First the fair – last night a traveling troupe from the Mexican state of Oaxaca arrived in Todos Santos and setup shop in the main plaza (zocalo) offering crafts, food, clothing and ice cream. I don’t know how long they will be here but they do have some interesting stuff, e.g. notice the “leche quemada” flavor of ice cream in the photo below…that means “burnt milk” flavor. Hmmm.
My friend Catherine M. Mayo (C.M. Mayo) is multi-talented as well as kind. She is the author of Miraculous Air and Skies Over El Nido as well as founding editor of Tameme and translater/editor of Mexico: A Traveler’s Literary Companion. She graciously allowed El Calendario de Todos Santos to print the Todos Santos chapter from Miraculous Air and has been supporting us with kind words and advertising ever since. She is a class act. Milkweed Editions has just released the paperback version of Miraculous Air and I strongly suggest you get a copy before they all disappear (the hard cover has sold out.) Check out her website www.cmmayo.com and her blog madammayo.blogspot.com
Finally, here’s a great story about my neighbor, Manuel Salazar Pascual. He is a poor farmer from Las Limas, Veracruz, Mexico. He lives one lot over and behind me in Las Tunas on land that belongs to Juanita Salgado. Manuel has been farming this land and living with his wife and two daughters in two tarp structures. Their life is not easy but they have huge kind hearts and seldom complain. I try to help whenever I can with materials and food for the girls. Before the story, here’s a photo of Manuel in his field of calabasa (zuchinni) – sadly he cannot find a buyer for these vegetables so he is giving the stuff away to those less fortunate than him, i.e. old folks, orphans and other poor people.
When Manuel was a young boy living in Las Limas, he discovered a statue buried in the ground in September 1965. The statue was a rock sculpture of the Olmeca picturing a virgin-like female in a Buddha pose holding a small child. This discovery was a very big deal in his small pueblo. Government officials came and took the sculpture and for a moment Manuel was famous. Manuel says the piece is now somewhere in Japan, having been illegally removed from Mexico. The following photos were supplied by Manuel. I scanned them and they carry my copyright notice although they are not my photos. At least this way, internet photo thieves know that someone cares and is watching.
The statue itself.
Manuel and his sister Rosa with the statue.
The entire familia Salazar Pascual with the statue.
Manuel shows the town mayor where he found the statue.
Everyone gets into the act…the entire pueblo and the statue, well except for the photographer<g>.
