So……… I was bamboozled AGAIN. Two Sundays in a row.

Last Sunday I went to a ‘lunch’ that was a 4.5 hour wedding shower. This Sunday I went to ‘meet my host mom’s family’ and it was also a wedding shower.

I knew I was going to meet Rosa Maria’s family. I imagined myself frolicking in a coffee plantation which her father owns. I thought I might hug some children, walk around in the sunshine exploring the coffee plants, say what few sentences I can arrange in Spanish and spend 85% of the time listening, and drink a refreshment inside before leaving. Maybe there would be a refa (snack) and we would be home by dinner.

Instead, I walked into a colorful home with balloons hanging from the ceiling of the entry patio. “Surprise!” (I don’t think they yelled ‘Sorpresa!’ but I don’t remember at all).

Immediately, I was relieved to see that the games were rapid fire, super-organized and prepared. They were all fun, funny, there were paper cut-outs and probably games inspired by Guatemalan Pinterest. You even got a chilled Corona with ribbons wrapped around it if you won something. This was the kind of shower I know. This is the kind of shower Aunt Becky throws in Tampa. This is the professional stuff. The other shower I went to was so slow and laid back that I was terrified they were all that way. Granted, it was my fourth day in the country. You can’t believe everything about a culture based on one party.

4 hours later, I had arranged myself in every “listening posture” I knew. I had perfected the quick glance at my phone (no wifi, no signal- no need to look except to jot notes or check the time). I ate 2.5 room temperature tortillas because I needed something to do with my hands. Everyone had a beer in hand, even my host mom drank two. During training with Peace Corps, no alcohol is allowed. It’s a matter of safety and cultural integration. Also many evangelicals in Guatemala do not drink at all and see drinking as an aberration.

But I was with the Catholics. There were enough beers to go around thrice.

So I sat. I sipped a clear glass of water from “el chorro”/the tap. Did I bring a water bottle? Why, no. I was going out. I didn’t want to bring my purple Camelbak. Guess I will from now on.

Eventually, Rosa Maria asks “You don’t want just one beer?” Aura, her sister, says: “It will be ‘escondido’/hidden!” I smile and laugh and (hopefully) politely decline. One of Rosa Maria’s brothers asks me if I am getting a drink every time I get up. He is just being hospitable, this is part of the culture. But I had to say no.

I was being bamBOOZEled.

I wanted to say “I’m drinking illegal water!” Beer is a no-go.

This is how it goes when you ask for water at a party:

When I asked for water, I asked for agua pura. I thought that was the same as agua purificada. It’s not. Agua pura means pure water. It’s pure plus everything else from the Guatemalan pipelines. So when Rosa Maria’s niece got a clear glass out and held it under the faucet, saying “el chorro?,” I said: “Es agua pura?” and she said “Si pero desde el chorro?” And I said: “Sí, está bien.” I’ve been bending over backwards to rinse my mouth and toothbrush with purified water, now I’m swallowing tap water in gulps. Go Team.

But, let me be agua pura clear, this night was not about what I could or could not drink. It was about not being able to participate. That is most easily demonstrated in the fact that I was not allowed to drink, but it was much more than that.

At the heart of it, el reto/the challenge is that I could not engage in anything: drink, games, conversation. 

I suppose I could have tried to join the young guys and make a joke in fractured conversational Spanish.

Here I am trying to learn Spanish but I can’t hear what anyone is saying over the music. Why am I even here? I targeted animated things that couldn’t talk, like the family puppy and the 2 year-old. They were creatures who would respond back to me but didn’t need words.

It was lonely. It was plastic. It was uncomfortable.

So, I sat. I smiled. I smiled for 5 hours. I might as well have been an alien mannequin drinking illegal water. I sat with my host mom and just listened to the Spanish I couldn’t hear. I answered questions when asked, and tried to smile.

I wondered, several times, should I get up and play with the kids? I could throw the soccer ball with them? But I didn’t know how to talk to them, and I couldn’t understand them if they tried to talk to me. I wasn’t ready.

But I suppose I was an esponja/sponge. Maybe that’s the point of total immersion, too. I absorbed the experience after all, the boiled-down heart of the event that runs deeper than the conversation. You can tell a lot about a family and a party without saying a thing. I could tell you just how much you can tell.

5 hours in, I saw Rosa Maria get up and put on her warm jacket. Freedom.

I kissed several cheeks, waved to many others. Said goodbye to Fernando y Carolina.

At the end of it, I felt happy that I went to the party. I was happy because I got to see all of these happy people for 5 hours. The room was bright, the colors were bright, the balloons on the ceiling were festive and the food was awesome. I liked the music even though it’s still new to me.

Eventually, my temperature will match the water here in Guatemala. I’m easing in one toe at a time, and eating lots of tortillas. I will have to continue to be the awkward turtle who says things wrong and doesn’t understand.

I wonder what I’m doing next Sunday.