Guatemala - Arrival

Here's the intro entry to my Guatemala trip. This is mainly to let everyone know that I've arrived safety and that I'm in one piece (physically at least, the mental component was always fractured).

So the Scholarly Professor is at it again. Another trip into the unknown. This time I'm not accompanied by the Raunchy Truck Driver (she had to finally find work the week before departure and as a result couldn't come). But not to fear, I am going to be traveling with Mustacheio PigBunny and my trusty friend Christie, who we shall have to devise a nickname for as soon as she arrives.

So I left LAX last night at the bewitching hour, after spending 2.5 hours twiddling my thumbs cause Em was afraid that I would miss the plane if I didn't get there 3 hours early. It turned out to only take 25 minutes to get through all the security.

The first flight was fine, pretty much slept through the whole thing. I arrived in Mexico City at 4am (LA time) and 6am (Mexico time). The country makes you go through immigration and customs, exit the terminal, and then re-enter, all for a connecting flight. They also gave me all the forms in Spanish to fill out and since I could read the necessary parts, I didn't bother trying to track down an English copy. As a result, everyone talked to me in rapid fire Spanish all through immigration, customs, and security. I just smiled and nodded and deduced that I was doing what they wanted cause they didn't single me out for special inspection. They did take my fruit though (I really wanted that apple).

The other thing about the Mexico City airport is that they have the terminal section and then they have a whole other section with duty free shops and small resturants and the usual major airport attractions. The thing is that you can only get to this other section, with it's more options and cheaper prices by exiting customs. They don't tell you that once you re-enter the terminal you can never get back out of it. I must have walked the terminal loop about 10 times trying to figure out how to get to the food options just on the other side of the metal detectors. I'm pretty sure that by the 5th or 6th pass, people were starting to wonder weather I was casing the joint. It killed time though, which was nice.

About 16 hours after I set off, I arrived in Guatemala City, the capital of the country and the largest metropolis in Central America (there are close to 3 million people here).

I'm staying at a Hostel called GuateFriends which is run by a Floridan named Joe and his Guatemalan wife. The wife opened the place after she was fired from the Crown Plaza Hotel for dating Joe when they first met 5 years ago. Kind of a romatical story.

Also currently stating here is a girl named Kate, that's been living here for 10 weeks as she prepares for a Law degree, Kate's childhood friend, Austin, and two Brits. They're all pretty nice, but going their own ways. Don't think I'll be attaching myself to any of them in the next day or so. Guess it's a solo journey till Christie gets here.

So you all know the drill, drop me a line, comment, greivence, etc. so that I know someone is reading this. Also, if you have any places you think I should hit up or things I need to try, let me know.