Thursday, February 21, 2008

Katherine Playground Hot

The Mexican Travelogue

CHRONOLOGICAL READING


"I did not care a bellyful of colors, like a donkey is filled with oats." Flaubert, letter to his mother, November 17, 1949, Alexandria.


first day. VOL - ARRIVAL After the stopover in Amsterdam, the curious curve of our journey : Faroe, Iceland, southern Greenland, then the vertical Canada - USA - Mexico. Is it shorter to trick the narrow Septentrion rather than pacing the tropics? Short window of views: the mass of Greenland Chantilly, lined plate to breakage of a snake, undulating steppe on the continent, the gray rivers polite, Midwestern, agro-industry in checkered tan desert studded with incandescent , lakes, sfumato in the mountains in the distance.

For her, for S, after five year absence, the reunion with his two aunts, respectable ladies, their own mother, 89 years, yet his whole head, all day between the monolith the oxygen cylinder and the first round of young close-ups, the telenovelas chain. She told S: "You know, you were right to leave," she calls him by his nickname since childhood, so many years than had been baptized as well, emotion, relief of S, it could review it before ...


2nd day. CITY OF CASTE A first day in Mexico City passed in part to a car. We follow a doctor in uptown. Three modern towers above a new residential area. We are waiting in the lobby and assist to come back and the goalkeeper. A person comes to the glass door of the lobby . He left his seat, bypassing the counter, door stoops to unlock the latch on the bottom of the glass door where the key is to remain. These closures meant to be operated several times a day. He holds the door to the visitor, it can also leave the door to maneuver a car. The system generates an employer-employee relationship special, not far from the home-bailiff emperruqué of two centuries ago. An owner who receives his salary and financial attention personal: some effort, flattering, is deployed to host and receives the information that they treat renewed its security. An effort perfectly sterile compared to modern, press buttons and video cameras.

In other classes, concern for safety is also prégnant, as the means, rolls of barbed wire on top of walls, electrified son, cameras at strategic angles and the ultimate, vigils, profession of the future . We see them in their impeccable uniforms, latest avatars of the world warrior, lounging on their folding in the shadow of the garages. Advertising on the walls, three officers WASP in photos of smiling U.S. group were recruited. The forward-looking urban dear Baumann seem obvious here. How long to reach this far in Europe?

What means of protection in the slums, clinging to the boulders overlooking the ravines between two portions of highway? I do not know, we went to a mall of international standing, accessible to those who can. Curious, the morgue our guide vis-à-vis the poor, Indians burned the skin too. There is a very specific vocabulary on shades of skin colors and attitudes to be adopted accordingly. In its behavior, our guide exudes contempt perfectly integrated, innocent, ignorant of its monstrosity in good conscience. Opposite, equally integrated acceptance of the rules of the game and the rancor that followed. By cons, that same person received us with attention, devotion of another century, far from a certain casualness democratic and modern.

But tonight, the Zocalo, the central square, social mix in a huge photo exhibition. Fervor of the crowd melted into the shadows, the public of the Barraca Lorca is eternal.

3rd day. PEMEX Today demonstration in front of the tower
Pemex. Background.
Pemex is part of the top ten global oil companies. Nationalized in 1938 by President Lazaro Cardenas, is a national asset constitutionally inalienable (art. 27) Mexicans remember with emotion the national mobilization which paid the compensation, the peons paying their dues brought in chickens, turkeys ... c is a national pride, a family heirloom which provides 40% of state revenues. Today, Mexico is for sale and its main promoter is Felipe Calderon, a señor Presidente orders from large neighbor. As usual? No, it goes even further.
In good nominee, he does not simply follow the instructions of the Chicago boys appointed directly by the White House who make up 50% of his cabinet. It represents the hard right of Puebla, catholissime, looking for a moral revolution, and its national program of Legionnaires of Christ is echoed in that of George W. Bush, with which the affinities are congenital. Pemex, weakened, would be promised Exxon, Texaco, but Haliburton and Repsol's ally Aznar has not said its last word.
Pemex is weakened because the "Washington consensus", the modern version of the Monroe Doctrine, was banned for 25 years with this company any modernization worthy of the name, for example by prohibiting him to refine its own oil, importing the product he then re-exporting crude oil refined in the U.S..
Under these conditions, its top technicians have left and one of the arguments of the sellers is the lack of technical engineers. Another is a lack of money! With $ 100 a barrel and prices cost $ 3. Where has the money, etc.. The company already knows

