First we met Chico as we arrived in Pachitulul, a small Mayan village outside San Lucas Toliman on Lake Atitlan in the Guatemalan Highlands. He was sitting barefoot on a bench, resting from toil in his field. He told us he has a wife, Andrea, and six girls. This evening he came by to offer us tomatoes, lettuce, cabbage, parsley, and celery. Conversation led to details about our family and his. We were astounded to hear that he has an Andrea (his wife), and a Cristina and another Andrea among their six daughters, just as Gundi has these two as daughters along with Claudia. Their other daughters go by the names of Maria,Isabel, Rebecca, Liliana.
Buoyed by Chico's sale of fresh vegetables to us, Andrea and Liliana came by an hour later under cover of darkness and tapped on the kitchen window. They were carrying three big baskets of hand-woven textiles Andrea had made and proceeded to extract a huge, vibrant assortment of clothing and decor, all beautifully and uniquely fashioned and created. Not now, later, Gundi re-iterated over and over as they unfolded more and more. Another time. Later. We are cooking...
Chico duly came by with a huge bag of lettuce, radishes, arugula, celery, tomatoes, parsley, and cabbage. He sat down, chatted as we peppered him with questions about the community and its history. Yesterday's marimba band concert was apparently attended by around a hundred locals, and celebrated the recovery from illness of a village member. "How old are you?" he asked Gundi... "... and you?" I countered. "Fifty two". "Ten years younger than me", I confessed. When pressed on the cost of the five pounds of vegetables, freshly picked from his garden, he shyly said twenty quetzales (around three dollars). "Cheap, no?", he joked. When I gave him thirty, he was very grateful. "Expensive, no?", he joked. The next morning he came by, as promised with fresh epazote and purple basil to make a tummy tea for Gundi. Ten quetzales were gratefully tendered and received.
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After I reminded Andrea about coming over with a shirt for me, she appeared on a Sunday morning with daughters Maria, Liliana, and Andrea, and three baskets of textiles. I picked out a subtle purple, green and orange shirt that Gundi approved of, and, lo and behold, it fit,with just the hood for Gundi to cut off. Andrea asked for 300 quetzales and settled for 250; we were all happy with the deal, which is the main thing. Too many tourists show no dignity in seeing haggling as a sport by which to belittle the seller and back-slap their own powers of persuasion in a display of cultural imperialism.
Chico is one of eight local farmers that rent land from IMAP, the *Instituto Mesoamericano de Permacultura*, in exchange for seeds that they grow. Chico saves a black corn, tomatoes, arugula, carrots, beets, chard, celery, parsley, lettuce, cabbage, spinach, and more. In addition, some early mornings well before the sun gets up, he and his two dogs walk an hour up the mountainside of Toliman volcano to tend his corn, coffee, peaches, bananas, and lemons. Ah, the life of a campesino - hard but gratifying; this and the physicality, sensuality, fresh air, sun on skin, and communion with nature, which have in concert provided me with so much enjoyment over the years. As we return home and then start a new chapter on the ocean in Cape Breton, I will miss Rolling Hills Organics, the farm and the farming vocation. The sowing of seeds, the changing of the seasons, the planting of seedlings, the turning and nurturing of soil, the harvesting of greens, the pulling of root crops, the selling at markets have, after all, granted me a happy living and sustained me in good health for the last two decades.
