Oaxaca - The United States of Mexico

I am very excited to start blogging about Oaxaca and Mexico, a country I know very little about, despite its important place on the world stage. Like most people, my 'knowledge' of Mexico mostly consists of news reports about drug cartels, illegal immigrants or violent gangs.

During the next few weeks, I'm looking forward to learning more about this country, through the lens of Oaxaca, I want to discover Mexican music and literature, I want to learn about Mexico's great linguistic diversity, about the cultures that survived the European conquest, the modern-day Aztecs and Mayans.  I want to find out about Mexican telenovelas and read some Mexican literature.  I want to prepare a traditional Oaxacan dish (if you have any suggestions, please leave a comment below!)

Which United States?

When we hear the words 'United States', I'm sure most of us think 'USA', so it was interesting to discover that the official name of Mexico is Etados Unidos Mexicanos or the United States of Mexico/Mexican United States.  In the 21st century, the USA and USM are two different sides on the see-saw, with the USA very much in the ascendant and Mexico considered to be somehow less developed and less important, despite the fact that Mexico has the world's 14th largest economy, just behind Spain and just ahead of South Korea.  They're also not doing too badly in the FIFA World Cup!

Say Oaxaca?

Oaxaca by Alex Torres

Oaxaca is a part of Mexico that isn't that well-known to the rest of the world.  I really only found out about Oaxaca when I was blogging about Enrique's Journey and Honduras.  Many illegal immigrants riding the trains to the border of the USA pass through Oaxaca and this got me interested in finding out more about this less familiar Mexican state.

I started by pronouncing Oaxaca as o-aksaka but, I now realise that it's pronounced more like wahaka. The pronunciation of Oaxaca got me thinking about the links between Mexico and the United States. Wahaka sounds a lot like a Native American Indian word and it made me understand that our modern perception of Mexico/USA means we separate Aztec culture from US Native American Indian culture when, actually, they're very much related to each other.

Native Americans and the arrival of Europeans

Oaxaca by Alex Torres

Funnily enough the last place I blogged about beginning with the letter O was Oklahoma.  I learned a lot about Native American culture, when I was blogging about Oklahoma and I feel there is a real 'trail of tears' in the Native American story that stretches from Oklahoma to Oaxaca and beyond.

I'm reading a really interesting account of  the Spanish conquests of Mexico and Peru by BBC books called Conquistadors by Michael Wood (2000). It's an informative and clearly-written account of the 16th-century conquistadors, Cortes and Pizarro.  It's a pretty horrific tale and, from a 21st century point of view, a real tragedy that the great cultures of Mexico and Peru were destroyed by Europeans without a second thought.

The Mexican Jigsaw

Oaxaca by Alex Torres

The chapters on Cortes and the Aztec Empire have given me a real sense of Mexico, as it existed in the 16th century, long before modern borders and states.

In fact, the big division, culturally, in Mesoamerica seems to have been between the Aztecs and the Mayans.  Even in modern times, Yucatan probably has more in common with its neighbours Belize, Guatemala and Honduras than it does with the rest of Mexico.  I'm speaking in cultural terms, of course, economically, with its thriving tourist industry Yucatan is a world apart.

When Europeans first started arriving in Veracruz and other parts of eastern Mexico, the Aztec culture was slightly beyond reach, hidden away in the Mexican valley.  The modern name Mexico, comes from this specific geographical area, once sheltering the Aztec capital of Tenochtitlan, now occupied by the conurbations of Mexico City.

Between the valley of Mexico and Oklahoma were much smaller cultures, eking out an existence in the harsh deserts of Chihuahua, Colorado and Mojave.  Aztec rule had barely reached these northern deserts, when the Spanish turned up on the scene.

Oaxaca's place in the jigsaw

"Oaxaca en México" by Yavidaxiu - Own work. Licensed under Public domain via Wikimedia Commons.

What is now Oaxaca was only part of the Aztec empire for 30 years before the Spanish arrived and changed the political landscape forever.  Oaxaca is a very mountainous place, most of the state is 2,000 metres above sea-level, which made it inaccessible in past centuries and, to an extent, protected from the radical Europeanisation that happened in other parts of Mexico.

You can still see this today, in the fact that Oaxaca is Mexico's most ethnically complex state with sixteen officially recognised indigenous cultures.  More than half of Mexico's speakers of Native American languages live in Oaxaca and the Spanish language isn't as ubiquitous in Oaxaca, as it is in other parts of the Mexico.  I guess Oaxaca is the Mexican equivalent of Oklahoma, but much more so!

