Sunglasses Always Fit

Moving out of seven years of home in Hong Kong to the temporary spot at my parents in California for six weeks was wild enough. But I couldn’t have ordered a more Rachel-esque day to get here to my new home in Panajachel, Guatemala.

I was waiting on boxes, culling an already culled wardrobe, planning for a new climate, and being the general hot mess I always am. And after putting most of it off in favor of being an Olympic-addict and hanging out with the dogs, the recipe for comical almost disaster went like this:

Day before takeoff – plan on a nice lunch with family, FREAK OUT INSTEAD. Cancel lunch. Panic pack. Turn in circles. Take a walk and try to find a single reason to go when summer has been so good. Question entire life. Force cuddle dogs for an hour. Pack, weigh, pack, reassemble.

End up at last minute family dinner out, relax because you think all the packing and planning and cleaning is done, it’s all done now, so have a few beers.

Come home, review packing, hate all of it, you were so stupid three hours ago. Rearrange a few things with commentary from mom, have another drink or two. Declare yourself ready. Watch Indiana Jones with your parents on the couch, raid the pantry for last minute food items to take with you and, importantly – everyone pretend it’s a normal summer night. Hug the dogs too tight. Kizzy starts giving the cold shoulder. She knows what suitcases mean. 

Try to sleep. Give up at 4am and invest in the stock market, your latest hobby. Give up sleeping at 6am to shower, rearrange things some more.

FLUSTER IN GENERAL FOR AN HOUR because, afterall, you are moving to a different country.

Take off for the airport, get so flustered in the goodbye and the unloading that you forget to put on your luggage tags or insert your airtags you just got and downloaded an app for. Get mad that the dogs didn’t really say goodbye. Be more mad about that then losing all your luggage in some “Brokedown Palace” – esque situation.

Fly from SFO to Dallas, ride the train several times for gate changes, fret over delays and luggage, and text the HR person at your Guatemalan school if maybe we should cancel your pickup tonight and you just get a hotel and come tomorrow? Isn’t it too late and scary to drive now?

GAHHH so then . . . she checks and the driver is already on his way, so you’d have to pay for his hotel as well . . . you decide to just go for it. You finally arrived in Guatemala at 11pm, over an hour later than you were supposed to, sweating through customs with about 250 lbs of luggage falling everywhere, and then there is no one at the pick up. You have no number for contact, no water, haven’t eaten since lunch twelve hours ago . . . but then suddenly your saviour shows up with a sign with your name, upside down, but there he is. Hallelujah. 

So we start the drive, it’s three hours in the dark on mountains, no lights on the road except the crazy neon ones coming towards us from the opposite way. Also it’s foggy as heck and eventually we turn off to go through some towns and off-roading areas without cell service that he insists are faster? Because I am woman and don’t want to die out here, I immediately wake up and start making myself a human and sympathetic character (“I love Jesus, I have kids, I’m here to volunteer, my ancestors are from Guatemala,” etc.). I compliment his driving and his taste in music (both are questionable). 

Luckily, it was all okay for most of the time. Until he swerved off the road and looked up into the sky and declared he’d seen a UFO. Until later, when he swerved off the road to take pictures because he’s an “instagrammer” and I still didn’t have cell service and thought I would get disappeared. 

Finally, around two am, I got to the hostel. But there was no one to answer the door, so we had to break in, and luckily, this was possible. Several feral dogs announced our arrival. This awoke the night guard, who finally helped unlock doors but then tried to stay in my room after dropping off my bags (fun). 

And then only one VERY large bug and the world’s worst mattress stood between me and my first night living in Guatemala. Spoiler – we made it. 

It was wild to wake up the next day to a place I’d arrived to in the dark and realize – this is my home for at least the next two years. But friends – I think I already love it. It’s such a sharp contrast to Hong Kong, and to the last six-ish weeks I spent being lazy in the States that it makes my head spin, and so different than when I was in Guatemala 16 years ago. But I think I might love it.

The people are so, so friendly. It’s a “hello” to everyone on the street, a “God bless you” whenever you take a tuk-tuk. And so beautiful and colorful in indigenous clothes, mixed with random thrift store finds. I love it. I walk into shops and ask the dumbest questions and they are so kind. The food is incredible. It’s as cheap as chips. It’s so relaxed. The weather is gorgeous. I can’t believe how nice people from my new school are – helping me figure everything out, texting me at all times to check in, giving me multiple tours of the town, arranging outings, helping me move on a SATURDAY?!

I am really happy so far, and settling in nicely. At the same time, it’s so weird to think of my alternative timeline in Hong Kong, watching all my friends come back after vacations and not having those in-real-life catch-up talks with them as we all go back to work. Not praying together for a red rain day off school, not rolling our eyes at each other over another new initiative at a staff inservice meeting we both know will be shite. 

I have to remind myself forcefully sometimes of all the HK things that did not serve me and my lifelong quest for happiness. Among them:

• Rude ass taxi drivers
• Constant construction noises
• The way hong kongers wander all over the sidewalk like milk drunk toddlers
• Being stared at constantly (why? Because White? Fat? Could be tourist?)
• Body-shaming (always being told there was nothing, not even shoes, in the store that was my size)
• Public toenail clipping, public hair plucking
• Humidity
• Mold (I developed so many allergies) 
• Seeing children being potty-trained over storm drains, against garbage cans, in the apartment stairwells. 
• Shoe prints on public toilet seats
• Watching the death of democracy in real time

That being said, there are so many things about Hong Kong that I will miss. I came on a two year contract and stayed for seven years! Obviously there were things to love. For example: 

• “Okay byebye” as the end to every conversation
• Bamboo scaffolding as a dying architectural art 
• The trams we called “ding-dings”, the ease of public transportation – the world could learn a lot
• Amazing lightning and thunder storms that gave us days off school
• Clean streets from the aggressive cleaning staff
• Cheap services like house cleaning, moving, pedicures, and massages
• Free healthcare – but hey, that’s in most places around the world except one glaring exception. 
• An absolutely wild nightlife. 
• Feeling safe ALL the time – walking home alone at all hours, and only three times in seven years was I accosted. This is a rare and beautiful thing. Still effing traumatic and unforgivable. But rare. 

The hardest thing to miss is, of course, my friends. I was in HK for seven years. We were closer than close, especially surviving pandemic trauma together.

We check in on whatsapp, and I watch their lives continue to play out on social media, despite the fact that I’m not there, and it hurts in a tiny way that only speaks to my insecurities. And it’s really just a part of international living – at some point, you move, and life goes on in front and behind of you. 

How many signs can point the way before I follow the way ahead of me?

Since I’ve arrived here in Guatemala, I’ve done things iVe loved! I’ve hiked, karaoked, found cottage cheese and kombucha, walked the waterline, brunched, seen a funeral procession, visited seven groceries stores/bodegas, and moved into my new place.

Tonight, waiting for my laundry, I could hear the church next door ramping up their nighttime worship set, and to my surprise, it was a song I used to sing on mission trips to Mexico – “porque grande eres tu, grande es tu gloria.” My head spun at the throwback – I’ve felt pretty far from God for a few years. And sixteen years ago to the DAY, I arrived in Guatemala for the very first time on the backpacking trip that would change the course of my whole entire life, so. 

We’ll find out. But I think I’ll be okay.