Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas from Zacatecas...

December in Queretaro

Lots to report since the last update. I’ve been super busy trying to finish everything up before the end of training, but as of the 19th I am officially a volunteer and as of the 20th I’m officially on vacation until I have to report to Puebla on the 4th of January. So here’s the summary of the last couple weeks…. We visited two different children’s homes (orphanages more or less) and brought Christmas things and piñatas (piñatas are traditionally used in Mexico during Christmas).
December 12 is the day of the Virgin Guadalupe (this is the patron saint of Mexico) and the day is capped off by masses, fireworks, and other festivities. The church is the picture below is the church of the Virgin Guadalupe in Queretaro and the metal structure is the firework tower for later in the night. There was also day of the payasos (clowns) in December. Also, around Christmas time, many posadas are held. These are basically a type of Christmas party and have a piñata. Unfortunately for me my attempts at actually hitting the piñata were fairly unsuccessful, although as can be seen in the picture, the piñata was a little high.

I also spent a day and a night in a small town in the state of Guanajuato called Apaseo el Alto. Not a whole lot going on in this town, but it was nice to spend some time outside of Queretaro, in a small town, and without any other gringos or tourists to be seen. There was supposed to be a huge old convent somewhere on the outskirts of town (as seen on the towns website), yet someone not a single person in town had heard of it or knew where it was…..

Then finally, on the 19th, we had our official swearing ceremony. Our host families, some of the heads of the SEMARNAT offices (unfortunately no one from Puebla could make it), our Spanish teachers, and officials from the embassy were in attendance. After the ceremony, there were tacos and a mariachi band. Still awaiting the official pictures, but the one below is me with my host mom.

That is about it for now. I’m headed out of vacation for ~10 days to visit Zacatecas, Morelia, and Pazcuaro. Happy Holidays!

Jalisco (but not the part with Puerto Vallerta, the beach, or the town of Tequila)

This week we headed to the state of Jalisco on the Western side of Mexico. We visited a couple natural protected areas (La Primavera, Nevado de Colima, and Sierra de Quila) to learn about different management strategies and things like that. We also had a couple days of seminars and workshops on a variety of topics including: growing mushrooms, building straw bale houses, worms, medicinal plants, forestry programs, and making charcoal. We did get to “ride” horses for a little bit, rigged up a volleyball net, and went to a river with hot (geothermal) water.

The highlight of the trip was the visit to Nevado de Colima, a volcano. We went up to 14,000 feet on the peak of a mountain right next to the volcano and from there you can also see the peak of an adjacent volcano. We spent Friday night “in” Guadalajara (didn’t see anything of the city because we basically were on the side of a highway next to a gas station). Saturday went to a market in a nearby town before heading back to Queretaro.

Coming back was a little bit of a surprise as it seems that Christmas exploded on the city while we were gone. The main garden has about 4 nativity scenes, an elephant that moves, a scene with devils, an Adam and Eve scene, a large cow next to a giant cactus, and the gigantic plastic poinsettias. All the streets are adorned with giant sparkly Christmas shapes and most of the plazas have some of the largest tinsel “Feliz Navidad” signs that I have ever seen.

more picts than you would even care to look at: http://www.flickr.com/photos/daninewcomb/

Feliz cumpleanos y dia de gracias

Not much to report on the 25^th birthday other than a successful night of playing quarters (get it….25) with real American quarters in a bar with bulls heads and matador posters on the wall. This was preceded by a quick trip to a bar with plaid cloth on the walls and the largest collection of model cars that I have ever seen…..interesting.

For Thanksgiving we cooked a full on turkey dinner at our language school. I must admit that having a Costco in town makes finding traditional thanksgiving foods much easier. We did have some salsa and tortillas (you can’t have a meal in Mexico without tortillas) and a jello mold cake. All that was missing was football and cold weather.

Snowballs and Turkeys.....in Mexico??

