Sunday.  Headed up one of the local volcanoes in the Land Rover with R & P.  Didn’t do any hiking, just sightseeing.

We ended up at Santa Maria de Jesus, the fairly large and mountainous village at the top end of the paved road and at the bottom of the higher ‘peak trail’ that starts at the town centre.  Sal and I had been there before with K a couple of weeks back but it was pretty sleepy and dull the first time.  Today was quite different……….shades of Latin American politics coloured the visit!

The big Sunday market was on when we got there and the central plaza was full.  It was cold, windy and there was a threat of rain in the air but the place was still alive and bustling.  I’d guess at about one thousand people if you peeked in every nook and corner.  With a few hundred others on the approach streets coming and going.  These out-of-Antigua village markets are not tourist oriented and most of the stalls were trading domestic goods and foodstuffs.  Trinkets were noticeably absent.

But what was noticeably present was the number of men not interested in the least with market goods.  They were gathered in clutches and groups all over the place and there was a main gathering over in one of the plaza corners.  In that larger group (maybe a hundred men) there was an angry, gravely-voiced guy speaking with a loud and nasty tone into a portable microphone and speaker system.  He was not happy.  And he was spreading his discontent to a rapt crowd of pretty rough looking men.  It was a political gathering of sorts.

I caught a few words that sounded like ‘economics’ and ‘government’ but discretion suggested I concentrate on the fruits and vegetables like a good little tourist and that I should provide no excuse to have his or their focus turned on us few gringos.

The wider spread, smaller groups of men seemed part of the ‘mood’  but they were not paying close attention.  I got the feeling that the speaker and his words were well-known and familiar to everyone in the area.

Also noticeably absent were the police.  Didn’t see one single ‘official’  anywhere in the town.  It was just the village.  And us.

Santa Maria de Jesus Market

We were amongst a very small number of tourists (maybe six others) dispersed about the square and no one was lingering or bantering with the locals.  The vibes just weren’t great.  In fact, the mood was distinctly ominous and threatening although there was no discernible anger directed at us or the other visitors.  Sometimes it is just a feeling but we definitely felt it.

Ironically, it is R&P who seem to provide the most protection.  Your basic abuela and abuelo generate genuine respect wherever they go in the area and the older they are, the better they seem to be regarded.  It is almost as if there was an unwritten code: leave the tourists alone but especially the really old ones. 

Gringas, however, are fair game it seems.

Personally, I didn’t feel much hostility, that is for sure.  But when you are in one of the out-of-the-way villages, that kind of disconnect, that sense of ‘us and them’, that sense of being an unwelcome outsider is quite rare.  Usually we are met with smiles and looks of interest.  To be held at arms length is weird and it is that as much as anything else that created the weird vibe.

I went to the public washroom just off the plaza.  There was a group of ‘hangers about’ milling around the entrance.  I nodded to them as I pushed past to the men’s room and was told that I had to pay 2 quetzales (the common charge for using public washrooms that, in exchange, are usually kept spotless by a couple of women cleaners who will clean up around you as you stand at the urinal).  So, I paid some guy with his hand out and I went in.  This facility was not one of those that was being cleaned by anyone.  Ever.  I got the impression that the 2Q charge was levied because I was too stupid to know better.  I was a gringo, after all.  They ‘got me’  for 30 cents.

When I emerged from the grotto that served as a bathroom, I looked for my bandito.  He was gone but in his place was a smiling, gold-toothed hombre wanting to test his English.  So I stood around with the group for a few minutes while he impressed his friends.  Even though the guys all regarded me with some malignancy, it was not intimidating.  There were five or six of them but I was a head taller and at least twice the size of the average guy.  Amongst Mayans, I am Hulk Hogan.

Hulk Hogan of the Mayan World

We cracked a few jokes, made a little small talk and I left.  Sal and I gathered up her folks and we made for the car and a slow trip back home.  The visit was uneventful but felt like an event nonetheless.  For a short while we ‘felt’ that unwelcome stranger feeling that sometimes crops up when traveling.  It is unusual but all the more remarkable because of that.  In an odd way, it felt more ‘real’ than does Antigua.

Don’t get me wrong – we get ‘real’ in the Antigua market and it is almost always pleasant and welcoming.  But Santa Maria de Jesus had that added feeling that seems to accompany the areas we occasionally visit that have no real interest in tourists.

Judging from the amplified voice in the plaza, they have bigger things on their mind.