Just another day, just another walk.
Just another wall of street art.
Just another April Fools Day (2012) mural.
Muchisimas gracias, KAD, for bringing a smile…
and leading us into the void.
Posts Tagged ‘Oaxaca’
A walk into the void
Posted in Creativity, Culture, tagged graffiti, KAD, Mexico, Oaxaca, photographs, photos, street art, wall art on May 26, 2012| Leave a Comment »
Justice for Brad Will?
Posted in People, Politics, Protests, tagged APPO, Brad Will, Bradley Will, Indymedia, Lenin Osorio, Mexico, Oaxaca, Ulises Ruiz Ortiz on May 24, 2012| 1 Comment »
It’s been almost 6 years since the October 27, 2006 day in Oaxaca when Indymedia video journalist, Brad Will, was murdered as he was filming a confrontation between APPO (Popular Assembly of the Peoples of Oaxaca) and paramilitary forces affiliated with then governor, Ulises Ruiz Ortiz, during the (at that point) 5-month long teachers’ strike.
Mexico catches suspect in death of a journalist Bradley Will
By Mark Stevenson / AP Wednesday, May 23, 2012. 1 day ago
MEXICO CITY (AP)‚ — Prosecutors in southern Mexico say they have captured a man suspected in the killing of a U.S. journalist Bradley Will during protests against the Oaxaca state government in 2006.
A spokesman for the Oaxaca state prosecutors office says suspect Lenin Osorio was captured early Wednesday.
The spokesman says he is not authorized to be quoted by name, and that he does not know which side of the conflict the suspect was on.
Will was shot as he videotaped a clash between protesters and government supporters.
The New York man was covering the conflict for Indymedia.org. He sympathized with the protesters, one of whom was arrested in 2008 for the killing but was later released.
The protests started as a teachers’ strike and paralyzed Oaxaca’s capital for months until federal police intervened.
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As I write, journalists are being targeted all over the world and the teachers are again occupying Oaxaca’s zócalo, as they have every year since. However, perhaps there will be justice for one of the 26, 2006 murder victims. Vamos a ver….
The Revolution Next Door is a video tribute to Brad Will and includes footage shot by him, including his last tape.
To follow this news on Twitter, The Friends of Brad Will website lists the following Spanish language sites:
Oaxaca journo on the scene’s twitter feed:
https://twitter.com/#!/Jorgeopl
PGJE in Oaxaca’s feed:
https://twitter.com/#!/pgje_oaxaca
Little handkerchief garden
Posted in Buildings, Churches, Parks & Plazas, Places, tagged Gurrion, Jardín del Pañuelito, Little Hankerchief Garden, Mexico, movie set, Oaxaca, photographs, photos, public spaces, Templo de Santo Domingo de Guzmán, wedding procession on May 21, 2012| 3 Comments »
The public spaces of Oaxaca are well-used. The cobblestone-paved Jardín del Pañuelito (Little Handkerchief Garden), that borders the south side of the Templo de Santo Domingo de Guzmán, complex is no exception.
Especially on Saturdays, when it is often used for wedding processions…
Occasionally, it is converted into a conference venue…
Frequently, a stage is set up and a concert ensues…
And, last year it was transformed into a movie set!
I command you to…
Posted in Buildings, Creativity, Religion, Signs, tagged Basilica de la Soledad, graffiti, Mexico, Oaxaca, wall art on May 18, 2012| 1 Comment »
Countdown to colibríes
Posted in Gardens, Nature & Science, tagged African tulip tree, Casita Colibrí, colibrí, Flame of the Forest, Flame Trees, hummingbird, Mexico, nature, Oaxaca, photo, photographs, photos, plants, Tulipan on May 15, 2012| Leave a Comment »
Just before this afternoon’s rains came, Casita Colibrí’s first African tulip tree blossom of the season.
And that means, colibríes (hummingbirds) won’t be far behind!
