Basquetbol y tortillar

The day before yesterday, Monday, I finished teaching in the Institute in my town, and as I was walking back to the house, a group of girls from the Institute were playing a game of "basquetbol"... in their strappy high-heeled sandals and cortes (long wrapped woven skirts), of course. They called to me and asked to join them. I've just been WAITING for someone to invite me to play. It was so much fun. Some of the girls are decent, especially considering the outfits they were wearing, and the Gringa-Playing-Basketball of course attracted a bit of a crowd of spectators (mostly men). For a while there was a large group of boys from the Institute watching enviously, and some of them kept shouting to me, "¡Seño!" (the standard female title here, short for señorita) "¡A game!" but I told them I was already playing. Of course they didn't ask to join the game since girls and boys generally don´t mix for sports (me being the obvious exception in their minds). Some other day, I'll play with the boys. But it was a lot of fun playing with the girls-- they were so cute and shy, and they laughed every time I gave them a high five. Baby steps toward my girls-group dream, perhaps? They invited me to come the next day, but I returned from the other Institute too late, and it was raining, and I was exhausted. But I'm sure there will be other opportunities.

Then the next evening, the little 6 year old girl invited me to come down to the kitchen and practice "tortillar"ing, forming tortillas with your hands from the play-dough like maza, or corn dough, and placing them on the plancha, or fire-heated stove top. This basically involves rolling a chunk of maza between your palms to form a smooth round ball, and then slapping the ball between your palms rapidly to form the flat round disks. The idea is to get them very thin and very round. I´ve "tortillar"ed a little with the other host family, but always quit after a little while. Last night, with the help of the girl´s mother Lidia, I made quite a few tortillas, and they were rather round I must say (although quite fat and rough-textured). And I didn't drop any (like I did twice with the other family). I´m getting better. By the end of this two years, I´m going to be a great Guatemalteca.

It amuses me about my life here that one evening I can spend playing basketball with the girls-- a very modern and new pasttime here-- and the next evening, making tortillas from maza and cooking them over a hot fire-- a tradition almost as ancient as the Mayan people themselves, the "corn people." I never know what new encounters the next day will bring.