Hostel karma...

...as opposed to hostile karma.

I rolled into Morelia this afternoon, the capital of the state of Michoacán. I was nervous about finding a place to stay, as the only hostel in the city (according to the LP guidebook) has one room with four beds. But upon arriving, I hopped into a "combi" (like a microbus--think minivan that make routes) and made for town. A block and a half of walking and--aha--there it was...Hostal Allende. It is a beautiful little place on a cute little residential street and they had an available bed! I met some other travellers there--two american college guys here to study spanish and a woman they call the "francesa loca." We cooked up some cheese enchiladas with fresh veggies (oh how I was craving vegetables) and sat around and chatted, in a mix of spanish and english. A local dude named Alberto whom Paul and Nick had apparently befriended earlier stopped by to chat as we sat in the pleasant, open, sunny, shaded courtyard. We chatted in Spanish and it was so low-key that I may stay here a day or two longer than planned. I have yet to do a thorough tour of Morelia, but already I love it. It has so much colonial architecture (the town center and its many glorious buildings are a UNESCO world heritage site) and the attitude here seems rather ´tranquilo.´ It is a truly pleasant change after Mexico City, where the bustle and pollution wore a bit thin on me. I can see myself passing an hour or two in the verdant town square here, where such a thing would have been far from pleasant in el DF (Distrito Federal). Buildings are not as tall here, and the weather is pleasant (thus far!). This evening it seems that several of the hostel residents and some townies are going to go out. I´m not sure what this will entail, but it will be excellent Spanish practice and a good time, I´m sure. And we´ve somehow convinced Nick to sing a Swedish song from his childhood. A few observations after spending a short while with these folks. (A) At 27, I am a fair bit older than the average backpacker (the two americans and the french girl are each 20). (B) I think I would like to really study Spanish and get it to a much better place. I can definitely get by (I understood almost all of "The Big Empty" which was shown on the bus ride, dubbed in Spanish), but my grammar and vocab could definitely use a big boost. Maybe I´ll enroll in a course this fall...

So while in Mexico City, I did a combination of walking through different parts of the city and visiting sundry sights and museums. I have to say, since I didn´t really feel all that well while there (mental? physical?), I didn´t do all many of crazy looking around. But a few highlights before my time on the internet expires:

As you may know, Mexico City was built over the Aztec city of Tenochtitlán. The aztecs were only one of many civilizations to populate what is now Mexico, but their reach was broad. Well, right next to the main square (the Zócalo) and the cathedral is the site of the aztec Templo Mayor (Great Temple). This is the most important place for aztec ritual and administration. The great gods were offered their (human) sacrifices here in almost unbelievable quantity. The Templo Mayor occupies the site that the Aztecs believed to be the very center of the universe--the intersection between the horizontal world (the four directions) and the vertical worlds (the many levels of heaven and hell). And it is all right there in the middle of the city, partially excavated amidst the modern city. And so as I stared at the altars of Huizilopotchli and Tláloc where hundreds of thousands of human sacrifices were made, I could hear the sounds of street vendors hawking their wares and foods and the tunes of the city´s ubiquitous organ grinders (hard to envision a human heart getting cut out when one hears circus music and "elotes! elotes! quince pesos!").

After visiting the templo (where my Dana Hall ID earned me free admission to the site as well as the extensive and very good adjacent museum), I sat on a ledge amidst sundry vendors to decide what to do next. Before I know it, I find myself chatting politics with a fellow from Oaxaca. He approached me as a local and started asking me questions about my opinion of the Mexican government´s handling of certain issues. I said I was not from Mexico, and we got to talking... It was a truly awesome encounter and we talked for the better part of an hour about politics and democracy and revolution. He is working with a group of people (in solidarity with the teachers from Oaxaca) trying to foment a revolution in Mexico. A psychologist and a well-educated fellow, some of his ideas and opinions were solid, others made him sound a little loco (which he himself smilingly admitted). A selection follows; you can decide which are which for yourself:
-Mexico needs a revolution.
-the government is blind to the needs of the pueblo, as many mexicans live in poverty
-all wars are caused by injustice and inequality
-democracy in mexico is a facade, votes are cast but don´t matter
-the government is in the pocket of foreign transnational corporations, and as a result the people of the country get exploited while the govt and foreign companies profit
-change can be peaceful (Gandhi, MLK, etc), but...
-true revolution is violent as the people take up arms against the ruling class
-in fact, conflict is a part of human nature--it´s in our chromosomes...consider dominant and recessive genes from each of your parents, duking it out in your own genetics
-but we much reach a higher level of understanding, where we can see that we are all part of the same universe, that we share carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, and nitrogen
-and this higher level of understanding will be reached when the human species undergoes a single mutation in its genome, probably by the year 2012, and it will come from god as a very bright light (brighter than our sun) that is not hot to the skin will shine upon the Earth and god will make the mutation in everyone, allowing them to overcome their own conflicted nature
-until then, though, we need to fight... a revolution with "arms"
-or, we could try a more pacifist approach: build a solid movement in the country, where transnational enterprises are shunned (no eating at the many McDonald´s here or drinking Coca-cola) and mexican business are supported
-and, people could join land collectives and be self-sustaining communities, growing and producing their own goods and needs
-and, people should band together and concienciously object to paying their taxes, thereby striking the government in the coffers....

Rafael and I talked about other things, but here you get the sense of it. It was actually pretty fascinating to have a back-and-forth dialogue (in spanish) where we each challenged each others ideas and listened to new ones.

In other news altogther, I took in a fair bit of art in el DF (there is a huge exhibit on Frida Kahlo at el Palacio de Bella Artes, Diego Rivera´s murals--as well as those of Tamayo and Orozco--are all over the city, and a fascinating cutting edge art gallery featured some wild installations). I am really getting into Kahlo and Rivera--not only their story (they were married) but also the work of each of them...

Ay! My internet time is up and it is about to pour outside and I´ve got to get back to the hostel....

As always, thanks for your emails and comments...