Etchojoa Cultura Indigenista

Buenas dias!

We went to the cultural indigenous festival on Saturday, in the town of Etchojoa, which is about an hour away.

There were many indigenous tribes there. Represented were the Mayo, Yaqui, Seri, Guajarito, Tarahumara and several others. The women above were from a group of about twelve, who came from the Copper Canyon, outside Northern Sinaloa and I am not sure they were very excited to be there. They were extremely shy and did not want to make eye contact. With them were a few young girls and the older women kept the younger ones very close and occasionally covered the girls' eyes.

Below the Tarahumara are standing off to the side. The woman in the sun bonnet is a Mexican interpreter.

The deer dance, along with many other dances, or pascolas, was performed. I wish I could show you all of them, but at the end of the post you will see one of the deer dances. Toward the end of the video, on the far left a small deer head will come in to view. Many of the other dancers are the wolves and other animals. The leg coverings are made of butterfly cocoons.

Below, a young dancer, wearing the butterfly cocoon and the twelve bells around his waist. The twelve bells represent the twelve apostles.

In addition to information booths, items for sale and dancing and music, the amounts and types of food available, prepared by each tribe, was just amazing.

Above, a woman cooks torillas on a large comal.
There were rows and rows of asadors, cooking grills, and they were all in use.

We saw a lot of beautifully embroidered capes and dresses. Pretty headdresses adorned with beads and feathers and of course, endless masks.

A goat skin drum waits to join in the music.

An old man tunes his instrument.

The butterfly cocoon leggings are for sale, along with masks, corn filled shakers and drums.

After spending several hours at the festival, we drove to the beach at Huatabampito. The sea was very calm and quiet even though there was a steady wind.

The restaurant on the beach and below, Senor is looking for shrimp boats on the Sea of Cortez.

I hope you will be able to open the video and watch the Pascola. Que buen dia!

The Deer Mask

Hola! Yesterday I visited a friend who collects Mayan deer masks. I thought you might enjoy seeing these pictures.

This particular style is carved and painted by a young man who lives in the campo, or countryside.
The masks are three colors, red represents Jesus Christ, white represents peace and black, the darkness. The hair is from the Palomino horse. There are four crosses on each mask, they represent the four winds.

There is a design, or pathway, on the sides of every mask, this design represents wisdom to finding the path.

Throughout each year there are many times when the indigenous Mayo and Yaqui Indians of Sonora perform the deer dance, or pascola as it is called. When I walked to La Aduana in the night, that was the deer dance I took a video of and posted for you to see.

Before the wood carver can carve a deer mask, he must dream the dance for many nights. He lies still and in his dream, he will fight the wolves. He watches for snakes, carefully, because an Indian cannot kill a snake, it will bring him bad luck. In his dream, as he dances and fights the wolf, he sees the mask he is wearing and then, he carves that mask.

These masks are carved from the roots of coconut palms.

Below is the wolf mask, created and worn also by Mayan and Yaqui Indians of Sonora.

Tomorrow there is a deer dance in the town of Etchojoa and we are thinking about going. We are still tired from all of our NOB trips and not sure we even want to make the hour and a half drive. But I thought you might enjoy seeing the incredible talent and skill it takes to carve and paint this particular deer mask. Of course, there are many, many different deer masks. Some are oval and made from old wood with just eyes, nose and mouth while others are very elaborate with actual antlers from the deer and glass eyes and ribbon streamers.

It got just a little warm today. In the nineties, but again, a very nice wind has been blowing all day and it keeps the heat down. We are off to a barbeque. Have a great night whatever you are doing!

Up on the Roof

Hola!
Holy Horsefeathers! It is a hot one today, in the nineties. But there is a stiff breeze so it does not feel so terribly hot and only twenty percent humidity. Both yesterday and today at six am when I got up, the humidity registered at almost eighty percent. Everything was covered with a fine layer of dampness. Throughout the night I could smell and feel that wetness in the air.

Cookies is splayed out on the cool concrete bedroom. Senor is probably dealing a bridge hand right now. Earlier I returned from History Club and I noticed there are a lot of workers up on the roof tops in our barrio. To me it looks like they are up there for a little chat. But later I saw them working. I think they are all permeabling the roof tops, taking advantage of this warmth before the rainy season hits. I have shown you permeabling before. It is a white paint like substance that gets rolled or brushed around on the roof tops. It hardens to a rubber like consistency and waterproofs whatever got rolled.

Below, you can see that Senor had Umberto up on our roof top permeabling as well.

I will take you up on the roof for a looksee. I absolutely hate Umberto's ladder. The guys like it but look at the second photo.

Is this an accident waiting to happen? To me?

Up on the roof now and you can see the white stripes are where he permeabled the roof seams.

The little brick structure is the beginning of the chimney steeple or house. It is in its preparation stages, of course. For some reason that is a big rock on the roof and the structure to the right is the skylight.

Here are the two skylights getting their icing.

And here you can see two prepared fireplace steeples that will look like that one in the distance which is on top of our neighbor's little casita. You can also see this section is bright and white and all permeabled up. So hopefully our roof will not leak this season.

Aren't the mountains gorgeous. We really have a pretty outstanding view from the roof top. Just above the neighbor's steeple, on Mt. Alamos, you can see the squiggly lines of cleared land and huge boulders left by Hurricane Norbert.

Not to be left on the bottom floor, I am fixing to go and paint some vigas. Then Cookies and I will maybe turn on the overhead fan and take a sweet little siesta.

adios!

It's All About Preparation

Buen dia. This is what had the birds all up in a tizzy yesterday.......cat in the tree.

