Samayac

Our visit to Samayac was a little different in nature to the rest of our trip. The reason for going was this: my parents were both volunteers in Guatemala in the Seventies. At some point, they were both based in Samayac, where they and others set up a health clinic. My dad oversaw the building construction and my mother, a nurse, helped to set up the medical side of things. As a note to myself more than anything, and because I'm writing this entry somewhat after the event, our trip to Samayac was on 20th November, 2003.

My parents were both very curious to see if the clinic was still running and if so, what it was like now. In particular, they suggested that I might try and locate Anita, an local Guatemalan lady who mum helped train who was very involved in the clinic. They'd kept in contact over the years, but have lost contact in recent years.

I thought this sounded like quite an interesting thing to do, I've always been interested in my parent's Guatemalan antics, plus I liked the idea of travelling many thousands of miles to doorstep someone in a Dave Gorman-esque manner (my reading matter on the plane over, as it happens).

I was also keen to see if we could do it, after all we weren't to know if Anita was still there, or indeed if she was still alive. Also, my Spanish is rubbish. With this in mind, Uncle David accompanied us, driving us in the old but trusty Honda.

About an hour into the journey, the trusty Honda broke down, so Yoli and Alex had to come and rescue us in the Isuzu jeep (aka 'the Trooper').

So it was that the five of us pulled up in Samayac town square and piled out of the trooper.

Yoli and David accosted some passing locals and asked if they knew Anita.

'Anita who?' they asked. I dug out my piece of paper and Yoli pronounced the surname.

'Pharmacy. Over there.' they said (I'm paraphrasing here, it was all in Spanish).

We went to the Pharmacy.

'Anita?' We said.

'Clinic' they said, 'Over there'. (there was a lot of pointing, as you may have guessed).

We went through some iron gates to where the clinic was. David knew where it was, having also helped build it (he did the wiring, apparently).

'Anita?' We said.

'Ah, wait a minute...' Said the man at the counter. Apparently Anita was in the next room, seeing a patient.

So there we go, five minutes flat, easy. took us longer than that to get through immigration in Houston, but don't get me started on that...

I was quite excited now, Anita was in the next room!! We'd found her, now would she remember mum and dad? Would she think we were crazy turning up unannounced?

After a few minutes, Anita finished with her patient and came to meet us. David explained that he was Ted's (my dad) brother, Anita seemed pleased and surprised. Then he explained that I was Ted and Glenys' son, and she seemed still pleased and more surprised.

Phew...

There followed a lot of smiling, chatting and reminiscing (mostly in Spanish, but I think I got the gist of it). Anita doesn't speak English and I don't speak Spanish, but she had a warm smile and a sparkle in her eye and I could see she was quite a character (as she'll have needed to be to keep the place going all these years, I imagine). We chatted for a while, I took some photos, and gave Anita a recent family photo of our lot. And that was it, we said our goodbyes and off we went.

Our visit was short and sweet, but I found it quite exciting to make a connection with what my parents had been involved with 30 years ago. I also very much enjoyed meeting Anita. My parents were most interested to hear our tale of our visit; thrilled to hear that, yes, the clinic is still running (and yes, dad, still standing..) after all these years, and enjoyed seeing the photos of the place and of Anita (photos will be added in the photo section in due course..)

So there we go, that was Samayac, and not a witch doctor in sight...