Californication meets Tranpacificism

So, what exactly am I doing here in Parras? As aforementioned, I’m on a school program studying Spanish (Español, o Catalano?) and Apropriate Technology (AT, o tecnologica apropreada). The latter will likely end up as part of my Environmental Sciences degree, or on the off chance I switch to ERE, a minor. It’s cool because we have a Campus Center for Appropriate Technology at Humboldt, which is pretty cool. Check it to understand/feel it better.
Here’s the slightly wordsmithed definition that our class came up with through use of a group process:

“Appropriate Technology (AT) encompasses thoughts, tools, implementations and observations, dependant upon cultural, political, economic and geographic context. In addition, AT works with and mimics the flow of nature to improve over existing impacts. AT includes adaptability, durability, and lifecycle analysis, while facilitating nonviolence and empowerment through community identified and locally maintainable/operable holistic approaches to meeting needs for present and future generations.”

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“…I said wow, what a concept, I could use a little fuel myself and we
could all use a little Change!”

Well.. Ajay’s still here but not for long, school’s out on August
5th, and my flight out from Monterrey is on the morning of August 12th..
It’s been an interesting last week and a bit, lemme tell ya. I went to what
might be my first “real” party of the program, and had a really good time,
playing video games (fighting mainly, a la Street Fighter, only different),
and choppin it up with some mexicans.. (one of which my friends says is the
hottest girl around, and they claim she wanted me, but they’re loco..) I
also tried to go to the swimming pool (El Estanque de la Luz) to search for
my forgotten swim trunks, but they were missing. I jumped in real quick
anyways (~2a), which was entertaining, of course. The next night was
another party at a ranch, it wasn’t quite as much fun since it was mainly my
group (who, ya know, I see like everyday or something!), but it was a good
time. My “mom” here was convinced I was drunk when I came home since
apparently I arrived home very happy. Kept asking me what I drank, etc etc,
funny stuff. That was like two days out of the weekend of somebody having
trouble believing me in saying I don’t drink.. ­Que Raro! Ahh well,
whatevs! What next..

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Eek! Sorry, practicing my spanish, english update to come!

Que una experiencia interesante, es que pienso. Fui a una fiesta de me
amigo Fernando el viernes (22). El tuvó una maquina de juegos, fué una
experiencia muy divertido. No jugaba los juegos de video mucho
regularmente, per ahorita creo que me gusta jugar mucho. Especialmente de
vez en cuando. (Como muchos otros cosas, es mejor como ese?) No sé.
Estaba jugando y hablando con una nena y su hermana, quien hablaban inglés
también. (¡Excusa me para mi gramatica horible!) Cuando otros no quieren
jugar, solo estaba yo y Miriam Pola, pero ella quéjese de jugar, que
confusa. Ella dijé que jugó porqué yo quisé jugar. Nyaah. No es muy
corecto, porque siempre prefiero a hablar con personas interesantes en lugar
de otros actividades tontos como veiando los peliculas o jugando los juegos.
Entonces, hablabamos por muchos horas, y tuvé un tiempo muy divertido
platacando. Quisé hablar más con ella, y pedí por su numero, pero no quisó
darlo a mi. No entendí. Solo quisé platacar más, pero ella no se gusta
platacar con hombres? ¿Por que estaba platacando conmigo? Pero, es lo qué
dijó.

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So! That was a wild and crazy trip, ‘eh? We left on our grand,
week-long journey on July 1st, arriving in the city of Creel.
Creel is in, or near, the la Barranca del Cobre, or in English, Copper
Canyon. This is the largest canyon in North America. What, “Grand
Canyon,” you say? Yeah, the lame-os would say that we only know about that,
not only because we’re ethnocentric, but more importantly because we’re
“ameri-centric” (which should properly be “US-centric,” so as to not be
ethnocentric, ya know? But then again Lonny has met people who don’t
know who Jews are in the U.S., so that argument falls a little weak on me.

But anyways!

What were my original expectations for this trip? My Appropriate Technology (AT) professor,
Lonny Grafman, has an associate in New Mexico who has been doing work with the
TaraHumarans in México, helping provide them with
AT, and supposedly we might have come in to help do the same. Or at least, if not do work
with or for them (heck, I’d even be down to do some more adobe! Excepting my wrist
problem.), to meet them, and help establish a relationship with them.
((Continue on to see how it really went..))

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So! What’s the news?
I posted a quick entry after I arrived, and since it’s the last week of
school (writing this on jul31st), maybe it’s time to write more? Kinda hard,
but let me try! At first I wasn’t caring too much for parts of this
experience, like the non-seriousness (aka: greater interest in sex than AT
or spanish) on the part of multiple of my companions, plus this feeling that
México is just like the United States.. not really, but me and one of my
friends Armeda think that it’s definitely not in the model of a
“third-world” nation. She terms it “second-world,” but I think that term
must refer to something else. It’s really weird to see how much Coke
(Coca-Cola, the “Drink of the Death Squads“) people drink here. Additionally eery is considering
that Vicente Fox, el presidente de México was the CEO of Coke! EEK! My
friend Ali talks of “America’s cultural hegemony” (very interesting piece of writing btw, check it!), and that just seems like an extreme example of it, imho.

Anywho, more ramblings below..

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