(Coban, Guatemala)

On the collectivo, I met a friendly Canadian. It was his first time abroad. When we got into Coban, we looked for a hostel together. While checking a guidebook, he left his bag on the sidewalk outside of the police station. After checking in, he realized this and rushed back to find his bag. It was missing.

(Coban, Guatemala)

He went to the police station to ask for help in finding his bag. As he spoke absolutely no Spanish, I decided to follow him to help with translation using my limited Spanish. Of course, with my Spanish language abilities, I was not that much of an improvement except in one way: My Canadian friend’s approach to getting the Guatemalan police to understand his English was to speak faster and explain in greater depth. For example:

Police: When are you leaving?
Him: 6 March… but my sister is sick so I have to leave earlier
Me: [in broken Spanish] 6 March
Him: No! No! No! You got it wrong. I am leaving on 6th March as my sister has cancer and…

(Coban, Guatemala)

Anyway, when I half-mimed and half explained what had happened to the police, they told us to jump into the police truck. We had 4 cops with us. They drove us around the city telling us to identify the robber if we saw him. For the next 30 minutes, I tried explaining that my friend was not robbed and that he left his bag outside. There was no way we could identify the robber.

His experience contrasted with my experience (nearly) getting mugged. The police in Xela simply went upstairs to get coffee when I explained what had happened. I cannot help but feel that race could be a factor.

Anyway, at the end of an unproductive trip, I got the police officers to drop us off at the hostel where the hostel owner could better translate for the Canadian. At one point, the Canadian asked if there were security cameras outside the police station that might have caught the thief on film. The police officer said, “Its Guatemala man!” Everyone laughed.