The photos above were taken one morning on a cloudy day in Chichicastenango, a village about an hour's drive from the lake. I chose that corner for no other reason than that I found the peace symbol curious and the images interesting illustrations of the mundane.

I doubt few people from the village know what a peace symbol stands for. Indeed, I would be surprised if the graffiti artist himself knows what it means. It's something from our culture, not theirs.

What was a Western icon doing in Mayan graffiti? Why did some young vandal with a blank pallet and a can of spray paint decide on that particular image at that particular moment?