Thinking of you, mom
Posted in Creativity, Culture, Travel & Tourism, tagged Chiapas, costume, dance, folk dancing, Guatemala, Mexico, mothers, Oaxaca, photographs, photos, San Antonino Castillo Velasco, Tehuana, Tehuantepec, traje, travel, women, Zinacatán tunic on May 13, 2012| Leave a Comment »
My mom was a folk dancer. She had studied ballet, tap, and acrobatic dancing when she was young and brought that training and muscle memory along with her when she took up folk dancing in her mid thirties. I spent many hours over the years watching her dance; the Kamarinskaya from Russia, Swedish Hambo, Fandango from Portugal, Mexico’s Jarabe Tapatio, and so many more. In addition to being a talented dancer, she made her own costumes. A dressmaker’s dummy was a permanent fixture in her bedroom, yards of colorful cotton fabric and braid were piled next to the sewing machine, and in the evenings her hands and eyes were often occupied embroidering pieces for a new costume.
Mom died in 1989, but not a day goes by that I don’t think of her. So, on this Mother’s Day, this is for you mom…
Guatemala
Zinacatán, Chiapas, Mexico
Zinacatán, Chiapas, Mexico
San Antonino Castillo Velasco, Oaxaca, Mexico
Tehuantepec, Oaxaca, Mexico
Tehuantepec, Oaxaca, Mexico
Jaguar in the midst
Posted in Animals, tagged jaguar, Mexico, Mitla, Oaxaca, threatened species on May 11, 2012| 1 Comment »
These jaguars can be found all over Oaxaca…
Live jaguars in the wilds of Oaxaca, not so much. They are notoriously elusive, reclusive, and on the near-threatened list. However, this just in…
Rare jaguar sighting in Oaxaca, Mexico
Mexican authorities have confirmed that a jaguar has been spotted for the first time near Mitla.
According to Mexico’s National Commission for Protected Areas (CONANP), the jaguar caught on camera is the first one confirmed to exist in the area of San Pablo Villa de Mitla, which is part of the 4,900-hectare Yagul and Mitla Natural Monument.
Pavel Palacios Chavez, an administrator at Yagul and Mitla Natural Monument, said the jaguar likely migrated through heavily forested and mountainous areas from Oaxaca’s Sierra Juarez mountain range.
“There hadn’t been a sighting in this area of the central valleys. It’s a high-altitude zone that is connected to the Sierra Juarez. We believe that it’s this connectivity between the forests of Sierra Juarez and the forests of this part of the valley that has facilitated the transfer of this species,” he said.
Authorities detected the jaguar – North America’s largest feline – using remote cameras which were left attached to trees and other vegetation. They allowed conservationists to observe the movement of animals throughout the night. [Read full article and watch video HERE]
Hmmm… I wonder what brought the jaguar down from the Sierra Juárez? I hope it stays away from local livestock and finds its way back up into the mountains.
Let’s hear it for the mothers!
Posted in Celebrations, Culture, History, Holidays, tagged Día de la Madre, Liza Bakewell, Madre: Perilous Journeys With a Spanish Noun, Mexico, Mother's Day, mothers, Oaxaca, photographs, photos, women on May 10, 2012| 3 Comments »
Today, May 10, is Día de la Madre in Mexico and it is celebrated in much the same way as in el norte.
The celebration migrated south from the USA in the early 20th century and was embraced and promoted by the Catholic Church AND the anticlerical Revolutionaries. As for their reasons, I will quote from Liza Bakewell’s book, Madre: Perilous Journeys with a Spanish Noun.
… around the 1850s the Liberals… were nervous about women’s growing participation in the public sphere. Establishing motherhood as venerable and the home as sanctified… would give women a sphere of their own where they could be boss. Also, it would keep them off the streets and out of the workplace where they had begun to compete with men for jobs.
Under their watch, everyday motherhood became an exalted madre-hood…. The twentieth-century Revolutionaries who succeeded them took the idea and ran with it, adding in 1922 a ritual, Mother’s Day… [p. 84]
Needless to say, the women of Mexico have not stayed home! As I write, hundreds of women are marching on Mexico City, participating in the March of National Dignity: Mothers Looking for their Sons and Daughters and Searching for Justice. And, as for the workforce, according to a report citing the 2010 census, 33.3% of women work and this doesn’t even include those working in family operated enterprises.
However distasteful the reasons behind the establishment of Mother’s Day in Mexico, it does nothing to diminish the need to honor these beautiful, hardworking, formidable, and loving women.
¡Feliz Día de la Madre mis compañeras!
Play ball!
