San Pablo

Working with children in the town of San Pablo yesterday was an incredible experience. The main difference between San Marcos (where I am staying at La Cambalacha) and San Pablo is economic. The presence of tourism in San Marcos provides a much larger cash flow. Even more noticeable, however, is the difference in the way the ecosystem is incorporated into each village. In San Marcos, everything is green and lush, with small foot paths and only a few roads up in the hills, providing for a jungle-like atmosphere. By contrast, San Pablo is a concrete jungle, with ramshackle houses constructed from cement and tin scattered over pot-holed concrete roads.

There is a small center for arts instruction in San Pablo where La Cambalacha brings about 20 or 30 of the village´s children twice a week. To pick up the children, we literally used a pick up truck, driving around the roads and yelling, ¨La Cambalacha...vengan a jugar!¨The children came running from their homes, or jumped up from the streetside where they were sitting with family and weaving clothes or working on the day´s meal.

Barefoot, the children dove into the first game, which consisted of ¨racing¨ bottlecaps over a chalk-drawn race course. Then, we had an African culture day, focusing on acting, dancing, singing, drumming, and learning folktalkes from Africa. It went pretty well. The most striking thing was the difference in the way the girls in San Pablo acted compared to the girls who come to La Cambalacha to play and study. Even though many of the girls at La Cambalacha are actually from San Pablo, when they are here they change into playclothes and interact quite well with other children. In San Pablo itself, however, the girls were quiet, and barely spoke, and only moved when urged to. None of them changed out of their traditional dresses into playclothes. They seemed to enjoy the games anyway: there were no shortages of smiles and giggles. But there was definitely less involvement.

Back at La Cambalacha, we are already a few hours into another day of dance, yoga, and theater. During our time off from these activities, Ashleigh and I are dedicating ourselves to harvesting the basil plant and making pesto sauce. Last night, we had the pleasure of enjoying a bright, full moon shining over Lago Atitlán, reminding us of the sacredness and unparalleled natural beauty of this place we are in.