(pictured - the marimba, the sound of this astonishing nation).

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the marimba - (48 seconds)

[CLICK TO DOWNLOAD MARIMBA MP3]

captured at a festival whose name I couldn’t pronounce. I just discovered it hiding on a recorder.

listen and lose yourself in a place where for just a moment nothing seems to matter.

originally posted on monday9am.tv on 7th December 2007.

originally posted on monday9am.tv on 14th October 2007.

‘… the soul of this country’.

It is becoming obvious to me. The more I experience. The more I listen beyond the words I seldom understand.

But my sense of perspective has taught me that space is required to write the words and make the film/s that might do justice to such a simple yet complex challenge. And space is something I have had little of in the last few weeks.

To give you a sense of this last two weeks, it might be fun to list the more obvious detail of the trip so far; the characters we have spoken to and filmed along the way. Those the wind has blown us towards. Many who see with similar vision.

… a midwife, a bone healer, a jesuit priest, a baker, an anthropologist, an entrepreneur, a former US Ambassador, a waiter, a weaver, a teacher, a storyteller, a cook, a karate teacher, a mayor, many many schoolchildren, a musician, a woodsman, a fisherman, an interpreter, a sculptor, a mayan priest, a cooperative, a photographer and perhaps even the soul of the country herself.

Later today I believe Edwin and I are to spend time with the national football team, then to a city prison, and soon to LA to film Carlos Peña, the Guatemalan winner of Latin American Pop Idol. He was in Mexico yesterday but appears to have moved on. Where else : )

And with a week to go on this leg of the journey I wonder where else the wind might blow us?

We remain wonderfully lost in the uncertainty of quite where to look. Just more capable in how to look.

And it becomes more obvious quite what might happen when a country regains the ability to see itself in the clarity of focus.

Here’s to the wind. And the clarity of focus.

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originally posted on monday9am.tv on 14th October 2007.

We are just back from the prison. A totally arresting ’story’ of the observation of life, which I will write about once I can lay my hands on an accurate translation. And make the film.

originally posted on monday9am.tv on 13th October 2007.

There are a group of youths sitting against of a tomb, laughing to a soundtrack groaning out from an over-used CD player.

Elsewhere entire families picnic on burial plots.

‘How irreverend… ‘

Or is it?

Perhaps the colourful way this nation celebrates its dead lies in its deeper understanding that death might not be as final as it might appear to many.

And then I wonder, when the time comes for me to shuffle off my perch, how I might wish for visitors to break with the silent tradition encouraged by the colourless, dare I say lifeless, cemeteries I have previously stood in.

I am just imagining the scene in a quiet English country churchyard.

But this might just be me & my soul : )

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We inadvertently stumbled into paradise in the most unobvious of places.

How could a community experience such joy and simplicity?

How could these people, despite the hardship of owning less than little, continue to focus on that which is truly important in life?

How could a nine year old girl volunteer that nothing on earth could take her away from this place?

How could the fisherman be so certain?

A short film is etched into my imagination. When I get a chance to breath I will make it. I believe it to be the soul of the country shining through.

originally posted on monday9am.tv on 11th October 2007.

As my ability to recognise the soul of this country flickers in and out of focus, it appears that Guatemala’s proximity to its land is more intentional than just the ability to feed itself.

We all tread our ground but I imagine too few of us to be inextricably connected to it. To understand its importance. To exist as a graceful part of it.

It seems to me that many in this quite extraordinary nation never forgot.

originally posted on monday9am.tv on 5th October 2007.

When one cares to look in that certain fashion, there exists a lightness beyond obvious description. Beyond the words that grace the usual labels.

Where we have been there exists a pace of life that to the casual observer might seem unambitious. But perhaps, just perhaps there is more wisdom in that steady pace than we might first consider. The pace in no hurry to get anywhere else but where it is.

Off to the Pacific Coast soon in search of a fisherman I believe might fit the legend that so many have heard. The fisherman whose simplicity confuses the ‘consultant’.

originally posted on monday9am.tv on 4th October 2007.

It seems the world wants the opportunity to speak from the soul. About its soul.

Perhaps we don’t allow ourselves the opportunity. And perhaps that is our own responsibility, rather than the situations we imagine ‘don’t’ encourage the opportunity.

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Perhaps the cathartic experience of being heard fully might provoke something. Might start something. A change in perspective. A change in fortune. Perhaps even the change of a nation’s experience.

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What might happen when we listen beyond the words of others. Beyond the obvious meaning.

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With no judgement. And with no expectation.

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How might the soul of a person with the opportunity to be heard allow itself to dance? And then, how might the soul of a country allow itself to dance?

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originally posted on monday9am.tv on 3rd October 2007.

We had left the city but Sunday ended as a day of dead ends. Literally. Having been lost, it seems we were still looking too hard. I’m not sure how many times in my life I have encountered so many dead-end roads. It ended with our route on a mountain pass blocked by a landslide. Thoughts had also hit a dead-end. How is the soul of a country found?

On Monday morning something shifted, sadly not at 9am. Although, it will have been 9am somewhere in the world.

I am not sure exactly what happened. A slowing of pace or a slipping into day-dream. Perhaps even Atitlan, a sacred Lake surrounded by the watchful eye of three volcanoes.

Now the world seems clearer. We, Edwin and I, are regaining our ability to see. Nothing around has changed physically but everything looks different. I think that is much of how life has the capacity to ‘work’ for us.

And now we find ourselves in San Pedro accompanied by my camera, a translator and an enthusiasm to capture ‘it’. ‘It’ is tangible, the quiet electricity of human spirit. I hope it transfers to film. It usually does.

But this time, we are capturing our subjects in a Mayan dialect. That is odd, I don’t even speak Spanish. So the questions ripple up and down a chain of friends. Myself in English to Edwin, who passes on in Spanish to Rolando, who in turn passes on to the subject. And back again. Somehow it works.

It has just dawned on me quite how monumental the task will be to spot the intricacies of two languages I don’t speak. To capture the soul of this quite unique nation, and make the film.

Our three subjects talk of life and the human spirit. It is in a similar fashion if you pay attention carefully. Perhaps that is the universal language. The way in which words are spoken. This is a language I do understand.

And then there is Feliciano Pop. A sculptor who used to be a mayor. He makes us all laugh. When I get a chance I must tell you more. (SEE HIS FILM).

I believe the soul of the country is starting to shine through. How could it not?

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* the midwife became a short film soon after. It will be up in ALL FILMS soon.

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We´re lost.

Actually what Edwin said was ´**** we´re already lost.´ Read more