Navidad en Xela

Leaving Antigua we headed straight for Quetzaltenango, usually referred to as Xela, skipping world famous Lago Atitlán, despite a glowing recommendation from our friend Fay. Unfortunately in the last couple years the lake has become so polluted that almost everything has died except for an invasive type of bass and a huge bloom of algae that thrives on the pollution. Furthermore, we heard from several sources of a lynching in Panajachel, a town on the lake usually referred to as Gringolandia. As I understand it, several thieves were caught by some locals and lynched in broad daylight in front of slack-jawed ex-pat onlookers. When the strongly distrusted police arrived the vigilantes turned on them, setting their vehicles ablaze. So, hoping to get home before we earn the label elderly, we decided to give it a miss.

Instead we spent about a week in Xela, which we loved. It is the second largest city in Guatemala, though it is still fairly small, only 140,400 people according to Lonely Planet. It has a university, a pretty central square decorated for Christmas, a nice cemetary (good God, not more cemetary photos!), excellent restaurants, the oldest bar in Guatemala, friendly people, and Vrisa, the best used bookstore in Latin America.








We settled ourselves down at the Hotel del Quetzal, a simple and inexpensive place with a comfortable bed and friendly people and no other guests, making it quite quiet, except for the fireworks and the Tuesday night when a Mariachi band decided 2am would be a good time to start a performance. I don't think we will ever attain the Latin American ability to tolerate noise.

Before Christmas we took a couple of day trips in the area. One to an inexpensive but luxurious hot spring spa up in the mountains called Fuentes Georginas, the other to a striking church in the small town of San Andrés Xecúl.








Christmas is a raucous event in Xela. The big night is Christmas Eve when the locals go to church, indulge in a tamale feast, and at midnight fill the night with rockets and explosions. Not so much a War on Christmas (copyright, NewsCorp.) as a War of Christmas.

We started by going to the Catholic mass at the cathedral officiated by an impressive bishop. Despite microphone trouble and frequent interruption from fireworks and trucks bristling with speakers manically announcing local sales to bass-heavy dance music, the bishop managed to give a forceful sermon linking the joyous birth of Jesus to his death on the cross and reminding the faithful of the meaning of all the food, rum, and fireworks.

I was touched by the diversity of the worshippers. Some were dressed in fine clothes, many women in beautiful traditional dress, but most were dressed quite simply. At the beginning of the ceremony a family carried a wooden baby Jesus up the aisle, a great honor I imagine. Somehow it was all the more lovely because the young boy was wearing a denim jacket with the words "Turtle Power" and cartoon characters embroidered on it and was followed by his big sister in electric pink Barbie boots.

No one invited us for tamales, so we sipped some delicious Zacapa rum, a Christmas present from Hilary before going back out to the square around midnight to join in the bomb throwing, having procured an impressive collection over the preceding days. The highlight was the look on a little boy's face when we handed him a roman candle just starting to shoot its eighty flaming balls. As we were finishing up we ran into Steve and Sarah, Americans we had met at the bookstore, and they invited us to a great party at the Yoga House for Christmas night. At the party we met many interesting people and stayed until the early hours of the morning.









We ended up staying an extra couple days in Xela, recuperating. We walked around a bit, enjoying the architecture and the crazy store signs (my favorite: "For Lady Men's"), basking in a slack sort of city life while sporting my The Dude Abides t-shirt, a birthday present from our friend Steffen (now back in Germany--we miss you Steffen!). But mostly we lay around reading books and resting and hoping next year to be surrounded by friends and family.