etg cover page | to purchase

© Merrily Cordova Laytener

Running into Guatemala by Katherine Burger In a few minutes we were cresting above Guatemala City. It spread out below us, a bowl of light, bigger and brighter than I’d imagined. Click to read Essay Profile of Author Bio of Author from ETG Essay, Late-breaking Developments Author's Comment on the ETG Experience Updated Bio Click to Purchase Send email to the author (The copyright on this essay is held by the author.  For permission to duplicate: copyright@cunepress.com)

Running into Guatemala
A few years ago a romantic relationship ended for me. I felt bruised and out of sorts with the world. "Why not visit me in Guatemala?" suggested my peripatetic friend Sarah Gates. All I knew about Guatemala was that an undeclared war between its rightist army and leftist peasants was in progress and that the country seemed to be an endless source of one-paragraph filler items in The New York Times, viz.: "Bus plunges over a precipice in Guatemala; thirty-seven killed . . . 416 injured." In my present mood Guatemala seemed an appropriate vacation destination.

Sarah said to fly courier—"They buy your luggage space and use it for some kind of secret but presumably legal cargo, and you and your carry-on luggage fly half fare."

I went to a courier service in downtown Manhattan called "Now Voyager." The walls displayed huge stills from that movie: Paul Henried staring goony-eyed at Bette Davis, two cigarettes stuck in his mouth. That’s what romance will do to you.

The Now Voyager clientele was comprised of bouncy young people who wanted to get away from it all—to Paris, Madrid, Casablanca, Rio. "I want to go to Guatemala," I announced. Well, they informed me, this was my lucky day: there was one round trip ticket available this month, leaving tomorrow, coming back in twelve days. If I chose to accept, a man would contact me during my Miami layover, arrange for my flight to Guatemala City, and give me a baggage claim that I would then relinquish to my Guatemala contact, a Señor Caraballo. I began to feel marginally excited, as if I were in a Bette Davis movie, an amalgam of "Now Voyager" and "Watch on the Rhine." Did I want to sign on? I did. Did I need shots, a visa, a green card? No, I was assured, just my passport.

I left New York on a cold January morning and flew to Miami. A morose young Hispanic man came up to me in the Miami Airport and gestured that I should follow him. "Si, Now Voyager," he admitted grudgingly, so I accompanied him to the Aviateca Airlines counter, where the two agents seemed to know my laconic friend, welcoming him with overt hostility. They accepted my ticket with exaggerated reluctance, then examined it intently. In due course they found something about it they didn’t like. This made them happy. My contact became even more morose. The three of them proceeded to argue in Spanish about my ticket for the rest of my four hour layover. Tempers flared, tempers subsided. Tiny cups of espresso were flung back like shots of whiskey. Arms were waved, phone calls made, a twenty dollar bill appeared and was passed back and forth over the counter like a shuttlecock.

"What’s going on?" I kept asking, "What’s wrong?" The morose man shrugged me off. The only thing he said was "If you do get to Guatemala tonight—if—don’t take a taxi. Peligroso." I knew this word. Posters in the New York City subways advise that the "via del tren subterráneo es peligrosa." "But why is it dangerous?" I asked. The morose young man wouldn’t elaborate, except to say that he would stay in a hotel if he were me—if I got to Guatemala at all, that is.

Finally, reluctantly, at the last possible moment, the agents behind the counter issued a new ticket. I ran down the corridor to the Aviateca gate, my carry-on luggage banging against my legs, and barely made the flight.

Part of my agreement with Now Voyager was that I would be a Wt representative for them, which meant no bad behavior, such as drinking. But when the Aviateca stewardess offered me a glass of good French wine, compliments of the Airline, I figured what the hey, I was over the hurdles.

It was ten o’clock at night when I deplaned in Guatemala City. It was hot. I had had two, maybe three glasses of wine on the plane and was feeling no pain. I had to meet Señor Caraballo in the customs room, hand over my baggage claims ticket, and find a taxi. I had studied my Spanish/English phrase book and memorized the appropriate phrases. I was on track, floating in a complacent haze.

