Comida and Culture (published in the episcopal news) 

By: Ned Popovich

These are the personal memoirs of my trip to the tropical country of Guatemala 

in the spring of 2003 (March 26th - April 3rd). Looking back upon the memories, 

I hope that this will inspire you to take the trip to Guatemala to assist our 

companion Diocese. 

Upon my arrival to the city of Guatemala (Wednesday the 26th), I was met by our 

posada guide, Victor Hugo. He was a man in his late fifties, spoke perfect English and 

had a wonderful sense of humor. He drove us (the Thomaes and I) around town for 

a while to soak in the picturesque view of the city. Guatemala City is a 

beautiful cultural mecca. It small streets are flowing with market stalls, 

people in native dress, and of course, hundreds of tourists from all over the 

world. We continued our wonderful tour and finally made our way to Posada Belen. 

It is a lovely little, very home like hotel tucked away on Calle 13 A. On the 

inside, it has tiled floors, with a small outdoor garden, including a fountain 

and two turtles. The owners, Francesca and Rene, are two of the nicest people 

that we met. The meals at the hotel are absolutely superb. Home cooked delights, 

the meals begin with a soup, then continue to a main course and a finished by 

either plantanos or homemade ice cream. The rooms are nicely arranged with one, 

two or three beds, a personal bathroom, shower and wardrobe. Comfortable and 

very affordable, it is worth going just to stay in the hotel and see their museum

On Thursday, we were picked up by our guide in the early hours of the morning to 

take the hour and a half drive to Chicicastenengo. Driving on the highway that 

goes North all the way to Mexico, it was packed with trucks loaded with melons 

to take to the market and buses and dozens of buses all around. This is the 

public transportation in the country, so the people take buses everywhere. They 

stop virtually anyway there is a person waiting flagging them down. We stopped 

about half way at a wonderful restaurant made out of wood and a gigantic 

thatched roof. The inside was so nice and they served wonderful authentic 

Guatemalan breakfasts: eggs, sausage, papayas, frijoles negros, and a really 

tasty cookie like thing, known as sweet bread.  We continued on to 

Chicicastenego, where we went through the market. Hundreds of vendors packed the 

crowded little streets as we made our way to the church of St. Tomas, built on 

the steps of a Mayan ruin. Inside were many offerings and flowers to dead 

relatives. We continued through the streets looking at the stalls placed in the 

street. There are hundreds of vendors trying to sell you things. In addition, 

there are little children in the street, either begging of tugging on your 

clothes to buy little knick-knacks that they have for sale. 

The next day, we took the five-hour drive to Mariscos. Once in Mariscos, we met 

Padre Abraham and his wife, Dona Juanita. The welcomed us graciously into their 

home, despite the scorching temperature and high humidity. We stayed in the 

Bishop's house, which had electricity, fans and a refrigerator. The following 

day we went to Playa Dorado, where Padre Abraham has a second church that he 

preaches at in addition to San Estaban. On that Sunday, we drove to Rio Dulce, 

to see Padre Victor, and his wife. The church is a small little one (though it 

has electricity and a sound system) with a beautiful little ornate altar. The 

service is quite the same as ours, except it is in Spanish. They do use the same 

prayer book as we do. That afternoon, with Padre Victor, we went to the Castillo 

de San Felipe, a castle in the harbor of Rio Dulce, guarding the port from 

marauding British ships in the 16th century. Relatively small, we toured through 

the main section of the castle, the dungeon area, and finally up onto the 

highest part, where the portcullis is controlled for access to the castle. On 

our last day in Mariscos (Monday) we drove to see Rolando (a lay pastor), and 

gave him art supplies for the large number of children in the day care at his 

church. 

