Introduction
These are stories I've written about some of the more memorable events in my travels that I've chosen to write in the style known in the mashup of journalism and literary circles as "creative non-fiction." They are true accounts, but I've taken liberties with their presentation, not to alter facts, but to make them more interesting and entertaining to the reader without the folderol demanded of journalism in which everything is sourced and people appear with real names unless otherwise explained why they aren't. You'll just have to take my word for it that these things happened among real people as I recount them. I just hope you are as amused and entertained in reading about my true travel adventures as I was in actually experiencing them.
***
Saysha: What Happened?
Bronze Award Winner, Elder Division
13th Solas Travel Writing Awards
13th Solas Travel Writing Awards
There was darkness down there, and places with only the shadows of darkness. A few bare, low-watt bulbs dangled here and there in the empty outdoor pavilions by the bay, their feeble rays crushed by the black, rain-soaked sky.
People hung around in what appeared to be lounges sitting high on rickety stilts, no lights there either. They may have been people’s living rooms. I wasn’t certain of anything.
Turns out the “drink” I thought I bought my new lady friend in Gamboa Place on the bay was a full pint bottle of Garifuna rum, strong and heavily seasoned with a thicket of roots and herbs stuffed inside the bottle with the liquor. She’d taken my money, and when no one was looking, walked around to the business side of the bar, grabbed the bigger bottle, took a long swig first then poured her pint full before we took off.
“Saysha,” or something sounding like that, had already paved over her native creole with a thick slurry of alcohol so it made no sense to me. But I was beginning to get the big picture. So I thought.
I talk a lot about how it doesn’t matter where you are, that you can always find yourself in dangerous situations, but that there are things you can do to avoid them, like using your gut instincts -- if it doesn’t feel right, don’t do it -- staying sober enough to make good, responsible decisions quickly in difficult situations. Don’t do stupid things, blah, blah, blah, … .
Then you get in a situation like I was in, and it’s like junior high all over again.
True, I could have been anywhere with sketchy women and big, menacing men hanging around in the night at an oceanfront barrio. This place happened to be Livingston, Garifuna town, on Guatemala’s Caribbean coast.
The number of gringos around here at night normally can be counted on one finger. On this night it was pointing at me. With Saysha. All I‘d wanted was a little smoke.
I hung out down at Gamboa Place plenty during the day. I was in town enjoying the Garifuna Settlement Day celebrations. The food was good and I had met Marie the owner, her mom, and Marie’s brother Elvis on a previous trip to Livingston.
But this was Friday night and there was supposed to be some traditional drumming and dancing going on.
I sat waiting with Elvis’s nephew, Caesar, who’s normally trying to hustle a living in New York City, but was enjoying the holiday himself this weekend in his hometown.
Caesar was mulling whether he might be better off staying down here, and I was just mulling along with him when the conversation turned to drugs.
Since it seemed that after a couple of hours the live entertainment was maybe not going to materialize as planned and that drinking had taken over as the prime source of entertainment, I started thinking about what else might amuse me. I allowed to Caesar that if he knew where I might obtain a joint or two I’d be happy to share and that way help pass the time.
That’s about when Saysha showed up, an attractive, dark chocolate-skinned local lady with soft, seemingly gold-flecked brown eyes and a bushel of curly brown hair framing a pretty, delicately featured face. I guessed she was in her young 30s.
Caesar said Saysha could probably get the marijuana, so after she filled her bottle with booze, she and I set out into the darkness that enveloped Garifuna town. The tide was high and small waves were sloshing around the muddy seafront walkways. I stayed close and she just gestured for me to keep following along.
And the first stop was her “bedroom,” which is where my ”holy shit!” instincts started going off. It was a bedroom, alright, with nearly every inch of wall space covered with snapshots of men -- many, many different men.
Quickly drawing on my emergency reserve of Spanish, I tried to convey to her that perhaps there had been some mistake in communication. I had neither the cash nor the protection, not to mention the Sildenafil, for what I was pretty sure she had in mind.
“Vamos, vamos,” I said. I only wanted a little marijuana, not a disease and my picture on her wall.
So she got the idea and we went out again into the gloom and came to a wooden staircase that we climbed up into an old beach casa with the waves of the bay breathing in and out hard but unseen beneath us.
