Day 6- Los Albaniles

I ride to and from work everyday in the bed of a toyota pick up truck.  Today the truck broke down and naturally we only put the hazards on and kept coasting down the mountain to stop at the nearest auto station.  Lucky for us, the rain had ceased so we could enjoy the lapse of neck jostling and knee buckling in the sun.  Maybe I will get tan after all.  It was a nice moment to see all the masons outside their construction element. They are all great guys. My favorite part of the day is lunch (that much hasn't changed since elementary school), where each one pulls out his own tupperware container of last night's left-overs and one goes down the the local tienda to buy a stack of steaming fresh tortillas.  We pull up extra concrete blocks around a makeshift table and listen to the Guatemalan radio- always the station featuring the epitome of latin style music.  Then, everyone just digs in. The different foods brought are for everyone to share.  You can try a couple tortillas-full of any dish. The tortillas themselves are quite versatile: they can be used as spoons, napkins, plates, or just a food chaser. Mostly they laugh and make jokes among themselves and I busy myself with interpreting the newspaper we buy every morning.  So far I've tried all varieties of rice and a chile so spicy it made me cry.  The idea that we all share the hunger of a tough day's work is commonly, and duly acknowledged.