Home again, home again jiggity jig

Feliz Pascua a todos! I am back in Los Angeles.

1. As I looked out the window of the airplane as it was landing in LA it was so wierd... I couldnt believe i as back to the place that two months ago i left, slightly afraid that i might never return...Guatemala, Peru, Argentina, Mexico all had laid ahead of me, mysterious and unknown and now they were all behind me, still mysterious but a little more known. Moments of my life had been lived there and now were memories.

2. So i like to think LA has pretty good Mexican food, but let me just tell you, Mexico has REALLY good Mexican food... and its everywhere! yum yum.

3. My overdramatic description of altitude sickness. Cusco is 3,300 m (10,800 feet) above sea level. ::: Every cell in my body ached for sea level, something we had never known we loved so dearly. Altitude with its invisible hands pulled on my insides, my head pounded, and as though we were underwater, we moved slowly.

4. The Inkans were crazy... obsessed with BIG rocks, trapazoids, the sun, moon, winter and summer equinox, perfection and effeciancy. Thier irrigation canals still function today. Thier structures have outlasted the Spanish constructions through many earthquakes. The staved of spanish for 30 decades of war until their last king was finally killed.

5. On ruins... something so wonderful about seeing the Inkan ruins, including Machu Picchu and having read the tour books, bits of Che Guevarra's interpereations of the place, and listening to our many opinions of the different tour guides is that there is still so much UNKNOWN, hypothesis. Leaving room for your own interepretations. Che saw all the buildings as fortresses of warrior civilizaition. Ronaldo (a tour guide) pointed out the storage houses, the temples, the housing structures, the faces carved into to the stones. I saw amazing perfection. Rock upon rock perfectly fit together outlasting wars, earthquakes, the stupidity of the spanish who let amazing temples be rock quarries, etc. Inkan hands touched where my hands now touch. It makes me feel connected and yet so disconnected from the not that long ago past.

6. Diego and Marlena. These two Uruguayans (Father and Daughter) were doing the inkan trail short version and we met them on the train from Cusco to Aguas Calientes. The father helped me understand south america a little bit... he said that he was taking his daughter on this trip, as he had done with his son when he was her age because it was important to their understanding of the world. Argentina and Uruguay in many ways have turned their back to the rest of their continent. looking to Europe instead. All the indigenous were killed. Everyone is of Italian or Spanish decent. Therefore, to see and connect with the rest of thier continent, to learn that all people though culturally different are all really the same, he takes his kids traveling to other countries like peru. They were really warm and kind, giving us kisses good bye and email addresses. What does this point of view have to say about our north american lives?

7. My two new favorite groups and songs are (sorry that they sound so offensive)... Te quiero by Nigga. and Lo que paso paso by Daddy Yankee...both of these musical masterpieces can be found on Youtube.com http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Thw0WQSn7_8 and http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ij3n4Ui217k (watch this one first, its my favorite)

8. In the US of A... my mom and I went to grocery store yesterday. We walked to the Cost Saver Market that is a block away from her house. We were speaking spanish the whole way and continued to speak spanish in the market that was full of people: black people, indian people, filipino people, latino people, and even white people. We told the bag boy in spanish that we brought our own bags and didnt need any more. The indian manager in his wonderful south asian accent said. "They are going green". Ahh yes, Los Angeles.

10. Last easter I was in France at a monastary called Taize listening to people say in over 7 different languages the Lord has Risen, he has risen indeed. It was here that I felt the freedom and the possibility to travel to latin america. It is wonderful to take note on this day, one year later, that dreams are possible. If I have learned anything on this trip, and I think i have learned a few things (including a little bit of spanish and hostelling etiquette), I have also learned is that God is kind and loving. sooo very very kind.