Cinco de Mayo, oh SI!!!!

Cinco de Mayo, celebrated in Yupukari. No joke! Mexican food and music HERE! In the Rupununi! Trying new recipes! Trying family recipes!

It started with making salsa with Dad back in August. I posted pictures and Mike mentioned wanting to make it here. Cinco de Mayo finally seemed to be a good time, especially after we found dried cilantro at the supermarket in Lethem (I swear, Lethem is turning into a huge metropolis; Savannah Inn, the supermarket, really has all you need). And THEN, I found my beloved Mexican agua fresca drink, Horchata, in a Tang flavor in GT! I brought some down and we all enjoyed it here immensely, and I found a recipe to try it from scratch. So that got added to the list.

Mike found a recipe for a lime mango grilled chicken sandwich, chipotle style, and we had ourselves a menu! Mike and I planned the grocery list which I bought in Lethem on Wednesday, we started preparations for the meal around noon Thursday (it was conveniently a Guyanese holiday - Arrival Day, which you can learn about in my post from a year ago), and spent the day working on it - so fun.

We had to borrow a blender from Maisie and then we had to use it at CH for the horchata and salsa, but the rest was done at K. House. The salsa was done from memory of how I cooked it with Dad, but I realized you gotta think about what you are doing if you want it to be the carefully orchestrated and flavorful salsa of the Ambriz Clan. It was a mix of orchestratedness and my flighty hand when it comes to cooking, and I think the product was a good compromise of the Ambriz style with a Rupununi setting influence. (The native peppers we used were enough to make your sphincter double-take).

I soaked and cooked black eyed peas to be mashed and become refried beans. The guys got firewood and grilled the chicken outside as I mashed our lone pear (avocado) and turned it into guacamole, as close to mom's style as possible, though I had to substitute paprika as the brown flecks instead of chili powder. Mike downloaded mariachi music, which played in the background and I thought of Papa. As the chicken finished grilling, I retrieved the horchata drink from the fridge at CH (a milky rice sweet taste that goes amazingly lovely with rum) and we gorged. Promptly fell into a food coma after.

Another amazing meal/journey.

The all-sensical flavors of Mexico captured right here in Y seemed to be a wild dream come true. It felt like KC home.


Salsa!!!


Mr. Lime/Mango Mike Himself

Cinco de Mayo!!!!!

Pearls Before Swine

You know that one scene in Independence Day, where the president stands up and gives an impromptu speech to the people at the army base?

"Good morning. In less than an hour, aircraft from here will join others from around the world. And you will be launching the largest aerial battle in the history of mankind. "Mankind." That word should have new meaning for all of us today. We can't be consumed by our petty differences anymore. We will be united in our common interests. Perhaps it's fate that today is the Fourth of July, and you will once again be fighting for our freedom... Not from tyranny, oppression, or persecution... but from annihilation. We are fighting for our right to live. To exist. And should we win the day, the Fourth of July will no longer be known as an American holiday, but as the day the world declared in one voice: "We will not go quietly into the night!" We will not vanish without a fight! We're going to live on! We're going to survive! Today we celebrate our Independence Day!"

That one. And then, they get inspired and come together go and kick the aliens' asses?

What if inspirational and logical words such as these are spoken, but the asses AREN'T kicked? Or worse yet, what if everyone just sits there little crickets chirping? ---

"Yes, behold my lord Ulrich, the rock, the hard place, like a wind from Guilderland he sweeps by blown far from his homeland in search of glory and honor, we walk... in the garden... of his turbulence!"
chirp, chirp, chirp

Are these words worth less? Less possible or valid?

Does the response determine the worth of the words?


Does the anticipated response determine the actual delivery of the words?


Does the belief that what you are saying is pretty damn inspiring, whether or not it actually is, determine it's reception or significance? ---

"You cannot learn from books. *tears out pages from a textbook*
Replace these pages with life lessons.
And then you will have a book that is worth its weight in gold.
I know these are expensive. But the lesson is priceless." - Michael Scott, Dunder Mifflin Regional Manager

Just a little word-wondering.

Language Barriers

I sometimes regret not learning Makushi, the native language spoken down here. I've never HAD to; everyone can understand me and reply to me in English. ESL is trying to be taught down here.

But I wonder - how much more LIFE would reveal itself to me, if I knew the language?