There were people hanging around up here, I was sure of it. I could hear low murmurings and see eyes atop large shapes.
Sometimes your best intentions, all your best-laid plans for certain situations, don’t amount to a ball of refried beans when you find yourself suddenly where everything seems to be taking a curve a little too fast.
Yet strangely, in my mind, there was still hope Saysha was going to come through for me -- with the marijuana, that is. But doubt was mounting as she seemed to be losing interest in me rather quickly now.
We visited another place like this and then a third, where Saysha immediately attached herself to a particularly large shape rather a little too warmly, I thought, landing deeply in what appeared to be a large lap. Then a pair of eyes fixed on me, which is when I decided that was my cue to excuse myself politely and begin easing backward down those stairs without tumbling into the bay.
I sloshed back to the Gamboa OK but a little nervous. Caesar laughed when I told him what happened and said Marie’s daughter, a pleasant, less, shall we say, adventuresome young woman than Saysha, could help me with what I’d gone out for in the first place, and she did. Very soon it all turned into a pleasant evening.
No harm was done though sad to say in a way I never laid eyes on Saysha again.
But my reflections on what did or didn’t happen began to unnerve me. I was never actually threatened with anything, but let my imagination work overtime in a spooky situation.
How did I know that anyone in these places wouldn’t have invited me in for a pleasant smoke? Was it because I was assuming that everybody was black but me? Did I even know? What difference did it make?
I’d like to hope none of that came into play but unfortunately no matter how good and enlightened you think you are, uncertainty and fear can induce some awful thoughts.
Maybe I should have actually talked to someone in those dark spaces. Maybe I would have been blown away by an unexpectedly wonderful new human experience. Or maybe a body washing away with the tide. The guidebooks don’t address this sort of thing.
“Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness, … ,” Mark Twain wrote.
True enough, perhaps, but maybe not always right away.
In my case, I’m afraid, the fatal blow had not yet struck.
People hung around in what appeared to be lounges sitting high on rickety stilts, no lights there either. They may have been people’s living rooms. I wasn’t certain of anything.
Turns out the “drink” I thought I bought my new lady friend in Gamboa Place on the bay was a full pint bottle of Garifuna rum, strong and heavily seasoned with a thicket of roots and herbs stuffed inside the bottle with the liquor. She’d taken my money, and when no one was looking, walked around to the business side of the bar, grabbed the bigger bottle, took a long swig first then poured her pint full before we took off.
“Saysha,” or something sounding like that, had already paved over her native creole with a thick slurry of alcohol so it made no sense to me. But I was beginning to get the big picture. So I thought.
I talk a lot about how it doesn’t matter where you are, that you can always find yourself in dangerous situations, but that there are things you can do to avoid them, like using your gut instincts -- if it doesn’t feel right, don’t do it -- staying sober enough to make good, responsible decisions quickly in difficult situations. Don’t do stupid things, blah, blah, blah, … .
Then you get in a situation like I was in, and it’s like junior high all over again.
True, I could have been anywhere with sketchy women and big, menacing men hanging around in the night at an oceanfront barrio. This place happened to be Livingston, Garifuna town, on Guatemala’s Caribbean coast.
The number of gringos around here at night normally can be counted on one finger. On this night it was pointing at me. With Saysha. All I‘d wanted was a little smoke.
I hung out down at Gamboa Place plenty during the day. I was in town enjoying the Garifuna Settlement Day celebrations. The food was good and I had met Marie the owner, her mom, and Marie’s brother Elvis on a previous trip to Livingston.
But this was Friday night and there was supposed to be some traditional drumming and dancing going on.
I sat waiting with Elvis’s nephew, Caesar, who’s normally trying to hustle a living in New York City, but was enjoying the holiday himself this weekend in his hometown.
Caesar was mulling whether he might be better off staying down here, and I was just mulling along with him when the conversation turned to drugs.
Since it seemed that after a couple of hours the live entertainment was maybe not going to materialize as planned and that drinking had taken over as the prime source of entertainment, I started thinking about what else might amuse me. I allowed to Caesar that if he knew where I might obtain a joint or two I’d be happy to share and that way help pass the time.