creeping privatization, outsourcing is widely used. Hence this event. She was dignified, sad and playful at the Mexican. Sincere.







5th day. URBAN Decay She said my city my city poor
it happened in my neighborhood the houses were beautiful people were treated proud they were confident tomorrow will be better the last time he was seven years ago have still believe it was a bad time but now look at the tire dealers have invaded the streets and stores of tacos and it stinks and c ' is like that for the entire city if it continued she would die but it will not burst my city that does not die a city eh?


6th day. MUSEUM ANTHROPOLOGICAL Disagree with an opinion firmly established over a lifetime, one can change his mind in three hours. I Jamai s loved art Columbian. Choice natural, since childhood, nothing. Failed disturbing a universalist aesthetic, transcending differences. Khmer, Dogon, Scythians, and all others, yes, I received these gifts from ancestors with happiness, to intoxication, but the American continent was a problem. Even China's most kitschy emberlificotages seemed more familiar and therefore naively, more acceptable. I found that Native American art clumsy, hermetic and could not penetrate it. Until a few hours.

At the Museum of Anthropology, the scales fell
me eyes. My turnaround

proceeded in stages.

First, by analogy. Plain masks, stylized, almost Cycladic m'intriguèrent. Then disturbing similarities with Chinese jades and expressions near Nara. My penchant for statues followed the same path beginning with an old man caught in a movement similar to the gigantomachy the Parthenon statues "Sinis" also, another fashionable Iberian illustrating once again the influence of Mexico on the imaginary Moebius ... I was ready to take the plunge and move to more rough masks, composites, statues to the glory of a infernal death, to the grotesque that I found terribly endearing.

Was I influenced, converted by impregnation of the place? I rather think that prejudice does not withstand the experiment, and it is reassuring to test our ability to change his mind, that is to say to evolve. The magic did not stop either. In the late afternoon, feature for feature, I found my Aztec Mayan clay my alive, in the subway, in jeans and hair cream.


7th day. TEOTIHUACAN Beyond the hills
slums covered in hard, gray cinderblock and villages in the unlikely city of France, we arrive. Cubism space where a giant flare does not exist. Vision changes with each step. The edges of the pyramids, corners are cut, overlap, exceed train other figures. We live amidst algorithms stone. But it misses the key to decipher. The simple look does not make a lot of information. How to guess, understand the frame of reference, the spirituality of the builders for the one who has little? A religious sensibility can it here be of any help? Not sure that believers today can penetrate these mysteries, but still, I recognize the limits of atheism, which sometimes do not embrace all human complexity. Historical explanations, sociological not enough. Without doubt, air and debate known, the novel can compensate, to experience the indescribable. For the pre-Hispanic civilization, it seems to fail. Cultural destruction of this civilization was methodically applied, recreations literary historicizing can only be fragmentary, the chain of transmission has been partially broken. At the top of the Pyramid of the Moon, a discussion at the summit begins.

