Último Tango en Xela (para mi, so to speak)
So here I am with Patricia and Julie, the 2 preceptors, and Holly, Megan, and Charlotte, the 3 UTMB PA students, in Quetzaltenango. This is Guatemala’s second city, although with a population of only a quarter-million or so, it’s a distant second. I lived here off and on for many years, and enjoy being here. Just haven’t had the time in recent years to come for more than occasional visits of a few days at a time. Over the years it’s become somewhat more urbane in a positive sense, as well as urban in a negative sense. The indigenous Maya culture lingers, but K’iche’ is seldom heard, and only then among the oldest city-dwellers or folks from the hill towns surrounding “Xela” (pronounced “Shay-lah), as it’s called throughout Guatemala. I’d like to spend a week lazing around here, visiting old friends and enjoying the city. But alas, tomorrow I leave the UTMB Students and my dear friend, Dr. Patricia, and head back to Guatemala City with Dr. Julie, the other preceptor.
There are still a fair number of women who wear the “traje,” or indigenous dress, of Quetzaltenango. But there are few who are 1) happily willing to pose as this lady was when I asked her, and 2) still wear such absolutely classic traje as this. Very reminiscent of the label of “Quetzalteca Especial,” the country’s #1 cheap single-distilled rum.
Julie will get on a plane about midnight tomorrow night, and I’ll have 2 days in less-than-sublime Guatemala City (I actually always enjoy GC, but I’m rare that way) before flying away. The “girls,” as I refer to them (mostly to annoy Patricia, who always either wants to or actually does accurately point out that they are “women”), will stay for another week and a half of clinical rotation here in Xela. They will finish out this week in San Francisco, a small municipality north of Xela, and then head a little further north the next week to the larger town of San Carlos Sija for another 4.5 days of clinic. I’m kind of confused about the plans for their last weekend in Guatemala, after finishing in Sija, but I think all or at least a couple of them want to climb one of the volcanoes near Antigua. That’s a fun thing to do, if you’re fond of exerting yourself to the point of self-abuse, and I say more power to them.
In any event, this is only my second blog post in the week and a half since the students arrived, so it’s entirely accurate to say I’m once again a failure as a daily journalist. There just doesn’t seem to be enough time in the day to get things done, and with no gun pointed at my head it’s hard to get around to even looking at photos, much less dredging up enough energy and creativity to actually write something coherent. To the extent that today is an exception, it’s because I didn’t go to work with the crew due to other obligations and a lingering case of allergy-induced bronchitis that started last Friday. I got a text from Patricia a little while ago saying they weren’t too busy today in San Francisco, but that there was a children’s parade that was cute. I’ve seen lots of children’s parades in Guatemala, and I can vouch that they are indeed cute, but I’m still happy to be enjoying a day of recuperation in pleasant downtown Quetzaltenango.
Martha, the director of nurses and, thus, the real director of the “Centro de Atención Permanente (24/7 local medical center) in San Carlos Sija. The group will be working there next week, as the poster she is holding up announces.
Although everything is very cool at this point, the day started off shakily when I went to Banco G&T to withdraw money. While I’m always annoyed, I’m never surprised that anything involving legal or financial protocol in Guatemala presents unexpected difficulties. So I took it in stride this morning, when I tried to get the money I deposited when I first arrived a couple of weeks ago, and was told my account had been “de-activated” — meaning I had to go talk to one of the proverbial cute young “señoritas” that sit behind individual desks in Guatemalan banks (virtually all employment applications in Guatemala demand a photo, so the men in charge ensure that subordinates are at least reasonably cute).
I found out that among a host of new rules governing banking and currency conversion that have taken place since the last time I was here, it is now necessary to engage in some kind of banking activity every 3 months to keep the account active. I resignedly pointed out that although it had, in fact, been nearly a year since I’d done anything with the account for almost a year previous, I had deposited a substantial amount of money 2 weeks ago and it hadn’t seemed important to “activate” the account before they took money I would need to pay bills at the end of my stay. Predictably, the señorita responded that deposits are always allowed, but they had to be made quarterly in order to keep the account active. I asked her if the size of the deposit mattered, and she said it did not, so I suppose I’ll leave 100 quetzales (about $14) with the ACEBAR office, and ask them to deposit Q25 in my account every couple months in one of their regular trips to the bank. Anyway, on the negative side I had to jump third-worldish hoops to get my money. On the positive side, the bank was astonishingly un-busy and I didn’t have to wait in line at all to speak to any one of three different bank officials necessary to get my money; and most importantly, after wasting only about a half hour, I got the money I needed to pay the bills.
This is the mayor – I think – of San Francisco La Union. I say “I think” because I went to look up his name on the internet, and it does not jive with what I understood him to say yesterday. I’ll correct this caption as I get confirming information. Perhaps he is some other official than the mayor? But anyway, he was absolutely the head of the welcoming committee in San Francisco yesterday.
As banking problems go, the little snafu of having to reactivate my account was far from the greatest obstacle I faced this time. What was a MUCH larger headache were newly expanded restrictions on changing money. There is, first, that most banks in Guatemala simply don’t change dollars anymore without an account. And second, the average account holder – whether Guatemalan or foreigner – can only deposit or change $500 per month in US Dollars in real banks that give reasonable exchange rates. This is a blow to tourists who want to spend much money on Guatemalan goods while here. But it’s an even bigger blow to the poor folks who work in the tourist trade, who can no longer accept dollars for pricey items without losing hundreds of quetzales in bad conversion rates at Banco Azteca or CamiCard or one of the other cheapshot banks that change larger amounts at exploitative rates.
As to WHY the laws and bank regulations have changed, I believe there are 2 main reasons. First, it’s because of internal pressure from the tax authorities, who find that trafficking in dollars is a good way to avoid tax accountability for Guatemala’s highly regressive ISR (impuestos sobre la renta – read: income tax). This of course is a good way to control tax evasion on the part of poor people, but only an annoyance for the rich, who as in the US use loopholes rather than dollar accounts to avoid paying taxes. The second reason is because of intense pressure from the United States to limit money laundering. Which of these two reasons is most important, I don’t have any idea. But what I’m sure of is that as a result of these changes banks have increasing power over the economy, and along with the economy the lives of poor Guatemalans.
Oh well. As I remarked 20 years ago, the more things change in Guatemala, the more they stay the same.
Meanwhile, I’m having a great time so far today at the Café Baviera, which burnt down a while back but sometime within the last 18 months reopened. Better than ever, making it one of my favorite coffee shops anywhere. Good wi-fi, power plugs by every table, and a very pleasing interior. Wait staff are assiduously non-attentive, and you can sit here as long as you like for the price of one cup of coffee (although I’m working on my third, and will also buy a lunch). I will heartily recommend this place to the students, who have a major test when they get back home to UTMB. It would be a great place to study – or at the very least take a break from studying.
About Café Baviera, Quetzaltenango. I will unashamedly plug the place with a few photos below, since I had such a good time here today, even running into a couple of old friends. I highly recommend this place not just to students, but to anybody who happens to be in Xela. Definitely worth a visit for a cup of coffee or a few hours of internet use, as the occasion warrants.
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