Tales of a Female Nomad by Rita Golden Gelman Page A

warning, “Be careful. They think nothing of stealing.”
    Then she invites me for lunch on Tuesday, two days from now. This is the first gesture of friendship she has proffered, and it is a significant one. She tells me she would like me to meet some of her friends. Until now, our relationship has consisted of polite greetings and the exchange of rent money. I’m hoping the luncheon will be the beginning of a new relationship. She will be the first friend I have in the Spanish (white) population of Antigua.
    The invitation is for
doce
(twelve)
y media,
except I hear
dos
(two)
y
media
and I show up two hours late. By the time I get there, lunch is over and her friends have gone home. I apologize profusely, explaining my mistake. But the significance of the invitation, the embarrassment in front of her friends, and the rudeness I demonstrated in not showing up ruin any possible relationship. She no longer talks to me when she sees me in the yard or on the street. I am disappointed. I’d been hoping a relationship with her and her friends would give me an insight into the Spanish population; but it isn’t to be.
    The next day is Diana’s party. María’s village is a short bus ride into the hills. I arrive with a birthday book for Diana (she is one) and a bottle of bubbles for the other kids. As I walk toward the small adobe structure, I can hear the clapping of
tortillas.
It’s the sound of villages in Central America, someone clapping a
tortilla
into its round, pancake shape before it goes on the grill. I’ve been hearing the sound for months. Now I’m about to do it.
    María’s mom patiently demonstrates. We are sitting in the cookhouse, which has a dirt floor, open walls, and a tile roof. In one corner there is a wood fire heating a pot of beans with bits of meat, and throwing its flame and sparks whenever the wood is turned. A second wood fire is being fed and getting hot for the
comal,
a rectangular steel griddle that will cook the
tortillas.
    We are sitting at a slab table pulling off blobs from a huge pile of
masa
dough and rounding them into balls between the palms of our hands.
Masa
is made from corn; it’s halfway between cornmeal and corn flour, finely ground and mixed with ground lime and water.
    Mamá puts the ball of
masa
into the center of one palm. Then, using a rhythmic clapping motion, she turns her hands,
clap, clap, clap, clap, clap,
in opposite directions; then back,
clap, clap, clap, clap, clap, clap.
The dough grows rounder and flatter until finally,
clap, clap,
you have a
tortilla
around ten inches across. Each new
tortilla
gets put onto a growing pile of
tortillas
waiting to be cooked. There are three of us slapping and twisting in the tiny, smoky hut filled with the sweet smells of burning wood and bubbling beans. And soon, the
tortillas
are flipped onto the
comal,
and the smell of toasting
tortillas
dominates the room.
    As the younger kids and a couple of the men string streamers around the lower tree limbs and chase bubbles around the yard, and four women clap and cook in the hut, two of the sisters are attached to their backstrap weavings, working the threads into beautiful patterns. The loom is attached to a tree on one side and the other side is held in place by leather straps stretched around the backs of the weavers.
    By the time the guests arrive, about twenty-five in all, there are three piles of cooked
tortillas,
each one about a foot and a half high. When the food is ready, Mamá hands each guest a
tortilla.
The
tortilla
is both a plate and a spoon as bits of it are torn off and used to pick up the beans that have been plopped in the center of the disc.
    I am watching the guests line up for beans when I hear my name. Mamá is holding up a
tortilla
with raggedy edges and holes in the middle. She laughs.
    “This one is Rita’s.”
    Everyone, including me, joins her laughter. I collect my
tortilla
and she goes back to passing the others out until the next