industry jobs throughout the city, in restaurants, supermarkets, and small shops, but it was the

country clubs that often provided them free places to live and was the starting point for many

new arrivals.

 Though he did not grow up in San Pedro Pinula, my husband's maternal family was from

Pinula and he had spent many vacations with his "country" cousins, milking cows and playing in

the fields. During the civil conflict, when Guatemala City became a dangerous place, his parents

sent him to Jalapa to attend high school; he spent his weekends in Pinula with his mother's

family. He was a city boy and, when we decided to go to Guatemala for my fieldwork, he was

not very excited about the prospect of living in the small town of Pinula. The fact that he didn't

live there and that people did not know him by name, but only by family, worked in my favor: I

was able to introduce myself as the daughter-in-law or wife of the nephew of the Enamorado

family, which enabled me to build my own reputation. It made people more comfortable that I

wasn't just any gringa in town for an unknown reason-that would be highly suspicious. In fact,

many people felt sorry for me. They interpreted my presence as my sacrifice for my husband that

I left my own family to accompany him to his country. Even though I tried to explain that I was

working on my research project to get my graduate degree (haciendo mi prdctica), they couldn't

fathom any other reason why a woman would leave her own natal community to be so far away

if it was not for her husband. My work was interpreted as something to do while I accompanied

him home.

 Although my husband is Ladino, his uncle was a well-respected man among the Maya due

to his past history of selling pigs in the city. Years ago, a common occupation of lower-class

Ladinos was to go to the countryside and buy pigs from the Maya and then walk the pigs all the

way to the city to sell them. At that time, the trip often took three to four days, so the pigs were