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A couple of weeks or so ago, over a period of a number of days, a super long line of people would patiently wait (some days in rain and drizzle) to do “something” in a little office just across the street from our apartment.

So I snapped a picture out of curiosity.

Another day or so later, the line was really long so I snapped another picture.  The line that day kept going (to the left in the picture) and around the corner.  So this time, in my beginner Spanish, I walked up to the line and asked what was going on.

I was told they were in line to register to vote.  Wow.  Unbelievable.  They were waiting to get into this little electoral office to sign up to vote.

I’ve since reflected we Americans would never tolerate standing for hours in line to register to vote.  We’ve got it easy.  We have multiple ways to register.  But then lots of us don’t vote.

We have easy democracy.  Maybe too easy.  I don’t know.  But I do know Guatemalans take their voting seriously.

Late this afternoon (Sunday), Leslie was cooking and the burner went out.  I was out so she called me and gave me the news.  No problem I thought, because everyone’s on small propane gas tanks and when they run out, you just call the little gas store in the neighborhood and they’ll bring a full tank around in 15-20 minutes or so.

But with my (still) limited español, I wasn’t ready to call so I just walked there – closed!

Hmm – but I’d also known about this other place in the back alley on the way to our lavandería (laundry) so I thought I’d check it out.

The door was open so I tentatively walked into the private courtyard and cried out “Hola” (hello or hi) a few times.  Ah – success!  I found a corner where  a number of tanks were sitting and in limited español explained my problem.  However, I also knew there are different tank nozzles and you’ve got to pick the correct gas distributor for your tank.  Didn’t know if these folks had the same type tank as mine, so I said I’d bring my tank over and they’d take a look at it.

Yes! They looked at my empty tank and said their tanks would fit with my little distributor valve back in the apartment, so I paid 110 quetzales (about $14) for 35 pounds of gas.  The full tank I knew would be about 50 pounds to carry back so Leslie came along with me to help carry it back a couple of blocks.

We’re somewhat curiosities here in town.  Even though Xela is a huge destination point for foreigners wanting to learn Spanish, we still get lots of looks (especially blondes like Leslie).  So two very much foreigners carrying a tank of gas through the local street drew interest!

Before we left the courtyard, I asked the young boy who brought out our new tank to take our picture.

Sandra, the woman from whom I bought the tank, and her kids loved looking at the picture so I asked if I could take theirs. Sure!  But who really loved looking at the “family portrait” were the two little kids!

I was in the busy food court of the Pradera mall the other day and, looking around, noticed only one vendor had a line.

Taco Bell.  Of all the places where you can eat ‘real’ “Mexican food” in town or at home, this is where the crowd lined up – for (American) “Mexican” food!

I’ve seen the extremes of life in Xela.

I’ve seen The Future of this country.  Close to our apartment is this private school just letting out and all the kids looked sharp in their school uniforms. These kids are fortunate there are resources (Mom and Dad or other family members) that can put them in this school.

Yesterday was Father’s Day here in Guatemala and Leslie and I happened to be in a shopping mall to pick up some stuff after school.  We headed up to the food court to grab a bite and saw a lot of families also grabbing a bite to eat.

At a table close to us, we watched as a young woman was trying to take a picture of her group on her iPad so Leslie volunteered to take the picture with all of them.  They were gregarious and laughing so I asked if I could take their picture.  Sure!

After I’d snapped my picture, they brought out their smart phones and asked to Bluetooth my picture with their phones.  They’re intelligent, educated, technically savvy, independent and strong.  These young women are The Future.

Across the food court Leslie noticed a family having a bite to eat, but Dad and his young son were both wearing BurgerKing hats.  I walked over and in my halting español congratulated the Dad on Father’s Day, said I liked his hat and asked if I could take a picture of the family.  Sure!  After the photo, Dad whips out his iPhone and we Bluetooth my photo to him.  Another strong, middle class family with a Dad (and family) who will ensure his son has all the resources necessary for a productive life.  This young boy is The Future.

And I’ve seen The Maybe of this country.  Every Wednesday morning is trash day and the tenants from the 10 apartments in our complex put their trash bags outside the gate for pickup.  Over the past several weeks since we’ve been here, we’ve noticed these sweet young girls waiting outside the gate for every bag of garbage brought out.  They open every bag and scavenge anything of remote value.

They’ve chosen our complex because there are a number of “extranjeros” (foreigners) here and our neighbors have clued us in about the girls.  They separate the “good stuff” (plastic, cardboard, etc) for the girls into the green bags to make things easier for them and now so do we.

There’s obviously a reason they’ve got to scavenge.  They’re maybe not in school (don’t know for sure) but they certainly don’t have the resources of the above.  They, and many kids like them, may have a difficult and uncertain future.

This shy, sweet girl is part of the Mayan community, where the Moms and grandmothers meet to sell produce on the sidewalks around our school.  I know resources are tight for this demographic so I wonder what kind of future greets her every morning in the mercado.

And I’ve seen The Lost of this country.  The man on the left is having a seizure and the man on the right is in a stupor.

I’ve reflected that in many respects, these contrasts aren’t that much different from my country.  We too have The Future, The Maybe and The Lost.

After we landed in Guatemala City and got to our guest house, I wanted to take a shower.  Hmm, the first thing I noticed were the electrical wires to the shower head.  This can’t be too good I thought.

Well, I then assumed this shower had been used before me (and there wasn’t a plot to electrocute me) so I jumped in and gave it a shot – and got lots of hot water.

I’ve since learned most houses here don’t have hot water as we know it.  There’s no hot water for the kitchen sink or anywhere else in the house.  Only the shower with one of these electric heaters.  I’ve also learned most Americans and other foreigners commonly refer to them as “suicide showers”…

When we rented our apartment a couple of weeks ago, the very nice landlady toured the apartment with us, showed us the bathroom, turned on the shower but only very tepid water came out.  Yet that seemed to be the accepted standard so we just went with it.  But…!  No way was I ever going to use that shower – especially with that big scorch over the wires!

So – no hot water when we moved in.  But, we’d bought an electric tea kettle at Wal-Mart and a new red bucket to shower with – so life was good!

Meanwhile we’d seen this thing mounted on the wall of our small patio with a copper tube cut off and what would appear to be water pipes.  Could this be an old gas water heater?

Networking is key to lots of things in Latin America.  With the help of my Spanish teacher and her father, I was put in touch with David who came over to our apartment on Saturday and spent almost 3 hours working on the heater.  It worked!  Then a hop in his truck to a plumbing store where I picked out a new shower head.

This is our new shower PLUS we have hot water to the kitchen sink and the bathroom sink!  Life is good – and life is very good when you’ve got hot water!

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Everyone’s on propane tanks, so this is what our new setup looks like.  One line to the cooktop and the other to the water heater.

And because everyone’s on small propane tanks, you never just leave pilot lights, etc, on.  You shut everything off when you don’t need it.  So anytime you want hot water, just light the pilot light, wait about 15 seconds and you’re good to go!