AFTER THE VUVUZELAS

View of historic house 5a Avenida

Weather: Mostly rainy and gray. Makes you want to curl up with a good book and just hibernate away. That kind of weather.

When Ugly is Lovely

Although recovery and renewal works are ongoing throughout the Historic Center, there are still spots which have fallen into serious decay and are mostly abandoned. Nevertheless, the architecture is beautiful--sometimes bizarre--and I think that it is precisely that decay which lends it a special, ghostly and mysterious aura.

In other words, I find beauty in decay. I find beauty, as well, in ruins and old cemeteries. That is as close to romantic or sentimental as I will ever get.

So today's pictures, taken around 7 am on a rainy day, are from that point of view.

View of bell tower and dome of Calvario Church
(Built late 17th Century)

When Ugly is Just Plain Ugly

The other morning, I went brunch with a friend. As we were having breakfast by a window, there was a huge commotion in the restaurant. Turns out that right outside our window, a guy had been walking by when a van stopped abruptly in front of him, several men jumped out and grabbing the pedestrian, brutally pummeled him as if he were a piñata.

Historic house with Moorish façade

Then they dragged him into the van, where they continued to beat him and the van, screeching, sped away with them not even bothering to slam the door shut.

While all of this was going on, there was a chorus of anguished ¡Ay Dios Mio! going on inside and outside the restaurant, and people frantically dialing the police on their cellphones.

Truth be told, the police did arrive sort of fast and some police pick-up trucks fanned out to search for the mysterious white van. Other officers started to take statements from people on the streets, but since most witnesses on the street had scrammed, I don't think they got much information.

They didn't bother to come inside the restaurant to interview the patrons! Which seemed to me the most common sense thing to do; but what do I know about investigative police strategy?

Art Noveau door (Late 1800s, Early 1900s)

I had tried to write down the van's license plates but wasn't able to. We were upset, we were no longer really hungry.

Today I found out that the guy is an alleged extortionist, who had been blackmailing surrounding businesses for money. You know, the typical exchange of "protection" for money, or rather, they won't cause harm if one pays them not to cause harm. The man had been "arrested" by plain clothes police officers, which was the cause for the brutal scene we all witnessed.

Or so a flyer issued by the National Police, mailed around the Internet today, explained. No mention of the beating, the van, etc.

Close-up of elegant Art Noveau door

That merchants feel confident to call the police to protect them against extortionists is good, and the police did seem to arrive quickly when called to the restaurant, which is also good. Nevertheless, I still feel kind of sick at the scene we had to witness. I have seen people killed and am no wuss when it comes to gory, but witnessing unnecessary brutality is always upsetting.

Well, we have our police brutality problems in the US, so can't really expect not to have them here, where there is less rule of law. But I don't believe I will ever get used to this.

Decaying elegant entrance and façade

Latest developments in our non-profit organization (Or learning to deal with local government)

Our non-profit partnership with the government has grown and we shall be sworn in on Wednesday at Casa Ibargüen, which is where the Office of the Historic District of the City of Guatemala holds its ceremonies.

We got a grant to subsidize our legit incorporation as a non-profit--a legal expense which isn't cheap here--and we will be a formal, viable, working organization as of Wednesday. This we have published heavily on Facebook, as well as sent print and digital invitations all over.

Our board of directors is constituted by business owners and cultural organizations from the Historic Center. We haven't gotten formally incorporated yet, and yet we already received more RSVPs than we thought we would actually get. Facebook has a lot to do with it!

Beautiful old entrance

Even some City councilmembers are coming. So it has been a few crazy busy days and it promises to become even more frantic as we get there, but we are exited and happy. And nervous.

It has been very stressful (yet a learning experience), to deal with several government entities at the same time and all the ensuing protocol which here, oh surprise, can be quite arcane and rigid. For a country this small, they do have a very complex protocol in place.

However... I guess the time is right for this, because as we speak, I just got a call from one of the local newspapers, elPeriódico, to interview me about the non-profit organization and the upcoming event. Cool.

Façade of an old business which used to be named Ackermann (as in the US, there was a great German immigration wave here, way back when)

New Job

Out of the blue, as I was not expecting it, I got a job offer from the Jesuit university where I just taught a course in their master programs. They want to keep me on their grad level teaching roster and offered me, as well, a job as a master thesis advisor. Here that is actually a formal paid position, a job on the roster. Quite different than in the US.

