Ancient, Modern and Colonial Places

México is a vast, discordant tapestry of varied wealth that sometimes rattles like an old bus struggling over a mountain road, that sometimes wheels and spins and rises up with elegant perfection like a magnificently trained horse and rider, charro or charra, and sometimes sits very still in the hot afternoon sun as a green iguana dares to stick its head out from between the stones in an ancient ruined pyramid wall. Northamerican soft-drink soda parking lots struggle against the older fruit and vegetable beverages of the people.  Manicured archeology zones blow whistles at you when closing time rolls around.  And, sadly, people are actually stealing religious art from the old churches. In spite of this I am wandering here anyway. Andar tras mesoamérica look for ancient America I want to travel across time future, past, now. If you join me I hope we'll discover fast-forward modernity, colonial remnants, and ancient rocks. As old Rome was briefly ruled by a triumvirate, so for the modern tourist, Mexico has three legs: 1) the ancient ruins of Indians whose cultures and food still survive and thrive while their rebuilt cities serve as touristic jewels for both the foreign and domestic market in beauty and pride, 2) the colonial stain of domination and conquest by old Spain whose architecture is preached both as fine art and as a symbol of slavery & caste, but whose language has become a unifying force (yet diverse and regional) and powerful tongue to stand up against the yankee big brother, and 3) the modern hybrid of a new world civilization born in blood from the difficult mixture of very old American and Mediterranean roots. Today the traveler thinks she and he are going from one place to another, like Athens to Jerusalem, with all that portends/means for western civilization.... No my friend, instead we are moving like ancient Mesoamericans, in a vast circle of time. This is not Europe, although it owes much to it. A man and his food cart with self-contained butane grill are selling delicious hamburguesas with chile and cheese on the sidewalk street in front of the gate to the Aztec pyramid museum. Two women walk by fingering their beaded rosaries on the way to the parish church from Rome. A television is babeling world fútbol somewhere nearby, and in a cafe down the street, the chavos are chatting on internet. Latte with extra sugar. No, my friend, this is not Europe, although we owe much to it, slaughtered and sacrificed on the edge of Toledo steel blades... no... this is America. This is the heartland of a completely different civilization, five thousand years old, which has only and only barely begun to make itself felt. . . .

Ancient sites: construcción Pinturas Rupestres, Baja California Chicomóstoc -- La Quemada, Zacatecas Los Toriles -- Ixtlan del Río, Nayarit Tenochtitlan - - - - - Colonial places lettered: San Blas Tepic Guadalajara Zacatecas Modern things speaking words: -

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Town & People

Culture & Nature

Countryside & Metropolis

Valley and Mountain

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This verseprose results from discussions and lectures and readings and speculations and studies of anthropological and archeological and geographic and historical materials all in abecediarical order along with a team of highly skilled technical imaginations in search of Mr. Spock and Godnosewhat bla bla bla.

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Andar tras Mesoamérica :

Diary Calendar

Mesopoem Index

Archeology

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Andar Tras Mesoamérica : Copyright 2002-2003 Daniel Charles Thomas