• Diary of Katana
    Walking my way up the stairs of the Temple of Masks weakened my strength and made my legs sore. According to the priests that created the 365-day Mayan calendar, today was considered to have a religious festival. I planned to gather water from sinkholes and swamps to bring surplus water for my family. Unfortunately, my parents forced me to go to the Temple of Masks instead. As I was walking up the stairs, other Mayan villagers offered me fruit such as: papayas, mangos, and avocados. I had a premonition that a disaster will occur.
    As soon I reached the top of the mountain, I saw an elderly woman and a boy about the same age as me. The woman had different eye sizes, the bigger eye was blue and the smaller eye was brown. The boy started to speak our Mayan language, but his accent was different as if he was from another Mayan city-state. I sat near the boy while the woman started chanting. I looked at the red shells on my belt that I obtained from the “Descent of Gods” ceremony while the boy looked at the white beads in his hair. At the end of the chant the woman said, “Very good.” Suddenly, my head started to throb and my mind went dark and blank.
    I woke up and realized a fainted. I looked at my reflection from the lake and my eyes became as huge as an elephant’s head. I was wearing an outfit for a wedding ceremony! I had to walk back home, embarrassed, with many villagers congratulating me. As soon as I got back home, my parents have already made wedding preparations, with decorations on the walls and gifts on the table. There was a feast of turkey tamales, beans, potatoes and tortillas. During the wedding ceremony, we were blessed by the priest and prayed to the gods, although there was no special deity of love. My mother told me the honeymoon would start the next day.
    Three years past and my life was the same as usual. I had a daughter and a son. My husband was an architect that built houses using adobe, wooden poles, and thatch. The rest of my life was not exiting as I imagined it to be when I was younger.