Wandering Jew and the Temple of Doom
Late Friday night, Ryan and I were in a swanky Guatemalan nightclub, trying to strike a deal with a notorious gangster. We were demanding a promised reward for the ashes of an ancient Mayan emperor, which we had procured at much personal risk. Unfortunately for us, the ganster's sons had no intention of letting us escape with our lives and we were embroiled in a violent imbroglio during which much of the nightclub was damaged. Fleeing, Ryan and I were finally forced out of a second story window and onto club's awning. Luckily, Corto Redondo, our trust, 12-year old, Guatemalan sidekick called to us from the street where he was pulling up driving a tuk tuk. We jumped down and he whisked us away to the airport from which we made our escape to the jungles of Tikal...
Arriving at the airport in Guatemala City at aroudn 4:30 a.m. and viewing the craft which would be carrying us deep into the Central American jungle, I must admit I was somewhat apprehensive. It was, as they litote, not large...
Unexpectedly, however, the flight was rather smooth and, while I relaxed attractively, Ryan honed his skills as an action photographer...
We arrived in Peten, the jungle-covered region of Guatemala in which Tikal is to be discovered, at around 6:00 in the morning and posed triumphantly before the instrument of our escape...
Ryan and I had, at this point, befriended a couple of the other guests from our school who would be joining us on our expedition. There was Wendy, a jewish mom from Berkeley, Ed, a young lawyer from North Carolina (Raleigh, actually) with a hypnotic southern drawl, and George, a former Georgetown professor of economics who had been recruited to be one of the brains behind a pretty serious libertarian think tank based in Indianapolis (the Liberty Fund). Pretty funny group.
We bused over to Tikal (about half an hour) in 90+ degree temperature and humidity reminiscent of a malfunctioning greenhouse. Apparently the region is the second largest producer of oxygen in the Western Hemisphere (this would explain my respiratory infection as we all know how New York jews react to healthy atmosphere). In any case, we entered Parque Nacional Tikal and, passing signs depicting crossing snakes, jaguars, and aardvarks (maybe?), we were brought to our hotel. We lightened our loads somewhat, applied sunscreen and bug repellent, and made our way into the park. I should note that I, stupidly, neglected to bring a bandanna for sweat absorption purposes. This mistake shall not be repeated in Asia (for which Tikal was a preview, I imagine). You can admire my glistening face and chest in the following pictures of the park.
Here's a map and our tour guide. He was pretty fantastic and even made howler monkey calls which succeeded in provoking a really awesome response from them.
At the first site we visited in the park (which is enormous because it represents an entire city's worth of ruins), we encountered a large group of these things whose names I can't remember. They were very cute, especially the babies. I have good videos of them frolicking, which I'll link when I figure out how.
The animals were awesome, the ruins were pretty cool, but we weren't yet blown away. Then we rounded a corner and were met by this...
Pretty unbelievable. We explored this area, which was largely residential (except for that one huge monument) for a long while...
Tikal is basically the ruins of an ancient Mayan city (estimates range from 2000 to 5000 years old). In fact, it's many cities. The mayan civilization (I could be mistaking some facts here) was on a 52 year cycle (based on the periodic concordance of their solar and lunar calendars) during which, for a given cycle, one noble family would rule an area. When a new family took over, they would commence the construction of monuments (both religious and self-promoting) over those of their predecessors. Rather than just tearing down the old ones, they would build kind of on top/around (like russian dolls) them, leading to the slow rise/expansion of the various structures. Mayan ruins are therefore layered in a very interesting way. You can see that pretty well in these pictures of one of the sites (El Mundo Perdido, The Lost World):
Later, we approached an area filled with huge temples and altars on which human sacrifice was performed. We climbed one of the larger ones (about 10 stories) so some of these pictures are from pretty high up.
It was really incredible. We drank some water and made our way over to the largest monument. At twenty-six stories, the stairs up were pretty crazy (here's a pic from a short way up them) and the view from the top was absolutely incredible. The pics don't really capture it that well. We were above the rainforest canopy and you could see, poking out of the trees, other temples and monuments from Tikal...all that remained of this huge ancient city. It was pretty haunting because up that high you could see how big Tikal actually was and how completely, despite its size, the jungle had reclaimed it...
After that climb and all the walking and heat, we were all wiped out and we made our way home to the hotel. We stopped along the way for the aforementioned interaction with howler monkeys. At the hotel, Ryan and I relaxed next to the pool with the lawyer, the libertarian, and a couple who were traveling from Belize (another lawyer and a financial analyst). We watched spider monkeys brachiating crazily in the trees over the pool (they are AMAZING, by the way...absurdly agile...incredible to watch) and toucans and macaws and parrots flew all around. It was nuts. We grabbed showers in our non-electricity-having rooms (complete with mosquito nets) and met up with the group for dinner where we had an intense political/economic conversation which I couldn't resist starting with the libertarian.
Didn't sleep super well due to intense heat, mosquitoes, and the arrival of my chest cold. The next day we headed out and caught another little plane back home. It was an incredible experience to see Tikal -- one which I highly recommend. A really awe-inspiring place that kind of puts human civilization in a non-flattering context.
I'm way behind on posts. We're leaving for Lago de Atitlan this afternoon and hiking the volcano on Sunday (then watching the world cup final) and I still haven't even written about my awesome new teacher or Cuatro de Julio. When I get back, there shall be more...
posted by The Wandering Jew @ 10:23 AM
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