That’s about when Saysha showed up, an attractive, dark chocolate-skinned local lady with soft, seemingly gold-flecked brown eyes and a bushel of curly brown hair framing a pretty, delicately featured face. I guessed she was in her young 30s.
Caesar said Saysha could probably get the marijuana, so after she filled her bottle with booze, she and I set out into the darkness that enveloped Garifuna town. The tide was high and small waves were sloshing around the muddy seafront walkways. I stayed close and she just gestured for me to keep following along.
And the first stop was her “bedroom,” which is where my ”holy shit!” instincts started going off. It was a bedroom, alright, with nearly every inch of wall space covered with snapshots of men -- many, many different men.
Quickly drawing on my emergency reserve of Spanish, I tried to convey to her that perhaps there had been some mistake in communication. I had neither the cash nor the protection, not to mention the Sildenafil, for what I was pretty sure she had in mind.
“Vamos, vamos,” I said. I only wanted a little marijuana, not a disease and my picture on her wall.
So she got the idea and we went out again into the gloom and came to a wooden staircase that we climbed up into an old beach casa with the waves of the bay breathing in and out hard but unseen beneath us.
There were people hanging around up here, I was sure of it. I could hear low murmurings and see eyes atop large shapes.
Sometimes your best intentions, all your best-laid plans for certain situations, don’t amount to a ball of refried beans when you find yourself suddenly where everything seems to be taking a curve a little too fast.
Yet strangely, in my mind, there was still hope Saysha was going to come through for me -- with the marijuana, that is. But doubt was mounting as she seemed to be losing interest in me rather quickly now.
We visited another place like this and then a third, where Saysha immediately attached herself to a particularly large shape rather a little too warmly, I thought, landing deeply in what appeared to be a large lap. Then a pair of eyes fixed on me, which is when I decided that was my cue to excuse myself politely and begin easing backward down those stairs without tumbling into the bay.
I sloshed back to the Gamboa OK but a little nervous. Caesar laughed when I told him what happened and said Marie’s daughter, a pleasant, less, shall we say, adventuresome young woman than Saysha, could help me with what I’d gone out for in the first place, and she did. Very soon it all turned into a pleasant evening.
No harm was done though sad to say in a way I never laid eyes on Saysha again.
But my reflections on what did or didn’t happen began to unnerve me. I was never actually threatened with anything, but let my imagination work overtime in a spooky situation.
How did I know that anyone in these places wouldn’t have invited me in for a pleasant smoke? Was it because I was assuming that everybody was black but me? Did I even know? What difference did it make?
I’d like to hope none of that came into play but unfortunately no matter how good and enlightened you think you are, uncertainty and fear can induce some awful thoughts.
Maybe I should have actually talked to someone in those dark spaces. Maybe I would have been blown away by an unexpectedly wonderful new human experience. Or maybe a body washing away with the tide. The guidebooks don’t address this sort of thing.
“Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness, … ,” Mark Twain wrote.
True enough, perhaps, but maybe not always right away.
In my case, I’m afraid, the fatal blow had not yet struck.
###
Om Sweet Om!
My Adventure in A Pisac Valley Yoga Shala
The scenic city of Pisac sits in Peru’s Sacred Valley at nearly 10,000 feet.
The Urubamba River, the valley’s lifeblood, percolates down from Andes mountain peaks that soar several thousand feet over the valley.
Hikers enjoy stunning views and Inca ruins that rival those of Machu Picchu itself, located some 80 kilometers downriver.
So Pisac seemed to be the perfect introduction to Peru, offering the allure of a mystical ancient culture while slowly acclimating to the coca leaf-chewing altitude.
I started booking.
I was searching accommodations in Pisac and was intrigued by one calling itself a yoga “shala,” promoting programs and instruction. I warmed to the idea of exploring my long-held curiosity with yoga, and it all looked so perfect in the reputable online rental site’s description. The price was right, and with righteous naivete, I booked a room for a month.
I did first send a specifically worded email to confirm that “private ensuite bath” meant the toilet and bath facilities are actually inside the room to be used solely by me.
Indeed, that’s what it meant, a prompt email confirmed.
When I arrived, I found a sink and a toilet outside my room under a stairwell that wouldn’t let me stand when I peed.
