“Olfactory and gustatory receptors is how we’re doing all of this.”
Literature, Amusement, and Politics in the Philippines
By Lance Corporal X
“You mean smell and taste?!! How is that even possible?”
“I don’t really understand it myself, but they say it’s all quantum superposition.”
“So I was recruited for my sense of smell and taste?”
“Yes and no. Your psionics is off the charts too.”
“Okay. But why Philippines?”
“We don’t know yet. But if you decide to come work with us, it’ll be you and me, and two other guys.”
“What’s next door?”
“That’s the Korean desk, they have like 30 guys working that country.”
“And just 3 for the Philippines?”
“They don’t think it’s priority.”
“But you guys think it is?”
“Some dude 4,000 years ago typed those words (framed on the wall), “The Philippines will be known as the Pearl of the Planet”, on his blog. And just like that the Philippines was put on the map of possible worlds to be prioritized.”
“You mean like Gottfried Liebniz’s Monadology, where he said: there are an infinity of possible universes in the ideas of God, and but one of them can exist, there must be a sufficient reason for the choice of God which determines him to select one rather than another.”
“Exactly, Die beste aller möglichen Welten or the best of all possible worlds.”
“But you’re saying some dude, namely joeam dot com, is God then?”
“We just call him Joe, and no he’s not God but his imagination comes from God so it’s not his idea, it’s God’s. The moment he germs an idea he really doesn’t know where it comes from. It just comes. When he acts on it like writing about it or talking about it, it becomes reality.”
“An infinity of possible universes is germinated via some random dude’s mind, then?”
“It has to be an original idea, but not all original ideas take root. This particular one does or did. We’re just trying to navigate through it now, pruning here and there to help it along. More on that later…”
“I thought orientation was tough, but now you’re telling me some blog is the start of a nation’s rise. I think I’d rather work on space or nuclear stuff to be honest. What are those desks like?”
“All idiots. Most people that wanna promote work those desks. There’s a lot of lawyers working those desks too. If you wanna be a bureaucrat, sure. Have at it.”
“I just wanna do good work. that’s it.”
“Then stay here. Commit to the Philippines desk. I’ll introduce you to our Filipino fanatic, he’s a Marine too, been here 20 years now. He’s always visiting Mango Avenue.”
“I did 4 years in the Marines, then 10 years at the Department of Energy working with ancient alien tech.”
“You’ll definitely get along with him.”
“And the other guy?”
“He was NYPD, real smart too. But got in trouble awhile back for slapping another brother on stage.”
“Call me Molly.”
“I’m Agent H. You’ll be answering to me mostly. Agent J is our direct hire from NYPD, he’s second senior here. and then LCPL_X, you’ll be working with him mostly.”
“Where do we start?”
“This way to the Hylaean flow machine.”
“Hylaean flow from Neal Stephenson’s Anathem, right?”
“Correct. But it actually works more like The Peripheral by William Gibson, only you don’t put anything on instead you’re just inside a room much like that movie Source Code with Jake Gyllenhaal. Then we turn it on and you go way back 4,000 years into the past. Give or take.”
“Does it hurt?”
“Well, ask LCPL_X he’s just coming back from another trip.”
“Hi. I’m Molly.”
“She’s the new blood, Herb?”
“Yup, we’ll start calling her M.”
“Hello, M. What do you know about MNLF and MILF?”
“Mother’s I’d Like to…”
“No! no, no, no… forget it. We’ll talk soon. Have fun in there.
- To see a World in a Grain of Sand
- And a Heaven in a Wild Flower
- Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand
- And Eternity in an hour
You’ll be fine, M.”
“Thanks, LCPL_X.”
“Yeah, that guy’s a real poet. Watch your head, the door’s kinda small. You can sit, stand or be laying down. It doesn’t matter because when you travel, you’ll spend days, months, years, decades there, but you’ll return in the exact moment you left here.”
“Smell and taste. Huh?”
