So….. This is not my first time writing about the wonders of Guatemalan indigenous clothing: traje típico. It’s the traditional clothing of the Mayan culture that is utilized in the pueblos of Guatemala. Each region has it’s own specific pattern/patrón and Santa Clara has it’s own (it’s very plain and not my favorite style of traje, but that’s just my feeling). Regardless, there are four major components to traje: A: the güipil or woven blouse, B: the faja or woven belt, C: the corte or skirt and as an additional piece D: the delantal or apron.

It took some time for my eyes to adjust to spotting traje at every turn. I, being much the foreigner, took in the elaborate patterns on the skirts like a painting in motion. Now I am used to seeing women in traje and occasionally the men, and when I go back to the office in Santa Lucía Milpas Altas, I feel more comfortable looking at Guatemalan women in traje than Guatemalan women in pants and blouses. It’s like reverse culture shock when the traje goes away. Of course there are women in Santa Clara who wear pants but usually they’re youngsters, and no matter what age, most people wear traje.

I would like to focus on the most evocative feature of the traje, the apron. Aprons, where I come from, are meant for the kitchen and only the kitchen (and if you work at a hardware store, I suppose). Aprons, in rural Guatemala, are meant for the mountain, the house, the market, church, for cualquier cosa. They’re meant for every setting. As an incumbent feminist, seeing aprons outside of the kitchen took some adjusting. When I was walking with my host mom to church one day, she stopped in her tracks: “I’m wearing my old apron!” and we turned around so she could switch it out for her crisp and new apron. To go to church… With all the other ladies wearing their fancy aprons… I repeat, aprons.. as adornments.. at church. As we say in the south, I like to die. I made the mistake of googling that statement in quotes to see what appeared and sites popped up about what it feels like to die along with some links for euthanasia. Moving on. We made it to church to sit amongst all the other ladies, wearing their Sunday best aprons.

I buy most of my traje used, which they refer to as ‘segunda.’ The thing is, new traje is super expensive! And I’m not probably going to wear these clothes in my own country, so why spend a bucket-load on it? I think it would be disrespectful to wear it in the States because it isn’t my culture, but also, because I think it would feel weird. Is that bad of me to admit? But I do want to wear it at least once in the US, just to run errands, and see how I feel to be in public wearing my traje. I think I’d feel like an imposter. Or maybe I’d feel right at home sticking out just like I do every day in Santa Clara, stick out, no matter what I am wearing.

But on the subject of being an imposter, one thing that gets under my skin is when tourists and foreigners buy only the traditional blouses but don’t bother with the rest of the traje. I assume they like the style of the güipil and don’t like the rest of it. But, in my opinion, if you are going to come to Guatemala and live off the land and benefit from the warm culture, you should wear the traje completo. Yes, there are days where I only wear the tops with my work pants and the townsfolk always ask me: “and your corte?” so I know it’s like, well, weird to them when I wear the güipil without the skirt. And while I’m on the subject of pet peeves, I think it’s super weird to wear traje to “ring the bell” at the Peace Corps end of service ceremony if that person never wore traje típico during their service. Me cae mal/I don’t like it. It’s none of my business, right? Different cultures always adopt and adapt styles from other places, and everyone has their own right to style, but it’s a personal conviction that I have that if you live here, you need to When in Rome it. So that is why I want to challenge myself to wear the full traje at home and see how it goes. I’ll keep you posted.

When I wear my traje in Santa Clara, which I try to do at least twice a week, folks in the street ask me: “How much?!” And then: “where’d you buy it?” I always tell them and then they comment amongst themselves, chuleando. That’s a colloquialism for ‘admiring.’ I only have one corte/skirt because that is the most expensive piece to buy. Actually, I have two cortes but one is hanging on my wall as a decoration. It’s SO beautiful but it’s too heavy to wear and I’d also have to alter the fabric to make it wearable which I don’t want to do.

And even more fierce are the reactions when I put on that blessed apron. When I put the delantal/apron on, my host grandmother says “Now you need to get to work if you are going to wear that delantal! You need to make tortillas, mop and cut firewood!” She laughs. But it’s true. Wearing an apron means you have work to do, the housewife’s uniform.

