Translate

A little about Playa Zipolite, The Beach of the Dead . . .

Playa Zipolite, Oaxaca, Southern Mexico, on the Pacific Ocean. A little bit about my favorite little get-away on this small world of ours.

Zipolite, a sweaty 30-minute walk west from Puerto Angel, brings you to Playa Zipolite and another world. The feeling here is 1970's - Led Zep, Marley, and scruffy gringos.

A long, long time ago, Zipolite beach was usually visited by the Zapotecans...who made it a magical place. They came to visit Zipolite to meditate, or just to rest.

Recently, this beach has begun to receive day-trippers from Puerto Angel and Puerto Escondido, giving it a more TOURISTY feel than before.

Most people come here for the novelty of the nude beach, yoga, turtles, seafood, surf, meditation, vegetarians, discos, party, to get burnt by the sun, or to see how long they can stretch their skinny budget.

I post WWW Oaxaca, Mexico, Zipolite and areas nearby information. Also general budget, backpacker, surfer, off the beaten path, Mexico and beyond, information.

REMEMBER: Everyone is welcome at Zipolite.

ivan

Tuesday, August 13, 2013

chill out GENERATION

Buceando en Huatulco con mi Hermano

Amaranth: Another Ancient Wonder Food, But Who Will Eat It? An ancient, nutritious crop might make a comeback in Oaxaca.

Amaranth is harvested.
Amaranth is a broad-leafed, edible plant that some say may hold the answer to improving diet in the world's most obese country—Mexico.
Photograph courtesy Roque Reyes
Brian Clark Howard
Published August 12, 2013
Grown by the Aztecs and then all but eliminated in the Spanish conquest, the ancient crop amaranth may become the next quinoa. Advocates hope amaranth can help Mexicans eat healthier, better connect to their roots, and lessen their impact on the environment. But will people eat it?
Amaranth is a broad-leafed, bushy plant that grows about six feet (1.8 meters) tall. It produces a brightly colored flower that can contain up to 60,000 seeds. The seeds are nutritious and can be made into a flour. Not a true grain, amaranth is often called a pseudocereal, like its relative quinoa. Both plants belong to a large family that also includes beets, chard, spinach, and lots of weeds.
There are around 60 different species of amaranth, and a few of them are native to Mesoamerica. For the last decade, the Oaxaca-based advocacy group Puente a la Salud Comunitaria (Bridge to Community Health) has been working to promote the plant's virtues.
Pete Noll, the group's executive director, argues that his work couldn't come at a more important time. In July, the United Nations announced that Mexico had overtaken the United States as the world's most obese country. According to the report, 32.8 percent of Mexican adults are obese, compared with 31.8 percent of American adults.
"Obesity is a devastating problem in Mexico," Noll said. "Amaranth may be part of the solution. It is a whole, healthy food that can be produced locally, and it may create the possibility of change."
Noll pointed to widespread availability of fast food, urbanization, lack of physical activity, and heavy advertising of junk foods as culprits in the obesity epidemic. As evidence of the devastating effects, he noted a recent media report about a 13-year-old Mexican boy who died of a heart attack.
At the same time, many people in Mexico still struggle with hunger. Some 10,000 children die from malnutrition in the country each year, Noll noted. "These issues are linked: Childhood malnutrition makes people seven to eight times more likely to be overweight or obese as adults," he said.
"Oaxaca has a cuisine that is known worldwide, but it also has food deserts," Noll added, referring to areas where it is difficult for consumers to find fresh, healthy foods.
Nutritious Plant
Amaranth is gluten free and its seeds contain about 30 percent more protein than rice, sorghum, and rye, according to a USDA Forest Service report. It is also relatively high in calcium, iron, potassium, magnesium, and fiber, according to Puente.
"Amaranth's amino acid profile is as close to perfect as you can get for a protein source," Noll said. The plant contains eight essential amino acids and is particularly high in the amino acid lysine, which is largely lacking in corn and wheat, he explained.
"So if you make a tortilla with amaranth and corn, you give people a low-cost, culturally acceptable, healthy basic foodstuff," he said.
Florisa Barquera, a doctor and nutritional expert at the Universidad Anáhuac, Mexico City, and a member of the Mexican Academy for Obesity, told National Geographic that amaranth has been recommended by the World Health Organization as a well-balanced food and recommended by NASA for consumption in space missions. The variety of amaranth consumed in Mexico is 16 to 18 percent protein, she said, compared with 14 percent protein in wheat and 9 to 10 percent protein in corn.
Some studies have shown that amaranth also contains beneficial omega-3s and may help reduce blood pressure, said Barquera, who writes and speaks frequently about nutrition in Mexico but is not affiliated with Puente.