A historian tells me she burst into tears in front of the cathedral Cordoba mosque (re) converted. Why, she wondered, demolished our temples, our codices burned? A peaceful syncretism was it not possible? I advance the sacrifices, terrifying vision of horror conquistadors Yet that did not tender. Destroy society which generated such atrocities became public act of salvation. She responds to recent studies, in fact, the sacrifices would not have been so many relationships that the Spaniards made it was only meant to justify the colonization and its abuses. What is it exactly? As always, history is key to power, legitimacy and identity construction. See what say at this moment the subaltern studies, with their reappropriations necessary but sometimes bad ... She said that at the time of sacrifice were itself, it was to contribute to world harmony, the individual was a member of the great whole ridiculous, but he had a role to play in helping to balance the great All cosmic in perfect communion with nature, a religious approach, pure, noble, sacrificing himself for example. The priests were happy, this should not shock me, me the Western Eurocentric.
I told him that in two hundred years, a historian might evoke Nazism in the same terms, pagan mysticism close to nature, environmentalism doubtful quest for racial purity, harmony of a world subject to the domination of Herrenvolk noble, self-sacrifice, everything is there.

We stay there, each on its position on top of an extinct world.

Note that if, on murals of Rivera, the Zocalo, I found the portrayal of torture against English Indians, I found no trace of these sacrifices.


10th day. FRUIT OF A PEOPLE RAPE
Amerindians, Malinche was the mistress of Cortes. Fine
policy her advice helped him greatly in
conquer territories. Traitor to his people, it is also the mother of the nation's new hybrid. On the murals of Rivera represented here, we see her hiding her shame behind the shoulder of Cortez while his family are being tortured. She wears the blond child born of her union with the conqueror. It is the first of the "race of bronze." In the second table, a few years later, the child who hides his shame in the lap of her mother. It seems more seasoned.

I can not resist the pleasure to deliver the key note of Robert Marrast, translator of "The Death of Artemio Cruz Fuentes, p 184 of the paperback edition:
" The verb Mexican ( chingar and derived nouns ( chingada, Chingon, chingaquedito, chingada , etc..) generally involve rape of things or people. In the language of the street is the biggest insult: (Oedipus and Jocasta sails stripped of myth. But the continual use of the insult eventually deprive him of his strength, and the word came to mean anything difficult, tedious, unpleasant, etc..: A chingada . A chingaquedito is a hypocrite by circuitous routes leads to complete its selfish or destructive purposes without anything to show. In contrast, the Chingon is the man who forced others to submit to his will by making a show of strength and courage. Artemio Cruz can be considered the type of large Chingon .
But it's the feminine word chingada which gives full meaning to the term ambiguous power and rape. 1a chingada mother is raped, the source and cradle of the race: the first Indian woman possessed by the English conqueror: Malinche, the mistress of Cortes, who led the Conquistador to the heart of the empire of Moctezuma: She was raped, and in turn violated his children, gave birth under the sign of rape, suspicion, anger. And her children secretly desired rape their own mother. Or are violated or is violating it, and whoever is violated, in turn, must necessarily violate others to be aware that they exist. Politics, love, labor, birth, death, everything in Mexico is secretly assigned by that word. "


14th day. FIRST OR THIRD-WORLD? From its four years it does not exceed the chairs circuits and between the tables with his half-moons host green cellophane. "Ten pesos! Give me ten pesos sir! "She chirps in her little voice. It is touching grace, an Indian beauty, fine, very pure. It lingers with the big mustache, insists. "Ten pesos, it's worth it! "She flute again. Finally, Mozart murdered has sold nothing and leaves the restaurant.
Later, sitting on the floor near the subway entrance, a family of Indian black skin and dirt. The couple has not yet thirty, already six children around them, the téteur the little man, plus two accordions.

