Mi Casa en Antigua

Since I’ll be working from “home” today. I figured I’d give a brief description about what “home” has meant for me for about two months now…

I live in a small house of concrete walls as is quite typical here. The roof is is a mix of flat concrete (for a rooftop terrace), tin, hard laminate and plastic. On the bottom floor are four very small and skinny bedrooms that are rented to travelers. I occupy one of these. It’s nearly impossible to keep it clean. While I really don’t have that much stuff, in this tiny room, there isn’t any real place to put much of anything. So, the floor offers most of my “shelf space.” There are two bathrooms adjacent to one another, both with a toilet and sink, one with a shower as well. The woman I live with is a salsa instructor and she works at a dance studio in town as well offers private lessons at home. Her in-home salsa studio is also located on the bottom level, almost directly across from my room. In the rare chance that I’m home for any length of time, I love hearing the salsa music that energizes the entire house as Gloria instructs her students. There is a pila for hand washing dishes and clothes on my level, but we also have a washing machine. We dry our clothes by hanging them on the rooftop terrace.

A winding, wrought-iron staircase leads to the next floor. The majority of this floor is kind of an “open loft.” It’s very typical to have open, interior courtyards – even tiny ones – included in the design of the homes here. Where I’m sitting now, it was meant to be one such open space. But it is now protected from the rain (more or less) by a white plastic cover that still allows the suns rays to offer a bright, cheery light during the day. I am sitting on a thick, wooden chair with a simple yet attractive carved flower design. Unfortunately, the table doesn’t match and appears to be a manufactured product versus the hand-crafted chairs and bench surrounding it. You can find an abundance of hand-crafted wood products here in Guatemala – ranging from quite simple to impressively ornate.

Beneath the concrete-covered part of this floor are two cozy bedrooms. Gloria has one and her mother, Licha, shares the other bedroom with her granddaughter Daniela (Gloria’s daughter). The kitchen is beside the bedroom and is big enough to host another simple, square table. We use a gas stove to cook. They also have a microwave and the seemingly rare oven. I avoid using the microwave as much as possible these days though. Food just tastes so much better when it’s heated by stove or oven. All the walls on this floor our sponge painted yellow over white or are simply yellow. All the outlets and light switches are surrounded in a burst of furn brown-colored design to help you quickly identify where they are located. There are plants everywhere, including green and purple ivy and crawlers beginning to creep along the walls. This is another trait I love about Guatemala. The residents love to have plants growing all throughout their homes. Most homes look like a mini nursery. And having come from a home in the U.S. that just doesn’t cater to many live plants I can definitely confirm that being surrounded by living greenery greatly improves your humor, the start of your day, your outlook on life! Even when you’re inside, you feel as if you’re outside. It’s relaxing and calming, yet enlivening and inspiring all at once.

In one corner of this floor, you’ll spot a cement-brick stairway that leads to the terrace. The terrace is simple with several lines for drying clothes and a plastic round table and chairs set. But, you do get a pleasing view of Antigua’s great, looming volcanoes as well as the typical tin-roofed homes clustered around this one.

I have really enjoyed staying here. There are always new travelers coming and going. I am planning to move quite soon though to a similar type house. My room would be a little bigger and I would pay a little less in rent. The best part, and the real motivating factor, is it’s a house of artists. Two young painters and another salsa instructor. We already have a plan to trade painting lessons for photog lessons.

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This entry was posted on Monday, September 7th, 2009 at 9:49 am. It is filed under alive, alternative, Guatemala, Latin America, Musings, Travel and tagged with antigua, casa, Guatemala, house, La Antigua, plants. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.