I got in line with the other disembarked passengers. They were filing past a checkpoint, through gates, then across a vast empty room and out into the tropical night. I presented my passport to the uniformed official, but he seemed to want something more. I riffled through my phrase book but nothing I came up with—"good morning," "hotel," "menu"—seemed to appease him. The man behind me began to get restless. He was German, dressed head to toe in a rainbow of tipica—the characteristic and ubiquitous woven fabric of Guatemala.

"He says you need a tourist card. You can’t get into ze country vissout a tourist card. Stand aside, plis."

I didn’t have a tourist card. No one had told me I needed a tourist card. "Just a passport," they’d assured me in New York. I could have purchased a tourist card in Miami for two dollars, sometime during the four hour layover, but no one there saw Wt to advise me that it might be a good, nay, a necessary item to have on hand. The offices here in Guatemala were closed for the night. Sorry, but they couldn’t let me into the country without a tourist card.

"Stand aside, plis," the German returnee repeated. I stood aside, in shock. The rest of the passengers—sun-seeking blonde hippies from Northern Europe—flowed past me, flourishing their tourist cards, and disappeared into the night.

I was left alone with the keeper of the gate. He gestured to two soldiers. They came over, unshouldering guns so big they needed both hands and wide leather shoulder straps to support them. "Wait here. Don’t move from here," the official said, and walked off. The soldiers watched me intently. I didn’t move. I didn’t even breathe deeply. Minutes sped by like turtles on downers. The airport emptied. Lights went off in the huge waiting room. At the other side of that vast room, beyond the gates and barriers, I could see the customs room. I imagined Señor Caraballo giving up and leaving, the taxis leaving. I imagined spending the night in the airport, with my soldier buddies. I imagined Sarah fretting all night then going to the town phone and calling my apartment, the American Counsel, my mother. After ten or fifteen long minutes the soldiers started arguing with each other, gesturing at me. Then they left.

I was alone. Anxiety bloomed in me like a dark, malignant flower.

I picked up my bags and ran. Through the gates and across the big room, I ran into Guatemala. Actually, I ran into the customs room. There were several men there, lounging and chatting. They all wore white cotton short-sleeved shirts and dark pants. They stared at me. "Pardon," I said in my best Spanish, "Dónde está Señor Caraballo?" A tall, courtly looking, handsome, shining man stepped forward, his face full of concern.

"I am Señor Caraballo," he said, "You are Katherine Burger? I had almost given up on you. Is something wrong? Can I help?"

He came back with me to the immigration office. The soldiers and the immigration official had returned with reinforcements. More officials and more soldiers had been summoned to deal with me, and they seemed rather agitated that I wasn’t there to be dealt with. Señor Caraballo talked to them, his hands moving as if he were soothing a nervous horse. There was a lengthy discussion. The officials asked me questions—about my visit, my political inclinations, my job, my grandparents’ jobs—and I endeavored to answer them. Señor Caraballo translated and soothed.

"I’m sorry, señorita," he said at last, "They won’t let you into the country unless you leave your passport here. You can pick it up tomorrow, when you come to purchase your tourist card."

"But I’m going to Antigua tonight."

He shrugged. "I’m sorry. You could stay at a hotel."

But Sarah—who had no phone—was expecting me; I was already past due. And it seemed easier to negotiate a taxi ride than a hotel, although by now all of the taxi-finding/fare negotiating phrases I’d memorized had deserted me. I could see myself asking for a pen for my aunt instead.

"I will help you get a taxicab," my champion said.

"Muy gracias," I answered.

I surrendered my passport to the officials and followed Señor Caraballo across the big room to the glass doors. We stepped outside. The night was hot and close, a complete change from the January New York I’d left behind at the start of this long day.