- But what do you think? People, good people are sick! The poor, everywhere, always asking. In response, of course, they are seen as beasts, filthy, vermin. Of course we expect the government a good sweep. And not just for beggars. Look, all you have to pay because those below have a real salary. The room filled with kids that your bags at the supermarket, the gas station attendant in charge of parking in every street, improvised, institutionalized, which protects your car, or sanctuary by his little red flag and his big mouth, begging for the big bus station in the waiting room so that his band does not care about you too - like, always in danger radius, in your taxi during the race if he calls you, you give the taxi number to your partner, insurance unstoppable to remove any bad thought the driver identified - and when you make a trip to the play rehearsal, because underground except, all other transit systems have been privatized in the 80s, there is no overall plan and you are forced to take several transportation to run an errand, and the part to each time, sometimes for ruins privatized, they do last, because the more profitable that way, a car is almost cheaper.
And the guys who draw their carts, cardboard, plastics recovery is typical, eh! It must be strong here, to take. To hold, we need something more potent than tequila, religion or standard must be Death. Stronger than all, Jesus, saints, everything. As the wrestler El Santo, stronger than all others. You saw in the slums along the railway, the altar of the Santa Muerte? She's nice, she is fierce, like all those. Yes, OK, yesterday we went to Toluca, an hour west of Mexico City. Entire neighborhoods have sprung up in five years. Areas
industrial chemistry Swiss, French, Indian, to export to the North. Cars and dealers, the gleaming, air-conditioned, for miles. Like your rurban French, people live here and go to work in the capital. And that is what proportion of the population? On paper, we do may be gone the first world, in the top ten it seems, but more than half of the people remains in the Third World. And it would change? Look, the event for PEMEX the other day, a few agitators infiltrated the media and the orders pose a dangerous conspiracy excited, look, the jacaranda trees bloom no matter how much too soon, let's get camp, leave for Zac!

We leave for Zac.

16th day. What this is Zac? Sometimes the smallest details trivial can be valuable clues. Let's start this first picture. How to tell? A place of comfort? To cut short, in good French, a shit. One can observe the seat wrapped with a sheath of wool, knitted with love for the greatest happiness of séants. Especially when the need is expressed at three o'clock in the morning in winter, and that the inside temperature must be well below ten degrees, despite the small size and orientation of the workpiece calculated so that the wind the mountain makes the least affected.

Second photo shows a very narrow staircase, so steep and a real ladder, ramp quickly proved indispensable. You'll notice, besides the amazing color for a French remained in shades of poppy fields under umbrella, perfect color that turns under the harsh light when the sun interferes in the courtyard, a deep brown, shining, curiously guarding intensity in the dark, you'll notice the irregularity of steps, the wear the old building of several centuries when scrolling generations, whatever their age, always go up, climb ...

The next episode.

17th day. ZACATECAS, POSTCARD Among United States of Mexico, the state of Zacatecas is located in the center north. It is named after its capital, Zacatecas, which itself contains the name of a local tribe, literally the people of the place [where grows] the grass. It is located 800 km from Mexico, north of Sierra Fría, at the confluence of the Sierra Madre Occidental and Oriental, in mountainous terrain at 2440 m altitude, dominated by peaks of 2700 m. In 1546, the Spaniards are large deposits of money and founded the city. She knows the dynamics of pioneer European cities where the wealth extracted from the empire. The Indians were slaves in the mines; shoring galleries in the area felled in fifty years. Because of the terrain, the town does not grow as the checkered colonial towns. Fine buildings appear, this stone built with pink marbled effect which brings the historic center in the Cultural Heritage of Humanity in 1993. Life is known for its harsh climate (because of that, its founders envisioned a fate ghost town), for his flashy wealth, freedom of manners (the mulatto dressed as English and wearing jewelry and ornaments !) away from the Holy Inquisition. Many religious orders such established and instead became the "Gateway to the North," from which all the north of the country is evangelized, including the current U.S. territory. Grand bravura of national history, in 1914 the "Taking of Zacatecas" victory Villa and Natera Angeles on federal Huerta virtually ended the Mexican Revolution.
Today, if the city plays the tourist map and cultural (museums), the state is nevertheless one of the poorest countries.


