or disapproving when I said I didn't. No one has ever asked me if I can speak Thai when I tell them about a Thailand trip.

Anyway I'm rambling a bit. One thing I'm finding really fascinating is the indigenous Mayan culture that has remained so strong around here. The majority of the people are Mayan (as opposed to Latino) and most where traditional costume - including a number of men. The costume - especially the huipil (skirt) reminds me alot of south-east asian costume, but then skirts made of a single rectangualar piece of fabric are pretty common everywhere.

I'm on the look out for a 'small box thing with a lid' for mum's trinket table, but Guatmala is really more of a textile place than a box place. Thankyou to Anne and Jen for writing me emails. It means a lot to me to get them, especially now when I can't speak to you on the phone and it's easy to get lonely. To the rest of you who are reading this blog (and I know you are, that's what that counter at the bottom is for) *please* write me a comment or send me an email (rjsha1@student.monash.edu.au). Especially if your last name matches mine (and get mum to write me a letter and get Melva to type it in). It's really not that difficult and it really helps me. So grr! Do it. It's so sad to log on finally after a few days and not have a single comment.

So that's my pep-talk out of the way. Will write more about my experiences soonish. We'll see.

In traveling fun - bec

Guatemala

Just another short note. I just checked my results for my Canada courses and I kicked! (for the parents - that¢¥s good!)

Pity these marks aren¢¥t recorded for Monash - they¢¥d really look good on my transcript.

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-- GUATEMALA --

Ok so here I am in Guatemala. Antigua to be precise. It¢¥s gorgeous here. All cobble-stone streets and stone houses painted in bright colours. It¢¥s so lovely. I haven¢¥t taken any photos yet. It¢¥s hard, the whole of Antigua is a photo. Everywhere I look is an amazing unique vista and I can¢¥t work out where to start.

Sam, I havent found the Swiss cafe (although I have found a Bavarian bar so Jenny will be happy!), but I{ve have great fun just walking around.

Haven¢¥t done much of anything. No climbing volcanos or 2 day 1 night tours of Copan for me. I haven¢¥t even visited any of the churches yet. I¢¥ve just been walking and looking and cafe-hopping.

There¢¥s lots of other travellers here, mostly earnest types learning Spanish. The atmosphere is very different to tourist towns I¢¥ve been to in Asia - there¢¥s hardly a tacky tee-shirt seller to be seen. Actually there{s hardly any shops at all to be seen. Since the town is world heritage listed all the shops etc (even the MacDonalds) are hidden within old colonial buildings. There{s few signs and almost no street lights. I¢¥m aware this is all slightly artifical, and must be very different to most Central American cities, but its a good introduction for me.

I¢¥m having fun, although I{m aware I can¢¥t stay here forever and I need to start working out where to go next and how to get there (why do all the buses in majority world countries seem to leave at 7 in the morning!)

Much love to all. I think I¢¥lll have to be communicating mainly by this blog and email for a while - phone service to Australia is really not all that accessible. But I¢¥m thinking of you all. Send me comments so I know you¢¥re reading this and I don¢¥t get lonely. -b