“Precisely, M. The other senses are only impressions of reality. Touch is an illusion, atoms don’t really touch they repel. Sight and hearing are just photons and atoms bouncing around. But smell and taste require receptors to catch stuff. So that’s what you take back here, those memories packaged within smell and taste.”
“Got it.”
“Ready?”
“Go.”
“Welcome back. Where’d you go?”
“December 4, 2024 , in UP Diliman campus, standing just outside Balay Kalinaw, eating fried banana, talking about what ‘unmodified’ and ‘unqualified’ means in COA audit report for OVP. cars and motorcycles were passing by I smelt their exhaust but workers were also cutting a tree, so there was also a hint of that.”
“How do you feel?”
“Like nothing happened, but I have all these memories.”
“Yup, you were inside another person’s consciousness. I think they had set for you a Japanese international student who’s fluent in Tagalog. Were you watching TV or involved in discussion with someone?”
“Discussion, but I was just listening.”
“Good, soon enough you’ll learn to influence them. Like a muse. LCPL_X is really good at it, you’ll learn from him. But remember the best way to nudge is through smell and taste. Ideas will drill down their minds and take root.”
“How does it work?”
“Like I said, I don’t really know the nitty gritty, but if you’re familiar with Split Personality Disorder, people’s minds contain multitudes already. Carl Jung called them Archetypes, but we think Plasma too has something to do with them. This room is made of some kinda crystalline metal of unknown origin found on Europa. It works on pure consciousness or subconscious. Hierarchs we don’t really interact with, task us with missions. They wanted your first trip short and simple. You took in a lot. That’s good.”
“So what’s ‘unmodified’ and ‘unqualified’ mean?”
“I think it just means, she passed the audit. Whether or not Congress will figure out the confidential sources the money was given to or they’ll choose not to instead, since it will be a Napoles situation times 10. MAD Cold War situation. It’s a Mexican stand-off, nobody wants. There’s a good chance they’ll have to sweep it under the rug now. LCPL_X has strong opinions on this matter, you can debrief with him. The timeline I’m responsible for is wider, from 2,020 to 3,030 AD, but during this time is when a lot was lost. For the longest time after, people were speaking Aussie Taglish. No one knows what that is really. But now we’re starting to realize. And why me and 3 others guys will uncover this whole mess, M. We’re close.
So welcome aboard.”
“Thank you, H.”
to be continued…
_________________________
Cover photo from SheSaved.com article “How to Make Fried Bananas“.
The Society of Honor by Joe America 
I can smell it and I can taste it. mmmmmmmmmm… caramelized so good.
Definitely. I’ve also become addicted to green mangos with a touch of salt. Those or fried bananas are frequently our mid-afternoon snack. I haven’t figured out the politics of it yet.
Joe, pinch your nose, take deep dive into the olfactory & gustatory delight of green mangoes with a dab of alamang! Ambrosia Filipino-style. 🙂
Ha, I like it simple, sonny, although my wife likes it complicated. Haha!
one vivid image i have comes from one summer day as I was walking along Carriedo plaza in front of Quiapo Church, mid 1960s. On my way to Avenida Rizal, I happen to meet a European white couple working on luscious slices of green mangoes with bagoong alamang. Their faces in sheer gustatory delight said it all. After passing them I made a beeline to the nearest green mango vendor with saliva welling in my mouth … 🙂
Ha, gustatory recollections run deep!
your green mangoes and bagoong, Joe & sonny, and just having Googled Huichols caused be to remember the routine of Viking bar across from INC church taxi to that BBQ place next to Fuente circle then after having eaten the girls we’ve barfined would demand we get green mangoes and bagoong across the street first before beginning the festivities. so we’d cross that bridge full of homeless kids asking for money to which the girls would pinch me to get me to give money to them, then where that green star indicated is would be the carts with green mangoes. where the sellers would cut it up and add a small plastic bag with bagoong, then another taxi ride to our final destination with green mangoes and bagoong in hand. so green mangoes bagoong has a special place smell and taste in my memory for sure.
