Guatemala: to go or not to go?

In the end of March, 2015, my wife and I spent a week in Guatemala.  The tourism in Guatemala is less developed than, say, in its close neighbor Costa Rica, and a number of friends already asked us questions like “is it worth going there”, or “when should you go there”, or “what can you see there”, etc. So here is what I can say about it on the basis of my very limited experience.

Yes, it is definitely worth visiting Guatemala.  It is an interesting and exciting place to see. For example, for me it was quite unexpected to learn that Mayan culture is very much alive and thriving there – until then I somehow thought that the word “Maya” belongs to the same category as Aztec, Babylon or Pharaoh, i.e. something from the distant past.  But in fact there are 22 actively spoken Mayan languages in Guatemala, there are Mayan traditions, Mayan holidays and even Mayan economy.

What should you see there? As I mentioned before, tourism to Guatemala is not very well developed yet (although it is growing fast).  Maybe this is why all tourist itineraries that came to my attention were very similar, as if they came from the same cookie cutter. They all were essentially based on 4 words – Antigua, Atitlan, Tikal, Chichicastenango – and our itinerary was no exception. So what are these 4 things?

• Antigua is a small nice city with rich history, which was the first capital of Guatemala in colonial times. Part of the old colonial architecture has been restored, part has not, and the combination of both these parts creates an unusual charm. This is the most visited by tourists place in Guatemala and, as a results, there are nice hotels, restaurants and services. 

• Atitlan is a beautiful lake, surrounded by several (non-active!) volcanoes and picturesque villages. When the weather is good and clear the views in all directions are great:

• Tikal is the ruins of an ancient city, which was discovered in a rainforest of Northern Guatemala in the mid 19-th century. It contains hundreds of pyramids and other buildings (many of which are still hidden by the jungle), and is one of the largest archaeological sites of the pre-Columbian Maya civilization. For history buffs this is the must see.

• And finally, Chichicastenango – a huge outdoor market.  Although part of it caters to tourists with traditional souvenirs, etc, the main purpose of the market is to serve “real people” and the combination of colors, smells and crowds can be overwhelming.

Another attraction is the local cemetery located within 5-10 min walk from the market. In my life I saw many famous cemeteries, but this one is by far the most colorful.

Based on the above, a nice trip to Guatemala would include: 3 nights in Antigua with a one day side trip; 2 nights on the lake Atitlan with a boat trip to surrounding villages; 2-3 hours in Chichicastenango on the way to the airport to fly to Tikal; and 2 nights in Tikal. While in the Tikal area, try to stay in Flores, a charming little town located on an island in the middle of a lake.

When should you go there?  Well, the honest answer is: not when we were there.  At that time of the year, the weather in Tikal it is extremely hot and humid. During our stay it was above 100 Fahrenheit (40 Celsius) and the humidity was also close to 100.  For people like us, the only way to survive was to start our excursions when it was still dark and  by 9-10 am be already under the air conditioned protection of our minivan.

As to Antigua and Atitlan, they are located on a higher altitude and the temperature there is always nice (surprisingly, you don’t even need AC in your hotel there). But here is another problem: it is the time when they burn sugar cane plantations in Guatemala.  As a result, most of the time the air is very hazy and the visibility is low – see for example the picture of lake Atitlan above. This explains why during the whole week we almost never had beautiful natural views (but compensated them with architecture, ruins, people and Mayan exotics in general).  Thus the advice: do not go to Guatemala in the end of March, go in the fall – September to November.

And finally, are there other interesting places in Guatemala? Of course they are! For example, the river and natural lagoons of Semuc Champey. Or the ruins of the barely accessible ancient city of Mirador, whose scale exceeds even Tikal. They are still away from the standard tourists routs, but it is changing and there is a hope that more people will be able to visit them soon.

Avoid The Happy Hooker!

