Polo & Guatemala

So I’ve been wondering what to write about my trip to Guatemala for about a month and polo came to mind. I’ve got a very open mind and am usually up for anything but one thing that blew my mind was attending a polo match in Guatemala – I’ve been on a Cameroonian radio show, attended a Monster Truck Jam, visited a sex museum, and swam in a bio-luminiscient bay, to name a few more eccentric things I’ve done as far as attractions and events. What made this recent experience more shocking was the fact that I had just been living in areas that hardly had roads let alone horses. “Boston?” one of the indigenous farmers had remarked when I told him where I lived. “Massachusetts?” I tried next, and still no reaction. I finally explained I was from the Northeast, U.S. At the polo match, quite a different venue with a very different crowd, it therefore should not have been a surprise when after answering the same question and telling the person “Boston – It’s in the Northeast U.S., Massachusetts” they replied, “yeah no shit.” (in English too).

The match was in Guatemala City with my friend’s former boarding school friend who came to the States for a decade or so before returning home to help run his family’s business. This man is one of the elite of the country; he was actually the president of the polo club. So he made sure we were well taken care of. Before seeing this though I have to admit I had never even thought people really played the sport, certainly not in the U.S.

Apparently you need at least six horses (which cost about $250 each to feed a month) –one for each period of the match, membership to a club (also usually pricey), a lot of $ to maintain the beautifully grassy playing field, and the money to pay for international refs. to fly in ($2000 a game maybe) and if you really want to win, you can bring in up to two players a team of higher ranking, who for a nice fee, will join your team for the match. As you can tell, it’s not the easiest sport in the world to join. What’s crazy is how interesting it is to watch and how powerful the horses are. It’s actually a really violent experience and people getting trampled are not uncommon. But it’s less about the game then the prestige of being there, hanging out with other wealthy and influential people, and honoring your family’s tradition of running the local polo club.

Our team ended up losing but it didn’t matter, we ate the best food there that we ate the whole trip (it was catered by a five star Guatemala City steakhouse) and met some powerful and racist Guatemalan’s who skin was sometimes lighter than that of my own (and my Jewish friend who traveled around with me). We were also constantly given more alcohol resulting in some contentious debates about Guatemalan history with some of the polo crowd lackeys. I highly recommend Guatemala as a place to travel internationally with beautiful sights, an interesting and colorful history, and an amazing disparity between the wealthy elite who play polo every now and then, and the poor who have no electricity or running water.

Quarter Life Crisis - It's not time to panic...yet

Today I turn 25. This seems like a monumental achievement in some ways. On the other hand, I about the same age as NBA legend Lebron James and Mozart had been composing incredible symphonies for his last 20 years at this point in his life. But I'm not Mozart and I'm not Lebron James, or am I? No I suppose I'm not, so I don't need to panic. But birthday's are strange things. I really don't want people to know because as soon as they find out they start telling other people and those are probably people you don't care about and then you just have a bunch of people wishing you something and making you feel like most of the people you know are not really people you will know in 5 or 10 years and you have very few close friends. I feel ok writing it here on this blog since no one really reads it, except perhaps a few close friends. It is fitting that my friend Sean, who's blog I also read avidly, wrote to me to a few days ago:

"You know what scares me even more, rationalizing this irrational existence." (in reference to finding a job, what to do with his life, and playing the game of sending your resume in, trying to look impressive, etc.) - see http://www.facebook.com/l.php?u=http://www.eyeweekly.com/article/55882&h=19117 for a great piece on quarterlife crisies

Ok sorry for the depressing note there, 25 years, big thing, big news, go me

-here's to the next 25!