Can’t find the political connect except during elections.
https://www.academia.edu/10356557/The_Art_of_Hypnotism_A_Phenomenological_Study_on_the_Experience_of_Budol_Budol_Gang_Victims_The_Art_of_Hypnotism_A_Phenomenological_Study_on_the_Experience_of_Budol_Budol_Gang_Victims
thanks, karl! I can use this. i thought at first it was gonna be about eating together with your hands over banana leaves but its actually about hypnotism which is in line with my current interest, eg. consciousness.
As to the eating with hands over banana leaves I know this is something new, cuz it wasn’t around when I was there (at least no commercially). i’ve read in reddit that this is actually some PMA tradition gone rogue, now people think its Filipino culture.
But I have eaten stuff laid out on table before for all to eat with their hands, but it was with Arabs. so maybe theres connection. though I’ve eaten with hands over there but not communally. i’d be very suspicious as to who washed their hands. and with soap.
How is this related to:
Edgar can enumerate away the interconnections in anything except LCX logic which Edgar will never parse.
Edgar Lores on January 4, 2013 at 1:42 pm
1. Now it can be told: Filipinos are the long-lost distant cousins of the Mayans. The dominant theory on the origins of Filipinos, the Austronesian Expansion Theory, states that Malayo-Polynesians migrated to the Philippines via a land bridge. Pah! How little do they know. Proof?1.1. The Mayan civilisation reached its peak during the Classic period (AD 250 to 900). Note that 900 AD is the end of Philippine pre-history. The date of April 21 of that year is inscribed in the oldest Philippine document found so far, the Laguna Copperplate Inscription. More proof?1.2. The Maya, as we know it, is the National Bird of the Philippines. Therefore we are birds of a feather.1.3 One of the well-know cities of the Mayans is Palenque. And where do we buy our daily meals? Need I say more?1.4 We use “maya” as a prefix to denote some sort of greatness. We say maya-bang to refer to a braggadocio. And maya-man for a Croesus.1.5 We also use “maya” as a suffix. We say ma-maya to indicate our habit of procrastination and our lordship over time.1.6 The Mayan civilization was destroyed by the Spanish conquistadores. And who did the same to the Philippines? No, surely that was not coincidence, that was written in the stars.1.7 Specifically, the Igorots are the full first cousins of the Mayans. Both people live in high places, in the mountains near the clouds.1.8 The Mayans are most notable for their stepped pyramids. Where do you think the idea of stepped rice terraces came from?2. So how did the Mayans reach the Philippines? Well, before land bridges, there were air bridges that could be reached by beanstalks. Yes, precisely, that’s where the story of Jack came from.3. Another background point is that the Spanish referred to us as Indios. Los indios bravos. So both races are also related to the Indian race. No, not the American Indians, the Asian ones.3.1 In Vedic philosophy, maya is the power by which the universe becomes manifest. Sorry, make that plural. Universes or multi-verses.3.2 Maya is also defined as the supernatural power wielded by gods and demons to produce illusions. So there is good maya and bad maya.3.3 The year 2012 was significant for Mayans, yes? It was a good year for good maya and good Mayans and the beginning of the end for bad maya and bad Mayans. We all know who the villains and heroes are.
2. So how did the Mayans reach the Philippines? Well, before land bridges, there were air bridges that could be reached by beanstalks. Yes, precisely, that’s where the story of Jack came from.
well, edgar did write that Edgar Cayce blog and that above though in metaphor/analogy form, is i think plasma consciousness, karl. or collective unconscious. the two i’m sure are connected if not the same. I’d never thought of Jack and the Bean Stalk as this before. very prescient. if not physically, there was I’m sure a metaphysical interaction. as edgar suggests above. more Filipino need to get to know Huichols.