Missing pieces of the jigsaw

It wasn't until the 19th century that Native Americans felt the pressure from the growing power of the United States of America and that nation's manifest destiny and expansion westwards.  Mexico lost around half of its land area during the 19th century, the missing pieces of the Mexican jigsaw being modern states like California, Arizona, Texas and New Mexico.

I'm embedding a useful YouTube video below, from the Open University, which explains the changes that took place in Mexico and the United States in the 19th century.  I thought it was quite poignant to note that, whilst the 19th century was all about borders crossing people, the late 20th and early 21st centuries are all about people crossing borders.




I guess the fate of these two countries will be forever intertwined and I hope the future of US-Mexican relations will be one of mutual respect, cooperation, promotion of Native American cultures and a sense of shared history.

Image credits:

Oaxaca doesn't really have an official flag, so I made my own image which combines the Mexican national flag, but replaces the national seal with the Oaxacan state seal.

For this blog post, I wanted to highlight the work of Flickr member psicoloco aka Alex Torres, who is originally from Mexico City.  You can see more of Alex's beautiful photos on his photostream.

Thanks Alex for sharing these images with us using the Creative Commons license.  

Barbados - Pride and Industry

It's 1800 kilometres (1100 miles) north from Manaus, the capital of Amazonas, to Bridgetown in Barbados, the place that I will be blogging about for the next month or so.

Barbados is one of the those places I've always dreamed about visiting.  I've only ever been to the Caribbean once, to Cuba, but Barbados would be high on the list for my next visit.  The country's motto is Pride and Industry and, from what I have read about Barbados so far, they have good reason to be proud; of their culture, of their democracy and the fact that Barbados is considered to be somewhat of a success story in the developing world.

Beach in Barbados by Loimere

It's a tiny country - the smallest one I've blogged about so far - it's slightly bigger than the Isle of Wight, a bit smaller than Lantau Island in Hong Kong and roughly the same size as Brooklyn and Queens put together.  I've also discovered that it's located a little bit apart from the other Windward islands of the Caribbean (eg. Martinique, St Lucia or St Vincent) lying about 100 miles to the east of the Windward chain. 

Barbados is also geologically different than its 'neighbouring' Windward islands.  Whilst they are mostly the volcanic summits of submerged mountains, Barbados is made up of coral and protected from the seas by a series of reefs.  It's very flat compared to other Caribbean islands and the difficulty of navigating ships to Barbados meant that, despite its Portuguese name (meaning 'beards'), Barbados remained continuously in the hands of the English from the 17th century until it gained independence in 1966.

Anglican-style church in Barbados by Loimere

Barbados has often been referred to as 'a little piece of England in the Caribbean' and ties with the UK remain strong.  It's believed that the island was originally inhabited by the Taino, a Carib people whose disappearance from Barbados is unexplained.  One theory is that the entire native population was transported by the Spanish to work on their plantations in Hispaniola (compare the fate of the Carib tribes in my earlier blog post about Jamaica). 

The word hurricane comes from the Taino word for their 'storm God', Juracan, who lived on El Yunque mountain in (what is now) Puerto Rico.  When he was angry, he would stir up the winds and seas and wreck havoc on the Caribbean islands, much as hurricanes do today!  Although Barbados lies directly in the path of many hurricanes, they tend not to hit the island directly and usually pass harmlessly northward. 

A busy street in Bridgetown by Loimere

The national language is English, but most people speak a dialect of English called Bajan. The dialect is believed to have been influenced  by languages of West Africa, such as Yoruba.  Like Yoruba, Bajan has no past tense, pronouns such as we have no accusative form (like English us), eg. in Bajan you would say - He see we (not He saw us). 

I'm hoping that, in the next few weeks, I'll be able to experience more Bajan culture.  I want to cook a traditional Bajan dish and read one of Barbados' most famous novels, In the Castle of my Skin by George Lamming.  I want to learn more about the role of sugar in the Atlantic slave trade.  I want to find out more about the West Indies' love affair with cricket, that most English of games!

Scene from The Tamarind Seed

I've already started listening to Calypso music and, as an introduction to Barbados, I watched a 1974 movie called The Tamarind Seed, starring Julie Christie and Omar Sharif - one of the few movies to be set in (and filmed in) Barbados.  I really liked the movie, which is about a love affair between a young English woman and a Soviet military attache.  You can catch glimpses of the island, as they drive around the countryside looking for a Tamarind tree that Julie Christie's character believes will have unusual seeds, shaped like the face of a man.  It's a movie about innocence and espionage.  The glimpses of Barbados were tantalising, but not nearly enough to satisfy my curiosity! 

