No se puede escribir de todas las experiencias, solamente the highlights. Por ejemplo, en la ultima entrada no escribi` como nos llevaron a la casa de una familia maya y alla` nos vistieron de ropa tipica y sacamos fotos. Tampoco escribi`como una niña de once años, arrodillada en el suelo nos preparo` las tortillas de maiz negro en un comal para que las probaramos. La "cocina" era un cuarto hecho de adobe con un piso duro, pero no de tierra y tampoco de concreto. No se de que era el piso.
Again before I go any further I must make another correction. The town is called "Zinacantan." I left out an "a". Sorry, so many new places, so many new words, I can´t keep up.
(Remember, this is about Sunday). Today two wonderful and unexpected things happened...well, maybe three if I include the good cup of coffee we had this morning after traipsing over half the town to find the place. We visited the Reserva Ecologica Huitepec, which is a private protected area of woods with oak trees, medicinal plants, bromelias and many beautiful trees. It covers an extinct volcano and we hiked straight up for a thousand meters. The total altitude was 2450 meters high. Near the top we could see the church at San Juan Chamula. We were there for two hours and I could have stayed all day. It was so nice being surrounded by trees and plants of all ages, sunlight shining through the leaves and branches. (Ah, mi Sol). The air was fresh and cool and I was glad I brought my wind breaker. Occasionally there were stone markers that gave information about the plants, but sometimes the markers just asked a question and gave no answer. Por ejemplo, (there were hoses along the trail) one marker read: ¿Por que hay mangeras aqui?
¿Que diferencia hay entre la parte de abajo y esta parte del bosque?
Los arboles tienen los troncos torcidos. ¿A que se debe?
By the time we got down, our leg muscles were shaking, pero valio` la pena, it was worth it.
How many more times in my life will I be able to do this? I thought. And then I got to thinking how many more years do I have? Twenty? Thirty? I can´t imagine what it`s like to be ninety. La mama` de Teo tiene 95 años y sigue de lista, toma clases, estudia poesia, viaja por avion sola, vive sola, sabe de todo, habla de todo. Ojala` pueda ser yo como ella si es que llego a esa edad.
So the next unexpected wonderful thing that happened was, we found serrendipitously, (I hope I spelled that right), this restaurant called Jardines de San Cristobal. They were serving a buffet, it was comida time, we had exercised and we were hungry. The place was really elegant and the waiters invited us to view the food before deciding. What a feast!
Imagina una mesa larga con sopas, sopa de elote, sopa de pan, sopa de fideo, aguacates rellenos de atun, (avocadoes stuffed with tuna), ensalada, chiles, rabanos, beef tongue in sauce, pollo con mole, carne de res (beef) carne de puerco(pork), arroz, frijoles, salsas rojas y verdes. ¡Y los postres! ¡Ni hablar! Natilla, (something like vanilla pudding), chocolate cake, sweetened fruit, etc. We ate a little of everything. Comimos un poco de todo...casi. El mole fue el mejor mole que habiamos comido en la vida...exquisito. A first for me was beef tongue. I had never eaten beef tongue before, being vegetarian for twenty odd years. It was delicious and very tender. The idea was creepy at first, but I got over it pretty quickly after one bite. So the buffet cost 160 pesos por persona, which is much more than we usually spend, but translated into 16 US dollars, it was really reasonable. I´m talking quality like you would get from the Ritz Carlton.
Despues de la comida, Teo queria regresar a Zinacantan on our own this time, so we drove there and as we were looking for a parking place, four little boys from the town appeared out of nowhere and began to tell us where to park and that they would take care of our car. They were so cute, all of them, I could have taken them home with me. After we visited Zinacantan and saw the dancers still dancing going on three days now, and went into the church again where I bought three ribbons (listones) colgados de un santo, we went back to our car and spent a long time talking to the boys who were two sets of brothers, ages 10 and 12. They all went to school and spoke Tzotzil and Spanish fluently. We were surprised at how much they knew about the world, being from a small town of about 2,000, where everone knows everyone. Todos se conocen. Uno de ellos tenia un tio que se fue a los Estados Unidos para trabajar. Otro nos dijo "Aqui no se gana mucho dinero, por eso se van a EE UU porque alla` se gana mas...y se va de mojado."
When we told them we were from the United States up north where it snows, they were very impressed. One of them asked me why it doesn´t snow in Mexico. I told him Mexico is closer to the equator and so it´s warmer.
Les preguntamos si podiamos sacarles una foto y les encanto` la idea. I asked them if they would like to travel to other countries someday and without hesitation they all answered no.
Que interesante. Parecian felices y no tenian curiosidad de conocer otras partes del mundo.
Sus padres trabajaban la tierra y no les faltaba comida.
Saliendo de Zinacantan I felt enriched. So, really, four wonderful things happened.
Today was a day of travel, packing up and trekking back across the mountains to Palenque where we will spend the night and then it´s on to Chetumal in Quintana Roo.
Soy Lorena.
1/22/07
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