This was a really good, and timely and relevant article, Ireneo. Joe then predates current UFO theories that aliens have placed us on a loop or some sort of stasis state due to our nukes in the 1940s. and why physicists were made to chase the wrong lead in string theory. just to keep us busy. and the Moon landing etc.
I can also use this.
Joe was ahead of his time then.
Edgar can enumerate away the interconnections in anything except LCX logic which Edgar will never parse.
karl, this was actually my first foray into fiction. cuz of Joe’s 2200, I was like oh we can do speculative fiction too. non-fiction is compiling stuff then putting it together like Playdoh of different colors. fiction is a totally different animal I found out. though theres nothing original above, but the Philippines connect was interesting.
I think I’m gonna do more fiction now, but not in this format. flash fiction and prose poetry I’m watching lots of videos on, and I think will do more of that. vis a vis Philippines. short and sweet, meaningful if i get it right. I hope you guys dabble into this too. the process is very different. like something from nothing. and the narrative forming its just a different process.
thanks to Joe for kindling this. good way to process current events (as well as history) too.
This video has an expert on the Mayas answering questions:
Probably, the late PNP Cpl Nuezca was of Aztec, not Maya origin.
Mayas sacrificed defeated warriors, preferably enemy rulers, never civilians.
Probably, the late PNP Cpl Nuezca was of Aztec, not Maya origin.
Yeah, that makes sense. (nice trip thru memory lane too, thanks!)
Aztecs were concurrent with Spanish, but Mayans (though they are still there now today) would’ve been back in the forest by the time the Spanish came. i think.
But Aztecs also took heavily from the Mayans which means they were into psychedelics too: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Entheogenics_and_the_Maya mushrooms and toads specifically.
I wonder how much of that practice got to go to the Philippines. https://www.pna.gov.ph/articles/1225466 cuz maybe authorities there can treat these as means to expand minds there, and not simply as drugs to be legalized.
You’ll need guides and be enclosed or at least in safe setting. and have your eyes closed when tripping as this would be an internal discovery not external. But Joe’s correct in that article, Filipinos need to see
the much wider context of consciousness, see thru all the fog, maybe then and only then will they start voting correctly.
UP Los Banyos should gather thousands of DE voters and give ’em mushrooms on campus and in controlled environments and see if that does the trick. give ’em like P1,000 to participate, make it 3 sessions spaced apart by 3 weeks. and then after the 3 session within 6 months,
keep them coming for debriefs as part of longer studies, see how it affected their lives etc.. I’m sure they’ll be able to get funding from US/UK institutions, Ireneo. peyote and San Pedro cactus too.
here’s some more on Maya and psychedelics.
===
“Various descriptions from the colonial period (such as the Florentine Codex) also describe how enemas were used to combat illness and the discomfort of the digestive tract.
Hallucinogenic mushrooms known to the Maya as k’aizalaj okox was often consumed for ritual ceremonies. The mushrooms were eaten in the form of fresh, non-boiled mushrooms, or as dried powdered mushrooms that contain separate entheogenic compounds, psilocybin and psilocin, which causes the user to experience visual hallucinations. Artefacts called “mushroom stones” also point to mushroom consumption by a Maya cult and are believed to be associated with human decapitation, warfare and the Mesoamerican ballgame.
Other flora such Nymphaea ampla causes opiate-like effects on the user and is known to have been used as a calmative and mild trance inducer by the Maya, while the Ololiuqui plant contains seeds with different alkaloids of the LSD family which gives hallucinogenic visions when ground into powder and then blended into a cacao beverage.
One of the more unusual entheogens employed by the Maya was derived from the skin and the parotid glands of different toad species. 16th century chroniclers document the Maya adding tobacco and the skins of the common toad, Bufo marinus, to beverages such as balché which increased the potency.”
===
Thanks for this socio-anthropo-archeology tract on the Mayas & Aztecs, Irineo; very helpful! My only foray before this was Von Daniken’s CHARIOT OF THE GODS back in1968; Then later on Mel Gibson’s APOCALYPTO.