Image credits:

The photos of Barbados, used to illustrate this blog post, were taken by flickr member, Loimere, aka Derek Hatfield, who is a self-confessed 'geek with a personality' from Wawa/Thunder Bay in Ontario.  You can see more of Derek's work on his website. 

The image of the still from the movie, The Tamarind Seed is from a photo taken by me. This image is being used to illustrate this blog post and promote Blake Edward's film. By publishing this image, I'm not condoning or encouraging reproduction of this image on the Internet or anywhere else. This image is not meant to bring the actors into disrepute or suggest their endorsement of this blogpost, but is meant to highlight the performances of these actors in this movie.

By coincidence, this is the second time I've blogged about a movie starring Julie Christie and Omar Sharif - see my earlier blog post about the movie version of Dr Zhivago. 

Amazonas - the World's Longest River?

It goes without saying that rivers have played an important part in the development of human civilisation.  In the age of air-travel, it's sometimes difficult to fathom the historical importance of rivers, whether as modes of transport or obstacles to colonisation.  Whilst researching for my partner blog Walking the Chesters, I was surprised to learn how much of an obstacle the River Severn was to the conquering Roman armies, as they tried to subdue Wales.

When I lived in Bangkok, I was impressed with the way that getting a boat down the Chao Praya is still used as a quick and easy method of travelling from one part of the city to another (certainly avoids all those traffic jams).  I know that some people use river transport on the Thames to get to work every day, but it's not really comparable, being the exception rather than the rule.  The Amazon is still a place where river transport is often the only logical option and I find that exciting, being so used to land- or air-based travel. 

Also, when I was blogging about Paraguay I learned that Paraguay is like a 'land-locked island', being surrounded on all sides by rivers, which made colonisation difficult for the conquistadors. 

Is the Amazon the longest river in the world?

Well, officially, the Amazon is the world's second-longest river, the longest river being the Nile.  It can be difficult to decide exactly how long a river is and the decision really depends on where you decide the mouth of the river is and where its true source lies.

The Nile by Michael Gwyther-Jones

How do you determine the 'true source' of a river?

The 'true source' of a river is understood to be the source of a river's tributary which is furthest away from the river's mouth.  Rivers tend to originate at high altitudes, as ice melts and flows downwards to the sea.  The world's longest rivers, including the Amazon and the Nile, have many tributaries which add volume to the rivers as they join them on their way to the open sea. 

Europeans have been interested in finding the source of the Nile since Greek and Roman times.  At various times in the past, the source of the Nile was believed to be in Ethiopia and even in places as far away as the Niger. The Victorians and their obsession with finding the answer to every question, were determined to locate the source of the Nile for once and for all. 

After the 'discovery' of Lake Victoria in 1858, there was a very famous public quarrel between the British explorers, Speke and Burton, as to which one of them had discovered the source of the Nile and whether the source was at Lake Victoria, or further south at Lake Tanganyika. Interestingly, the most remote source of the Nile is still undetermined in the 21st century, but believed to be at the Ruvyironza River in Burundi.

The Source of the Amazon

The 'most remote' source of the Amazon is believed to be at Nevado Mismi, in the south of Peru.  As part of my research for this blog, I watched Bruce Parry's fascinating TV series, Amazon.  Bruce started his journey at this 'official' source of the Amazon, on the Ucayali river.  Ed Stafford, the first person to walk the entire length of the Amazon (finishing in August last year), also started his journey at Nevado Mismi.  

The Amazon by CIFOR

Other major river sources

The source of China's longest river, the Yangtze, is believed to be at Geladaindong Peak in Qinghai province near the border with Tibet.  The Mississippi River is believed to start at Lake Itasca in Minnesota.  Russia's longest river, the Yenesei flows from its source at Mungaragiyn-Gol in Mongolia all the way to the Arctic ocean.  Western Europe's longest river, the Rhine is a real minnow, in world terms, being the 123rd longest river.  It has its source at the Tomasee in Switzerland.

The rivers of the Amazon

The thing that has suprised me most, on this learning journey, is that the Amazon is really a sum of its parts, rather than one single river.  Although I'd not heard of any of them before I started researching for this blog, I've come to realise that the Amazon's tributaries are magnificant rivers in their own right. 

I'm listing some of the main tributaries of the Amazon below.