 Amaranth is planted.
A young boy plants amaranth in the San Isidro community of Oaxaca.
Photograph courtesy Alice Stafford

Amaranth's Bloody History
During the pre-Columbian period, the Aztecs cultivated amaranth as a staple grain crop, according to Kate Seely, a co-founder and the president of the board of Puente. But things changed when the Spanish conquistadors arrived.
In addition to its use as a core food crop, amaranth had been used in a religious context. "Native folks would pop the seeds and mix them with sacrificial human blood," said Seely, who is now based in Oakland, California. "They would form the seeds into sculptures and then eat them in religious ceremonies. This was seen as pagan [by the Spanish], so it was outlawed."
Amaranth crops were seized, fields were burned, and those who tried to grow the plant were punished. According to Noll, the locals replaced their former staple by eating more corn.
But amaranth cultivation did survive in a few isolated pockets. The grain lived on in a traditional treat called alegria (joy), in which popped, whole-grain amaranth is made into bars with honey and sunflower and pumpkin seeds. The bars are often enjoyed during Day of the Dead and other festivals.
"What we're trying to do is bring amaranth back into cultivation and consumption," said Seely. "It has high levels of micro- and macro-nutrients that are lacking in the Oaxacan diet, and it is a source of vitamins and nutrients that can help combat malnutrition," she said.
Fighting Birth Defects
Seely first identified amaranth's potential after doing research in Oaxaca in the summers of 2001 and 2002. She and a group of other students were doing research on neural-tube birth defects for the Oaxacan Secretary of Health. The rate of such defects is high in southern Mexico. Seely learned that folic acid is largely absent from the local diet, which increases the risk of the birth defects.
Invited to run educational programs on the importance of folic acid, the students "didn't want to be vitamin proselytizers," Seely said. They looked for a local, natural source of the nutrient, and found amaranth.
In 2003, Seely turned that project into an organization by founding Puente with Katherine Lorenz, who was doing similar humanitarian work in the region. Lorenz is currently the Puente board's treasurer and secretary.
Puente now operates in three regions of Oaxaca, serving three different indigenous groups. It works at the national level on agricultural policy reform, and works at the community and individual levels to convince farmers to plant amaranth and consumers to eat it.
Puente teaches classes, broadcasts on community radio, and runs ad campaigns. The group is also working with a network of some 250 small-scale farmers. Staffers hand out starter seeds and provide training and technical assistance. Puente is also building a regional network of markets to sell the amaranth locally.

 An amaranth cooking demonstration.
A woman demonstrates how to prepare amaranth on a comal, a griddle traditionally used in Mexico.
Photograph courtesy Nikhol Esterás Roberts