When I wash my hands after doing the dishes, I can never find a towel to dry my hands around the sink. It took me months to realize that this is because my host family wears delantales and they wipe their hands with it like a towel.

I am always reaching for a napkin if I eat too much chile and my nose starts to run. Why am I the only one at dinner doing that? Because, this might sound gross but it’s really not, they wipe their nose on the underside of the delantal. They place one palm flat on their lap to hold the apron in place and with their other hand they flip the apron over, wipe their nose on the underside, and flip it back over like normal.

Does my host mom use a purse? No. She puts her change in the zipper pocket of the apron. Yes, the delantales come with zipper pockets so who needs a purse? Every woman in the market does the same, their change purse is their apron. Delantales also serve as baskets, just hold it out in front of you and you can carry wood scraps, beans, coffee or whatever you need to transfer. I don’t think my host mom would function without hers, not for five minutes.

But now I will tell you a story about the delantal:

My compañera de trabajo, Seño Mary, is the teacher for Home Ec, Technology, Communication & Language and Natural Sciences at one of the middle schools where I work. I’ve visited her in San Juan La Laguna, her home, we’ve attended trainings together and worked together for almost a year. One day over our refacción (it’s a very important institution in this culture, but it’s essentially just snack time), her language background came up in conversation. Which did she learn first? Spanish or Tz’utujil?

I was surprised to learn her story, how could I not have known this all along? She said: “No, I grew up speaking only Tz’utujil. We spoke only Tz’utujil in my house.” I think Seño Mary is in her early 40s. And I asked: “So I assume you learned Spanish when you started to go to school?” And she said: “Well I will tell you what happened.” And I have learned, but still forget, that when I hear this phrase, I cannot anticipate what story will unfold.

“I started primaria (elementary school) and studied for two years. By the third year” (what would be the second grade in the States) “I don’t know why but I was discriminated against and the school director kicked me out. He said that I was not allowed to study there.” (She didn’t say why but I believe it was racial discrimination for being Mayan). “So I left the school and worked and I don’t know why but there was this priest in my pueblo and he always told me and my brother ‘You must keep studying. You must go back to school and keep studying.’ And thank goodness for him, I don’t know what it was in him that made him concern himself with us, but for whatever reason he kept coming back and saying: ‘you need to keep studying, you need to fight to study. You must, you must.’ And when I was 25, I went back to second grade. Can you imagine, at age 25 going back to primaria?” (elementary school). “I was so embarrassed that I carried my notebook in my apron. Yo llevé mis cuadernos en mi delantal.”

She said, through a sort of shock and laughter at her shame and what she did to address it: she hid her notebooks in her apron. And when she graduated from middle school, she continued on to get her title to be able to work as a teacher. She didn’t get her ‘título’ until 2001, or 2007. I can’t remember the details but she had to keep on studying at such a later age in life to get her education. She speaks both languages seamlessly, Tz’utujil and Spanish, from my perspective. But look what it cost her to be Mayan, to study and learn how to speak Spanish and function in a world that privileges Ladinos and marginalizes Mayans.

My perspective on my ‘struggles’ as a young person have shifted completely since living here. When was I ever discriminated against, denied education, entry or a space in society? Why did I have it so easy? Of course, I didn’t know it at the time but that’s what it was: easy.

She told me once through a whisper: “I don’t know why, Natalie, but I just don’t have any interest to learn English. Do you know why that is?!” It made me laugh out loud. All I ever get asked in this country is to teach English. “I’ll pay you, I’ll invite you to my house. Do you have a book you could give me? What’s difficult is the pronunciation.” Just yesterday someone who works at a bank asked to hire me to teach English. I can’t accept money for anything, nor am I here to teach English, but I always tell them that if they can buy a book of English vocabulary I will teach them how to pronounce the words. Anyway, when Seño Mary shared her admission, the only person who’s ever expressed such a sentiment to me here: “I don’t like English,” it was so refreshing and honest and unique. Everyone else seems to want to give their left arm to learn English. She says: “Eh, I don’t really like it..” and I love that. Seño Mary is truly a role model to me.

Out of all the uses for a delantal, and there are many, hiding a notebook is my favorite.