The shower was about 50 paces away through the crisp mountain air in a well-shared bathroom that smelled much like an outhouse. The water was lukewarm at best and dripped lazily from the showerhead at full force.
Over the next few days, it appeared there was no regular program of yoga, the wifi signal was weak when working at all, and there were food scraps and dirty dishes left out daily by the hosts, attracting an impressive collection of bugs in the kitchen.
But it was all so cheap, I reasoned, and I was so ripe for the adventure that in the spirit of it all I resolved to make the best of things.
Meanwhile, there were very few guests in the shala and no one doing yoga until about 10 days into my stay when a pleasant couple of young aficionados from Colorado arrived.
Hosts Paco and Javier (maybe not their real names) seemed genuinely pleased to have some real practitioners on the premises, which led to my first yoga class.
I thought I might do alright but the first session was humbling. Paco, the yoga master, led the exercise in the studio located directly above my room. Only a single, thin, combination floorboard and ceiling separated my bed from the studio. But since I was then in the program, it all seemed OK.
Afterward, the experienced Colorado yogis said it was a grueling session, especially for a beginner. I didn’t feel so bad then, but I started harboring suspicions about Paco.
The next night was a full moon so there was no workout. Instead, there was a meditation session with candles and prayer rugs and doodads scattered about in the dim light. And there was the promise of a campfire later outside in the cold beneath the full moon and clear Sacred Valley sky.
The meditation consisted of sitting in that cross-legged yoga position, chanting ommmm, and repeating a five-line verse in Sanskrit. I think it was Sanskrit. We were to chant the verse 108 times.
I don’t believe we really did it 108 times but I’m pretty sure only Paco was counting. If we missed a few verses, that was OK with me.
I really thought the exercise was better suited to a more restful, prone position. But it didn’t seem appropriate to complain at that point. So I stuck to the program which, for me, unfortunately, made it difficult to concentrate on the chant.
At verse 58 or so, my mind wandered to that campfire, wondering if there might be marshmallows. Now that struck me as funny, and it was about all I could do to keep from chuckling out loud, which I realized might interrupt the piousness of the whole affair. So I clamped down a little harder on the ankles under my crossed legs. That crimped my desire for snacks.
At about the 89th om, I felt a rumbling in my bowels that normally precedes a satisfying release of intestinal gas and started wondering what a real yogi does in that situation. I guessed real yogis don’t consume enough carbs to worry about it.
Meditating further on the matter, I mulled an urge to let loose one good, loud ass-belch just to see what would happen. But a sense of decorum prevailed.
By then, I was pretty sure we were rounding the 100-chant post and heading for home. Wasn’t long after that when one big, long “ommmm” apparently marked the end of the meditation, evoking a refined sense of relief among the devotees.
Removing myself from the position I’d maintained throughout the ceremony proved troublesome, however.
So I was amused when Mr. Yogi himself from Colorado said his leg had fallen asleep and that he was pounding it with his fist WHILE THE CEREMONY WAS GOING ON!
All the while my eyes were closed in deep meditative thought of marshmallows and intestinal gas, wholly unaware of such blasphemy in our midst.
As soon as the blood started flowing into my lower limbs, I went down to the backyard where it was clear these yoga masters were not schooled in the Boy Scouts.
The fire was a paltry conflagration of bamboo and eucalyptus leaves burning down to nothing in no time, constantly sending the faithful off for more suitable shrubbery.
Alas, there were no marshmallows, nor even hot chocolate, which I really could have used in that brisk Sacred Valley night air.
Little did I know then that real fun at the Shala had only begun.
Saturday morning of the last week of my stay, a self-absorbed group of about a dozen well-practiced yogis moved in hell-bent on a rousing weekend of mantric mayhem.
Javier and Paco were enthralled. All of a sudden a yoga program was underway.
On Saturday evening, in fact, there was a yoga exercise session that I stumbled upon mid-om upon returning from collecting my laundry in town. Though not invited to participate, I had the privilege of listening to it through the ceiling.
Then, early Sunday morning, the yoga troupe was abuzz about an excursion with Paco and Javier to a lake where they were planning a “spiritual healing” ceremony with huachama, a “healing” drug of the hallucinatory kind.
The yogic pranksters crowded into a van and were driven round and round on a nearby mountain but they never found the lake, only a large, muddy pit that from what I heard smelled much like the shower room.
