Fleas are insects that bite me when they get a chance. They bite me a lot when they get the chance.


( fleabytes )

I've been to México and back... (Sounds like a song!) and now I am beginning to do some serious studying. So the question is do I keep on posting or let the journal die?

If I keep it up it will be filled with musing about the Tenochteca Excan Tlatoloyan (Aztec Triple Alliance in common parlance), Spain in the 16th Century and the horrible time of the invasion of the Carribean islands and correlating bits of information.

For instance, just today there was a post on the Stirling list about an Island called St. Kilda in the western Hebrides of Scotland. These people were evacuated in the early 1930's. St. Kilda seems to derive, not from any saint but from a mislabeling of the name of the sweetwater spring that made it habitable in the beginning... Called Tobar Childa (both words mean "well", one in Galic and one Norse) it slid into a more "logical" name for the later visitors = St. Kilda. The wikipedia entry has a lot of discussion on the possible evolution of the name. But I like "well, well." It reminds me of the wiki entry for "mole," a generic name for many spicy sauces used in México as feast day food.

Queen Chihuapilli of Michoacan is supposed to have invented it to go on human flesh and the good frairs coaxed her into using it only on pig flesh. My grin there is that "Cihuapilli" means female noble, and of the lowest class, sort of like Baroness, so "Queen Lower noble."
The noteworthy things about St. Kilda, for me are the probably survival of the folk religion up until the early 18th century and the reaction to the disease environment brought by the ships. Also the influence of just one or two people on the island's population is of interest.

How much can I infer as universal behavior, how much is unique to the conquest of México and how much can be seen as correlation. Did they occur for the same reasons or different reasons and just look the same?

In a few months I'll be giving a talk of the survival of pagan systems of belief among the Nahuatl of the Sierra Oriental of México, known as the Huasteca region. It's a bit of an "I am going to eat crow," talk, since I always believed what I was taught... that the pagan religions vanished within a few years of the conquest. Learning that the "conquest' was a long drawn out proceedure and that the religions did not vanish easily or completely was a bit of a shock to me.

After all, all those dances in front of the cathedral in indian dress with feather headdresses and rattles on the ankles and wrists were catholic right? Ummm... there is a considerable amount of re-evaluation I've undergone since I started my journey.

So maybe I'll use this as my sounding board and if people like it they can comment.

After 53 days gone, I am finally back home. Spent Monday-Sunday at Denvention; world science fiction convention. Competed in masquerade (unplaced! Dmn it!) and have cleaned out the kitty litter boxes, unpacked one of four suitcases, gone to the pubmet of Seattle fans and kissed and pilled my kitties. They are trying to decide if they recognize me or not.
Very tired.

It's just a little post... I finished up the document on making tortillas with 24 photos in it and decided it was too big for the livejournal. So I switched it over to HTML.

http://www.ipinc.net/~kiers/Mexico/080803Tortilleria.html

So if you want to hear my interest, my musing, see my pictures and learn a few fact about tortillas... hop on over.

This is the last post from México. As I leave the school, I leave behind the key and the fast internet connection.

I may or may not post from Denver and the WorldCon. Otherwise, I'll be home in mid August and have to decide whether to keep on posting.

I have now done everything on my list. I'm amazed. I am so used to having left things not done until the next time that I'm looking at my list and shaking my head. This is a short post (rrrright!) with a couple of pictures. Next post is my "Modern Tortilla making" post and it will be long and photo- intensive.

( Nomoretodo )

It only took 7 minutes before JB from one of my internet groups came back identifying the bird as a grackle. When I told my sole remaining classmate, Odyn started at the picture and told me his Tlamachtiquetl, (teacher) in Nahuatl, ADlC had told him a story about this bird. And here is a weird story.

( Weirdness )

Time is getting shorter and shorter. Last class was on Wednesday and we had a very productive brainstorming session with the head Tlamachtiquetl, (teacher).

( Thingstodo )

Five days without a post? I'm falling down on the job.

( LastDay )

Have I gone missing? No I'm right here. But it's end-of-course blahs... and some hard end-of-course work.

( WindingDown )

As I've said before, Zacatecas can really surprise me.


( SCA )

Zacatecas Likes it's music. I've pretty much stopped mentioning it, but marching bands, singing groups, student choirs and ensembles are a nightly feature.


( Music )

There are a lot of dogs here. Especially those really small dogs an unloved ex used to call "drop-kick" dogs. But I rarely see cats. In my fourth week I count my fourth sighting of a cat.
( Cats )

Signs, signs, everywhere a sign.

I promised a new photojournal, a day late, but not a photo short...
http://www.ipinc.net/~kiers/photos/Signs.html

I promise a URL to all the fun shop signs I photographed. We might as well get some advantage out of my heat stroke.

This is an "I'm sick and I'm going to tell you all about it," entry. So, if you are squeamish, don't read any further. However, if you think you'll go to a high altitude city, you might want to re-warn yourself how easy it is to get heat and sunstroke, dehydration and altitude sickness.
( consequences )

I wasn't as sore as I thought I'd be from all that climbing around on ruins. So today I decided was a good time to work on another project of mine, photographing all the fun and interesting and odd signs in town. In between working on my verbs... which continue to puzzle the heck out of me.
( walking )

Last night I accepted an invitation to make part of a party to go see "La Quemada," an archeological site near Zacatecas. It was only around 9pm that I suddenly remembered Aracely, my tutor and I were going to meet at midday to make up two lost hours of study. Yikes, I was leaving with the group at 10am!

( night )

It's hump weekend and I haven't posted for four days. Dear me. What have I been doing?

( bits )

I've been here, taking classes for two weeks now, and haven't posted much on the classes. Well, for one, early lessons in a language tend to be incredibly boring. More for the listenee than the takee, if you get my meaning.

( classes )

We wandered town Sunday morning and saw super dog. No kidding, somebody had dressed the pi-dog at the church (one of them) in a faded old superman t-shirt.


Taking that photo was a little nerve-wracking; poor dog thought I was going to feed him and kept jumping on me. But he is a friendly little doggy. I've been watching him for a while, now. Pi-dogs in México learn ... ah, let me rephrase that. An aggressive pi-dog dies, quickly and early in México. A nice lady finally turned and called him and I got the pic.

randwolf left a bit after 2 pm Sunday. I waved goodbye as the hostel car took him off to the airport and then took myself off. Sitting around and feeling sorry for myself felt like a bad idea.

( recuerdo )