a week in images 10/23-10/31

a bit surreal. really.

los hacelotodo. los vendelotodo. los comelotodo.

guanacos. from Miguel Gutierrez Jr on Vimeo.

suchitoto, el salvador

holy savior.

i haven't been writing much these last few days. it's not that i haven't met great people or listened to great stories, but in a way, i haven't felt entirely connected. i guess, in some way, it's similar to rhetoric. distant, in a way. there's a certain level of disconnect. tonight was different though. spontaneous. el salvador offered itself to me; it opened up. i walked to the gas station with my friend cassidy in search of some cigarettes, and ended up with stories from people who weren't prompted to share. offerings. there's alex, a man from new york. a salvadoran who lived in bushwick for a majority of his life, but is now back in el salvador. the product of a situation he didn't ask for. there's also guillermo, a 27 year old man from california, who was brought to the united states at three months of age. guillermo loves california. he knows it like the back of his hand; he knew it enough that he felt compelled to name the freeways for me. also, the american cities he loved and the ones he might never visit. completely unprompted. guillermo was deported three years ago from the only country that he has known. he now lives in el salvador. this is now his reality. his home. the product of a situation he didn't ask for. i can't imagine how i would react given the same circumstances, but guillermo took it with stride. it is what is, so he says. it is what it is.

tropicalisisimo

san salvador

i am in the capital of what is considered to be one of the most violent countries in the western hemisphere: el salvador. before my arrival, in the media, i heard many stories of gunfights, people burned alive in buses and of transit systems brought to a halt by gangs. from people, i have listened quietly to stories that describe san salvador as a place devoid of life, a city that is overrun by pollution, poverty and thieves. though there is truth in these narratives, it is not the only one that exists in san salvador, nor the one that deserves the most attention. after all, we are talking about humans here, and i have had the fortune of meeting great ones in my life. it is extremely simple to regard san salvador as a city full of negativity, one that is more or less in decay, but this does not serve visitors or the people of el salvador well. it is true, san salvador is not rome. it is not barcelona. nor is it paris. el salvador was born from a different context, one of colonialism and of dictatorships. eighteen years ago the country was ending its civil war. inequalities and scars run deep. these things need to be considered when describing a place, in order to fully understand why it is the way that it is. i refuse to believe that el salvador is only those narratives that i have heard. i refuse to believe that a place where people live is devoid of life. there is beauty here, but it is subtle. it requires attention and a careful eye. this is my attempt at attuning my eye to it. i am here, and though it is not easy, i would not be anywhere else in the world.

el salvador.

how strange it is to be anything at all.

chuitziribal, guatemala.

en las nubes.

my head was in the clouds. quite literally. for five days, i visited the community of chuitziribal, one that consists roughly of thirty houses, floating calmly at 8,100 feet above sea level. the air is cold and thin. clouds roll in gently over hills of corn. it's quiet in chuitziribal, with silence occasionally broken by a dog fight consisting of half the towns' dogs. other than that, it's rustling corn, an off key song or a neighing horse. i stayed with the familia tax, a family of three women, a girl and two boys. the women have the disposition of women that have held firm in times of adversity. true beauty. señor tax is in the united states, one of the countless immigrants that leave home in order to subsidize a better life; pictures of this distant life cover the walls of the bedroom. one of the little ones told me that the father was set to visit this christmas. i didn't have the heart to ask when it was that he saw him last. i've passed through chuitziribal and am passing through guatemala, but some aren't passing through. this country is their life. their reality. i've been privileged with a glimpse of it.

"yo en el volante, y..."

...dios adelante. from Miguel Gutierrez Jr on Vimeo.

camiones, derrumbes y un temerario.

el lago de atitlan

brighter skies

if one has heard any news about guatemala lately, it would be safe to infer that it hasn't been too sunny here. it was for a bit today and it was beautiful.

andando from Miguel Gutierrez Jr on Vimeo.

