I believe I am currently in the state one would call “completely and utterly burnt out.” As such, today’s will have to be a shorter, snappier, and less edited travel blog with a smattering of photos.
Evening set upon the village as we filed into a one-roomed building and took seats on plastic chairs. The Hilary Clinton of Nebaj sat before us: a confident woman in traditional clothing, her gleaming beaded necklace catching what dim light there was in the room. We knew her to be the “mayor” of the local indigenous group—an ambiguous position caught in between the “occidental” (Western) government, as she called the Guatemalan government, and the locals. I was fascinated to hear if and how First Nations’ self-government functioned in Guatemala in comparison to Canada—especially from a woman who could, perhaps, vocalize issues differently than a man would.
There were a number of impressionable moments.
Dona Anna, hands folded in front of her and head held aloft, seemed nonchalantly interested to hear where we were from and what we thought of First Nations. Well, Aly mentioned that the Enbridge pipeline plans to plough through several resisting Aboriginal roups, and we were learning, increasingly, that Canadian mining corporations affected the First Nations all the way down in Guatemala. My professors bickered over beer later on about what kind of interaction this was–was it cosmopolitan, this brief exchange of thoughts between Canadian students and a Guatemalan indigenous leader? The program is named “Arts Term Abroad in Global Citizenship” after all, and we spent a lot of time thinking about cosmopolitanism during the trip; especially asking if we are cosmopolitans of the fashionable, elite “frequent flyer” variety, and if cosmopolitanism is inherently one-sided.
This poli sci junkie found the electoral process for local leaders quite interesting. The mayor said that you would not take it upon yourself to run for leadership positions and to run campaigns, but you would be chosen by community vote. You would have to accept the duty if the community chose you. Hmmm…
Furthermore (a perfectly decent word to use in essays, Professor K.), their judicial punishments were different. Serious offenses would incur traditional, so-called “symbolic”, beatings. While a freely wandering mind may compare and contrast this with Foucault’s depiction of non-violent prisions being, in some way, incredibly violent upon the mind….it was nonetheless an image that raised all sorts of speculation in me from ”uh, really? to “how do pluralistic judicial systems work, jurisdictionally?–do indigenous people really have a choice in which courts they were to choose?”…and finally, “who am I, to judge these judges?”
I will evaluate the two courses, PHIL 335 (Power and Oppression) and SOCI 430 (Civil Society in Theory and Practice), as I would any other course at the end of this blog series. In the meantime, I will say that we had our first couple of assignments those two weeks in Nebaj. One assignment was a short paper that caused a contagious fever of nerves that spread among the students living in close quarters. All of that perfectionism for something we would have typed up in a couple of hours or less in Vancouver, alone in our rooms. As for myself, I decided early on that I would focus mostly on comprehension, not assignments or grades. Besides, I could not physically do more than that–I could not think creatively and thoroughly without private space and extended periods of time for reflection. The physical demands of being around people at all times, listening to others, or being ready to hop into a conversation, sucked up energy out of this introvert. It reminded me a little bit of this poem by Franz Kafka, although obviously with a much more diluted meaning:
The Street Window
by Franz Kafka
Translated by Willa and Edwin Muir
Whoever leads a solitary life and yet now and then wants to attach himself somewhere, whoever, according to changes in the time of day, the weather, the state of his business, and the like, suddenly wishes to see any arm at all to which he might cling – he will not be able to manage for long without a window looking on to the street. And if he is in the mood of not desiring anything and only goes to his window sill a tired man, with eyes turning from his public to heaven and back again, not wanting to look out and having thrown his head up a little, even then the horses below will draw him down into their train of wagons and tumult, and so at last into the human harmony.
One school night, we returned to our classroom in the cafe after dark to listen to a man standing at the front of the room as if giving a lecture. I found this choice of location odd, as those who regularly lecture me at university do not teach us about their personal stories. He called himself a “survivor” of the civil war (he was optimistic) and he shared with us memories that should have never been. I do not think I will ever forget the experience of listening to Guatemalans speak after dark. I mean, not just what they said, but how they said it. So many of these personal stories were spoken in Spanish, rehashed and rephrased in English by a translator, tossed into the humid night air, past my drooping eyelids, into my consciousness. Anyway, he tied everything back to the Mayan Calendar. As many will have heard via pop culture, 2012 is an important year for the Mayans; it is the end of an era in time. He expressed the sincere hope for a brighter, harmonious, flourishing future for Guatemalans and the world. Amen to that.
Next time: less crappy writing, living on the Coffee Co-op, and more.
Dragon of False Consciousness tattoo, anyone?
