hola queridas, lo siento por la espera;) now it’s saturday & much has passed… wednesday i spent the morning painting the mural again, then afternoon teaching more rhythms until ryder (nee carolyn) arrived with her translation of “tres ratones ciegos” (three blind mice) which we taught to a bunch of kids (ever tried to scan spanish translations into a melody for an english song? lotsa syllables to squeeze). then some kids said they wanted to learn it in english also, so we started painstakingly teaching syllable by syllable the anomalous english-spelled slightly morbid tune. by the end (about an hour & a half later) only one pupil remained, but she had it, and mostly knew which words were which. hardest word: “thing”. español centroamericano has no unvoiced “th” sound so poor rosa had to struggle with the right position of tongue between teeth (teethththth). she got it, but every time she came to the word she got nervous & invented a new pronunciation.
also some of the gringas had created a dance to the following song:
once there was a candy store
business was so bad
asked my wife
what to do
this is what she said:
take zee can of gasoline
spread it on zee floor
take zee match
make zee scratch
no more candy store, hey!
(repeat last 3 lines 2ce)
(song courtesy of ryder, “obviously” if you know her)
by then the kids musta thought all english-speakers are demented, which i guess isn’t that far from the truth…
then yesterday about half of us rose at 6am to head to izalco, whence we rode horses up the volcano of which i’ve thoroughly forgotten the name. these were, bluntly, some ragged caballos. at first most barely wanted to move, though a couple were a bit too eager. one of our crew, jen, was nearly tossed off a cliff when her galloping horse decided to plant her front hooves fast, & kick her back legs out at the following horse & rider. jen grabbed the neck of her steed & held on but managed to hit her throat on the saddle horn hard enough to require a trip to the hospital, as she was having trouble breathing. she’s ok, back here again, but that sucked. luckily it was early in the trip & we had (pathetically enough) two escorts: the horse owner in a jeep, and three cops on foot (apparently “tour groups” here usually get police escorts to ensure safety; a bit creepy to see them lurking in the brush behind us at times). so jen was easily whisked away to the relative safety of the izalco clinic (though i’ve heard some unencouraging things about other hospitals here…)
anyway, i personally loved the galloping (after trading in my original nag, i got a pretty antsy steed), not only for the thrill but also because those were some damn hard saddles & the transition from cantering (whereupon yr butt slams hard against the saddle with every step) & galloping (which feels more like gently leaping 20 feet, gingerly touching down, then leaping again) was ever more comfortable.
we didn’t actually completely climb the volcano unfortunately (probably because we were so gosh darn slow), but ended on an old lava flow dating from 1956 or 1963 (the guy said one date in spanish & the other in english) which also offered a lovely view of most of the country (hey it’s small) & also the coast.
ok other highlights: i drank from a spigot what was described as (& i still hope to be) spring water, figuring we were high enough above the cities’ water tables that it wouldn’t be contaminated by the same horrible things that they dump directly into most of the water supplies. i also ate three pupusas de queso & frijoles with the pickled cabbage stuff which seemed not entirely sanitary but by then i was feeling invincible (hey i’d just ridden a grumpy but hurried horse up & down most of a volcano).
another highlight. after our descent & starved 4:40pm lunch, we visited a tiny church which was essentially the center of a santeria sect. the couple explained how the indigenas had once worshipped sun & wind &c, & when the conquistadores came, they’d essentially just placed intermediaries in there, one saint representing the sun, another the east wind, another corn, etc, & placed jesus above them all so they’re technically christian, but they still have largely the same rituals as 600 years ago. they also served us a rice wine that tasted a little like homebrewed mead, lots of it.
today, i made a point of doing as little as possible, since i’m shall we say a bit sore, especially shall we say my ass. i painted a bit, sorted through the photos on my camera (oh i took some really nice shots at 70 miles per hour from the bus window), & now i’m emailing.
we’ll be here another week & then tory & i strike off for guatemala & oaxaca. thanks for yr responses & i love you all. p
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