Al

Throughout my travels here, I've come across a good number of expats who came to Guatemala years ago and never left--and they are consistently a little bizarre. What is it about Guatemala that attracts the slightly eccentric?

While in the super-bodega today buying contact solution, I met a real gem. I'll call him Al. Al cornered Sabiha and I in the supermarket after overhearing our conversation in English (we were discussing which flavor of ramon noodles to buy). Tall lanky guy, beard, cargo shorts and a tech vest, holding a shopping basket full of cheese resting in a cardboard box in a way so I couldn't tell if he was a maxi-bodega employee stocking cheese or just a lone Gringo buying a lot of cheese. I might have asked him if I had been able to get a word in edgewise, but alas I could not. For ten minutes he ranted about Guatemala and his travels and his extensive knowledge of the Guatemalan people. Once he figured out we were Peace Corps volunteers working in education, he started on another rant about how Guatemalan people don't listen because they were never trained to listen, and that we as volunteers should train them to be better listeners just like Bill Clinton was trained to remember people's names.

I'll get right on that.