i don't even know where to begin. it's only been two days, but i have already seen a lot. it's all heavy, maybe a bit too heavy. i wish i could post pictures, but i haven't taken any. i can't get myself to. i visited communities of affluence today. $1,800 USD apartment complexes with extravagant patios. security guards. spas. fine dining. jaguars. twenty minutes later, i was in abject poverty. i visited a school that is situated next to a city dump. literally, right next to the city dump. i could hear the trucks. smell the fumes. saw children sorting garbage. the school is next to the city dump with the goal of educating children who work in the dump. the logic being, if children are going to work in the city dump, at least they can get an education on their down time. so far, the program has been working, but with limited success. guatemala city is big, and one program can only do so much. a few people can only do so much. the social worker of the program is a short guatemalan woman, about 50 years of age, with strong brown eyes. she possessed a motherly tenderness, one that is needed, given the circumstances. but she also spoke with conviction, with the air of someone who has witnessed their fair share of life. but i don't mean to focus on the negative stories. i don't want to victimize guatemala. cause pity. it's just that this is all very heavy right now and i've never been face to face with this before. in the same day, i listened to a story of hope. a story told by a man who lost his dad, his brothers and a sister to torture. to war. the story is of a 13 year old boy named enrique. enrique is a member of the ms-13. the central american gang with a vicious reputation. enrique was in his colonia, he was looking out of his window, when he noticed that the police had arrived. the police headed to the home of two individuals, dona mari and don jose. the couple was arrested and taken away. the police locked the door so no one could get in. i don't know if the police knew this or not, but a two month old was now locked in the building. alone. the son of dona mari and don jose. but enrique knew this and he came up with a plan. he'd break into the building through the roof. and so he did. during the day, enrique would go out and extort money from local businesses. threatening with death those who would resist to pay. enrique would set aside some of the money and would buy milk for the baby. enrique fed the baby, comforted the baby, slept next to the baby. for six months, enrique was a father. dona mari was eventually released. she hurried home, expecting to find her dead baby. instead, she found enrique holding the baby. he was burping him.

part two: guatemala

i made it. i'm in guatemala city and i've met up with my group. traveling through mexico was great, but i'm definitely ready to start the program. i made it across the border yesterday. barely, kind of. i ended up meeting five young gents from england in oaxaca, who were planning on heading to guatemala through tapachula, chiapas. we spoke of heading in this direction, but never set a plan to head out together. fortunately for them, they had enough foresight to buy their tickets ahead of time in mazunte. as for me, i decided to wait til the last minute. when i arrived to buy my ticket in huatulco, the tickets were sold out. i was out of luck. there was nothing left for me to do but to keep heading south. maybe my luck would turn. i decided to ride a second-class bus to juchitan, oaxaca, about 3 hours from huatulco. once there, i tried my luck again. directo a tapachula, por favor. i was in luck, two tickets were available. it was 4 pm and the bus headed for tapachula at midnight. all i needed to do was kill some time. midnight arrives, i board the bus with the ten hour overnight trip to tapachula being a breeze. nothing to do but sleep. i get off the bus in tapachula and i realize that the brits are on the same bus as i, but there are only 3 of them. one of them fell ill in oaxaca, and another stayed behind. fortunately for me, that's how two seats became available. more fortune, the brits spoke no spanish and i now had people with which to cross the border. symbiotic relationship. crossing the border was intense and i'm glad i didn't do it alone. first, we needed to sell our pesos and buy quetzales. we were promptly ripped off. second, we needed to cross the border. once again, a sleight of hand. there's not supposed to be an entrance fee. third, get to Malacatan, the closest place with buses heading to a major town. this third part was the most overwhelming. i clearly remember crossing a bridge in guatemala, looking over my shoulder and realizing that the brits and i had an entourage of ten guatemalans hovering around us. everyone was yelling at us. had something for us. wanted something from us.Taxi! Combi! Amigo! Cuanto?! Aqui! Vamos! We managed to complete our third objective unscathed. we opted for a combi, a minivan fitted for inter-town travel. it was the brits, 17 more souls and i. bienvenidos a guatemala.

part one: mexico

the mexico part of my trips feels a lot more like a vacation. not to say that i haven´t seen interesting things or haven´t encountered great people with great stories, but i think maybe i´m just taking it all a bit more with stride. i mean, it's hard not to on the beach, or in a bar putting back a few victorias. i did have a moment with my grandmother in guanajuato though. i showed her a picture of my father and for a second she had trouble recognizing him, and when she did, she wept a bit. she cried at the fact that my father is now an older man, who at one time left for the US as a teenager. my grandmother softly said "the united states took my son and there he became a man." it was sad to witness my grandmother at that moment, recognizing the few times she had seen my father since he parted for his new life, lamenting that she wasn´t by him when he was a young man. unfortunately, he wasn´t the only one. most of my aunts and uncles followed, with only one aunt remaining in mexico to make a life for herself, in a city a couple of hours away from home. it´s extremely sobering to listen to these stories from my family. it helps reveal how extremely fortunate i am. i have just recently arrived in guatemala, about to embark on another part of this trip and i don´t know if i can feel any luckier to be here. to travel because i want to and not because i have to.

Untitled from Miguel Gutierrez Jr on Vimeo.

no siempre se puede ir en linea recta hasta conseguir los fines, hay que dar rodeos. es verdad.

untitled

untitled from Miguel Gutierrez Jr on Vimeo.