A little trip to Esquipulas

Close by in the country of Guatemala is a city called Esquipulas (S-key-pull-us for those non-Spanish speakers). About 3 weeks ago Allan and I made the trek because we had heard there was a great Basilica that we should check out. We also heard there was zoo! The Basilica was pretty cool. It is the home of "black Jesus" shrine. This is quite the tourist attraction. Luckily Allan and I waited in line on Saturday to see the black Jesus because the line was SOOOO long on Sunday to just walk past the shrine in the front of this Basilica. It was interesting to see this kind of devotion and how important just walking by this shrine of Jesus was for people.

We also enjoyed the zoo a lot. It was a zoo like I had never seen before. Allan and I paid at the "entrance" and then were told we had to walk or take a moto-taxi up a huge hill (the picture above with the Basilica in the background is taken from about half-way up!) and back down it to reach the actual zoo. Since we are cheap, we decided to walk! It was further than we thought and funny. The zoo, which turned out to be like a family fun park, was even funnier. There was one ostrich, stuck in a small cage, 2 emu's, monkeys (in 3-4 different cages AND an island in the middle of a lake full of monkeys... I guess monkeys can't swim, because they couldn't escape!), birds, goats, ducks, deer (a little taste of the homeland), baby cows, and lions! It was crazy funny and worth the hike.

Another cool siting of the trip was the futbol field (pictured above) that we happened upon. I have NEVER seen a futbol field like this. There was no grass and lots of dust, but the children were playing in an organized soccer league on this field. I was atleast happy to see organized soccer, but I couldn't believe this field. They seemed so content though! And the fans were cheering them on! :)


One of my favorite things about Esquipulas, however, was the market. They had such a crazy intense market. The streets were filled with food vendors (pictured!), artisans, and tiny stores all selling the same things. Inside the market was even crazier though. Tons of fruits and vegetables and MEAT! In Copan, our market sells meat on Sundays (a man just plobs the cow meat down on a small table near the entrance of our market...last week he had the cows nose sitting with the meat. Yummy!) In Esquipulas, the market walls were lined with mini-stores selling meat. They just had it hanging in the back of the stores and would cut it up right there for you. Allan even got some coke in a bag :) What more could you ask for?