Notable Times: Adventures in Guatemala, Part I: Old Friends

Adventures in Guatemala, Part I

In Which Randy & Linette visit old friends of Malcolm & Thelma

In 2011, my wife Linette and I had a wonderful opportunity to travel to Guatemala for the dedication of the Quetzaltenango Guatemala temple. Linette served her mission in Quetzaltenango, and we had always wanted to go visit, so when she heard the temple was being dedicated, it seemed like the perfect time to go. It also helped that her high school friend, Neal Summers, had gone to the same mission and was asking if we wanted to go with him and his wife Stephanie.

My grandparents, Malcolm & Thelma Merrill, had traveled to Guatemala many times. When I inherited and scanned Malcolm's massive slide collection a few years back, Guatemala was one of the most beautiful places in any of the slides, due largely to their vibrant, colorful outfits that they weave by hand. The patterns date back centuries, and you can tell where people are from by what pattern they are wearing. Here is a picture from 1955 of Thelma and her friend at a market, probably in Antigua:

(Sorry if I seem too informal referring to my grandparents by their given names, but given the audience, it keeps things more clear to use their names.)

I kept seeing this one young couple in the slides, along with their three small children. My mom said that this was Dr. Carlos & Lilly Perez, who became dear friends with Malcolm & Thelma back when Dr. Perez was doing residency in California, and also when Malcolm visited Guatemala regularly with INCAP (Instituto de Nutrición de Centro América y Panamá). Lilly is in the picture above. Here is a picture of Lilly & Carlos with Thelma in 1955 at Lake Atitlan, which is a beautiful lake in the highlands of Guatemala, surrounded by volcanoes:

And you've got to love the old "carry the pot on your head" picture:

There are many pictures of them in various places around Guatemala. There were also pictures from 1957 showing their children doing an Easter egg hunt in the back yard of 814 Cragmont Street in Berkeley, California, just like many of us did as children. Below is a picture of their family. The oldest daughter's name is Maria (which will come up again later).

The earliest pictures I had of this couple are from 1955, and the latest were in 1978, so their friendship went on for quite a while. There is also one series of pictures taken in 1958 in which my mom ("Jeannie", as she was called at the time) accompanied Malcolm & Thelma to Guatemala.

My guess is that these were taken at the ruins of Antigua (which was the capitol of Guatemala until a volcano and earthquakes did enough damage to cause the capitol to move to present-day Guatemala City in 1776). Here is "Jeannie" in an archway in Antigua in 1958 (3 years before she was married to my dad):

Here is another picture of Lilly & Carlos (in 1959), doing a traditional Guatemalan dance (which we saw examples of during the cultural celebration before the temple dedication).

And here is Malcolm & Thelma with Lilly & Carlos a few years later in 1966.

Thelma and my dad (Robert) had a bet at one point of who could get around to painting an oil painting first. Robert eventually won, but Thelma took some painting classes at Rossmoor, and went on to do a painting of Lake Atitlan that now hangs on my bedroom wall. Here is a picture of Thelma with the painting she made. She said she based it on a postcard that she had seen, but that she moved the trees over to give it better composition.

So with all of this background, I was pretty excited to go to Guatemala. Furthermore, my Mom checked on Google and found the son-in-law of Lilly & Carlos, Oscar Marroquin, who runs a newspaper in Guatemala City. She e-mailed him, asking if Lilly & Carlos were still alive. In November, she got a call from Carlos saying that they were indeed still around (now in their eighties) and that they would love to meet me and Linette when we came down.

We e-mailed and didn't hear anything back, so we didn't think it was going to work out, but then the day before we left I got an e-mail from Maria, their oldest daughter, inviting us to breakfast the day we arrived. I was so excited!

So on December 6, 2011, Linette and I picked up Neal & Stephanie Summers and headed south.

Here is me and Linette having our last American meal for a week:

And these are our friends Neal and Stephanie Summers, getting ready for the all-night flight to Guatemala.

Wednesday morning, December 7, 2011, we arrived in Guatemala City at 5:30 a.m., and we piled all four of us with our 5 suitcases into a tiny taxi. Here's a picture of Linette in the back seat.

We eventually found the house and were graciously welcomed by Oscar and Maria. They treated us to a wonderful traditional breakfast of eggs, black beans and "pan" (bread/baked goods). It brought back memories for Linette, Neal (who had both served in Guatemala) and Stephanie (who had served a mission in Argentina). I really enjoyed it, too. It was the perfect introduction to the country.

Their English was great, so we had a wonderful conversation with them. I could tell they were really good people, and when he talked about the political articles he writes for his paper every day, I could tell he really loved the people of Guatemala and wanted what was best for them.

We showed them the collection of 75 pictures that I had printed from Malcolm's collection of slides, and also gave them the same pictures on a DVD. (I assumed they were tech-savvy because her e-mail had said "Sent from my iPad"). As we looked through the pictures, we saw these pictures taken in 1971, and they pointed out that these were taken at the same house that we were sitting in! Maria & Oscar had moved into Lilly & Carlos' old home.

(Home of Lilly & Carlos in 1971, which is now the home of Maria & Oscar:)

(Carlos, Lilly, Thelma, Malcolm, Lilly's sister Helen?, 1971:)

(Lilly & Carlos, 1971:)

So of course we had to take some modern-day equivalents:

(Randy & Linette, 2011):

(Maria, Linette, Randy, Oscar, 2011:)

After breakfast, we walked a block to the home of Carlos & Lilly Perez. There we showed them Malcolm's pictures, too, and they were delighted. Lilly said that they used to have pictures from that era, but that they had all deteriorated, so she was so happy to see these pictures from so long ago.

Lilly was so charming and graceful, and Carlos was hilarious. He asked if we wanted anything to drink, "...bourbon, perhaps?" knowing full well that we were Mormons and didn't drink. He kept joking around. They both knew Don, Bruce and "Jeanie", and had heard that Don had passed away.

I was so thrilled to have been able to meet these fine people. We asked to get a group picture before we left. (Neal & Stephanie were kind enough to take the picture)

(Randy, Linette, Lilly, Carlos and Maria):

As we talked with Oscar about whether it was safe to rent a car, or if we should take the bus to Quetzaltenango, he said, "Well, we have an extra car we don't use except when our son comes to visit. It's a Yukon. You could use that...."

"Wow, that's very generous," we told him, but thought that was a bit much. However, about the third time they insisted, we finally took them up on their offer. They lent us an SUV, which let us explore much more of Guatemala than we thought we were going to be able to. I couldn't believe their generosity and the wonderful visit we had had, with our "second friends, once removed." We were also a bit worried about driving in Guatemala, so we let Linette take the first shift since, as we joked, "her driving style most resembled that of the Guatemalans". ;)