downtime = self reflection

Bad timing with Semanas Santos (Easter holy week)brought my travels to halt. After Flores/Tikal I planned to go to Antigua for holy week/weekend. Alas, by the time I began making travel arrangements for Antigua EVERY hostel and hotel in the entire city, as well as surrounding cities, was booked! I found myself stuck in Flores trying to redo my itinerary, make new plans and find a new language school in another city.

Fellow backpackers mentioned Quetzaltenango, locally know as Xela (Shay-la), a beautiful colonial city in the Guatemalan highlands. After minimal research I discovered studying in Xela cost $60 a week less than Antigua, the city was a better place to practice Spanish and it had a thriving foreign student social scene. SOLD! I board a bus to Xela the next evening, actually I took the overnight bus to Guatemala city and then transferred to another bus heading towards Xela. It was a long, uncomfortable, dirty bus ride.

After sixteen hours in a bus I arrived in Xela, haggard, as I looked around the city it was a ghost town. Every store and restaurant was closed (a combination of afternoon siesta and holy week), finding a taxi was impossible, as was finding a hostel or hotel with an open reception. Once finally settled, rested and showered. I went for a walk in the city. The city was beautiful as were the decorations and processions for Easter. I sat in the park thinking about next steps; next steps in Xela and next steps in my life.

My mind wondered to future travels, to my desire to visit Southeast Asia, India, New Zealand and Antarctica. My wanderlust is only fueled by this journey, I am a travel addict and I want more. I spend lazy days thinking of ways to finance my addiction. In moments of self reflection, I see how my time abroad is special and how it makes me feel happy and alive. Positive and negative experiences are all a part of the experience and they all bring me a kind of satisfaction nothing else in my life can provide.

I have two more months in my Central American odyssey. For now I need to shift my focus to the present, to the experiences and opportunities. My wanderlust can wait. It will still be there when I return home and I am confident it will never truly go away. Indeed, I finally understand how world exploration is the root of self discovery, understanding and knowledge. How routine and monotony, work for some, but stifle my need for something more. I am ready to take on the world and I hope the world is ready for me. Readers I promise you, I will continue to journey near and afar, in my quest for knowledge and intellectual harmony.