First are the Negro and Branco, the black and white rivers. The Negro comes in from Columbia and is the world's largest 'blackwater' river, ie. a slow-flowing river that winds through forested wetlands and swamps.  The quality of the earth it flows through is incredibly poor and it's called Negro (black)because of the tannins that leach into the river, giving it a tea-stained colour.  In Bruce Parry's Amazon, there is an interesting shot of the Amazon/Negro confluence, where the dark waters of the Negro add a cloudy mix to the clearer waters of the Amazon.

The Japura also rises in Columbia and flows into the Solimoes, a river with several names, also called the Ica in Brazil and the Putumayo as it forms the border between Columbia and Peru.
The Napo river comes in from Ecuador and the Ucayali comes from the official source of the Amazon in Peru. The Juruá river also comes in from Peru, as does the Purus.  

People of the Amazon by CIFOR

The great Bolivian rivers such as the Beni and Mamoré join the river Madeira just after Porto Velho, where they flow on to meet the Amazon just east of Manaus. Porto Velho, the capital of Rondônia, was built to serve the needs of the Mamoré-Madeira railway.  An unsuccessful attempt to link Bolivia with the Amazon and ports of the Atlantic, the Mamoré-Madeira railway cost millions of dollars and thousands of lives to build.

The Madeira is the Amazon’s biggest and, arguably, most important tributary.  I've learned that the name madeira, also the name for the Atlantic archipelago, comes from the Portuguese word for ‘wooded’. The Madeira-Mamoré is pretty impressive, being only slightly shorter than the Volga, it's the world’s 19th longest river.

The Amazon’s eastern-most tributaries, the Tapajós, the Iriri and the Xingu all rise in Brazil. They mostly flow through Amazonas' neighbouring state, Pará.  They are the closest to ‘civilisation’ and, therefore, quite often the scene of mass deforestation and conflict between the indigenous people and the corporations that are keen to exploit the Amazon region's resources.  Currently, the most controversial project is the proposed construction of the Belo Monte Dam, which faces opposition by indigenous peoples such as the Kayapo of the Xingu river.

The Araguaia and Tocantins rivers aren’t really tributaries of the Amazon, but both flow into Atlantic at Ilha de Marajo, close to the mouth of the Amazon.

Aerial view of the Amazon by CIFOR

A sobering fact for someone from Western Europe is that, even the shortest of the Amazon tributaries that I've just mentioned - the Iriri - is still longer than the Rhine!

The Amazon-Congo river?
One interesting hypothesis is that the Amazon and Congo were once part of the same river system, which drained into (what is now) the Pacific ocean.  When the continental shelves divided, separating Africa from South America and after the Andes rose, it's posited that the Amazon changed direction to flow into (what is now) the Atlantic ocean.  If this hypothesis is true, then it means the Amazon-Congo was the longest river in history, at an estimated 7,500 miles (12,000 km).

Image credits:

The view of the River Nile is by flickr member Michael Gwyther-Jones who is an architect from Cardiff in Wales.  You can see more of Michael's photos on his photo stream.

The photos of the Amazon were posted on Flickr by the Center for International Forestry Research (CIFOR), a nonprofit, global facility dedicated to advancing human wellbeing, environmental conservation and equity.  They have a really interesting website where you can find out more about the work that they do. 

Thanks to Michael and CIFOR for sharing these images with us, using the Creative Commons license. 

Xinjiang - saying goodbye to the Music of Central Asia

Xinjiang is approximately 7 times the size of Britain and almost 4 times the size of California.  It has one sixth of China's land area but, with over 20 million people, barely a sixtieth of China's population.  As usual, when I'm writing my final blog post, I feel that there is so much more I could learn about this region of the world, but the time has come to say goodbye!

A summary of the topics

My learning experience about Xinjiang has given me an opportunity to learn about the history of the region and the politics of Xinjiang versus East Turkestan.  I've also learned a lot about the geography of the region and the diversity of its landscape.  Not just deserts and mountains, but the Turfan Depression, the Dzungarian steppe and the fertile Ili Valley.  I learned how to cook Dà pán jī and how to make my own noodles.  I learned about Khoja Iparhan, the Fragrant concubine and how the Occident represented adventure and exoticism to the Chinese, similar to the way that the Orient was perceived by 19th century Europeans.  I learned about the magical qualities of Jade, how important this stone has been in the development of Chinese history and China's relationship with the people on its Western borders.  I learned about the Uyghur language and where it sits in the Turkic language family.  The Indo-European mummies of Tarim gave me an opportunity to explore the origins of race and the specific nature of racism in China.

