When I first visited Guatemala, I heard that Hemingway said Lake Atitlan was the most beautiful place in the world. Last time I visited, my mum's charge, Andy said it wasn't Hemingway, it was Somerset Maughm. It's a good thing I picked up a guide book: they claim it was Aldous Huxley. I haven't been enough places to agree with any of them but I do remember crossing the lake from Santiago to Panajachel, which are on opposite sides of the lake. The half of the lake towards Santiago was covered by black billowy clouds. The half towards Panajachel was covered by those rich thick foamy white clouds. They met directly over San Pedro, which is in the valley of a volcano, where they crashed, delivering regular bursts of lightning to the little town. I was on the boat with my brother and a friend watching it and we imagined the clouds were shaped like colliding cavalry.
btw, it was Aldous Huxley
Sunrise
Sunset
March 2, 2008
Guatemala #5: Sunrise, Sunset - Lago Atitlan
Guatemala #4: ONIL Stove
The ONIL Stove is one of the fabulous designs which addresses the alarming WHO estimation that over 3 billion people are exposed to poor indoor air quality as a result of dependence on biomass as a fuel source. From their website, the ONIL Stove:
* Reduced smoke emission's from within the dwelling by 99%,
* Increased the cooking surface height - eliminating burns and/or uncontrolled fires,
* Created a 60-70% savings in fuel consumption - allowing for a reduction in deforestation.
Photo courtesy of Mayaan Katz, Flickr.com
February 28, 2008
Guatemala #3: Market
I just love this before and after I found while looking up images for the post on ruins - This is the market in San Pedro (on Lake Atitlan where my mum lives) in 1942 vs. now.
February 27, 2008
Guatemala #2; Mayan Ruins Before and After
These three archeological sites are all in the Peten region of Guatemala. Archaeologists often render ruins as a means of reconstructing the salvaged artifacts into a cohesive picture of the site and it's residents. These "before" pictures give us huge insight into the contemporary "afters". (note: the research I did here definitely whet my appetite for ruins)
Ruins at Uaxactun: The drawing was done by Tatiana Proskouriakoff in 1950. This site was rediscovered in the early 20th century by an American Archeologist.
The site at Tikal is the biggest in Guatemala and the most complete as well. It is very remote and surrounded by jungles. I've never been but I must say, it looks haunted to me. OooooOooOooooooo...
Archeologist Tatiana Proskouriakoff is buried at the ruins of Piedras Negras. Read about the discovery of the panel here by Stephen D. Houston. To recognize the drawing in the bottom photo compare the glyphs on the side of the panel with the monuments at the base of the temple stairs and the faces on the temple with the one in the thick jungle brush. See. Haunted.
Guatemala + Stan = Missing House
I'm off to Guatemala in a few days so I thought I'd do some Guatemala Before and Afters.
In 2005, Hurricane Stan devastated much of Guatemala, Mexico and El Salvador. My grandparents lived in Jucanya which is just outside of the tourist town of Panajachel, Guatemala. This is a before and afters of their awesome house. I was back there last year and crossed the river to their property. When Stan widened the river which ran by the house, it washed away about 40% of the property. The place was stripped, empty and deserted except for the squatter who had set up camp in my old bedroom.
Check out my mom's flickr set of befores and afters.
No need to point out the fact that I'm mourning a villa - I'll post in a bit with some more down to earth B&As.
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