This May my wife and I spent 11 days in Benelux (more precisely, in Be and Ne but not in Lux). For us, Americans, Europe now is pretty expensive because the current exchange rate between dollar and Euro definitely benefits the Old World. And the most expensive part of the trip was accommodation in Amsterdam. People love Amsterdam – it is beautiful and exciting, and is rightfully called the most tolerant capital in the world. But this universal love has a side-effect: in high season it is next to impossible to find a decent hotel room for a reasonable price. While planning the trip, I spent tons of time on various expedias, orbitzes, bookings, tripadvisors and similar, and realized that you can get either decent room or reasonable price, but not both. And suddenly somewhere on the web I found the following link: http://www.absoluteamsterdam.com/bed-and-breakfast/arty-amsterdam.htm

This bed and breakfast had a great location, looked OK and the price was, well, more or less reasonable. Of course, 125 Euros/night (~US $170) for a B&B was not in any way cheap, but at least it was less than other comparable options. I emailed them a reservation request and soon received confirmation containing, in particular, the link http://www.xavierahollander.com to the website of Xaviera Hollander, the person in charge of this B&B. From pure curiosity I clicked on the link and … here it became really interesting.

I learned that Xaviera Hollander is “the most famous madame of ‘the world’s oldest profession,’ author, Penthouse columnist, legend, performer, raconteur and theatrical entrepreneur”. I learned that “In 1968, she left her job as the secretary of the Dutch consulate in Manhattan to become a call girl, where she made $1,000 a night. A year later she opened her own brothel called Xaviera’s Happy House and soon became New York City’s leading madam. In 1971, she … was arrested on several occasions for prostitution by New York police.” I also learned that she published a lot of books and other stuff, of which the most famous is “The Happy Hooker”:

Exciting, isn’t it? I especially liked the word “legend”. Maybe I should call myself a legend on my website as well?

Anyway, needless to say that I read all of this with certain reservations. Needless to say that my wife was strongly against my dealing with hookers in general and the happy hooker in particular. But after clarifying a few details I decided: let’s go for it! After all, I am an open-minded person (at least this is what I like to think about myself), so why should I care what this 70+ years old woman did many years ago? Thus, we finalized all details and made reservation for May 22, 23 and 24, but I still had certain concerns. The style of Ms. XH’s emails was a bit weird. Plus she wanted to get initial deposit immediately. And the rest preferably in cash, not with credit card. Etc, etc. But here I decided to listen to my wife (thanks god) and insisted that everything should be on credit card.

On May 21, as planned, we sent an email to XH about the time of our arrival next day. The response was bizarre: she completely messed up everything and expected us to arrive on May 20, not 22. And since we did not arrive, she already charged my credit card for the whole 3 nights. And, as a very caring person, she found for us another place for which she was going to charge us the full price as well. This is how you must do business!

Fortunately, we had her emails (I still keep them as a souvenir :)) confirming the reservation, whose subject line was literally “Arty Amsterdam Central may 22,23,24“. For me it was enough. I forwarded these emails back to XH, demanded a total refund of our money, and strongly recommended to quit B&B business. After that I went online and reserved another room, which was quite modest but insanely expensive (what else can you expect if you need to get a room in Amsterdam one day in advance?). On returning home I found out that the happy hooker indeed charged my credit card to a full extent but did not refund the money. Fortunately, my credit cards trust me unconditionally and all charges were promptly removed.

Conclusions: (a) listen to your wife; (b) when you deal with hookers (happy or not), be ready to get screwed.

P.S. But Amsterdam is still a great city and we had a very good time there!

A Few More Shows …

Good news: my pictures were recently accepted to several juried exhibitions.  The first is called “Breathing Earth” and was accepted at the 35th Annual Juried Art Exhibition “Expressions of the Natural World” in Monmouth Museum (http://www.monmouthmuseum.org/acceptedartists.html).  As somebody may ask, is it still planet Earth? Yes it is: the image was made in Yelowstone. Moreover, except for a gentle “massaging” around the sun, there was no serious photoshopping involved.

Breating Earth

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The second image was taken in Point Reyes, California and accepted for the “Oasis and Mirage: Disappearing Water” exhibition in the D&R Greenway Land Trust in Princeton, NJ (http://www.drgreenway.org/art_galleries.htm). I was lucky to catch a moment when an ocean was glowing under the beautifully mixed sunlight (and lucky to come up with a nice title for the picture :)).

On the Edge of the Earth

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The last image “Colors of Mexico” will be shown at the 31st Ellarslie Open in Trenton City Museum
(http://ellarslie.org/ellarslie-open-xxxi). It was taken in Guanajuato, Mexico, and for those who have never been there, here is the key word: colors. Imagine all possible colors in all possible combinations, then add saturation, then more saturation, and on the top of everything throw a lot of blinding sun. The result will be Guanajuato.

