Tapir Travels #15: The Ixil Highlands

June 16 – The Ixil Highlands
It took us a long time to reach the small Indian town of Nebaj, found in the rugged mountains due north of Quich�. The gravel road curved itself through and up the highlands, what is called the ‘Altiplano’ in Spanish. Some parts of the road had been washed away by the rain, and we had to cross over a few small streams on our way there. After several hours on shaky roads interestingly close to the abyss, the roadside totally lacking safety fences as one would expect, we arrived in the late morning.

One of the characteristics of this town is given by it’s simple white church. It stands there as a monument, almost shining against the background of green mountains surrounding the town on all sides, protecting it against outsiders such as us. In front of the church the people were carrying their things and speaking to each other. The men in too big cowboy hats which makes them look even smaller than they are, like a caricature of themselves. The women with kids resting against their backs in a piece of cloth, almost never crying but instead sitting there quiet, on the border of passive and understimulated by western standards.

We did a lot of interviews during this week, one of them with a local pastor who told us how he escaped together with his village from the guerillas. We listened to victims of the war telling us about the atrocities committed by both the army and the guerillas. Most of the Indians we talked to had lost at least one family member or perhaps their entire family, sometimes brutally shot down in front of their own eyes. We also spoke with some missionaries living in Nebaj, and social workers building whole villages complete with schools and irrigation systems in a successful project called Agros.

June 25 – The Lost City
Probably one of the most famous places in Central America is Tikal, situated in the northern jungles of Guatemala. It’s the remains of an old city, abandoned by the Mayans for some unknown reason sometime before the conquistadors arrived. The ruins were hidden and forgotten for hundreds of years until they were discovered again in the mid 19th century.

The ancient Mayan empire had a highly developed culture, especially considering their knowledge of astronomy and mathematics that was far ahead of what the Europeans knew by that time. Their calendar is still used today by some indigenous villages, following the eternal cycles believed to affect the crops and prosperity of their people. Measuring the length of the year, it is as accurate as our modern one. One reason why they were able to figure that out was because they were using the number zero a long time before we discovered it’s use in Europe. Another, but less flattering, thing they are famed for are their human sacrifices that were made to make the sun rise every morning as they believed. We were excited to go up there to see “the hidden city” ourselves, and took a few days off to do that.

I had almost forgotten how humid and hot the climate is near the Caribbean coast, since we have been moving around mostly in the cooler mountainous areas during the last weeks. On the way from Flores to the site, we hitched a ride with a pickup car. For some reason they were each armed with a gun sticking out of their pants. We both thought that they were going to pull us off the road and rob us, but luckily they weren’t bad guys. It’s more of a macho thing to walk around with weapons in these countries. Sometimes it feels like the Wild West in my opinion…

That night we slept in hammocks, listening to the howler monkeys screaming and the insects playing in the jungle. Early next morning we walked the trail to the ruins. Some of the buildings are impressively high with steps leading up to a temple at the top. The highest one is over 60 meters tall, and from there we could see far into the distance, overviewing the thick green canopy that stretches out for miles and miles.

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