"You shouldn’t have told them that you’re a writer," Señor Caraballo chided me gently. "They think that is political."

"But I’m not a journalist."

"All writing is political," he answered. If the guns hadn’t convinced me, I knew now that I was no longer in Kansas.

There were only two taxis left in the parking lot, each one brokered by a small boy. The boys hung on Señor Caraballo’s sleeves, imploring him, each touting the merits of his taxi cab and its driver and disparaging the competition. Señor Caraballo spoke with each boy, then ushered me into the cab of choice. We shook hands.

"Enjoy your stay in my country," he said.

The driver was silent, and the road climbed almost immediately. In a few minutes we were cresting above Guatemala City. It spread out below us, a bowl of light, bigger and brighter than I’d imagined. And then we were driving between steep embankments which eclipsed the lights, up switchbacks, through dark, unseen, mountainous countryside. There were no other cars on the road; we seemed to have the entire country to ourselves.

I now had the leisure to sit back and think about—ok, obsess about—the morose Miami man’s warning: peligroso. Were there banditos in the hills? Guerrillas? Renegade soldiers? Would the driver himself slit my throat and take my traveler’s checks? But all he had said was, "Peligroso, muy peligroso."

I was relieved when a sign said: Antigua 2 km. A short time later we entered a colonial Spanish town: white stucco; tile roofs; plazas with fountains; narrow, cobbled streets. Everything was closed up tight; there were few lights, fewer people. With a shock I realized that the plazas I was seeing were the same plaza, over and over again. Was my driver circling around and around the town like this while making up his mind to rob me? Looking for a dark deserted street to accomplish same? Looking for his compadres in crime?

But the driver conveyed to me that he couldn’t find the address. "OK," I thought, "we’re lost; nothing to worry about. He is a nice guy, after all; give him the benefit of the doubt." Then he stopped the cab in the proverbial dark, deserted street. Panic surged though me. "This is it! Where did I pack my Swiss Army knife?"

But then the driver got out of the cab and peered at the number on the side of a white adobe building. He grinned at me triumphantly and pounded on the huge metal door. I got out of the cab and found the name under the doorbell: Sarah Gates. Chaos condensed into the known and loved. I rang the bell, then pounded on the door myself in an excess of sheer good feeling, like a gorilla proclaiming, "I am!" against his chest.

I suddenly realized that I hadn’t thought of my ex-boyfriend and my chronic bad mood for hours now. I was in an exotic country, on the verge of who-knows-what new experiences. The world seemed once again full of romance and adventure, and by God I was ready.

Profile
Katherine Burger is a New Yorker who traveled to the West and did time at Evergreen, a college in Olympia, Washington known for its advanced ideas. In those days, 1974, she was a poet and rock climber and hung around with Tom Sleigh, a tall, emaciated Evergreen student-poet who, when his girlfriend ditched him, stood on the dock and watched her ride off on a ferry boat which left a "spermy wake."

I was pursuing a notion of chastity if not celibacy, no wakes for me, spermy or otherwise. So Katherine and I began an affectionate, chaste relationship that has lasted ever since. Back then we were trying to figure out how to make it as writers. One Saturday we drove from Seattle in my ’65 Mediterranean blue missing-the-front-passenger-seat VW bug on a tour of Whidbey Island, Camano Island, and the Skagit Flats (the delta of the Skagit River). The object of our circle tour was Fishtown, the last vestige of traditional salmon fishery on the Skagit, a collection of shacks on stilts in the marsh water connected by wooden ramps.

We were looking in particular for Tom Robbins, whose book Another Roadside Attraction had come out three years earlier and won raves among local readers. Tom had taken the literary hermit approach, fleeing a cultural center for the sticks. In Tom’s case, he moved from Ballard, Seattle’s Norwegian ghetto, to LaConner, the Victorian art colony on the Swinomish Slough, and then to Fishtown—or so I had heard. On the way into Fishtown we drove a narrow, private road, passing signs: No Trespassing; Absolutely No Trespassing; Trespassers Shot. We forged ahead, and, after winding through the woods above the Skagit we came to a clearing with a turnaround, a view of the mighty river, and one last sign: Trespassing $10.

