We’re approaching the end of our two week stay in Santiago-Atitlan and I’ve been doing some learning about the place. Dave and Mary’s house is located on the outskirts of town, about a 30 minute walk or a 5 minute “tuk-tuk” ride from the town centre.
Dave and Mary’s house is a stone’s throw from several other houses that Mary’s sister Vicki and her partner Tom have designed and built. Tom and Vicki are both artists and their buildings and grounds reflect creative design and careful thought and an appreciation of beauty. The houses are stunning.
This “parcel” of houses is built on lakeshore cropland, on extremely narrow and long lots. Arable land is limited by the steep mountains that surround the lake, and over time, families have divided and subdivided land so that long narrow plots remain. The lot that Dave and Mary’s house is on is about 10 meters wide and perhaps 150 meters long. On either side of the house are several lots of garden plots of similar dimensions that are currently being farmed. There are men scraping the soil with large hoes just outside my window as I’m writing.
The village of Santiago, on the shore of Lake Atitlan, is one of the largest and the most indigenous towns on the lake. The easiest way to get here is by boat because of the mountains that surround the lake, Locals call Santiago-Atitlan a “pueblo” or village but it’s home to about 60,000 inhabitants. The local residents are primarily indigenous Guatemalans, a Mayan people whose language is Tzutuhil, and that’s the language widely spoken in daily interactions. There are about a dozen villages on the shores of the lake, and about half of them are Tzutuhil villages, but the dialects vary widely and people from a neighbourimg tzutuhil village may find it difficult to communicate in Santiago.
Santiago-Atitlan has a special place in the modern history of Mayan people. It was a site of conflict and is said to have been a turning point in the life of the Guateman Mayans. Here is an article I found online that gives a brief history of the Santiago “massacre” and summarizes the role of this village in preserving indigenous identity and culture:
https://www.culturalsurvival.org/publications/cultural-survival-quarterly/massacre-santiago-atitlan-turning-point-maya-struggle
In the last week we have explored many parts of the town of Santiago-Atitlan. Often we sit in the square and watch people as they mill about the market, many of the locals still wear their traditional mayan dress and it’s simply what they wear, it’s not for show.
There is one tourist street and the town is a stop on tourist boat tours of Lake Atitlan, but it’s still always noticeable when you see a tourist in the town. We look much different from the locals. Mayan are mostly built short and stocky.
One point of interest is the church of Santiago Apostol I mentioned in a previous post. The church is interesting for its age and for its story, but also because the statues of the saints are always dressed in smocks or robes and sporting scarves around their necks. I don’t know the significance of the smocks and scarves.
One of the stories of the church is a story of a priest who was killed here in 1981 for offering people asylum during the Guatemalan civil war in the 80s and 90s. Here’s a link with information about the martyred priest :
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stanley_Rother
The town has been heavily evangelized. There are evangelical churches everywhere and they are generally the shiniest and most impressive buildings on the street. Many of them stand three or four stories tall and look like hotels or commercial buildings. This past week there was a pastors conference held in town and there were many men with bibles under there arms walking the streets. Mostly they looked latino but there were also American and Canadians there. The last few days we’ve been hearing a revival meeting in the late afternoon. They use large loudspeakers and and the sound carries in the lowland, and so we are serenaded and harangued from a distance as we sit on our roof terrace.