Me Gusta Guatemala

Well, I’m sitting in my bedroom in my new apartment in Guatemala, a fact I still can’t quite wrap my head around. At this point I don’t really know long I’ll be here; whether I’ll pay a month of rent and be ready to go or whether I will settle in for a bit and continue working on the Partners in Solidarity project and DJing. I’m living on the third story of one of the taller buildings in Xela, with a view over the green mountains surrounding the city and the buildings below. It is surprisingly one of the nicest places I’ve lived in in years. My roommates are two and 1/2 Guatemalans; a good friend of mine named Sylvia, Luis, and occasionally Sylvia’s ridiculously cute baby Maya Sofia. I just today got my room setup the way I like it and am truly enjoying the space, as well as my life and routine here in Xela.

I continue to work with Partners in Solidarity, which includes some teaching, some technical supervision, some random technical tasks and traveling. Monday I will go to a school 1.5 hours outside of Xela to setup up a computer laboratory for them. Apparently its somewhat out a dirt road and pretty far out into the sticks – I’m relishing the opportunity to be able to provide them with some computers and education that they can share with their kids. These are computers that to most of the world are considered trash, that are restored first by Next Step Recycling in Oregon, then more by us and some Guatemalan technicians that we work with. You can see on the Next Step page that the founder recently won the Vovlo for Life award, and has made People Magazine and CBS, all things which could bring good publicity for us as well.

I’ve also been DJing far more than I’m used to, with a weekly lounge gig here in Xela, and almost weekly invitations to play at parties. I played an all Soul-song Valentine’s Day set on Thursday that reminded me of doing radio back in Santa Cruz – lots of fun. There’s mainly one other Gringo DJ, DJ Payne and one other Guatemalan, Kokopeli, that I DJ with, both of whom are becoming good friends. We were invited out to San Pedro la Laguna in Lake Atitlan last week to DJ a party at a hotel for some friends, including bascially all of our costs. Its great to have time to practice my two main arts, being DJing and Photography, and even making some money at it in the mean time. I can definitely say I miss having more clubs to go, musicians and DJs to hear, but the community here is quite nice and great to be a part of.

I’m finding myself really enjoying the opportunity to settle into and explore a new and foreign town. Enjoying things like walking downstais in the morning to buy two eggs and some delicious, thick, fresh corn tortillas from the tienda for $0.50. Enjoying walking by the parties pumping marimba music all afternoon with indigenous families dancing inside. Watching the school kids on their lunch break hanging out in the plaza in front of my house from my balcony. Walking to the market and buying Passion Fruit, Mangoes, Zapotes (some kind of avocado-mixed-with-sweet-potato-thing) and others all arrayed on the street around a giant indoor market, with lots of things for sale including strange things like Goat heads. As well as enjoying more traditional activities like traveling, making friends and just relaxing in my room on a Saturday night.

Two weeks ago I also spent some time in a minuscule beach  town near the Mexican border called Tilapita with one hotel that hosted the one restaurant. I went alone, savoring the opportunity to do some traveling alone for a bit.  Just spent a night and loved the aspect of seeing a town so far removed from the life I’m used to; basically just some small houses arranged on a grid pattern on the sand, a few tiendas and some churches.  The hotel was a bit weird, with damp rooms and grumpy management, but quite cheap and an experience for sure.

These last couple shots are from a town called San Andres Xecul, just outside of Xela.  The yellow church is quite a sight.

I hope all is well and look forward to being in touch and maybe seeing some of you down here.

‘nice’

November 5th

If any of you are still wondering, I’ve bought a ticket for Guatemala and depart LAX the morning of November 5th. That will mark the end of 3 great and full months in Los Angeles. Burning Man, a beautiful trip to Kings Canyon (I haven’t posted any pics to the blog yet – they’re here), a photo published in Citizen L.A. (see below) and now a gallery show at the Dale Youngman Gallery in Downtown L.A. (featured photos are here).

Leaving Burning Man this year, I said I wanted to take my photography more seriously. I didn’t imagine it would be the photos I took there that would lead to this being a reality. Ever since being offered the gallery show, I’ve thought a lot about what it means to be an ‘artist’. With so many possible meanings, I’ve come to the conclusion that anybody who believes in their own creative potential can be an ‘artist’; a photographer, a DJ.

I’ll leave with a link to The Dynamics‘ sublime cover of Curtis Mayfield’s immortal ‘Move on Up’; I think it is apropos for this evening. The Dynamics are a contemporary Reggae group out of Lyon, France currently playing mostly cover songs. Their album drops soon – watch out for it!

Move On Up

Man Burning

Its Friday evening now, 4 days after returning from Black Rock City in the Nevada desert. I won’t seek to explain what Burning Man is; enough people have already and will continue to do that. One great series of posts on Burning Man can be found on an Uber blog that I found here. Suffice to say that spending the time that I did with 48,000 people last week was incredible and impactful. I figured that in this space I can provide some memories that were particularly meaningful to me.

Arriving at Burning Man is quite an experience, and one that all of the preparatory materials don’t address. After an 11 hour drive from Los Angeles out to Gerlach, Nevada, we spend another two hours waiting to get inside. Those waiting are truly shown that convenience and speed are not important aspects to those in charge at Burning Man LLC. The line at the gate seems to be there to reinforce the boundaries between the default world and Black Rock City within. We arrived Monday night, just in time to unpack a few things and wander the playa to see the lunar eclipse. So complete was my disorientation that I completely missed the first (early) burning of “the Man.” I was too busy watching an eclipse I guess. An eclipse being a perfect way to start a trip like this, as a familiar, everyday object is blocked from view.

(This post has taken a while to finish – its now the Tuesday following the initial Friday mentioned in this post). The next week is a jumble of events, certainly much more than the sum of their parts. There was the woman who cleaned and moisturized my cracked and dry feet, even providing me with a pair of socks to take home. This one event provided me with a wealth of energy and goodwill. The was the sheer amazement at the amount of work that goes into building this city in the Nevada desert, which exists for only one week a year, only to be built again the following year; the scale of the structures, the incredible sound systems, the immensity of the city. Also, riding across the playa on a bike, hearing ‘Lookout Weekend’ by Debbie Deb playing out of a giant bus dressed up to like the Cheshire Cat.

Another beautiful thing was the freedom of transportation in Black Rock City. I found it beautiful to be able to ride my bike on a large flat expanse, without worrying about hills or cars hurtling at me at 40 MPH. Not to mention the limiless stimulation and potential for exploration. One could stop pretty much anywhere and see a sculpture or art project, or meet somebody new and speak to them for a moment or at length. At night, there were probably a hundred places to  stop and dance, all of them free and within easy walking or biking distance of one another. It truly felt like limitless possibility.

And then there was the Temple of Forgiveness. One of the most powerful spaces I have ever experienced. A place people used to find peace with lost loved ones, part with aspects of themselves they wished to be done with and multitudes of other cathartic experiences. Everywhere I looked there were photos, drawings, notes and personal affects, all imbued with emotion. People cried, I cried. Someone came up to me and gave me a pen and a notebook to write; I did. And left what I wrote as notes inserted into the intricate woodwork of the temple to burn. I deeply respected the inclusion of this sacred space within the larger framework of Black Rock City.

In the end, I would never wish to to explain the entirety of my time at Burning Man within this forum, or any other. My week in Black Rock City held parallels to a week anywhere — there were good times and bad, easy times and hard. Time was spent exploring, eating, resting, loving, learning. A 24 hour a day, 7 day a week opportunity to experience.