As usual, I haven't updated this as often as I would like to so I have a lot to say. Last week, on Wednesday, we went to Cholula. At Cholula, we visited the largest pyramid in the world. It's considered the largest in the world, but has to give that title to the pyramids in Egypt because it's partly undergroud. The pyramid was built originally in the 3rd Century BCE and then was remodeled and more was built on top of the original material about 4 times. The final time, the Spanish built a cathedral on top of it all in 1594. There were lots of people there on that day because it was the first day of spring and everyone was wearing white. The myth is that you can absorb the sun's energy if you wear white.
This week, our excursion was to Tlaxcala. First, we tried the pulque we have been learning about. Pulque is an alcoholic drink made from the liquid honey-like substance in the maguy cactus. It is kind-of thick and sour tasting. We decided that it tasted similar to sourdough bread. Many from the group liked it, but I couldn't take more than a couple sips because of the awful texture. Then, we took a quick look at the plaza where they have bull fights. After that, we visited the oldest church in Mesoamerica!! It was gorgeous and had a lot of history all over the walls as well as many names of the first Spanish people who arrived here. Our next stop was a museum with beautiful, brillant, brightly-colored murals containing history of Tlaxcala and all of Mesoamerica. It was really cool to see images of some of the things we have been learning and the murals were gorgeous! Our last stop was a museum about some of the cultural traditions here. It included traditional costumes for special occasions, pottery, tools and the famous masks that they use for dances. The masks cost about 20-30,000 pesos and some of the embroidered shirts cost so much, our guide compared them to Armani and Prada.
In addition to our group excursions, I have been going to museums with my guide during my conversation times. I went to the museum of the revolution, which is actually the house where 4 families that initiated the revolution lived and were killed. The bullet holes were still in the walls, and you could walk in the places where they lived and died, as well as view some of their clothing, furniture etc. One interesting part is that during the battle, the police climbed 3 different churches close to the house to shoot at the revolutionaries. We also walked around in the "Biblioteca Palofoxiana", a library built in 1647 by two men as apart of the first seminary established in the area. The library has books in more than 8 different languages and topics ranging from religion to history to famous literature to philosophy. We found a book about sermons written in 1631. The library originally contained books that were the only original copy written, but now of course all of those books are catalogued on the computer. I think my guide told me that today and tomorrow we are going to see art museums because we happened upon an art exibit at the seminary, and she saw my eyes light up.
The group is in good spirits for the most part. A few of us have felt a little under the weather, myself included, but nothing too major. Most of us are trying to find the balence between being excited to go home (as we have less than a month left) and still enjoying our time here and not missing out on any experiences. I was very lucky to be able to talk to my parents and brother last Sunday on the phone for about an hour. On Sunday, we leave for Mexico City and we will be there all week. We are visiting a bull ranch, museums and temples and watching a traditional folk ballet, then the last part of the week we are celebrating Holy week with the Mennonite Church there. We are all very excited about it!
Oh, and I suppose I should explain the title for those of you who don't know all of those things. Churros are a little doughnut-like tube-shaped food often filled with chocolate, sugar or pie-filling type stuff. I ate one this last week from a little stand, mostly just to say that I had one while I was here because I'm not a huge fan of them. Chucho is the name for stray dogs that we used in Guatemala. Dogs here tend to be pets, but you still see a few dogs running around loose. Chacos are the wonderful sandels that I have been wearing often and are fairly popular in our group. We often joke about it and take a picture with everyone who has them wearing their Chacos together. Churches, well I would certainly hope you know what those are! We have seen so many old and beautiful churches here, including many with so much gold, figures of people, angels and intricate detail it almost makes you dizzy! I guess that's all for now...until next time.
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