Colors of Mexico

 

 

What is Travel Photography?

Until recently, when asked what my primary photographic interests are, I usually replied that it is travel photography (see for example http://www.vovsi.com/about). But now I am not even sure what “travel photograpy” is and if such a “genre” of photograpy actually exists. To explain what I mean, let me give a few examples. A few years ago I traveled to Norway and, as any of the many “photographer-enthusiasts” made tons of pictures (most of them were dreadful but it is not the point). Here are a few:

Together with the other images from that series they describe my trip to Norway and therefore for me personally they are travel photography. But if an independent observer were asked which genre of photography each of these images belongs to, the answers most probably would be: (a) portrait; (b) nature; (c) landscape. I doubt that travel photography would ever come to his/her mind.

Moreover, let’s imagine that precisely the same images were made by a Norvegian photographer right near his/her home (most probably they would be better than mine but it is not the point). The guy/gal would never think that they have anything to do with travel. And the word “travel” would quietly disappear from the conversation … .

So here is the point. Actually two points, both rather paradoxical.
1. The concept of travel photography is relative. It depends on who is the author of the images in question. Strange, isn’t it?
2. It does not make a lot of sense to speak about travel photography while considering a single image (even made by a “real” traveler, not by an aborigen). A single image is a portrait, a landscape, a street scene, a nude, a bird, etc. For me the words “travel photography” are appropriate only when we have a series of images giving a coherent description of a certain travel.

Agree? Disagree? Comments are welcome.

Less is More, Dear Speakers.

Yesterday I was attending a presentation at a local photography club. The speaker was a well known and well spoken photographer, and his works (at least most of them) are quite good. But the guy could not stop!  He showed us about 50 interesting  images, then a few tens more images which the audience watched with less interest, then more, then still more, etc, etc.  Eventually more and more people began to leave, but the speaker continued talking regardless, obviously enjoying himself.  He forgot what every presenter  must know and unconditionally follow: less is more.  The span of attention of every audience is limited and trying to extend your performance beyond this span is practically senseless.   For example, for a slideshow type presentation (a series of images with brief comments)  the optimal number of images should be somewhere in the range 30-40.  I know, I know, it is hard.  When I  speak about my own work, I can do it infinitely and it is practically impossible to shut me up. But here what I noticed: when I watch presentations by other people,  then after 30-35 images I begin to feel that this is probably enough. And the faces of people around me usually express the same feeling … .  So here the advice: limit your performance to 30 pictures.  Ok, let it be 35.  OK, let it be 40, but this is it! Not more!! Never ever!!! Because less is more.

Merit Award at Grounds for Sculpture

People often ask why I am so attracted to photographing sculptures. Being unable to come up
with a rational explanation, I usually reply with a joke: “There are two reasons: they never move and never complain”.

Anyway, when about a year ago Princeton University opened an exhibition of a famous Chinese sculptor Ai Weiwei =”Circle of Animals/Zodiac Heads” (see http://www.princeton.edu/aiww/about), I could not resist temptation and took a number of shots there. The exhibition is at the Robertson Hall on Washington Road; it features 12 bronze monumental sculptures of animal heads, real or fantastic, each representing a sign of the Chinese zodiac (don’t quite understand why the word “circle” is used
there – the sculptures are placed in a stright line):

The shooting was not very successful and later I deleted most of the images without regrets. But one of them was worthwhile photoshoping, and I have been just pleased to learn that it got a Merit Award at the “Focus on Sculpture” annual photo exhibition at the Grounds for Sculpture in Hamilton, NJ (see http://www.groundsforsculpture.org/Exhibitions/Educaton-Gallery-Exhibition-Focus-on-Sculpture):

Beasts

To Blog or Not to Blog?

This is my second attempt to create a blog.  Initially I did it on Blogspot and the result was pretty miserable. More precisely, it was me who was miserable while fighting with numerous weird and counterintuitive features of Blogspot.  The simplest things were taking hours and hours, and during each minute of this unequal fight I felt the iron claws of Google (who owns Blogspot) on my throat.   Despite my desperate resistance, it forced me to become a member of Google+ and other Google-related entities and eventually I stopped understanding where my blog ends and Google universe starts. 

Let’s hope that WordPress will be nicer.