Welcome. It is also interesting that large regions of Maya territory were like the Mountain province, meaning never significantly controlled by Spain, thus the Maya language and culture stayed intact.
The caste war of the 19th century even had them going against the creole and mestizo Yucatecos, who were located in major Spanish colonial cities like Merida and Valladolid – nowadays their language is recognized and used in public similar to how Quechua, the Inca language, is officially used in Peru.
December 11, 2024 at 2:43 am
Irineo, it was more than once my late sister invited me to visit Machu Picchu. I had to decline: no available time during her invite; that would have been my first trip to So America. Other unrealized invites: Buenos Aires, Sao Paolo, Tierra del Fuego & Iguazu Falls. Now she’s gone; I have the time.
Incursions were all about gold with the 1 or 2 friars to justify (conversion of new peoples). THE MISSION captured the leitmotif of those times & places & motives. The discovery of our mountain tribes by the Spanish is typical. Paracale gold was another instance, whence the fair-skinned Filipinos (my take 🙂 ).
There is a far larger percentage of actually white Latin Americans than white Filipinos. Only Zobel de Ayala and Razon come to mind. Lopezes of ABS-CBN and Roxases are creolized both in appearance and behavior.
Sure, for instance, in Iloilo, there was the colorum type uprising of Papa Isio as well as the mestizo planter uprising, just as the Katipunan andilustrados were different, but it might be that gap is not a chasm anymore. Social differences are still huge, of course.
If it is written in the Maysn tablet that Jojo Bonay will never be president, it maybe accurate after all so I wish it would be written that no Duterte or Tulfo ( still contemplating) will ever be president. Maybe a Binay or two will be acceptable.
The Society of Honor on
Hi, Doc. The point of the article is that the UNA triumvirate is detached from the present reality, brought on by the advent of the internet, a Mayan concept of community enlightenment come to pass, that will reveal charlatans for what they are. The broadening core of informed citizens, plugged in to social media, will understand that it makes little sense to have four top government officials striking a pious praying pose whilst engaged in the breaking of a law in defiance of the State.Binay will not be president. You read it here first. It’s on the Mayan tablet, Monument 6b, that no longer will the people permit the State submit to those who want power for personal gain. The Spanish are gone and the crooks are on the way out.
that no longer will the people permit the State submit to those who want power for personal gain. The Spanish are gone and the crooks are on the way out.
The Mayans do have staying power. Huichols too!
https://tayaupa.com/en/culture-wixarika/ harvesting peyote and making a whole ritual journey out of it.
and where they go to get Peyote:
http://lophophora.blogspot.com/p/geographic-distribution-of-lophophora.html
Filipinos need pilgrimages steeped with meaning like what the Huichols do.
paging, paging, kb… is that just Vitamin D rubbed on scar tissue for better healing or is that some sort of special bandage?
heres another angle for your consideration.
ps. I’ve been minding the scar (as per your mention awhile back) but i’ve not seen it look aberrant til now. either its a see thru bandage or something has been put on the scar, eg. ointment etc.
You mistook it for Philippine Marines’ Boodle Fight. Understandable.
We Navy brats use to mimick that but without the banana leaves and we were less than ten. We mix corned beef and sardines or whatever we find in the kitchen that is easy to cook and we choose whose kitchen or household we would disturb. Hehe
We have a jibe for nabudol but you would not like it: Na-Duterte.
hypnotized sort of or fooled depending on one’s bias or degree of remorse.
LCX
I misplaced or displaced the comment. But you know what I am replying too.
karl, how did restaurants start making boodle fight into a thing though? cuz I remember 20 years ago this whole boodle fight gimmick wasn’t really mentioned now its all over YouTube hell even Olivia Rodrigo did it when there, also over here Filipino restaurants are featuring this for parties and celebrations. cuz they always fail to mention that it in fact is not Filipino tradition but PMA– military tradition. corned beef and sardines is considered delicacy in the bukid province like Hey we have special guests break out the canned goods, lol. I’d rather have that chicken over there! lol.
