WHY I LIVE IN GUATEMALA

I live in Guatemala because each day I wake up and see the volcano called Agua out my window. As the day goes on, the volcano changes before my eyes; first it’s clear against a blue sky, then the clouds roll in and I only see the top of the cone; then it’s totally covered by mist and clouds. By the evening, it may re-appear. It’s almost like a point of focus for meditation--a lesson in mindfulness as I watch the volcano out the picture window facing the desk where I do my work: my computer keeping me in touch with the rest of the world…Agua bringing me back to the here and now.

I first visited this Central American country in 1975, and fell in love— Guatemala is one of the most beautiful places I’ve seen. Within its borders are pristine rainforest, monumental ancient Mayan cities, and what Aldous Huxley called the most beautiful lake in the world, the majestic and mysterious Atitlan. Almost thirty years later, I returned on a Fulbright scholarship to work with indigenous radio stations. When it was time to leave, I just couldn’t do it.

Somehow, Guatemala feels like home to me. Home is where I’ve found balance and a healing sanctuary …home is where it’s ok not to do anything at all every once in a while…home is where I often go to sleep by eight in the evening—something absolutely unheard of in my former life.

In my former life I worked twelve plus hour days; in my former life I was “important” …in my former life I was my work. Here I’m the person who lives and works and meditates and sometimes tries to write and no one really knows about it. And that’s just fine.

In this life a simple morning greeting from Don Santos the gardener brings a golden light of joy lasting the whole day. An exchange at the laundry or the corner store can be an exquisitely sweet encounter.

Not everything in Guatemala is sweet of course. “One of the most violent countries in the world” is how the European union recently characterized this place I now call home. And if you takes a look at the State Department’s Consular Report on Guatemala it may make you run for your life: Violent criminal activity has been a problem in all parts of Guatemala for years, including murder, rape, and armed assaults against foreigners, is how it starts, and it gets more frightening as the details emerge.

One of these details is that Guatemala is a developing country attempting to arise from one of the longest civil wars in the Hemisphere—almost four decades of conflict that ran from 1954 (when the United States helped overthrow the democratically-elected government of Jacobo Arbenz), to 1996, when peace accords ended the ensuing bloody war that killed over 200,000 Guatemalans.

More than ten years after the official end of the war, the country is still awash with guns. Unemployment and underemployment are high, and literacy is low. Governments, even in this ”new democracy” have been to one extent or another corrupt and have neglected social ills.

In this country just about the size of Tennessee the reality of poverty, illness, crime and the disparity between the rich and the poor is never far away. In effect, what exists in Guatemala is a situation much like a great deal of this world. Although I certainly don’t like it, living here makes me feel closer to reality… more alive, more in tune with the majority of humanity. Viewing poverty on a regular basis, I feel more grateful for what I have.

In the States it’s often too easy to believe that we are what the rest of the world is like. Too easy to fall into a cocoon of comfort, materialism, and denial… to forget how lucky we are. Even for those with means living in Guatemala is to some extent uncomfortable. I don’t often go out past dark; I almost never take public transportation; I hardly ever drive by myself, certainly never at night.

There are huge contradictions here …they stare you in the face – such a warm sweet people, so much death and violence. The legacy of the war is still felt in the random street crime; people get killed for bicycles and cell phones.

Here, my mobility is limited. Or, I limit my mobility. But in the need to make my world smaller, that smaller world is somehow richer. I’m more relaxed… more at home in my home … more in tune to what I need—more, yes “balanced.”

“Do you have many friends there?” people ask. Not really—my work often takes me to the rural areas outside of Antigua and into the gritty capital Guatemala City. Still, wherever I am in this country, I feel more human warmth on a day-to-day basis than on an average day in my life in El Norte.

These days, I see many more baby boomer-aged Americans on the streets of Antigua. I think they too have discovered the economic advantages of being here. Rent is cheaper, so are food prices, and foreigners can usually afford help.

And though the price of living is certainly rising, living here remains more affordable.

My Antigua hideaway (most houses here are located behind high walls and thick wooden gates) was even more appealing after I suffered a health crisis, and needed time and a place to heal. This was one place I could afford not to take on a full-time job for a while.

Still, for me it’s not enough to come for the cheaper living and spring-like climate. To truly enjoy all the benefits of being here and to be able to live with the disadvantages, I personally feel I have to give back to this country.

Countless Americans and other internationals are here doing just that—working in clinics, establishing NGO’s for reproductive health, literacy, micro-lending… or like me, working with rural and indigenous journalists. In doing this, I think we take part in the process of trying to establish a different relationship with the people of Guatemala than that which has been traditional for so long—here come the gringos to plunder and profit …and off they go somewhere else when a better opportunity opens up.