18th day. Telenovela Him Californian made his fortune in spare parts for industry automobile. 70, bald, big belly, slow movements, diabetes and cholesterol. A white bar mustache face reddened sun and whiskey. On the back of the card stack chair its six phone numbers, including the Silver Benz car and the yacht's satellite. She Mexican, 39, unpretentious good girl, not too thin despite studying psychology, was selling shoes in the family store. Rather beautiful, had few contacts with men, lived a quiet boredom which had the advantage of being predictable.
There are eight years ago, a fairy godmother of her friends, whose presence on earth seems to be moving things, with his agreement to snatch wear, attending a club meeting gringo on the Internet. At the same time, the secretary of the remark Mr. sustainable pattern of sadness. He is serving his fourth marriage, lived as a long friendship, clouded by his wife's incurable cancer. With his agreement, she went to recruit a new partner, with the sole criterion of youth, health guarantee, Mr. has already buried one of his wife and is about to recur. In twenty years of experience, the assistant knows her better than his own man and he chooses women shortlist three daughters uncomplicated, easy-going as him, a sign of serenity for couples and safety for the heirs, three older children that their future stepmother. He falls in love with the photo, the first meeting is delighted. Soon he bought him a monthly basis and fax it to receive his letters with little hearts drawn. No longer, it installs in Los Angeles in the beautiful neighborhoods. It is filled, he covers it with flowers, jewels, she also receives the affection that he has missed so much, an orphan very early, at age nine she discovered both her parents died in the sauna newly purchased ...
Unexpectedly Madam, the Official, survives. View the pot pink, hires a detective who gives the film compromises, divorce is rare but can finally get married. In Zacatecas two years ago, a party to any break. We were treated to photos. The aircraft specially chartered for the hundred and fifty guests of the American side, including major Japanese and Australian customers came specially for the occasion. Under the big white tent, there was even a rodeo machine but that did not, ah, the Mexican Red ... picture of the groom of effort and emotion, it is on all fours and just picked their teeth with the garter of the bride.
Since then the Chinese competition has eaten away half of its profits, it works more than five hours a day with his young wife and an extended cruise that allows himself his future knee operation will suspend for a time.



22 th day. TANIA LIBERTAD Saturday, March 8, Zacatecas celebrated in its way the day of the woman. Among the many events, a concert Tania Libertad on the parade, the evening before the freshness begins to bite. Tania Libertad's voice would be the clear stream of Nana Mouskouri crossbred accents manly Mama Bea. Peruvian born but long Mexican, she sings about love, life, freedom. True, it comes every year, Zac, it is close to the Governor. After a thank seconded officials, the concert begins. She is alone all the women, Anna Magnani as Fellini, mother, sister, wife, lover, dreamer, frustrates, gentle, raging. You should see all women take heart in his songs that tell their lives. This is important, they apply, they give too; the crowd in the cold up in unison intimate, shared a warmth tongue.
Then comes "Gracias a la vida". It's a bit my song, too. It is not the first to sing it, but the purity of tone achieved from the outset the blue note. "Thanks to life / that gave me so many ..." http://youtube.com/watch?v=4vKfW7B-4QM

And in the audience, can claim all his words. Yet, all they would not mind to use simple words in a speech so ambitious: thank you to life for giving him the five senses to feel better, appreciate, love his beloved, uncover plot universe and we share that fullness. No doubt many of these women there is not as benevolent, but this one song allows them time to think, and let gently rocked by the words of consolation that amazes.



25th day. BARATA LITERATURA / LITERATURE TWO SUB The comics are an important part of Mexican popular culture . Here is one. Of course, this is not a masterpiece, but it can receive the frame of reference, ambient mood.


The book measures 13.5 cm high by 13 wide, a slice of 4 mm, 98 pages, 92 color narrative. Collection "El libro policiaco of color," 26 th year, No. 1276 entitled " Los Implicados " prohibited under 18, 2008, editions Nies Editores, founded by Romualdo O'Farrill Jr. Executive President Jose Antonio O'Farrill Avila, Operations Director Jose Antonio O'Farrill Welter, executive director Christian Welter O'Farrill. All for 7 pesos (0.44 €).

