Julio-So, I didn't cop out. I tried to learn the salsa in a local club called Riki's, where one of the surviving members of the disbanded Buena Vista Social Club, Ignacio "Nachito" Herrera, plays a quick set every Wednesday night. Usually late, always unexected, he might show up, he might not. I've caught him a couple of times (me and my friend Amy have become his official "groupies") but last night he jammed for three hours and I totally forgot about learning salsa, grabbed my camera, and just tried to capture the energy in the room. At some point, everyone forgot they were in a restaurant, put the chairs aside, and just danced. I didn't want to use my flash, I felt it would somehow alter the mood, but now I'm really glad I didn't. These abstractions capture it completely and I'm blown away to realize that if someone asked me to describe the salsa for them, i probably couldn't. but i would show them these. su amiga gringa, Jessie

Ignacio "Nachito" Herrera jams and yes, he's just as cool in person...

Malagasy Discotheque

[8/18/07 LE BUS, TANA – Dear Molly, Africa is a place of contrasts – of high highs and crushing lows. For Tana’s wealthy class (read: ex-pats), you find highs at Le Bus, an all-night discotheque. You can be openly gay there, and no one blinks. That totally amazes me, since elsewhere, homosexuality is completely taboo. But it still makes me uncomfortable to think that this life of excess can exist so close beside dire poverty. But then again, what difference does that juxtaposition make really? In the West, we live to excess all the time. It’s just easier for many people, because they never have to, or don’t want to, see how the other side lives. Here, unless you want to sit inside your razor-wire compound all day and all night, no one has that luxury. – John]

The beat goes on, lex, just to the tune of a different drum ...

Lexey -

This son and father play in this same spot every single saturday afternoon. the music is intense, like nothing you've ever heard. the dad is on flute and the son is on drums, just sitting there waiting for his cue. the timing is perfection. you should have been here, we could have totally jammed with them. - Jessie

I'm ready to admit the thing that struck me most about the people of Guatemala was the poverty, the empty way some people look at you in the street, how their stores are filled with goods most americans wouldn't even consider, let alone put down good money for. but the more i am here, the more i realize they have fuller lives than most wealthy people you would come across in the states.

i'm not saying i've been here long enough to become numb to it, and i still feel a gnawing in my stomach everytime i run into the guy on 6th avenue north who plays the mandolin and has no legs and spends the entire day begging for change, but the thing is that now, i focus on the laughter, on the happiness i see on these very same streets.

there's this one family who runs a vending cart and the kids are never wearing shoes and they sit in the hot sun all day selling plantains and bags of juice (yes, "bags" of juice, but more on that later) but my point is, if i were to tell you about them, i would show you how they eat every meal together, always, how they pat each other's backs and display acts of love in almost everything that they do.

the drummer and his father have to play in the streets for money, for survival, so the white tourists can stop by and contemplate how much money to throw in front of them, but the bond between the two was striking, one no amount of money can buy.

watching them, i seriously felt like dancing. you would have too.

No sleep

[8/7/07 NOSY KOMBA --- Dear Monies/Mock, I tried everything – falling asleep with my index fingers in my ears, smashing pillows on both sides of my face, breathing exercises to distract my mind – but when there is a bombastic Malagasy “sallegy” concert going on 100 feet from your thatched bungalow, there is really nothing you can do to sleep. I joined the party until about 1 a.m., but since my boat left early in the morning, I thought I would try to sleep at least a little. But Fandrana, the band, and its constant banging bass drum and asinine accordion riffs definitely won the slumber standoff, rattling my chest and making my ears scream high pitches until 6:23 a.m. (yes, I wrote it down). I think the band is kind of like the American or Euro version of techno, or it fills the same role. The chords and patterns repeat over and over. They pick up and drop off, but never go away, so you can dance until dawn. The dance that goes with sallegy appears to be inspired by the America’s own ass-shaking wonder, Beyonce. Endless booty shaking. Can’t get enough. For much of the night, the part where I wasn’t on the verge of lunacy, I wondered what the finale would be. Fade out? Big bang? Screams? What time? (not dawn, please God, not dawn). I never would have guessed a rapid-fire accordion solo of “Frere Jacques,” but that is what is so great about Madagascar. You never know what to expect. Hope you guys are doing well. Tell Hunter hello. – SUTTER]