The van rolled back into the shala just about the time the huachama started kicking in.
Several yogis plopped down cross-legged outside in the rain in a serious huachama state until soon they, too, decided to retreat with the rest of their group to the meditation area which, as I mentioned, was above my room with only a single, bare sheet of plywood separating us.
I might have felt better about that had I been invited to partake of the huachama, which has a high that can last up to 12 hours. I looked it up.
But as I lay in my bed listening to the omming, the giggling, the badly played flutes, and senselessly beaten drums above, I grew irritated thinking this could go on a while. Already miffed at being marginalized, I imagined they were just rubbing it in.
I retreated to the kitchen where two rebellious yogis sulked after being ridiculed and ostracized by their fellow troupers for not taking the huachama. The rebels now were mostly occupied keeping the bugs off their food.
We commiserated a while, then hatched a plan.
I suggested playing some music as loud as I could from my room to compete with the yogis above. My new kitchen friends suggested that heavy metal might seriously offend their former friends’ high-tuned sensibilities, so I offered up the obvious choice, Metallica! They were delighted.
And with that the assault was on.
I went back to my room, located Metallica’s “Top 30 Hits” on YouTube, cranked my Chromebook up to “11” and let the good times roll!
On cue, the yogis could be heard scurrying about like roaches when the light turns on.
In less than five minutes, our sonic battle was over. Victory was declared in the kitchen with high-fives all-around.
The yogis, all but two, vanished the next day, while peace and harmony, at last, reigned in the shala.
Ommmmmm.
The Urubamba River, the valley’s lifeblood, percolates down from Andes mountain peaks that soar several thousand feet over the valley.
Hikers enjoy stunning views and Inca ruins that rival those of Machu Picchu itself, located some 80 kilometers downriver.
So Pisac seemed to be the perfect introduction to Peru, offering the allure of a mystical ancient culture while slowly acclimating to the coca leaf-chewing altitude.
I started booking.
I was searching accommodations in Pisac and was intrigued by one calling itself a yoga “shala,” promoting programs and instruction. I warmed to the idea of exploring my long-held curiosity with yoga, and it all looked so perfect in the reputable online rental site’s description. The price was right, and with righteous naivete, I booked a room for a month.
I did first send a specifically worded email to confirm that “private ensuite bath” meant the toilet and bath facilities are actually inside the room to be used solely by me.
Indeed, that’s what it meant, a prompt email confirmed.
When I arrived, I found a sink and a toilet outside my room under a stairwell that wouldn’t let me stand when I peed.
The shower was about 50 paces away through the crisp mountain air in a well-shared bathroom that smelled much like an outhouse. The water was lukewarm at best and dripped lazily from the showerhead at full force.
Over the next few days, it appeared there was no regular program of yoga, the wifi signal was weak when working at all, and there were food scraps and dirty dishes left out daily by the hosts, attracting an impressive collection of bugs in the kitchen.
But it was all so cheap, I reasoned, and I was so ripe for the adventure that in the spirit of it all I resolved to make the best of things.
Meanwhile, there were very few guests in the shala and no one doing yoga until about 10 days into my stay when a pleasant couple of young aficionados from Colorado arrived.
Hosts Paco and Javier (maybe not their real names) seemed genuinely pleased to have some real practitioners on the premises, which led to my first yoga class.
I thought I might do alright but the first session was humbling. Paco, the yoga master, led the exercise in the studio located directly above my room. Only a single, thin, combination floorboard and ceiling separated my bed from the studio. But since I was then in the program, it all seemed OK.
Afterward, the experienced Colorado yogis said it was a grueling session, especially for a beginner. I didn’t feel so bad then, but I started harboring suspicions about Paco.
The next night was a full moon so there was no workout. Instead, there was a meditation session with candles and prayer rugs and doodads scattered about in the dim light. And there was the promise of a campfire later outside in the cold beneath the full moon and clear Sacred Valley sky.
The meditation consisted of sitting in that cross-legged yoga position, chanting ommmm, and repeating a five-line verse in Sanskrit. I think it was Sanskrit. We were to chant the verse 108 times.
I don’t believe we really did it 108 times but I’m pretty sure only Paco was counting. If we missed a few verses, that was OK with me.
