A Cellarful of Nose - Future Shoes

Belize and continued toward Flores.
The road did not seem to bad at first, and the bus was not
overcrowded. Only a few people stood in the aisles.
Indeed, the vicinity was full of workmen, widening the gravel
highway. We knew Guatemala is pushing to make Tikal a major
new tourism center for Central America, and the highway project
was a part of this effort.
So Rachel and I imagined we were the beneficiaries of this
campaign, and enjoyed the relative luxury.
Just outside Flores, however, everyone on the bus stood and
gasped.
Lying in the middle of the limestone road was a dead man.
Over his face lay a handkerchief. Around his head a still pool of
blood had gathered. And not more than ten feet in every direction
were his fellow workers, raking the gravel, going about their
business.
The nearest ambulance was 200 miles away. Whatever had
happened that morning on the road from Tikal, whatever machine
had squashed that poor man's head, and ruined his family back in
whatever village he had traveled from to join this road gang, he
never had a chance. His friends, calmly raking to right and to left
knew this, thanked God it was him and not them, wished his soul
straightaway to heaven and put his body out of mind.
*
The city of San Benito has worse water problems than the
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