Rachel and Eric on sat 2 sep 00
The Gringo Invasion (a Very Long tale of danger and personal sacrifice)
Speaking of workshop disasters (which we have been doing), I run workshops
from time to time. Fortunately I don't know much about workshop disasters
(yet). The clay we dig in the villages here is hard to get wrong. It's clay
or it's top soil. And the only way to fire a bonfire kiln is to stand there
and throw wood at it. So at least you always know how hot it is. To date I
have had no disasters. But there have been some mistakes:
=20
To wit, I was running a pottery workshop in a very tiny Mixtec village just
this side of the moon. It is a place I've been going on my own for seven
years, but this was the first time I'd brought company and a weeks worth of
food.=20
The place is quite spectacular, high and barren. The hills are weathered
and worn red and white soil not unlike the American Southwest and filled
between with musty oak hallows.=20
From these oaks the local potters boil the dye they use to make their pots
look wild. And the workshop was about learning about making these pots, this
dye and getting to know folks around. Then come =91round five in the PM the
school bell would ring and we'd call it a day. Every one would get up off
the floor and try to get blood back into their appendages. And, as there's
not much else to do out there by the moon, some folks would sit around and
tell lies and others would head off wandering to explore the eroded hills
and oaken hallows
I've been living in Mexico long enough that I ought to know better than to
wander so. But for longer than that I grew up in the American West where
near all the land was BLM land. Government land. Which made it our land and
so we wandered wherever we pleased. And so I've done in Mexico. Difference
here is all the land is village land, which means it belongs to somebody not
too far away. And they use it, for planting corn, gathering wood or grazing
scourge goats. I guess if you are wandering the hills alone it doesn't
concern people too much. But if there are four or six of you trooping around
where nary a pale face has been seen before, well=85
As the week moved richly on in that peaceful and empty landscape little
bits of news would come back from our wanders in the field like, "Some guy
was talking to me in Spanish while I was on the trail. I don't know what he
was saying, but he didn't seem happy." And our hosts mentioned that there
were rumors going around that we were here looking to get gold and silver
and diamonds out of the hills. Though no one had ever seen any here,
apparently it was evident that gringos from the land of high technology and
portable CD players would find it. Or maybe we were scouting the area to buy
it all up and put in a corporate farm. On the other hand there was no way
any one was really going to believe that a pack of Americanos had come to
this end-of-the-road town to sit on the floor of a small adobe house making
pottery. I can't blame them for their skepticism.=20
Our hosts politely brushed the issue aside. They said they'd deal with the
rumors. Celso, the head of household, got a message from the village
authorities to show his face at town hall. He didn't seem too concerned
about this either. "I'll go see them next week and tell them what your=
about."
And so it went. But it was clear to me that although we couldn't see them,
folks were seeing us. And trying to make some sense out of what the heck we
were doing there. Although most of the dozen people crowding the open hills
were folks I've been buying pots from for 7 years- we'll, maybe they were a
little jealous because I wasn't hanging out at their houses with 6
Americanos. And which is a more interesting story to pass on to your
neighbor on a boring evening; "There are 8 Americans at Celso's house making
water jugs," or " those guys are special agent scientists from the U.S.
government and they are finding all that secret treasure our grandparents
buried during the revolution"? I figured I ought to do something to bust the
rumors. I wandered around in the afternoons and visited with the other
potters I knew along the hillside and chewed the fat about the weather and
what not. In the process I answered all the questions that they were dying
to ask but not intrusive enough to do so. I suppose that helped.=20
On the last day of the workshop, hot, high noon I was standing around the
kiln with our host and teacher, Cecilia. She was building up the candle. She
glanced up the hill to the road where my assistant was packing up the van.=
=20
"The town authorities are up there talking to Josh." she said calmly.=20
Josh's Spanish is good for dealing with things like ordering dinner,
finding the right bus and getting a room. But he hasn't had the class yet
that explains the subtleties of dealing with town authorities out in the
backcactus. I wasn't sure I'd had that class either but still thought it
best to relieve him of the chore. I said so to Cecilia. She agreed.
The car and dirt road were about 100 winding yards up hill from the kiln.
When I got there Josh was coming down. "Those are the bosses," he informed,
"they aren't very friendly."=20
There were three of them in broad brim hats. I swallowed hard and stepped
into a cool, slow gait. I was pretending pretty hard that I wasn't nervous.
I pulled my hat brim down to shade my eyes a bit more (and then spit into
the white dust and squinted into the mid-day sun. A breeze kicked up and
rolled a tumbleweed acrosst the road. Somewhere a dog barked and then there
was silence, not a sound but for my dry exhaling.)
Well, it was nearly like that. Least ways that's how it felt, Tex.
(Who will draw first? What will happen to the innocent
workshop participants? He may be the fastest bargainer in the south, but
will this prove too much for the Oaxacan pottery buyer? Tune in tomorrow for
the thrilling and final chapter of this amazing but true cliff hanger.)
=09
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -=20
Rachel Werling, Biologist
and/or
Eric Mindling, potterologist
www.manos-de-oaxaca.com
email: rayeric@rnet.com.mx
Apto Postal 1452
Oaxaca, Oax.
cp 68000
Mexico
phone 011 52 (954) 7-4534
fax 011 52 (952) 1-4186
Kurt Wild on sat 2 sep 00
At 09:33 AM 09/02/2000 -0500, you wrote:
> The Gringo Invasion (a Very Long tale of danger and personal
> sacrifice)
Hey guys - having been to Mexico (Mata Ortiz) I became quite interested in
your tale. I was captivated but let down expecting a conclusion and not
finding one.
PLEASE do post a part 2. Thanks!
Kurt
email: KURT.L.WILD@uwrf.edu
website: http://wwwpp.uwrf.edu/~kw77
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