Posted in Archaeology, Culture, tagged ballcourt, Jeffrey Blomster, Mesoamerican ballgame, Mexico, Mixteca, Mixteca Alta, Mixtecs, Monte Albán, Oaxaca on May 8, 2012| Leave a Comment »
At the top of my Oaxaca Yahoo! Alerts today…
GW professor’s research on ancient ballgame reveals more about early Mesoamerican society
GW anthropology professor Jeffrey Blomster’s research featured in PNAS journal
WASHINGTON—George Washington University Professor Jeffrey P. Blomster’s latest research explores the importance of the ballgame to ancient Mesoamerican societies. Dr. Blomster’s findings show how the discovery of a ballplayer figurine in the Mixteca Alta region of Oaxaca demonstrates the early participation of the region in the iconography and ideology of the game, a point that had not been previously documented by other researchers. Dr. Blomster’s paper, Early evidence of the ballgame in Oaxaca, Mexico, is featured in the latest issue of Proceedings in the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS).
Dr. Blomster, GW associate professor of anthropology, has spent 20 years researching the origin of complex societies in Mesoamerica. The participation of early Mixtec societies in ballgame imagery is a new aspect of his research. For the journal publication, Dr. Blomster worked with undergraduate students Izack Nacheman and Joseph DiVirgilio to create artistic renditions of the figurine artifacts found in Mexico.
While early games used a hard rubber ball, the ballgames Dr. Blomster researches bear little resemblance to today’s Major League Baseball. The games and the costumes or uniforms participants wore were tied to themes of life and death, mortals and underworld deities or symbolizing the sun and the moon. In some instances, the ballcourt itself represented a portal to the underworld.
According to Dr. Blomster, “Because the ballgame is associated with the rise of complex societies, understanding its origins also illuminates the evolution of socio-politically complex societies.”
During the Early Horizon period, or roughly between 1400 BCE (Before the Common Era) and 1700 BCE, there was little evidence of ballgame activity in the way of artifacts in the Oaxaca region of Mexico. Dr. Blomster’s findings of a clay figurine garbed in distinctive ballgame costume, similar to both Olmec figurines and monumental sculptures from the Gulf Coast, indicate such engagement did take place in the area.
“Exploring the origins and spread of the ballgame is central to understanding the development of the Mesoamerican civilization,” he said. “We know there were earlier versions of a ballgame prior to the Early Horizon with both a ballcourt and rubber balls found in coastal Chiapas and the Gulf Coast, but the institutionalized version of the ballgame, a hallmark of Mesoamerican civilizations, developed during the Early Horizon. While there has been some limited evidence about the participation of the nearby Valley of Oaxaca in the ballgame, the Mixteca has largely been written off in terms of involvement in the origins of complex society in ancient Mexico. This discovery reemphasizes how the ancient Mixtecs were active participants in larger Mesoamerican phenomenon.”
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By the way, there was a lot more to these ballgames than mere athletic competitions — think ritual, conflict resolution, sacrifice. Below is the ballcourt just up the hill at Monte Alban.
The stories it could tell…
Alejandra Robles – Ma (yo) en Oaxaca
Posted in Creativity, Culture, Music, Parks & Plazas, People, tagged Alejandra Robles, Ma (yo) en Oaxaca, Mexico, Oaxaca, Plaza de la Danza, singers, video, vocalist, women on May 6, 2012| 2 Comments »
As the promotional material for Ma (yo) en Oaxaca, Mujer (es) Arte y Cultura explains (loose translation), like a skilled weaver, women create the fabric of life… part of the history of humanity, intelligence that moves, the look that looks, which is regarded in the construction of better horizons of life for her and those who are around her. And so, from May 3rd through 13th, the women of Oaxaca are being celebrated with workshops, exhibitions, lectures, and concerts.
Last night, under the supermoon, one of the accomplished women of Oaxaca, Alejandra Robles, gave a free concert, just a block away, in the Plaza de la Danza…
Ma (yo) en Oaxaca is a party for all of the principles of inclusion and participation to make possible the knowledge and appreciation of the cultural richness of groups which, for various reasons, have been marginalized.
¡Viva las mujeres!