As to Na-DU30, would it also be accurate to use other dynasts names like Na-Marcos, or Na-Napoles, etc. why the special hatred for the Dutertes is my interest here. Imee Marcos seems to be the great example of loyalty. is she Na-Budol?
Irineo, it was more than once my late sister invited me to visit Machu Picchu. I had to decline: no available time during her invite; that would have been my first trip to So America. Other unrealized invites: Buenos Aires, Sao Paolo, Tierra del Fuego & Iguazu Falls. Now she’s gone; I have the time.
Sorry, LC. reply intended for Irineo.
Buenos Aires, Sao Paolo, Tierra del Fuego & Iguazu Falls.
no worries, sonny. now i have to put these places in my bucket list as well.
Add Reykajvik: looks very interesting and invitingly inhospitable. 🙂
I have been thinking about Greenland alot , sonny and am a fan of Bjork too.
did you know Iceland was the first island US Marines took (though no landings) in their WWII island hopping campaign?
https://www.nps.gov/parkhistory/online_books/wapa/extcontent/usmc/pcn-190-003118-00/sec1a.htm#:~:text=The%20Marines%20were%20deployed%20to,CNO)%2C%20Admiral%20Harold%20R.
https://sfshortstories.com/?p=6827 The Man Who Came Early is about a GI stationed in 1950 Iceland who time warps into 950 Iceland and inspite of speaking Icelandic which has changed little over the ages is basically lost..
It is a bit of a critique by Danish-American sci-fi author Poul Anderson of fellow sci fi author Lyon Sprague de Kamp’s novella
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/94715.Lest_Darkness_Fall which has a professor of Italian and Latin warping from Rome of the 1930s to the 560s and thru his modern knowledge preventing the Dark Ages.
Goes to show how stories beget stories, ideas beget ideas. It also relates to how we should be humble when it comes to trying to change places we think are backward. We aren’t as superior as we might think at times.
Hear, hear, Irineo, LC!
Tropical climate such as our beloved archipelago does have its natural hospitality to tarry a while. Obsidian terrain in the cold does have its mystic attractions. A popular travelogue takes viewers for scuba dive for vicarious exploration of the many riverine fissures of Iceland.
I have always been spellbound watching the voyages of Cousteau & his Calypso crew traipsing over & under the seas of the planet. The Calypso divers entered Palawan’s fabled underground river riding with the waves at the river’s mouth at sea. Earlier at the turn of the 20th century, the American colonial government charted the Philippine coastline for a full decade! I suspect they added their island count to that of the Spanish.
I’ve been trying to write to those guys trying to convince them to do a whole season in Mindanao. selling point was a Gold Rush slash Skinwalker Ranch type show, in which gold is mined but St. Elmos and white ladies etc. etc. keep on sabotaging men and machine from finding gold, the personalities involved would be Philippine ex-military/ex-police and other such types looking for gold from the earth extraction old school California gold rush variety instead of treasure hunt Yamashita’s variety. cuz for some reason theres supernatural activities related to gold, the clue being where theres lots of quartz, gold would be near-by, but with gold nearby so will be white ladies, etc. like a Catch-22. so you push on thru essentially selling your soul to the Devil. thus riches. but with possibility of possession first.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Kingdom_(2024_Philippine_film) BTW is a coming movie about an alternative timeline of a never colonized Philippines – which is “of course” a unified kingdom facing a succession crisis. Stories we tell say a lot about how we see the world. What does a story like that say about today’s Philippines?
I’ll have to check that one out, Ireneo.