Environmental and Cultural Benefits
Amaranth may have some environmental advantages over corn, noted Seely. The plant needs less water to grow, which is particularly important in water-stressed areas like much of Oaxaca. "Amaranth can exist up to 40 days without rain and still produce seeds, unlike corn," said Seely.
Amaranth also grows fast and is easy to harvest, and can help reduce reliance on imported food, said Seely.
Farmers can get three to four times more money for a bushel of amaranth than a bushel of other grains, said Noll. Even so, adoption of the forgotten plant has been slow. Puente estimates that about 200 acres is planted with amaranth in Oaxaca now, compared with two million acres of corn in the state.
"We are at the very beginning of a long journey," Noll said.
Seely added, "The most common response when we started the program was, 'My grandparents used to farm this,' or 'I know this through alegria [the traditional treat].'" People aren't used to farming it today.
Even if farmers are convinced to take a gamble on amaranth, it typically takes two to four years for them to start seeing much production, said Seely. She said it takes practice for farmers to learn to get everything right at all stages of production on their land, from sowing to tending and harvesting. Technical assistance helps, but there is still some trial and error to the process.
Perhaps the hardest step is convincing Mexican consumers to eat it on a large scale. Besides baking the meal in tortillas, Puente encourages people to experiment more with eating amaranth leaves, by putting them in soups or blending them in juices. Puente even distributes an amaranth cookbook.
Barquera says few people in Mexico are aware of the nutritional properties of amaranth. "Why do people prefer corn? Maybe it has to do with the fact that we are exposed to it in many different forms since childhood, and because it is so accessible," she said.
It may also have to do with the fact that amaranth is currently far more expensive than corn, running around $1.50 a kilogram versus 40 cents a kilogram for corn in Mexico. Barquera counters that relying too much on corn has nutritional costs; she would like to see people eat a more varied diet.
Barquera advises consumers to consider choosing products that incorporate amaranth into processed foods like bread, chips, pasta, and even desserts like marzipan and ice cream. Puente tries to distance itself from such products, instead promoting consumption of amaranth in as pure a form as possible.
U.S. Market?
Seely said health-conscious consumers in the U.S. and other developed countries would likely gobble up Oaxacan amaranth, but Puente is "not ready" to begin an export business.
"We're very conscious of not wanting to make amaranth a cash crop," Seely added. "Our focus is consumption within the household, and then whatever is left is sold on a small scale locally."
Seely said she doesn't want to drive an amaranth bubble along the lines of what has happened to quinoa. In Bolivia, high international demand for quinoa has driven conversion of natural areas to big fields, and the price has soared so much that some locals can no longer afford their native food.
In 1977, Science magazine called amaranth "the crop of the future," thanks to its hardiness and nutritional profile. The advocates of Puente hope it will become an important crop of Oaxaca, today, but there's no telling yet if it will take off.
Follow Brian Clark Howard on Twitter and Google+.

Saturday, August 10, 2013

333 Nina Salerosa

Los Angeles immigrant community pushes to keep Zapotec language alive Home | Stories | Politics and Society | Los Angeles immigrant community pushes to keep Zapotec language

Los Angeles immigrant community pushes to keep Zapotec language alive

Home | Stories | Politics and Society | Los Angeles immigrant community pushes to keep Zapotec language alive
 
image
In Los Angeles recently, people from the small town of San Bartolome Zoogocho, located in the southern Mexican state of Oaxaca, honored their patron saint. (Photo by Ruxandra Guidi.)
In an area of Los Angeles heavy with immigrants, there's a movement to keep an old language from a Mexican village alive. The Zapotec language is at risk of dying out by 2050, but it could be saved by people who have immigrated to Los Angeles.

