Services at the tiniest Cathedral in the Anglican faith offered a respite from the crowded city streets to both English and Spanish speaking Episcopalians this morning. The street traffic is thick. The roads hilly and very narrow. And though the cars move fast, the pace of the pedestrians, and there are a lot of pedestrians, is wonderfully slow and relaxed. So many people everywhere. Many young children. Many elderly. Half of them selling something, anything at all, in order to support themselves.
Enormous piles of bananas, papayas, mangos, stacks of pig´s heads, curtains of raw meat, and the most unusual displays of softball sized globs of mole offered sensory overload to those who braved the food markets. And then there was the street scene to see jewelry and clothing and soccer jerseys galore. I think one of the things that made a strong impression on me was the look of the people themselves. There are mostly indigenous people here. We saw very few other Americans or even Europeans. Maybe 15 or 20 all day after seeing hundreds, or even thousands of people crowded into the marketplace. Those of us who do not know Spanish were eternally grateful to Jordan Napper and Zach Martin and Mary Stoner for their effortless skills in interceding for the rest of us. I did not get the impression that many local people know English.
It is difficult to convey the layers of life we witnessed today. This evening an American fellow who lives and works here came to speak to us about Mexico and a little bit about this complex country. His window in to what life is really like, plus our own brief experience today watching and tasting southern Mexico will, hopefully, be good preparation for our work to begin tomorrow in Alejandro. That, and a good night´s sleep.
mdk
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