Reminds me of…
The rest of the story mostly tells of Roberts’ (unsuccessful) attempts to fit into this society, which begin with him helping to sacrifice a horse by shooting it in the head with his service pistol. Ulfsson is not impressed however, “as the beast quivered and dropped with a hole blown through its skull, wasting the brains.” Matters do not improve with Roberts’ subsequent attempts to repair two spearheads (he ruins them and almost sets the forge on fire) or mend a nearby bridge (he cannot master the primitive carpentry tools). Roberts manages to partially redeem himself by winning a wrestling match with one of the warriors by using his Judo skills, but a further suggestion about manufacturing a cannon and gunpowder are rebuffed:
==================
Reminds me of Outlander, Ireneo. do you watch that show?
I thought the author of the books was Filipina at first,
so far so good, i guess… but these things usually get out of control quick. pay back’s a bitch.
Just file the criminal case already! These media election year stuff type posturings is not necessary. there’s a crime, file the criminal case.
Back from Mayaland, with a lot of olfactory, gustatory, tactile, 360-degree visual and ambient sound experiences stored. The state of Quintana Roo is the only Mexican state with EST, Eastern standard time like NYC. Yucatan has CST like Chicago and most of Mexico.
Didn’t go to Chichen Itza, but the fried chicken near the ruins of Coba, which is just as large and still mostly jungle covered (so cooler), was magnificent.
Mayans of today eat a lot of corn as in olden days, but are not corny. It is hot, but they are chill.
Most in the area Spain never controlled (mostly Quintana Roo) reminded me of Northern Luzon highlanders, while Valladolid in the interior and in Yucatan state was classic colonial Spain of the reduccion, with folk dances remiscent of those in the Philippines on the town plaza.
Cancun was very much the tourist paradise of the 1970s with huge hotels. Tulum is where they force non-Mexican places (Burger King, 7 Eleven, Gulf, etc.) to gray out their logos.
Some Mayans prefer to speak English, a bit like Visayans. Spanish feels more colonial to them.
The street dogs are somehow related to Filipino street dogs. Which way they migrated one can’t ask them as we don’t speak aso. Coconuts came from the Philippines via galleon trade.
Camote and sayote, aka chayote, are from here and migrated to the Philippines.
Tulum Mayan ruins reminded me of the Sicilian Greek ruins of Selinunte in being just by the sea, both certainly impressed incoming traders during their best days. More to come..
Even Valladolid, where natives were not allowed inside (or maybe just during the day like Intramuros before) during Spanish times, just Spanish, creoles, and mestizos, now has bilingual Spanish-Mayan signage in many places. And histories of the “Caste War”.
Tulum has a trilingual school, presumably Mayan, Spanish, and English. An American hadicrafts store owner in Tulum told me it ain’t how it used to be in 1989 when she arrived, presumably as one of the hippies on the beach, but she ain’t going anywhere else.
As someone who last traveled far in 2019, pre-pandemic, the sensory dimensions of really being somewhere else are far beyond anything vloggers can convey, this was really good.
Ahh, terrific. “Big travel” at its best.
“As someone who last traveled far in 2019, pre-pandemic, the sensory dimensions of really being somewhere else are far beyond anything vloggers can convey, this was really good.”
What was the cartel situation like did you hear thru word of mouth and/or tv coverage anything like Sicario (don’t watch part 2 of that by the way) over there?
and what was the psychedelics situation with Mayan natives there cuz their use would predate cartels, are they using mushrooms, peyote/San Pedro cacti, toad DMT, etc.? if yes, do tourists or long time expats get to partake in this Mayan tradition, like do Mayans overtly offer it as part of the tourist experience? and not considered criminal?
Did you get anything from Mayans that would confirm plasma consciousness and or collective unconscious? Am glad you had a good time, Ireneo.
Some Mayans prefer to speak English, a bit like Visayans. Spanish feels more colonial to them.
What was the Mayan writing system scene like, if any? like for instance with hiphop in Middle East I’m seeing more arabic calligraphy but in graffiti format. is there similar in Mayan writing going on?
and, what pasalubongs did you buy for us?
Mayan today is written in Latin script.
As pasalubongs, I have stories and the inspiration Mayan honey will give me.
That’s my kind of pasalubong, Ireneo!