Listen NowListen Now
It’s 6 p.m. on a Friday. About a dozen people gather inside a small office space in Los Angeles — in the MacArthur Park neighborhood, where many immigrants live.
Sitting around a circle, they recite words in Dizha’ Xhon, also known as the Zapotec language.
Aaron Huey Sonnenschein, a linguistics professor at California State University, Los Angeles, is leading the group, focusing solely on the sound of Zapotec words. It’s called the “phonics” method of learning. Sonnenschein adds it's a methodology that linguist Leanne Hinton, a professor emeritus at the University of California, Berkeley, has innovated. He said it works especially well with indigenous languages like Zapotec, which counts few native speakers.
The idea is to avoid the “years it would take to create a full language program and create one as we go along,” he said.
Aside from their Friday night meet-ups, the group in Los Angeles is creating a digital archive on Facebookfeaturing Zapotec words. It also has photos illustrating their meaning and their translation into English.
The web-based, interactive archive is meant for young, English-speaking Oaxacan Americans like 15-year-old Alison Morales.
“My whole family speaks Zapotec,” said Morales. “My grandma would always say hi to me in Zapotec and I didn’t know what it meant. So I decided to learn a few words here and there.”
His mom, Celerina Montes, couldn’t be happier — or more proud.
“I’m really proud to be Oaxacan,” Montes said. “Of course, I’m also proud to be Mexican, and to speak Spanish.”
But, she adds, that with people who she knows speak Zapotec, she always bids them a good afternoon by saying “patir” rather than “buenos tardes.”
In Los Angeles, Montes constantly runs into people from her Oaxacan village, San Bartolome Zoogocho. So, the class is also a place to see old friends, and to get the latest gossip from back home. But San Bartolome Zoogocho is shrinking.
There are only about 400 people left there these days. On the other hand, Los Angeles is home to about 1,500 Zoogochenses.
“Most of us live here. We have a ghost town, basically, at home,” said Odilia Romero, director of the L.A.-based Binational Organization of Indigenous Communities. It’s hosting the Zapotec classes. “If the language was to be rescued, it would be here in LA. But if we don’t do anything about it, by 2050, it’ll be gone,” Romero added.
On a warm Sunday afternoon, Romero and more than 50 other Zoogochenses stand outside a home in South L.A., holding red gladiolus flowers. They wait for the brass band to start playing. Then, they march behind a framed 8-by-11 photo of an effigy of their patron saint, San Bartolome.
The photo is taken inside a home and placed on an altar, surrounded by incense and more flowers. The display is similar to the type of ritual done back in the Mexican village, with the original effigy.
With flowers in his hand, Ted Lazaro says this little procession is one way of keeping his village’s traditions alive. Speaking Zapotec is another.
“To say that you’re indigenous is a dirty word for many people still. It implies that you have no education,” Lazaro said. “But these days, our kids go to school and learn about many cultures, including their own. So now it’s the kids that talk to their parents and grandparents here, and tell them, 'Look, your culture is important.’”
Lazaro is a computer programmer by day. Lately, he’s spent evenings and weekends practicing Zapotec with his children and making traditional masks. On Aug. 24, dancers will wear those masks at a fiesta organized by people in Los Angeles with ties to San Bartolome Zoogocho.
It's something they have done in LA for nearly 45 years.
----------------------------------------------------------
"PRI's "The World" is a one-hour, weekday radio news magazine offering a mix of news, features, interviews, and music from around the globe. "The World" is a co-production of the BBC World Service, PRI and WGBH Boston. More about The World.
Found in:   immigration   culture   history   language   USA   Mexico   immigrants

Bon Jovi - Raise Your Hands (live) @ Sofia 05/14/2013

BEAUTIFUL PLACE! ZIPOLITE


HERMOSO LUGAR!!! ZIPOLITE
BEAUTIFUL PLACE! ZIPOLITE (Translated by Bing)


Thursday, August 8, 2013

playas de zipolite, barra de la cruz, mazunte, san agustinillo, paniqueada, aragon etc..

SASO to perform in Mexico for Oaxaca Opera Festival

SASO to perform in Mexico for Oaxaca Opera Festival

The Southern Arizona Symphony Orchestra is starting its 2013-14 season early with its first-ever trip to Mexico this weekend.
Of course, international touring is nothing new for the volunteer orchestra. Last year it made its second tour of China since 2009.
SASO, under the baton of music director and conductor Linus Lerner, will perform at the inaugural Oaxaca Opera Festival Saturday and Sunday. The orchestra will be joined by a chorus and 16 soloists from Mexico who competed for their slots in the festival.
Lerner, who also is artistic director and founder of the Oaxaca Opera Festival, will lead the performance of selections by Bizet, Donizetti, Gounod, Handel, Mascagni, Massenet, Mozart, Puccini and Verdi. SASO will perform the overture to Verdi's "Nabucco" and the intermezzo from Mascagni's "Cavalleria Rusticana." The orchestra, soloists and chorus will join in for four Verdi selections - "Brindisi," "Gypsy Chorus" and "Matadors' Chorus," all from La Traviata, and "Va Pensiero" from "Nabucco."
The opera festival is part of Oaxaca's fourth annual Festival of the Historic Center. SASO performs Saturday in the Teatro Macedonio Alcalá and Sunday at the Church of Santo Domingo.
Lerner, who left for Mexico last week, said in a written statement that both venues "are absolutely outstanding acoustically."
"The Teatro Alcalá resembles a mix of Carnegie Hall of New York and Teatro La Scala of Milan," he added.
Lerner has led SASO since 2008. The University of Arizona alumnus also is music director of the Symphony Orchestra of Rio Grande do Norte in Brazil and has conducted orchestras, operas, choruses and ensembles in his native Brazil, Bulgaria, China, the Czech Republic, Mexico, Spain and the U.S.
Contact reporter Cathalena E. Burch at cburch@azstarnet.com or 573-4642.