New Year's
Buy and sell tamal pots and New Year’s party supplies in Guatemala.
At midnight on the 31st many Guatemalan families are unwrapping a tamal, while a suitcase packed with clothes waits behind the front door so the coming year brings travel. It is the night of the big tamal pot, the twelve grapes, yellow underwear for a year with money in it and an outfit worn for the first time. Pots, toasting glasses and dresses kept for that one night are offered here new and pre-owned. Anything printed with the year is finished on 1 January, so the pieces worth looking for are the ones without a date that will serve again next December.
Tamales at midnight and a grape for every stroke of twelve:
the 31st in Guatemala is a table first and a party second. The table wants a deep pot for the tamales, a jug of hot fruit punch, glasses for the toast and a small cup of grapes ready for each guest. Much of that kit already did duty on the 24th, so a tamal pot listed under Christmas belongs to this night just as much. The party side is lighter: paper hats, streamers, gold and silver garlands, a banner for the wall and foil balloons shaped like numbers. Wearing something new on the night is an old habit here, so dresses and shirts bought for one New Year’s Eve turn up second-hand once it is over. A red dress first worn on the 31st has a second chance a few weeks later on Valentine’s Day.
A tamal pot, counted in tamales:
Guatemalan tamales are not stood on a steamer rack. They are packed onto a bed of spare leaves with water in the pot, covered with more leaves and a cloth, and left to cook for hours, so the pot that matters is deep, wide and thick-walled. Thin aluminium is light but scorches the bottom layer before the top one is done; a heavier gauge spreads the heat of a gas ring or a wood fire and keeps its shape. Because the leaves and the cloth hold the steam in, a lid that sits slightly crooked is no reason to walk away. Loose handles are, since a full pot takes two people to lift. Size it by the batch you make: a family pot takes a few dozen, and a batch that also feeds the neighbours needs a pot that barely fits on the stove. A household aluminium pot that takes a family batch starts around Q350 new, and a heavy commercial one big enough for a street’s worth of tamales passes Q900. Aluminium of that weight barely wears, so a used one with a sound base and firm handles cooks as well as a new one, and its price should come down only for the faults that matter in December: a dent at the bottom edge, a missing lid, a rivet that weeps.
Gold foil, sequins and anything printed with the year:
a banner, a set of glasses or a tablecloth with the year on it is finished at midnight, so pre-owned New Year’s kit is worth having when it carries no date. Foil number balloons are sold one digit at a time and usually only the last one changes, but ask whether a used one still has its valve intact, because a torn valve will not hold air again. Sequinned dresses shed along the underarms, across the seat and wherever a bag strap rubbed: check those places in daylight before agreeing on anything. Underwear, yellow or otherwise, is only worth taking new and in its packet. On a used pot, look inside for pitting left by water that stood in it for weeks, check the base for a bulge where the flame sat, and lift it by each handle in turn.
A tamal pot put up for sale in early December:
reaches buyers while they are still planning, and the families who make tamales for the 24th will use it again a week later. Say how many tamales it holds, since nobody here thinks of a tamal pot in litres, and photograph the inside of the base as well as the outside. For a dress or a shirt, give chest, waist and length rather than a label size, say whether it was worn once and whether it has been cleaned, and show it in daylight so the sequins tell the truth. Fill the pot with water an hour before a buyer from Cobán arrives on the 30th: a sound one stands on a dry counter, and a weeping rivet gives itself away before anyone has to ask.