In the poor state of Hidalgo, but two poor peons scarce sympathetic with mustache, grow their donkeys laden with bundles of wood. Comes a big pick-up brand-new, red, driving a big guy with a smile, mustache, too, had left the village years ago, everyone thought he was dead, and back again, he made his fortune in gringos, there are lots of English words very chic in his mouth, he urges them to follow him out of misery, for " gorging dollars" and swap their stinky asses cons a nice pickup. The Gentiles are packed naive, they sell their horses for the journey, embracing women and children in the only language they know, Nahuatl, the language of the ancient Aztec and go on an adventure.

In good wet backs, they crossed the river to swim " a bit before as neighbors, they take to build the wall of shame , wipe a few shots fire of Migra crosses Texas and led by their mentor in Florida, a farm to pick oranges. The boss is a little overweight patriarch, in the prime of life, hair and yellow beard. From the intermediary, it is clear that the two recruits only speak their dialect incomprehensible agrees, the two workers rejoice, this is the beginning of wealth. Then it says that " following days, the brothers Hernandez justified the large capacity of the laborious work of Mexico. "


Deus weeks later payday. There is a gringo foreman, a hunk bodybuilder, a good for nothing that the employer has engaged in memory of his father. The cableway has only disdain for the servants illegal hustles the tail of employees is yelled at by the boss instead congratulated the two brothers for their seriousness, and even pay their overtime he had not authorized it to serve as an example to others, polished over the objections of the intermediary. Moreover, the following days, the teacher appreciates " these guys sound, the work does not scare them, they do not even use gloves, really, they deserve a better fate. "


The following Saturday, the recruiter makes a case of beer in the tenements, they turned off the TV American dancing to the sound of radios in the country, it vomits out the window, it also throws in a can pick up a mysterious gloved hand, she also picks up a machete and his false teeth in the morning, we find the nasty blond machete her sofa, the instrument and the can lie on the ground. Miami then landed an inspector with breasts thighs buttocks bounce, boots with heels, hands, face of a mannequin and a cascade of red hair. She's nice, she is not stupid. She understands that the two Mexican illegal and innocent. The illegality is not his problem, "she said. In addition, she spoke Nahuatl, limits Third World. Above all, it unravels handling. Sweating profusely through his paunchy admits complicity to $ 50 000 she confiscates it, it was the perfect recruit idiots likely to endorse murder. " A mind like that of the beautiful Fiona could bear more. - And who are you, stupid bastard? Sometimes you believe you than your fellows? At least they are more worthy than you, they do not deny their origin! . She shakes it loose piece. He had to get drunk so they could not swear to it while the boss was collecting objects and compromising assassinated the ungrateful, the lover of Mme. Flashback where we see a close father, with tears in the hallway, follow the lovemaking of the damned, emphasizing the masculinity of the dandy and his failures as a husband. It is a violent. Moreover, drilled to date, he takes refuge in his house, shoots everywhere, ends up killing his wife and deletes itself. recruiter crying "double tragedy " as Sganarelle his wages, he was released by Fiona merciful, "because he did being loyal to his boss . It distributes the dollars to both of Judas Brothers cleared. His sidekick, a black man with Caucasian features and hair frizzy articulates: " Tell them that they would return to their land. Here, they can only condemn their souls. Officially, this will be a crime of passion. Conclusion: " Thus, no innocent person will suffer without cause .

The next three pages are devoted to horoscopes, and a page advertising a home for children in vulnerable family situations, from 2 to 18 years, " offering them the means to become men and women for responsible and productive society . "It was founded in 1954 by among others Dona Hilda Avila Camaracho of O'Farrill. Donations are accepted. The 4 th cover is occupied by an advertisement for the energy drink Gladiator, the Coca-Cola ®. Slogan: "Hey, watch out! Remains in custody! - Energy for your daily struggle "


27th day. THE MAKING OF ZACATECAS In the seventeenth century, the Jesuits built the Colegio de la Purissima Design, now the museum Pedro Coronel it deploys its rooms.