I really thought the exercise was better suited to a more restful, prone position. But it didn’t seem appropriate to complain at that point. So I stuck to the program which, for me, unfortunately, made it difficult to concentrate on the chant.
At verse 58 or so, my mind wandered to that campfire, wondering if there might be marshmallows. Now that struck me as funny, and it was about all I could do to keep from chuckling out loud, which I realized might interrupt the piousness of the whole affair. So I clamped down a little harder on the ankles under my crossed legs. That crimped my desire for snacks.
At about the 89th om, I felt a rumbling in my bowels that normally precedes a satisfying release of intestinal gas and started wondering what a real yogi does in that situation. I guessed real yogis don’t consume enough carbs to worry about it.
Meditating further on the matter, I mulled an urge to let loose one good, loud ass-belch just to see what would happen. But a sense of decorum prevailed.
By then, I was pretty sure we were rounding the 100-chant post and heading for home. Wasn’t long after that when one big, long “ommmm” apparently marked the end of the meditation, evoking a refined sense of relief among the devotees.
Removing myself from the position I’d maintained throughout the ceremony proved troublesome, however.
So I was amused when Mr. Yogi himself from Colorado said his leg had fallen asleep and that he was pounding it with his fist WHILE THE CEREMONY WAS GOING ON!
All the while my eyes were closed in deep meditative thought of marshmallows and intestinal gas, wholly unaware of such blasphemy in our midst.
As soon as the blood started flowing into my lower limbs, I went down to the backyard where it was clear these yoga masters were not schooled in the Boy Scouts.
The fire was a paltry conflagration of bamboo and eucalyptus leaves burning down to nothing in no time, constantly sending the faithful off for more suitable shrubbery.
Alas, there were no marshmallows, nor even hot chocolate, which I really could have used in that brisk Sacred Valley night air.
Little did I know then that real fun at the Shala had only begun.
Saturday morning of the last week of my stay, a self-absorbed group of about a dozen well-practiced yogis moved in hell-bent on a rousing weekend of mantric mayhem.
Javier and Paco were enthralled. All of a sudden a yoga program was underway.
On Saturday evening, in fact, there was a yoga exercise session that I stumbled upon mid-om upon returning from collecting my laundry in town. Though not invited to participate, I had the privilege of listening to it through the ceiling.
Then, early Sunday morning, the yoga troupe was abuzz about an excursion with Paco and Javier to a lake where they were planning a “spiritual healing” ceremony with huachama, a “healing” drug of the hallucinatory kind.
The yogic pranksters crowded into a van and were driven round and round on a nearby mountain but they never found the lake, only a large, muddy pit that from what I heard smelled much like the shower room.
The van rolled back into the shala just about the time the huachama started kicking in.
Several yogis plopped down cross-legged outside in the rain in a serious huachama state until soon they, too, decided to retreat with the rest of their group to the meditation area which, as I mentioned, was above my room with only a single, bare sheet of plywood separating us.
I might have felt better about that had I been invited to partake of the huachama, which has a high that can last up to 12 hours. I looked it up.
But as I lay in my bed listening to the omming, the giggling, the badly played flutes, and senselessly beaten drums above, I grew irritated thinking this could go on a while. Already miffed at being marginalized, I imagined they were just rubbing it in.
I retreated to the kitchen where two rebellious yogis sulked after being ridiculed and ostracized by their fellow troupers for not taking the huachama. The rebels now were mostly occupied keeping the bugs off their food.
We commiserated a while, then hatched a plan.
I suggested playing some music as loud as I could from my room to compete with the yogis above. My new kitchen friends suggested that heavy metal might seriously offend their former friends’ high-tuned sensibilities, so I offered up the obvious choice, Metallica! They were delighted.
And with that the assault was on.
I went back to my room, located Metallica’s “Top 30 Hits” on YouTube, cranked my Chromebook up to “11” and let the good times roll!
On cue, the yogis could be heard scurrying about like roaches when the light turns on.
In less than five minutes, our sonic battle was over. Victory was declared in the kitchen with high-fives all-around.
The yogis, all but two, vanished the next day, while peace and harmony, at last, reigned in the shala.
Ommmmmm.
***