Casual liming evokes Makushi, village meetings change into Makushi, so does church. Ladies' mutterings are in Makushi. Children's retorts are in Makushi.

How much more would I be integrated, know the better way to go about doing something, or understanding why the things are the way they are?

I don't think I should, nor do I want to, fully integrate to the point of becoming someone I am not, but I wish I were more... a member of my village.

Did I just say that?

In a nutshell....

QOTD: "You've just destroyed the only thing I've ever loved. All right, there it is. What do *you* love?"
-"I love poetry, and a glass of scotch, and, of course, my friend Baxter here."

Good to know, Ron Burgundy, good to know. As for me -

I love coffee, the breeze, hammocks and a good laugh (or even a tiny giggle, really).

What do YOU love???

The Green Ibis

Felix says that people believe that when you see a green ibis flying upriver, the river is about to rise, and vice versa - when you see one flying down river, the river will go down.

On the way back from Katoka, we saw one going upriver. Rainy season must be coming!

And....... ACTION!

I was boating up the river from Katoka, thinking “what wealth to me the show had brought.” This, and any river trip I take, I can look at the water and water edge and see fish jumping, caiman floating, turtles posing, maybe a capybara drinking. I can look at the trees and see iguanas basking, birds perching, monkeys frolicking, snakes wrapped around a branch. I look at the tree tops and see birds of all kinds perched, I look in the sky and see birds in flight; swooping and landing, soaring and gliding…

As I take in this magnificent display (that is different every trip I take) with a bit of reverence, this time, a more errant, sarcastic thought passed through my mind: do you think animals are maybe strategically displaying themselves for passer-by’s? Maybe they all have a one-animal show going on, or maybe there’s one big director. They all have roles they choose to play – or maybe it’s a Scenes From a Hat kinda gig, or a rotation. Whatever the selection process, they all have roles, like The Majestic Display, The Startled Retreat, The Docile Indifference, The Playful Interactive, The Statue…

The crane hears the boat coming and thinks to himself, “They’re coming! Here they come! Ok, Majestic Display, on three – swoop down, almost touch the water, make sure your neck is extended…. and land. Pose for effect… ok, that’s a wrap. I think they loved it. I am SO graceful…. Hey everybody! Come and see how graceful I look!”



Then there’s the caiman, with its head poking up out of the water, supposed to play the Startled Retreat role: “Ok, they’re coming, they see me, they don’t know I see them, ok, they see me seeing them, let me give it a second to think about it…… ok, and duck down – smooth like butter, it’s like I’m disappearing into thin air, that was great, just like a magician! Ok, they’re gone; I’m comin’ back up for air.”



The great big neon green iguanas who somehow all seem to ‘coincidentally’ get the Docile Indifference role- though all the other animals are sceptical they didn’t somehow roll the odds in their favour so they could all just lay lazily on the branch of the tree and soak up the warm sunshine and call that work.



I don’t think the monkeys would mind that though, because most of them probably prefer the Playful Interactive role, as they really are good at working WITH the audience and they love to have a good time anyway, even if it means they are a little too attention-seeking.





Certainly too rambunctious for the old granddaddy caimans who generally get The Statue, simply out of their intimidating presence. “I am a goddam prehistoric legacy and I don’t have to acknowledge your presence in the least, you homo sapiens. You just sit there, with your dulled eyesight, wondering if I am a log or not and I will stay here, unmoving.”

Then what about those animals who play The Tease? They must love the power they hold in their hands – strike that: paws, claws or wings - making the humans crane their necks, waiting for long moments, whip out their camera only to put it away because they missed it – only to bring it back out again because of another re-sighting. The jabiru stork thinks “Ooh, here’s a boat coming, I see cameras. Ok, I’m gonna turn my back to them for a few seconds, let them see my profile….. ok, they’re reaching for their cameras, get ready for it… they are focusing….. ok, fly off NOW! Muah ha ha ha.”



Quite a venue for an afternoon matinee. “And now, presenting, Mother Nature’s directorial debut in Rupununi River Drifting, a story of nature and all its eclectic inhabitants accommodating sightseers.”
(all these pics, except for the one of the iguana, were taken by RLI Volunteer - and my roommate - Matt Hallett.)

Random Thought

Do you ever think, that when you're telling a kid to "behave," what you're really telling them is to stop having fun?


I completely recognize that kids need some discipline and structure in their lives - I just don't want to be the one to have to enforce it all.