Feliz cumpleaños MACO
Posted in Buildings, Celebrations, Culture, Exhibitions, Travel & Tourism, tagged Contemporary Art Museum of Oaxaca, MACO, Mexico, Museo de Arte Contemporáneo de Oaxaca, numbers, Oaxaca, photographs, photos on May 4, 2012| 2 Comments »
A belated Happy 20th Birthday, Museo de Arte Contemporáneo de Oaxaca!
As the theme of the birthday celebration on February 28th said, Say ‘Coma’ Twenty Times,
COMA, COMA, CO-MACO, MACO, MACO…
Come say, Feliz Cumpleaños MACO, in person!
May Day in Oaxaca
Posted in Celebrations, Economics, Holidays, Labor, Protests, tagged Confederación de Trabajadores de México, CTM, Día de los Trabajadores, Día Internacional de los Trabajadores, demonstrations, holiday, International Workers' Day, labor, May Day, Mexico, Oaxaca, photographs, photos, workers on May 1, 2012| 4 Comments »
Like 80+ countries in the world, International Workers’ Day is a national holiday in Mexico. Early this morning in Oaxaca, streets were closed as contingents began gathering and then marching toward the city center. And for hours, they poured into the Zócalo and Alameda for speeches, music, and bottle rockets, all of which will, no doubt, continue for hours more.
FYI: CTM stand for the Confederación de Trabajadores de México, the largest confederation of Mexican labor unions. Think, AFL-CIO in El Norte (though with some significant differences).
¡Feliz Día Internacional de los Trabajadores!
Update: For a more nuanced view of yesterday’s march, see the report by longtime resident, Nancy Davies.
Children’s Day
Posted in Celebrations, Culture, tagged children, Children's Day, costumes, Día del Nino, kids, Mexico, Oaxaca, photographs, photos, traje on April 30, 2012| 2 Comments »
When I was a child and asked, “If there is a Mother’s Day and a Father’s day, why isn’t there a Children’s Day?” My mother’s usual reply was, “Everyday is children’s day!” Hmmm… I never did buy her explanation, until I had kids of my own. However, here in Mexico, there is a day to celebrate children and today is that day — Día del Niño, a day when children are made to feel special.
Schools organize parties with games and treats instead of lessons, parents may give their niños y niñas gifts, and special community activities for kids are organized. Yesterday, here in the city, the Service Workers Union threw an all day party for 5,000 children in the annex of the Eduardo Vasconcelos baseball stadium. There were box lunches, candy (of course), a petty zoo, games, shows, and even a raffle for new bicycles.
So, here’s to the girls and boys of Oaxaca…
To their good humor.
Their pride in celebrating their communities…
Their beauty…
Their amazing patience…
Even when they are shy and tired.
And, especially to the street children, who, despite the challenges of their lives, seem to find ways to “just be kids.”
Tlacolula, she’s my baby…
Posted in Culture, Markets, Travel & Tourism, tagged costumes, cotton aprons, Festival de la Nieve Mezcal y Vinagre, graffiti, market, mercado, Mexico, Oaxaca, The Pop-up Food Shops of Oaxaca, tianguis, Tlacolula de Matamoros, traje, wall art on April 27, 2012| 3 Comments »
Every time I pass by the turnoff to Tlacolula de Matamoros, I break into song, “Be-bop-a-lula, she’s my baby.” And, seeing this guy on the front of a building on one of the town’s main streets only contributes to channeling Gene Vincent.
I was last there early this month for the first Festival de la Nieve, Mezcal y Vinagre. Ice cream, mezcal, and fruit and veggies in vinegar… what’s not to like?
And then there is the weekly Sunday tianguis (market), where women in colorfully embroidered cotton aprons over tightly pleated polyester brocade skirts (where did that style come from?) buy and sell everything under the sun.
As the article, The Pop-up Food Shops of Oaxaca confirms, I’m not the only one who is captivated by Tlacolula.
And, then there were fireworks!
Posted in Celebrations, Culture, History, Holidays, tagged 480th anniversary, birthday, celebrations, fireworks, fuegos artificiales, Happy Birthday Oaxaca, history, Mexico, Oaxaca, photos on April 25, 2012| Leave a Comment »
Tonight, instead of candles…
Fuegos artificiales exploded from the Alameda de León…
As Oaxaca celebrated her 480th birthday!
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