We are currently working on designing a watershed management plan for a watershed in the southwesten corner of the state of Queretaro. So this Sunday we had a trip out to the watershed, but encountered a bit of unusual weather. We got hit with a decent sized hail storm, possibly the biggest one I’ve even been in, and within 20 min the ground was covered enough to actually look like snow. We even had a snowball (or ice ball depending on how you look at it) fight. Later we ended up in a small town to try and conduct some interviews and ran into a large flock of turkeys. Who knew that the days leading up to Thanksgiving in Mexico would be so similar to those in the US…..

San Miguel de Allende

On Saturday I went to San Miguel de Allende, a town in the state of Guanajuato that has become a major destination for North Americans. A lot of Americans are currently building homes there along with some other oddities like a retirement ranch for old burros. It’s another town with a picturesque city center, lots of churches, and a large botanic garden with many native cactus species. Not too much more to say about it but here’s some picts…..

Guanajuato

This weekend Janet and I took a weekend trip to the cities of Leon (leather and shoe capital of Mexico) and Guanajuato. We went to Leon Saturday morning en-route to Guanajuato to see the shoe markets and a little bit about the shoe industry. That’s about it for Leon, but Guanajuato is an amazing city. It is an old silver mining town that is nestled in a valley. This basically gives the town three layers: (1) the old mining tunnels under the city are now used for most of the car and bus traffic, (2) the main/center part of town, and (3) the rest of the houses that are build ascending the valley walls on two sides of the city.

The city is also the birthplace of Diego Rivera and his boyhood home is now a museum that contains sketches for his murals and of Frida, as well as water colors and other paintings. There is also a unique tradition that was imported from Spain. During the weekend nights, there is a group of students from the university, called the Estudiantinos, walk through the streets dress in medieval Spanish dress playing traditional musical instruments, telling jokes, singing, and passing out wine to the crowd that gathers to follow them through the streets. There is also a “Romeo and Juliet” story that takes place in the callejon de beso (alley of the kiss) where the street is so narrow and the balconies of the houses are so close, that two forbidden lovers were able to kiss from their respective houses.

Guanajuato also has unique soil that creates natural mummies. In Mexico, it is very common to only bury someone for 6 years, after this 6 years the body is removed, cremated, and the site in the cemetery is rented to someone else. When this occurred in Guanajuato though, it was discovered that with the combination of minerals in the soil and a very dry climate, the bodies being removed were fully mummified and many are now on display in the museum of the mummies. They even go so far as to sell mummy shaped candies. All in all a good weekend away from Queretaro and first experience with the Mexican bus system. This week things are pretty much back to normal with Spanish classes, training, and working on our technical project that is an assessment of a nearby watershed……

Dia de los Muertos

Día de los Muertos was celebrated on November 1^st and 2^nd. The 1^st is the day to recognize children that have died and the 2^nd is for all the others who have died. The main day is the 2^nd and this is when families travel to the cemetery to clean and place flowers on the grave. Many times families will spend the entire day at the grave site eating and playing music (mariachi bands are at the cemeteries).

Another part of this tradition is the creation of an altar in the home, to help the soul find its way back, complete with the deceased’s favorite foods, drinks, sweets, and even clothing or memento of a favorite futbol team. We constructed on of these in school, but an incident with papel picado (tissue paper cut into various designs with skeletons) and a candle led to a burnt wall and a torched picture of the deceased. The city constructed a huge altar in Plaza de Armas which was dedicated to two brothers important in the revolution (the bicentennial is in 2008).

All things sugar are also an important aspect of the holiday (they are placed on some altars, especially those honoring children and additionally are consumed in mass quantities by children). Sugar skulls (calaveras) are the most widely constructed, but there are also fruit, animals, and coffins made entirely from sugar. Pan de muertos (bread of the dead) is also widely eaten.

Race Day

Last Sunday I got to run my first Mexican race. It’s pretty much the same as a race in the US except (1) they play the Mexican national anthem (2) there are virtually no women (3) you have to run on cobblestones for quite a while and (4) all the markers are in km. This one was a 12.5 km race. The other interesting thing that occurred is that at one point in the race you’re running down a fairly large road which is closed to traffic, except they decided to let buses and trucks continue driving on it. So all the runners are on the far left side of the road with some traffic coming down the middle and the right. This would be fine except for the fact that they placed the water station on the far right side so anyone who wanted water had to dash between traffic to get water and return to the other side. As you might imagine this made for some close calls on the road. There were 5 in our group that decided to run.

