Pixie in Paradise

aka “Walkabout With Care”

I don’t watch the news, maybe out of laziness, disinterest or because I don’t want to be bummed the hell out all day. Instead I’ll read select uplifting news feeds on Instagram, watch endless cat reels and stories from The Dodo. And I’m always up for viewing an inappropriate meme; if it’s about sex, the zodiac or hot men and “gray sweatpants season,” I make time. When back home I do open the Apple News app on my iPhone but inevitably scroll down to the articles about health tips or warnings for people my age, or the Food section where they suggest nutritious snacks and delicious recipes.

My point is that sometimes I don’t get the memo right away when a newsworthy event occurs and now we seem to be in the middle of a bunch of them. In addition to places I’m not even aware of, the current horror in Israel and Palestine – innocents on both sides caught in the chaos – and the ongoing nonsense in the Ukraine is beyond troubling and I pray for their health and safety, for justice, and swift reckoning for those responsible.

One week ago I decided that I would need a break from this island soon and wanted to take the opportunity to travel to nearby countries while I’m so close. A break from a tropical island you say? Yes, bitch. This is a tiny island, with limited resources, gossip-y people – it’s like living in a fishbowl! While there are beautiful views, water activities, a couple of good restaurants and you can walk down the street with alcoholic drinks, the rest of the time – for me, anyway – is a bit like survival mode. I enjoy ocean walks, which are only one mile each way, then you have to turn around or fall into the ocean. And I’m really enjoying the almost daily routine of spending part of my morning and afternoon at the oceanfront cafe sitting, writing and watching tourists fumble their breakfast orders, visiting with some of them as well as my new local friends and acquaintances.

I decided that the place to visit would be neighboring Guatemala, specifically Antigua. It felt like a relatively safe city for a solo female tourist in a country that does carry a Level 3 travel advisory from the U.S. Department of State – for whatever that’s worth. I then started searching for places to rent on Airbnb. Airbnb has been my favorite place to find unique lodging for many years. It’s the same price or in many cases, cheaper, than booking hotels or housing on any other website. This was no exception. Very soon after typing in prospective dates and my desired location a very sweet house popped up, a garden house. This humble house was beautiful and simple, outdoor in all areas except for the bedroom and bathroom, which weren’t anywhere near each other. There were unique open-air black lattice wood panel walls separating rooms from each other and the living room opened right into the backyard which was a huge lawn and gardens full of trees, flowering bushes and native orchids everywhere. The listing is called My Aunt Kiki’s Garden and a very nice man named Erick manages the listing. I’m going to make a big intellectual leap here and say that maybe he is Kiki’s nephew? Once I booked this home for six weeks, Erick responded quickly, thanking me for booking and letting me know if I needed anything I could message him. I appreciated this greatly and explained to him that my Spanish fluency is not advanced and I might need some assistance from time to time. He assured me that they lived near the house in Antigua and would be available. I then booked a flight on TAG Airlines from Belize City to Guatemala City. The only thing I needed to figure out was how to get from Guatemala City to Antigua safely. Learning that Guatemala uses Uber™, I was so excited to think that ground transportation would be as easy as it was in the U.S. However, after speaking with a few people and watching the social media forums about Guatemala and Antigua, it was clear I should purchase a ticket to have a shuttle bus get me from one city to the other. Leaving that until closer to my departure I started to read a little about the country and towns I would be visiting.

Three days later, a British tourist came to the cafe and we started talking. This woman, Anna, a very experienced solo traveler having logged thousands of miles in dozens of countries, hundreds of cities all on her own, in her 34 but very capable years. She was trying to get her trip to Guatemala refunded as she had just read that the political climate there had taken an interesting – not for the better – turn. This was a surprise to me because I had spoken to two tourists a couple of weeks ago who had just been there. Both tourists were young solo female travelers in their 20s, one Dutch the other Australian. They’d both just come from Guatemala and loved it. The Dutch woman was going to return there a few days after we spoke, wanting to spend more time there.

That was September but this was October, and things had changed in Guatemala. I messaged my Airbnb host, Erick, begging him to refund my rental because I didn’t think this would be the safest time for me to visit. He was more than happy to give me a full refund but the Airbnb software app would only let him refund a miniscule portion. I tried to get through to Airbnb after submitting a refund claim which they acknowledged, then never replied back for three days. The international cell plan I have still charges me $0.25/minute to make phone calls which is why online platforms like WhatsApp are the only way to go for international travel. North American (U.S.) cell phone plans need to make it easier to travel, after all we give them enough money each month to put up with their shitty service. I don’t even want to add up how many thousands of dollars I’ve paid to Sprint, AT&T and T-Mobile over the last 25 years for it all to come down to a more expensive plan to upgrade to their international roaming and data, to get stranded by not being able to make phone calls without incurring a huge charge. 

After three days of still not hearing from Airbnb and stewing in my somewhat unfriendly thoughts about the situation I did the math and thought I would be happy-ish if I could talk to Airbnb customer service for 20 minutes or less, get the problem resolved and walk away paying the cell phone company $5 USD extra for their “service.” I get it: technology. I made the call and got to an actual human surprisingly quick, named D. I firmly – borderline rudely – explained to D that I had heard nothing from them for days, my host wanted to fully refund me, I was calling from Central America and it was costing $0.25/minute so we had 20 minutes or less to wrap this up. I am getting better at a softer approach with human interaction but there’s still remnants of a feral animal, the one that told a fast food worker, “And none of that damn mustard.” (It was years ago but ask my ex husband and southwest-y bestie and they’ll tell it like we just hit that drive-thru yesterday)!

Let me just say that up until now I have had great experiences with Airbnb for the ten years I’ve used them, and planned  on continuing to use them for lodging regardless of how this transaction went. Fortunately it went my way and quickly. D and I spoke for seven minutes – I was counting. He said he would message the property host, get his authorization and then refund my money. And that’s just what he did. Twenty minutes from start to finish I was refunded, no frustration, no hassle. It sure makes a difference when you can speak with someone on the phone rather than dealing with a machine or software app. Fricking machines and artificial intelligence. It’s just not the same.

Speaking of technology I’m looking into an e-SIM option for an upcoming journey! Instead of Guatemala, my new British friend Anna and I are going to hit three new Central American countries in the next two weeks! New to me, not to her, and they seem much more politically stable and relatively safe than Guatemala at this time. I’m rather excited and also feel very lucky that I’m not doing this quick trip completely alone. It’s nice to have another human physically aware of my whereabouts. Loved ones at home are tracking my location from 2,000 miles away on their phones and I of course am tracking myself and belongings thanks to AirTags which might be one of the best modern inventions currently on this planet. It’s not an oversell,  these little doodads are awesome.