Que? or Adventures in espanol

Saturday was a day full of adventures. In addition to earthquakes and football championships, I took my first solo trip across the city. To the infamous Xela Walmart (it does exist). To buy a mobile phone. My host mom told me I could catch one of the many microbusses at the smaller parque two blocks from our house, Parque Bolivar. She gave me a 25 cent coin and instructed me to pay my fare in exact change because otherwise they'd think I was a crazy gringa who couldn't count and wouldn't give me change for, say, Q5. (Microbus rides cost Q1.25 per person one way, around 15 cents US). I think they probably would have given me change for a Q5, but until I learn how to say "do you have change for..." I'll stick to small bills and exact change.

Anyway, I only half listened to her, deciding that I'd rather walk to Parque Central to catch a microbus, which is on the way to Zone 3, where Walmart is. Surprise! There aren't any microbusses that stop directly in Parque Central. I ended up asking a newspaper vendor for directions and he directed me to a random spot two blocks further on. Sure enough there was a microbus on a completely non-descript corner that if you didn't know was on the microbus route you'd never guess was a bus stop.

I kept telling folks that I wanted to go to Walmart, and they kept correcting me saying that the place where Walmart is is called something else. No one refers to it as "the Walmart," it's referred to as "the mall" (Palabraja, maybe?) or something. I tried, but for the life of me couldn't remember the exact name, no matter how many people coached me in its pronunciation. Fortunately, everyone knows that the Walmart is at this particular place so, even though they don't call the location "Walmart," people could tell me where it was that I wanted to go when I told them I wanted to go to Walmart.

On the bus ride a very nice older couple got on at a stop after me; I moved to the back of the van to let the woman have easier access to a seat. The gentleman ended up squished in next to me and made small talk. I told him I spoke just a little espanol, and he replied that he spoke a little english, and seemed highly amused at the coincidence. He and his wife were very helpful, coaching me in pronouncing the name of the stop that I wanted. In the end, when they got off, they told me that it was the stop after the next. So it really wasn't difficult to find where I was going at all.

Once at Walmart, a similar scene ensued. First off, it's huge. It's also full of giant pinata-like decorations hanging from the warehouse ceiling. Giant like the size of a queen-sized mattress. I wandered around a bit before finally asking a clerk where the electronics section was. I got there right after they opened, so it wasn't terribly busy at all, and he was nice enough to almost walk me all the way over to the department. He reappeared a few moments later as I was circling the display cases and asked me what kind of phone I wanted. There are three main service carriers down here and they all offer pay-as-you-go phones. I had been recommended to get Tigo, the carrier with a good balance of low price and solid service. The clerk showed me where the phones were and indicated the cheapest one. Q240.00, which sounds like a lot, but works out to around $26.00 US and includes 100 minutes and one month of texts to start.

Once I indicated that this phone would be just fine, two more clerks appeared to undertake the process of check-out. They don't stock the phones at the electronics department, instead they give you a sticker for the cashier to scan so you can pay, and then after you've got your receipt you go to the front pick-up counter and get your phone. We have similar theft-deterrent arrangements at various stores in the US so I wasn't that confused about the process, although I must have looked it because another clerk, a female, offered to escort me up to the front of the store where the cashier lanes were. I think what confused me the most was she kept asking if I was all done with my shopping, and I just couldn't catch all the words so it took me a few times to understand what she was saying.

I often have a puzzled look on my face as my brain works to translate what people say, and I think they often interpret that as confusion or misunderstanding rather than thinking. I need a little hourglass icon, or the mac beachball/windmill thing so people know when I'm still processing the input/output of the conversation.

Eventually I explained that I thought I understood the process, got in line, and paid. The third electronics clerk came down to the pick-up window with my phone and very carefully opened the box and went through all the contents with me - phone, charger, headset for listening to the radio function, and instruction booklet (in spanish only, of course). I doubt they do that for everyone but it was probably the simplest solution to explain the basics of phone ownership to me since I never would have followed everything if he'd just told me verbally. Visuals really are worth a 1,000 words.

After I navigated the microbus system to get back to my neighborhood (going past the Zoo, main bus terminal, futball stadium, and main Saturday market in the process), I set out on phone adventure #2: activating phone minutes. This was actually my favorite part of my whole day. I knew I started with 100 "free" minutes that are included with the phone's purchase price, but I also knew I'd need more than that over the course of my stay. So, on my way home, I stopped at the little tienda (corner store) a block from my house and asked if they had re-charging cards for Tigo phones. They did and the clerk asked how much I wanted. I indicated that I'd like 5 of the 100mensajito cards. They're only Q5 apiece which was very surprising to me - I didn't realize they were that cheap. So I happily paid for my five cards and headed back home to play with my phone. I plugged it in to charge, clicked through all the menus to see if I could change the language to english - I can't, which is really probably a good thing. I now know the spanish word for "delete" or "back" is borrar. After tinkering with all my settings I started pouring over my instruction packet to learn how to put my new extra minutes on my phone. That is when I learned that minutes in spanish is minutos (duh, I actually knew that). Mensajitos are messages. Thus, I am now the proud owner of 500 text messages.

Turns out that you don't buy cards to re-charge your phone minutes (asking for tarjetas - cards - was my key error), the tiendas that sell minutes have a special administrative phone that they use to transfer minutes to your phone. Regular price is Q1/minuto, but various days of the week or month there are 2-for and even 3-for deals.

Of course, the story doesn't stop there. This entire undertaking was primarily because I wanted to make an international call to mi novio (my boyfriend) back home. I had been told that this was totally possible with these cheap little pay-as-you-go cells. Now, I wrote down a whole bunch of important numbers for reference while I'm traveling, but the one thing I didn't think to write down was the process for making an international phone call. Duh. Of course, my little espanol phone instruction book didn't have much to say on the topic other than the zero key was somehow involved (what it really says is "to type the "+" symbol for making an international call, press and hold the zero key" or, at least, that's the functional translation. It took me a good half hour of trial and error to figure that out though. I thought maybe you just had to type "0" before your international call to indicate it was international, or something)

I knew I needed the international country calling code for the US, and unfortunately my host mom didn't know it. She suggested looking on the internet, which was my next plan. That of course required going to the internet cafe. Pause here to say that my interaction went beautifully smooth this time, compared to my first night in town. I was even able to communicate that I'd like change for 1Q so I had 25cent coins to pay my host mom back from that morning.

The info I found online said the US country code was number 1 (of course it is *sarcasm*). It also said that usually you have to dial an IDD number, which is the number to call out of the country you are in. I found two different numbers listed for Guatemala. Armed with this info, I returned home to figure this all out.

And totally couldn't.

No combination seemed to work. I tried it with the little "+" sign (once I figured out how to make it) and without the little plus sign. With an extra zero, with no extra zero. I kept getting the very polite female voice recording telling me my call could not be completed because this wasn't a recognized number (in espanol). Finally, I went to double check that I wasn't somehow mistyping Dylan's number, and saw where I had written down the phone number for tourist assistance in Guatemala, known as ASISTUR. Guatemala has this super-handy hotline for tourists you can call for all sorts of info. It's also one of the numbers you can call for emergency assistance if you're in a bind for any reason. I figured if anyone knew how to make an international call, it'd be these guys. And if not, I'd also written the US embassy phone number down right below them.

After a 30 second conversation with the friendly gentleman who answered the phone, I learned that the country code for phone calls to the US is indeed number one... proceeded by two zeros. 001. And then the stateside number. No plus sign needed, no extra zero. That's it. Just those three extra numbers tacked on at the beginning of the US number you want to call. Muy simple.

The other super good news? You can send mensajitos to international numbers too.