Sierra Gorda

This past week we took a group field trip to the Sierra Gorda region located in the north eastern part of the state of Queretaro. This area is extremely mountainous and sparsely populated. There are several medium sized towns, but the rest of the people (for the most part) are dispersed in smaller communities throughout the area.

Day 1:

We set off in a caravan from the city of Queretaro with a small bus/van thing, and several other cars. We got to have our 1^st encounter with the Mexican military and a machine gun as they have check points on various roads to search cars for drugs and weapons, everything went smoothly though. From there we spent some time on an oregano cooperative and got to see where they collect oregano from (grows wild so it is not cultivated). Our next stop was a community of about 50 people on top of a mountain ~8,000 ft high. The road was a little rough, to put it lightly, and we had some issues with all the vehicles making it up to the top, but we eventually made it just in time to see the clouds, fog, and rain roll in to completely cover the view that the place is known for. Some of us did hike up to the scenic view after lunch, and between clouds were able to see why people would venture up that far. Our next stop was Jalpan, where we were based out of for the next several days, but the drive took a little longer than expected since the road pretty much disappeared for the majority of the drive down into the valley.

Day 2:

In preparation for this field trip we were told that this area was always hot. Well guess what, we hit a cold front. Tuesday was cold and rainy which left a slight glitch in the schedule since we were supposed to take a hike that involved crossing a river at several points, but with all the rain the river was a little too high to safely cross. Instead we crossed one of those long, wobbly, pedestrian bridges that you get ½ way across and really start to question the intelligence of your decision. We also went to an aquaculture site to see tilapia (which we ended up eating for lunch later), tomato fields, a tree nursery, and got to drive the vehicles through the river.

Day 3:

This morning we got to wander around a market in Jalpan and then headed farther north in the Sierra Gorda to an town called San Juan de los Duran. En route we stopped at a mission (Sierra Gorda is famous for its numerous, beautiful missions), a ceramics factory, ate lunch in a field, and stopped at a carpentry shop where we had some arts and crafts time. Wednesday night we stayed in cabins (with bunk beds) in the reserve and even had a campfire complete with marshmallows (although warning if anyone is planning on buying Mexican marshmallows….it is impossible to find a bag that is not mixed with pink and white ones and the pinks ones are definitely strawberry flavored and are not so great roasted over a fire).

Day 4:

We went on a hike this morning to see the destruction caused by the pine bark beetle and the management strategies currently in place. Then later we saw the opening of a community run ecolodge/campground which was complete with live local music and dancing. We also got to try this food that looks like the world’s largest tamale (think the size of 4 or 5 footballs), but then gets opened and served from. When we finally returned to Jalpan we had a final dinner next to a large reservoir that is there and had Mexican corn on the cob for the 1^st time (called elote), although I’ll admit I skipped the mayonnaise on mine and only had chili powder.

Day 5:

After walking around the reservoir (same as the night before) and killing some time while a tire got repaired we headed off to go for a hike to a 30 m waterfall. Then we went to the town of Pinal de Amoles where we arrived knowing the name of the place where we were supposed to have lunch, but not the location. Seeing that the town was very small we figured that we would have no problems just asking around, it seems that that strategy only works if the name of the restaurant is correct to begin with. We finally found it, ate (great mole), and then headed back to Queretaro. All in all it was a great week. I failed to mention some of the funnier stories like (1) the night at the cabins someone got up to go to the bathroom and crawled back into the wrong bed when she returned (2) dinner was pretty much in the dark the last night and some grabbed and ate an uncooked ear of corn (3) dinner was also pretty much in the dark on the 3^rd night and numerous people at the very hard shell of some type of squash that was served for desert. Guess that’s about it for now.

