A Tour of the Guatemalan Highlands
My husband, Jason, and I had walked about 50 feet, when suddenly two beaming Mayan children greeted us. We heard it was common to be approached by local youngsters offering walking tours or asking for money.
The boy and girl – no more than 10 years old – wore grimy clothes and had faces smudged with dirt. You could tell they lived in harsh conditions. But the girl stood out, because tucked in her left arm was a live white chicken. Oddly, the bird seemed very comfortable, like a baby with its mother, and didn’t make a sound.
In English, they asked us our names.
“Jason y Linda!” the kids squealed. They fancied my name, which means “beautiful” in Spanish.
When Jason asked for their names, they responded in Spanish.
“It turns out,” Jason said laughing, “his name happens to be Jason, and hers is Linda.”
So we adopted them as our tour guides.
******
“Do you want to see MaximÃ?¡n?”
Several Guatemalan towns have shrines to MaximÃ?¡n, an idolized Mayan god. The most famous effigy is in Santiago AtitlÃ?¡n. Demonstrating the complex relationship between the Maya and Spanish conquistadors of centuries past, MaximÃ?¡n’s attributes represent a combination of religious beliefs.
We hiked up a steep path and came to an open doorway.
Inside, flashing red and green Christmas lights, paper streamers, and gold-glittered shapes dangled from the ceiling. The air was thick with ceremonial smoke. Light from dozens of candles softened the stoic faces of several Mayan men seated on a bench against the back wall.
A short wooden MaximÃ?¡n figure sat in the center of the room. The statue wore a long-sleeved shirt and pants decorated in the area’s signature patterns and a wide-brimmed hat. A lit cigarette, half its length already ash, hung in its mouth. An old man danced around the figure, swinging a tin can of burning incense.
Jason and I stood with our backs to the wall, unsure of how to show proper respect to their deity. Then a man gestured for us to present an offering, so we dropped some coins into the money jar.
Afterwards, we meandered back to the main square and rested in front of Santiago’s sixteenth-century Catholic church. Its white, freshly scrubbed faÃ?¯Ã?¿Ã?½ade contrasted with lines of orange and pink triangular flags strung throughout the plaza. The square bustled with villagers preparing for a festival the next evening.
The girl pleaded with us to join the celebration. We hadn’t planned on staying overnight and the last boat to Panajachel was leaving in 15 minutes.
That night, we ran into an American who had taken our boat but to a different village. We started to tell him about our excursion to Santiago Atitl�¡n.
“My language teacher said to expect aggressive kids at the pier,” he chuckled.
“Oh, we saw them!” we said.
He added, “Especially some boy and a girl with a white chicken. She said they’re con artists!”
We have no reason to believe they were or were not. But they showed us an unforgettable side of Guatemalan life. I know our trip wouldn’t have been nearly as rewarding without Jason, Linda and the white chicken.