At the entrance, a state library, two aisles where the memory of centuries aligned and stacked to the sky vault. The first populated dark back volumes, is half in our language. You can read Dante in French, Cars, Corneille, D'Alembert, Humboldt, Hume, Guizot, Thiers ...). Our Civil Code meets the gun rights of the Inquisition and Vice-royal constitutionalists and the doctors of any country to forge the progress so strongly connected textbooks and journals. The bookplate of the library is marked on the edge of the iron works. In second, the books are covered with parchment light, writing a big round reed, black shaded time stamps the old ivory. Then the museum itself.

The native son, Pedro Coronel, himself a painter and sculptor, has assembled a collection of art from around the world, the magnitude of the substantive dispute in good taste that led to its aggregation.
The room reserved for this on a wall Goya etchings of bullfighting, the titles have the irony of understatement. "The inconvenience of the show" shows a bull dog-eared in the stands at all is a populace terrified set piece. In front, his last period plunges into his madness, hell, monsters of his nightmares grab it with wild-eyed harpies. A low door opens onto a corner of heaven, we go out. It is a narrow triangle of grass between the walls. The sun does not hit that two hours per day, which explains its survival. In one corner, the tomb of Pedro Coronel, a large pedestal topped with a gross spherical sculpture. A huge wisteria plants his roots in an ancient well, takes water, spreads luxuriance incongruous for the place, smells, while the desert wind laden with sand whitens the day beyond the walls where the trees whip air. Here everything is calm.
We sit. An old gardener took her pose, the conversation begins: - Where are you from? - From Monterrey. - And you? - By. - And you? Paris. I am the military hello, I referred to it. - Do you know that here, 6,000 men died in one day?
we go for the great story. He will talk about the making of Zacatecas. Flow is a bit mechanical, it must show several times a day, he waits for his part, agree, Adelante!

The leak of Porfirio Diaz in 1911 was preceded and followed by increasing chaos in the country. In 1913, with the support of the United States, Victoriano Huerta seizes power in a coup. Many citizens, both civilian and military take up arms and rebelled, both by desire for justice, social reform (land reform) than of legality. For a year, little by little, the revolutionaries gain ground. Natera, head of the Centre Division attack Zacatecas even twice to no avail. But this June 23, 1914, things are different. The Federated Huerta experienced many setbacks, the insurgents are structured, strategically, if the city falls, the power can not escape them.

In the revolutionary generals, three warlords have contrasting personalities.
The first two, and Natera Angeles, are professional soldiers. The photos show the angular, stiff in uniform, dry as a cudgel. Apparently, nothing predisposed them to rebellion. I do not know what were the facts, the thoughts that drove them to cross the Rubicon to the risk of regulatory dozen bullets into the skin. Natera, the swarthy-skinned mestizos, native son distinguished himself by managing the conquered territories with dignity, in maintaining law and order, which helped to moderate the image of revolutionary share and looter in the minds of many citizens. Angeles, Gunner, is primarily a brain. Came to 14 years at the Chapultepec Military College, he became its director 26 years later. It is a reference geometry and ballistics, made numerous communications on the subject, trip to France for the latest innovations in the genre. Impressive pedigree, which does not prevent him from choosing the camp of the Revolution and especially paradoxical character, serving under the command of Pancho Villa.
This is an entirely different stamp. Son of the people spent for the banditry have avenged the honor of his sister, his personality is intact, sharp, generous, cruel. "You should have heard the story of his prodigious feats. After a surprising act of kindness, at once the feat was the most bestial (...) Villa is the reincarnation of the ancient legend, the bandit welfare crossing the world, carrying the torch light of an ideal: to fly the rich to enrich the poor! (...) If your head back to General Villa, he will give you a farm, but if you're not his idea, he will shoot you. " He founded the legendary Northern Division to the exemplary organization, a model of modern guerrilla warfare, "... only the types of the North, well dressed, with cowboy hats, khaki with brand new clothes and footwear States United, at four dollars. " Nothing like those below, those without degrees in tatters, burdened with poverty, having nothing to lose. Division won victory after victory, unlike other warlords constitutionalists, extraction purely military sometimes trample, experiencing setbacks. Hence the annoyance of the staff revolutionary starting with its leader, Carranza, who sends the Centre Division of Zacatecas on Natera and prohibits Villa thither. Penalty
lost the June 9 to 14, despite repeated attacks by constitutional experts, the feds held firm. Villa then disobeyed. He landed on 22, preceded by Angeles which he approves the plan of attack. The power relationship is so close to 2 men to 1 in favor of the revolutionaries (22 500/12900) and 39 guns against 10. But on June 23 at 10 am, morning mist, we must take the Bufa. A hill 600 meters high above the town. Steep, the sides smooth, open at any wind. And above, Hotchkiss and Colt machine guns of the Federals. More than fear is the power to take. The fate of the revolution is here, in Zacatecas, the Bufa. The shock is tough: "From the middle to the bottom of the hill is a veritable carpet of corpses. The machine guns we were literally swept away (...) The generals were livid, they were reluctant to order a new charge ... " Doubt takes constitutionalists.
While Villa is giving his elite cavalry, Los Dorados, this rose to 40 degrees. Those who do are not chopped by shot guns to take the lasso. The battle is fierce struggle "a ferocity presqu'humaine. " And about five o'clock in the evening, the rout of the Federals were a fact.