Bernal

Today was the first official day we were allowed to leave the city limits of Queretaro without our host families so some of us decided to head to a nearby town called Bernal. This town is home to the world’s third largest monolith (or in plain English….a really big rock…Ayers rock in Australia is the 2^nd largest). You can hike up to the midway point of the rock and there’s a cute colonial town down below. Since we wanted to hike before it got too hot, we decided to take a taxi there and the bus on the way back since the bus is much slower. We’re in the taxi and we see that we’re coming up on a prison and make a joke that we’re going to leave someone there. Then the taxi driver stops and pulls over in front of the prison and says that we’re here. We thought he was joking at first, but finally figured out that he had misheard us and thought we said “penal” (which means prison in Spanish), not Bernal. We got that all straightened out, but then he wanted to change cars and take a better one to Bernal so we met up with someone he knew, changed cars and finally got to Bernal. We hiked up to the midway point which is about 7800 ft (Queretaro is at about 6300). I’m still not quite adjusted to the altitude, but that’d better happen fast because I just signed up to run a 12.5km race next Sunday through downtown Queretaro, so we’ll see how that goes. Nothing too much more to report from Bernal. The town is known for their napole (cactus) gorditas and goat milk candies, which we sampled and later headed back home via the bus. We’re leaving tomorrow for a week in the Sierra Gorda region, a mountainous region in the northwestern part of the state of Queretaro.

More Fireworks

There was another celebration last night (evidently every church has one for their parton saint). This time I have a video of the firework tower. What the video fails to capture is that the ground this time is covered with sawdust from an earlier ceremony, some of which proceeded to catch on fire. To cap this off, the fireman who is watching this whole thing is standing there smoking. Well, there's the video of one section of the tower igniting.....

First full week

We’ve all been settling into our daily routine of spanish and PC classes all day. This week we got to celebrate a birthday and my official graduation from UVM. We also took a field trip on Thursday to a natural area just outside the city limits of Queretaro called Parque Cimatario. On Friday night we had a party at the Spanish school with all our host families (mainly just the mom’s) for a potluck dinner and to watch some traditional Mexican dances. We finally have a full free weekend and a little free time. Here’s some picts from last week…..

El Campo

Today I headed off to the countryside with my host parents. These adventures are even more fun because I don’t always understand everything my host mom tells me and they also don’t necessarily give me all the details either. They have a house about 30 minutes outside of Queretaro. Once you get outside of the city it’s a pretty rugged landscape of mountains and rocky hills and lots of cactus plants. Across from their house there was even a burro tied to a cactus. They have a yellow lab at their house in Queretaro and a different dog, Barto, that lives at the country house as a guard dog. I think Barto is something mixed with a German shepard, but I’m not sure. Either way the dog is amazing. After a dinner of fish with a cilantro pesto and fresh avocados and rice, my host mom and I spent the rest of the afternoon playing with Barto and talking while my host dad took a siesta in the hammock. A little later we took a 20 min drive to a very small town called Colona that has a very old church dedicated to the virgin Dolores and an old friend of my host mom. This was another good example of not really knowing what to expect….

Host mom: Would you like to take a walk?
Me: Yes.
Host mom: We’re going to take the car.
Me: Ok.

Then we all get in the car and other then pointing out things along the way no mention is made to how long we’re going to be in the car or where the final destination is. For a while I thought we were going to see this really big rock (3^rd largest monolith in the world for all of you who are keeping track), but then we turned down a narrow street and were parked in front of a church. It’s good, it keeps me on my toes and in a stable state of never being sure that I know exactly what is going on. Thought it would be nice to sometimes be able to communicate a little better with my host parents, I’m actually glad they speak no English because it means I can’t ever take the easy road. Until today I had only seen my host father once and for ~5 min. One of the first things he told me today was his top 3 list of American inventions which goes like this: (1) Coke-a-Cola, (2) Milkyway chocolate bars, and (3) Tabasco sauce. Its good to know that even in a country with so many chilies and spicy food, Tabasco is still appreciated.

For anyone that has been dying to call my Skype # starting today, most days M-F I’ll be online from ~5:30 – 7:00 pm (CST).