Other areas of interest

Again, there are many other things I've learned during the past month or so, but not had time to write a blog post about.  I'll try to summarise these below so, if you're interested in finding out more, I'd encourage you to do some research into topics that I have only had a chance to scratch the surface of.  These include:

Uyghur demonstration in Helsinki, July 2011

- the history of Islam in China, including the Chinese muslims, the Hui people.
- K2, the second highest mountain in the world, which is situated on Xinjiang's southern border.
- Nuclear testing in the Taklamakan desert
- the Tocharians, their language and culture.
- the Parthians and the origin of the phrase 'a Parthian (or parting) shot'
- the story of the Chinese princess who gave away the secret of silk
- the Legend of Prester John
- Wuer Kaixi, a Uyghur who was one of the student leaders during the Tiananmen rebellion
- the role of Eunuchs in the Chinese Imperial court
- the symbolism of oleaster
- the Taiping rebellion (hopefully I'll be able to come back to this one!)
- the story of Yakub Beg and his independent Kashgaria in the 1860's
- George Hunter and the China Inland Mission
- the Xinjiang Military Region Production and Construction Corps "August First" Field Army Swearing to Defend the Thought of Mao Zedong to the Death - probably the longest name ever for a military regiment (I wonder if they used an acronym?)
- the claim that there were (or even are) gulags in Xinjiang

The Jiayuguan Gate by Richard Towell

- the Jiayuguan Gate in the Great Wall of China, often the last sight of China for exiles heading West.
- the Manchus of the Ili Valley
- the development of the Han Chinese city of Shihezi, just north of the capital Urumqi.
- the Uyghur diaspora and the challenges faced by the East Turkestan 'government in exile'
- the cause of goitre, attributed to the lime and magnesia salts of the southern Taklamakan
- the lake monster of Kanas
- the story of Tutuqash and the Mangqys

As you can imagine, I could have gone on blogging about Xinjiang for some time to come!

The sound of Central Asia

One topic I do want to draw your attention to is the rich musical traditions of Xinjiang and Central Asia, in general.  When I was preparing to go to Uzbekistan, I bought a CD of classical Uzbek and Tajik music, which I played over and over again, as I was packing my bags and getting ready for my 'big adverture' on the other side of the world!  Whilst the musical traditions of Central Asia have a lot in common with music throughout the Islamic world, I couldn't help noticing the influence of, what I perceived to be, Chinese music, on the music of Uzbekistan.  I think it was the sound of wind instruments, like the surnay (known as in shawm English, an ancestor of the oboe) that made me think Central Asian music sounded slightly Chinese.

Two shawms or surnay by tomfbh

The chanting that is so common in the Central Asian classical tradition sounds very much like chanting throughout the Arab world - but the solo singing, especially that of female artists, has a pitch that wouldn't sound out of place in a Chinese Opera.  As with everything else in Xinjiang, I think the music is an end result of centuries of cultural interaction.  Whether or not the wind instruments came from China, or the drums came from India or Arabia, Central Asian music has a sound that is pretty unique - it can sound both Western and Eastern, Islamic and Oriental.

The most popular form of traditional music in Xinjiang is a style called Muqam, a set of 12 musical suites, which is usually grouped into three parts; the muqaddime or introduction, the dastan or narrative songs, usually with a set text and the meshrep which is a faster beat and gets people dancing at weddings!  It's a shame I've not had time to delve deeper into the music of Xinjiang but, if you're interested in finding out more, the website of the London Uyghur Ensemble has more information about Uyghur music than I could ever give you.  As well as links to recordings of various instruments, their website also has great research documents by Rachel Harris, who is a Lecturer in Ethnomusicology at London's School of Oriental and African studies. 

I'm going to leave you with a video from YouTube, which features a performance by the London Uyghur Ensemble.  It's a recording of the Penjigah Muqam, which is popular in the Ili Valley.  The picture quality isn't great, but the most important thing is to sit back, listen and enjoy!



On Learning about the World next month, Y . . .


Image credits:

The photo of the Uyghur demonstrators in Helsinki was posted by Amnesty International Finland - you can find out more about this demonstration on their flickr stream and see a news report on the situation in Xinjiang at their website


The photo of the Jiayuguan Gate (aka Jiayu Pass) was shared with the world by flickruser Richard Towell - you can see more information about Richard at his profile page on Flickr

The image of the surnay/shawms was posted on flickr by tomfbh - you can see more of Tom's photos at his flickr photostream.