     Then we continued the five-hour journey back to Guatemala City. All the 

way, you could feel you ears pop because of the rise in elevation. Mariscos is 

about 150 - 200 feet above sea level, where as Guatemala City is about the 

elevation of Denver, Colorado (3500 feet). Once back in the city, we said good-bye to 

Victor, and set off to drop our luggage at the hotel. From there we walked 6 blocks on 

to the Central Market, in Guatemala City. I had thought that the market in 

Chicicastenego was large, but this market was incomparable. Shops were squeezed 

into every available inch of area. Thousands of people crowded the square and 

the surrounding area. Vendors would follow us, trying to get us to buy things 

from their shop. We stopped numerous times to bargain with vendors, trying to 

talk them down to lower prices on certain items. Most of the time, they will go 

down anywhere from twenty to a hundred quetzals (there are about 8 quetzals to 

the US dollar), just to get an American tourist to buy something. In one 

instance I was looking into buying hammock. I talked the merchant down but she 

refused, only to later follow me trying to get me to buy it, offering a new 

lower price. 

On the following day (Tuesday), Victor drove us to the archeological museum, in 

the center of Guatemala City, following our glance at the National Palace (which 

was closed for presidential meetings). We toured the museum, which was very 

interesting. It had artifacts from various Mayan ruins from all around 

Guatemala. There were also stone pillars from Tikal and other ruin sites on 

display in the rotunda. We then continued to drive through the "residential" 

section of the city. Basically, it is a Guatemalan version of Beverly Hills. 

Dozens of mansions squished together on land. Most of them were embassies, 

though there were multiple residential houses in the area as well. 

On our last day in Guatemala, we drove to Cuilapa, to visit Padre Hugo (who came 

to our church a few years ago). His church (Jesus de Palmas) was on top of a hug 

bluff, over looking the highway that leads into El Salvador. We talked with him 

for a time, and he played some folk songs for us on his guitar. His church has a 

complete sound system, plus and electronic organ. We then drove to a really good 

restaurant, about a stones throw from the border of El Salvador. We then dropped 

Hugo back off at his house and drove back to Guatemala City and made it just in 

time for dinner. We then checked all our bags to make sure we had everything 

packed and then called it a night. 

            On Thursday morning we drove to the airport. After waiting in line 

we got our boarding passes and headed for the gate early, knowing that the 

security checks would take a while. Finally we got t the checkpoint. A guard 

signaled to us and told us to go through the metal detectors, the to go to the 

tables on the right to have our luggage searched. The practically tore my bag 

apart. They searched every nook and cranny, including the lining of my pants, 

and every pocket in my bag. Obviously I had nothing to hide, but it was 

terrible. And the worst part was, he didn't put everything back the way I had 

done it, and now my bag was stuffed and overcrowded. Finally we got onto our 

plane, and we landed twenty minutes early in Houston. When we first got to 

immigration, I was afraid that they wouldn't let me in because of the Che 

Guevara t-shirt that I was wearing. But we got through ok, until Customs. We 

were searched again. It took a long time, though not as long as in Guatemala. 

Finally we took off, and three and a half hours later, we landed in 

Philadelphia. So ended my excursion to Guatemala and I encourage everyone to go. 

It is safe, and it is a great experience to help our companion churches.       

     When you look at the essence of the lives of the people living in 

Guatemala, you can see that they have only one main objective: to survive. The 

country is in a state of turmoil, as the economy plummets due to hurricanes and 

droughts. The people of the country don't think about what they will eat for the 

next meal, because they can't even guarantee that they will get a next meal. 

They focus more on the important things in life, such as assisting their 

children in any way possible to get them an education. Most of the children in 

Guatemala don't go to school for the reason that their parents cannot afford to 

have them go. The average cost, per semester, for a middle school student is 

almost five hundred quetzals. That is almost a ten-month salary for a normal 

working person in Guatemala. 

     This is all well and good to hear the adventures of another person, but you 

ask yourself, "What have I got to do with this?" Well, the answer is, you can 

contribute and go to Guatemala, or if you are unable to go, to help in every way 

possible in order to fund the trip, donate supplies to the people, or organize 

other efforts to help out companion churches. As a final word, and more as a 

command, you need to go to Guatemala. The things that our church has been doing 

are not enough. We need to have more people take the journey to Guatemala and 

experience the life of everyday people trying to scrape by in a third world 

country.