Colonial façade overgrown with greenery

I have never been a thesis advisor before, but I have written quite a few and have produced a fair share of research and nerdy publications, so I guess I shall be fine. I already have been assigned my first advisee who, as luck will have it, happened to be one of the best students I had in the course I taught recently. A young woman from Spain. Her topic happens to be of interest to me and something I know about, so at this point in time, it seems like it will be a pleasant endeavor. Veremos. We shall see!

Original Art Deco façade
(reminds me of South Beach, Florida)

Another newspaper article in the works

I am starting to like this and it seems that they like me back. I got commissioned, again, to write another piece for the Sunday magazine of Siglo XXI newspaper.

There are no quality regular magazines to be found here--NONE--and that void seems to be filled by the Sunday magazines of the varied newspapers published here. The best newspaper here is elPeriódico (funded by the Soros Foundation) with Siglo XXI running a close second.

But the best Sunday magazines belong to Siglo XXI and Diario de Centro América, which is the government newspaper.

Cool graffiti face besides an abandoned Colonial building

Strange, but somehow the state newspaper has managed to have a pretty darn good Sunday magazine, which has even published articles by Noam Chomsky. I was like, a government organ publishing Chomsky??? But there you have it. I feel ambiguous about Chomsky's writings--some I really like, some I dislike. But still.

However, the state newspaper's magazine is a literary and current events publication more than anything else. So I have become a faithful reader of local Sunday magazines.

Thank goodness I have found a place where I can also buy Rolling Stone, ArtNews, The New Yorker, Vanity Fair and Vogue. At about US$10 a pop! And not quite current, and not to be found always, but! It works. They even call you when new magazines arrive. Smart move. It's like a siren call.

Fading sign colonial house wall

A New Strategies Workshop

Last week, I took a 3-day intensive workshop with Beatriz Briggs, from the University of Chicago, who is an expert in Outcome Mapping. This is a strategy developed by Canadian organizations, adopted by US institutions and now being disseminated worldwide as the new thing in organizational communication.

The workshop, sponsored by the Jesuit University and some research organization in Costa Rica whose name I forget, turned out to be pretty good, despite my not-so-high expectations. I tend to be quite the pessimist when it comes to this type of didactic stuff. But this time, I was wrong. Moreover, Beatrice spoke completely in strongly-accented but perfectly fluent Spanish!

Late 17th Century Century colonial house, boarded up

I liked the people there, starting with Beatrice. I met a couple of participants from Belgium and several from Costa Rica, among them some graduates from US universities. There were some local community leaders and overall, most were non-profit managers and/or academics there to learn the latest in mapping strategies.

It was a pretty diverse group. Many of us made friends, networked a great deal, had meals together, exchanged emails, etc. I made some new friends with whom I suspect I am going to end up pub-hopping in the near future ...

Hey, that is a measure of success when it comes to networking! Did I make business connections? Land a contract? Did I make new drinking buddies?

Colonial façade

I sent a group of Costa Ricans bar hopping through the Historic District and they absolutely fell in love with it. Costa Ricans tend to be cultivated and well-read. They are doing similar things in San Jose, their capital, and its historic district. I'd love to go check it out.

Anyhow. I can envision a lot of uses for mapping in the business world as well. In truth, Beatrice, a native of the Midwest, strikes me as more business-oriented than anything else, despite her vast experience in development. Her workshop was professional and effective. Money and time well-invested, methinks.

The Inn

The inn had a crazy busy month, particularly when we had the hotel bursting at the seems with a group of adolescents brought by a health organization for some educational workshops. Despite the chaperons, that is always a fun-headache kind of experience.

They won't stop talking loudly and giggling, endlessly, till all hours. Add that noise to the vuvuzelas!

Teenagers are nuts and no matter how well-behaved, they end up doing some sort of mischief, usually to one another. In the end, however, they are always funny in the eye-rolling, head-shaking funny way.

Ah yes, I remember those days. I kept getting kicked out of school myself, so far be it for me to criticize the youthful shenanigans of others.

But... all that is neither here nor there.

Okay.

For some strange reason, bug love is in the air, and during the last half hour several couples of mating bugs have been flying around me and landing all over the laptop, so I think that is a sign that I need to let it go. Thanks for coming by!

www.QualityGuate.com

Hotel - Lofts - Parking

In the heart of the Historic District of Guatemala City