After it happens what happens to revolutions, reforms, and reforms to half confiscated. "careerists cities are promoted officers, before they know hold a gun, while the hardened veteran of a hundred fire-fighting, became useless at work, is still private. And the few remaining leaders (...) s'indigent too, because gradually Staff has been invaded by young people of the city, installers and fragrant.
But worst of all Venancio said, is that it is infested former federal. "
Quotes from Those of the lower (Los de Abajo) by Mariano Azuela, 1916, foreword by Valery Larbaud, translation of Joan and Joaquin Maurin, the latter being one of two co-founders of the POUM.

30th day. DEATH The Columbian spontaneously believed in the immortality and considered existence with a certain fatalism. Hence arises the idea rooted in the world that the Mexican border between life and death is blurred.

The main concern is not afraid of death but the weight of a life of hardship, a daily suffering that we find in art Catholic country with its Madonnas stabbing pain and bloody Christs especially his knees and ribs planed as flogging has laid bare (but modestly while keeping their long skirts and velvet dresses, the most shocking is not suffering but nudity).


There has a whole apparatus are thetic that contains the objects of death and transforms them into re ferential funeral but not gays, reassuring and ensure that life continues after death. Have you ever eaten your own death? Mexicans do it regularly. Imagine that from your childhood, you crunched each year a sugar skull with your name engraved on it? P o tame your death what better way? But do enough?


(To be continued)

... Upon our return we stopped in Mexico City. We reviewed the people who we had so wonderfully received at the beginning of our stay. The house was in turmoil. The mother, the grandmother, the grandmother of all becomes uncomfortable, the ambulance arrives. whispering in the corridor, we pay attention. S me whispers: "Look at the dog. It is too quiet. He already knows. "We go the room, I stay on the landing, just a second I glimpsed in the shadows ancestor prostrate in his chair, unconscious, his face dark force to be red, surrounded by her daughters, their hands resting on his arm his shoulders, still a little; the serum bottle gurgles to a rolling boil.
The ambulance arrives, an old army truck, red with a white background on its flanks khaki. The husband of the Lady was general, it is entitled to military services. I remember on his writing-day among the children's photos taken at the current age of their offspring, for one, cliches childhood, an image oldest, middle, a man in uniform, in the forties, fifties. I sat on a corner of her bed and later I was told, for years a man had not come into the room, the honor ... We
ECLIPSON. Later, before boarding the plane, on the Paseo Reforma, we call it. It is much better we are told. Good. Yes, we too hope. See you soon.

She died a few hours later at night, while we were flying over the sea to the east, in pursuit of the day.