I was very surprised to see Cookies up there and even more surprised that he eventually found his way down. He thinks this is his new secret hiding place, but he is just a big fat yellow blob of a sitting duck up there. All the birds can see him. A big cardinal kept flitting from one branch to another in the next tree, almost mocking poor Cookies......you're too fat to go any higher, you're too fat to go any higher.

The silly cat is actually up in the tree again right now.

After he came sliding down yesterday, I stepped back laughing and nearly stepped in this.

I knew it was there. When I walk near it I watch it to make sure it isn't following me.

Then I went to fill a nearby birdfeeder and got a little to close again. It makes me very nervous.

It is one of Senor's many latest projects that begin and don't always end.........right away.

All about preparation, he says.

Well, I should just prepare some bricks around it, something to remind me to stay clear.

This is what will go in the deep hole. Another tinnaco. A friend did not need it, so Senor took it.
It is going to some day have a pump in it, like the one in the backyard and it will hold water for the wall fountain that will go right beside the front door. That's the front door right where the window is.The one in back is still all prepped to be used some day. So, now we will have two tinnacos prepped to be used some day. But Umberto and Senor are working on vigas.

I think the hole will be around for awhile.

Meantime, the air is fragrant with the scent of lime, lemon, grapefruit and orange blossoms. Everyone in this town must have at least one of those trees because this wonderful smell is everywhere.

Here are the tiny blossoms on Senor's lemon tree.

And here is one of his lemons. I believe it will stay green until it is picked and then turn yellow.

We are visiting a friend's orchard today and hoping to come home with bags of grapefruit and oranges. All the fruit in town is so ripe. You can see it hanging heavy on the trees, just preparing to drop.

Cookies is back in his tree and he looks all prepared, hiding his fat yellow self under the dangling yellow flowers, twittering in his throat at even the flies buzzing around him.

Time to go. adios! linda lou

Carnaval Week Here in Alamos

Hola.

To put it very simply........ I have had bog block, so I have read a couple of good books instead.

But I am done with both those books now, so things will be looking up for you to catch up on exactly what we have been doing.

Each Sunday a movie for us extrajeneros is held in the museum auditorium. The gringo guy who picks the movies and shows them has not picked a bad one yet. You would not believe the stuff we have seen, all incredible.

We went down Sunday and saw 'The King's Speech', as excellent as all the rest.

But before we went in to the auditorium we spent a little time on the Plaza. Workers were putting the last minute touches on the stage. Vendors were getting out their wares and food. Musicians were practicing in a corner by the church.

This was the first vendor to begin selling confetti filled eggs. I bought a bagful.When we came out of the museum, the streets were packed. Carnaval night was in full swing.

Carnaval, which began here last Friday afternoon brings parades, music, dancing, colorful costumes and crowns and people. It is a very festive celebration here in Mexico as in other parts of the world. Most of the music happened right in our own backyard.

Friday night's music and dance began at 8:30pm and ended on Saturday at 3:30am.

Carnaval is not quiet.

We siesta'd on and off all day Saturday. We siesta'd so much that we missed the parade.

Saturday night we went to dinner with friends and then drove through to the Plaza. A lot of people were milling around, walking or promenading around the square. That night we heard about 3 different bands competing out in the backyard. The winner played until 4am. I liked the other 2 bands better myself.

On Sunday, the whole town must have been at the tiangus and the mercado and the plaza and the alameda. We went down in new old car to do our shopping and it was so crowded that I had to return later on new old bike to do the rest of our shopping.

Below are some of the fanciful stilt walkers, outside the church.

My night time photos are still not too good, but I am working on the problem. You will still get the idea.

The little girls below are only a few of hundreds of little girls at the Plaza that night who were looking for people to smash their eggs on or had been just smashed themselves by someone else's eggs. Carnaval fills the plaza with kids, all looking for victims to egg smash. Extranerjos, or foreigners, are not exempt from this activity and while I did my share of egg smashing last year, this year I spent my time aiding young children whose bags were empty, but they were still looking to get their big sisters.

The Plaza was filled with confetti and crushed egg shells.

Here are a few of the dancers. I could just not get close enough to the stage for any good photos of the queen and her court or any of the dancers. I got lucky here because these girls were the closing act and enough folks had left.

Then here's my favorite. I snuck behind the stage just in time to see the feathers fall off the back of this dancer's dress. The little girl, while carrying her bag of confetti eggs, is trying to attach the feathers back to the dress, while the dancer, somewhat oblivious to the girl, is texting on her phone.

Music from the baseball stadium continued Sunday night to the early hours. It was good ranchero music and we didn't even have to go down there.

Now Carnaval in Alamos has died down to a quiet whisper so folks can get their siesta on before Semana Santa arrives in April. The streets are all clean again and the only music we hear is from a worker whistling or the music from a car as it goes by.

Ahh, I will miss it, but I will sleep through the whole night again now, for awhile, oh, well at least until Friday or Saturday night.



Senor has had a bad cold. He brought it down with him from our last trip to the states. See, there is another good reason to not go to the states. You catch all kinds of stuff up there.

But he has been feeling better and yesterday he and Umberto finished the 2 columns they had been working on and are now starting to pour a new viga.

This column, by the ladder, will be where the kitchen begins to the left and doors to the right will lead out to the portal.

This column, in the center, will hold the big beam that will then hold the vigas that will run left to right over that end of the big sala or living area.

Very interesting, huh?

So, manana who knows what I might tell you about.........right now, there is a lot of bird music going on. I am fixing to go and see what is making them so happy.

Que le vaya bien!

linda lou