Kathy and I never did find Tom Robbins, but it didn’t matter because there was another approach. Instead of leaving Seattle to become a hermit on the Skagit, a person could leave this provincial cultural center for a national center, a mega-place, the heart of the literary universe.

A year later, when I was in Manhattan, Kathy took me to see her father, literary agent Knox Burger, in his Greenwich Village office. I met Kathy’s mother, a writer and sculptor who gave me the news on the book-length manuscript that she was currently circulating among Manhattan publishers. Kathy talked of her friendship with Malcolm Braly—a West Coast guy who survived San Quentin, moved to New York, and became our nation’s foremost prison novelist.

I visited the 1838 Federal style townhouse where Kathy grew up and where Jane E. Jacobs rented a work room when she was writing her classic study, The Death and Life of Great American Cities. Kathy and I took long quick-paced walks across Manhattan and did an especially thorough tour of the Village, passing cafes where, years before, Dylan Thomas drank, Bob Dylan sang, and James Agee talked all night.

I knew that the Village had been William Faulkner’s Paris, the place where he found theory to structure his down-home subject. I knew that Faulkner’s reputation had been made, not in Mississippi, but in Greenwich Village. I also knew that another Southerner, James Agee, had come here and Robert Penn Warren had holed up over in New Haven. I was from the West—a place just as obscure as the South had been before Southern writers found Greenwich Village. I thought that the Village was an opportunity for me, and Kathy was my link to this place.

Years passed. In the end, Tom Sleigh took the academic approach, went on to become a prof at Dartmouth and a published poet. Kathy became a playwright and moved into the apartment in the attic of her family home where she lived between stints at writer’s colonies, the odd out-of-town acting tour, and occasional trips to big mountains. For some reason I stayed in Seattle, halfway between Fishtown and Greenwich Village.

Kathy and I kept in touch, and every so often we compared notes. Kathy was having more success than I. She was hired to write a screenplay about Maud Gonne, her poetry and plays were read, performed, published. She took roles in Off Off Off Broadway productions. Now she works winters as a child wrangler at the Metropolitan Opera, a great job which does not involve data entry. In the summers she manages the Byrdcliffe Art Colony in Woodstock, New York. In 1995 Kathy’s play Morphic Resonance had a reading at The Ensemble Studio Theatre’s Octoberfest and has had some nibbles by other theatre companies. "I live on hope," Kathy says. After all of these years, in my estimation, the world of arts and letters has failed to do justice to this woman.

—Scott C. Davis

Bio
Katherine Burger
Places of residence: New York City and Woodstock, New York.
Birthplace: New York City.
Grew up in: Greenwich Village and rustic cabins in New England.
Day jobs: Winter—child wrangler at the Metropolitan Opera (in charge of the children’s chorus). Summer—manager of the Byrdcliffe Art Colony in Woodstock. (Byrdcliffe: a residency program for writers and visual artists. Contact: The Woodstock Guild, 34 Tinker Street, Woodstock, New York 12498. Voice: 914-679-2079.)
Education: Oberlin College and Evergreen State College.
Plays: Way Deep, published by Samuel French. Morphic Resonance was a finalist for the Susan Smith Blackburn Award for the best play written in English by a woman. This play was recently produced by the Eclectic Theatre Company in Los Angeles.
Awards: Fellowships at several art colonies including the Millay Colony. Finalist in the Chesterfield Screenplay writing competition.
Current project: Illustrating a book I’ve written.
Beliefs: Animism and yoga.
Craving: Sushi.

Click to
Purchase
Return to ETG cover page

Cover | Skills | Essays | Travel |  History | Fiction | Poetry | Reviews | Ordering | Books Online