El Perro Bailarín

Wreaths — Coronas (Día de los Muertos I)

Corona de muertos (wreath) for placing on a grave Full Image

Dancing Dog noted today the first signs that Los Días de los Muertos, the Days of the Dead, are approaching. A large truck was being unloaded of its cargo of coronas de muertos near the market.

Coronas de muertos for sale prior to the Day of the Dead Full Image

Corona literally means “crown,” but in this case is usually translated as “wreath.” Families purchase these colorful, often elaborate works and bring them to the cemetery on November 1^st to place at the head of the grave of their deceased loved ones. They come in a variety of shapes and styles, and can be constructed of real flowers, paper or plastic.

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The ones pictured here are handmade of plastic ribbons and “silk” (paper) flowers in two different towns in the western part of Michoacan.

Figurines — Imagenes

Figurines for sale at the Basilica Full Image

Dancing Dog has a ritual of meandering across the grounds of the Basilica de Nuestra Señora de la Salud (“Basillica of Our Lady of Health”) on his way to morning coffee. Vendors rent space and set up along the walkways along the side and in front of the church precincts. Among them are several sellers of small statuettes who arrange their wares in a kalidescopic hodge-podge that's almost disorienting.

La Sirena shares shelf space with San Judas Tadeo Full Image

An enchanting La Sirena (“mermaid”) shares shelf space with a rather detached San Judas Tadeo (St. Jude Thaddeus). The latter was one of the twelve Apostles and, as “patron of hopeless causes,” is one of Mexico's most popular saints. He’s usually portrayed with a small tongue of flame on top of his head symbolizing the fire of the Holy Spirit received on Pentacost and holding a gold medallion with a profile of Jesus.

D.D. trusts that La Sirena's modest costume needs no explanation, but notes that her surprisingly empathetic face appears in replication on numerous statuettes of the Blessed Virgin Mary also on display at the various stalls peddling religious artifacts. What is it about the slight tilt of the head, the downward cast eyes, the pale skin, the light-colored, almost blond hair that is so appealing in this culture?

Rats! — ¡Ratas!

Ad for Ratifin rat poison Full Image

Dancing Dog notes with sad amusement a story this past week originating from a town in the remote mountains of Chihuahua State. Headlines flashed the world over, announcing the “recruitment” of an army of conscript cats to deal with a plague of rats infesting the homes of townspeople. Reports ranged up to 800 rats per household, up to half a million in toto! In an effort to eradicate the hoards of rats infesting their storehouses, the local farmers began setting poison, which in turn, killed off the cats and other rodent predators.

Wildflowers — Flores Silvestres

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The locals say the wildflower season here in Michoacan will peak in about two weeks. Today, on the drive from Patzcuaro to Morelia, miles of the median strip and shoulders of the autopista (“freeway”), as well as the meadows and corn fields on either side, were carpeted with wildflowers.

Pink cosmos (Cosmos bipinnatus) were especially prolific, living up to their wild origins here in Mexico. In Spanish, they are known as girasol (“turning toward the sun”) or mirasol rosa (“facing the sun”; rosa is “pink”), reflecting their habit of following the sun as it transits overhead.

A carpet of cosmos in meadows along the highway Full Image

From this Texas A&M University site, D.D. learned that Spanish priests who came to Mexico domesticated the wild cosmos for their mission gardens. They christened the flower with the Greek word for “beautiful world-order” (kosmos) inspired by the plant’s radiant colors and orderly arrangement of petals.

Now that we’ve passed the autumnal equinox, the daylight hours are growing noticably shorter by a few minutes each day. Flowering plants that are day-length sensitive like cosmos have also taken notice and are hurrying to salute the end of summer.

Conical Granaries — Silos Cónicos

Conical granaries built by CONASUPO in the 1960s (along the main highway near Huiramba between Pátzcuaro and Morelia) Full Image

Dancing Dog has always been curious about these mysterious structures that appear along roadsides throughout Mexico. Could they be re-creations of ancient Aztec mini-temples? Small jails? Landing beacons for extraterrestrial UFOs? Homes for the Coneheads?

It turns out these cone-shaped concrete structures were built in the 1960s by CONASUPO (Compañía Nacional de Subsistencias Populares or “National Basic Foodstuffs Company”) and intended for use as granaries (silos cónicos, in Spanish).

Wild Mushrooms — Setas/Hongos Silvestres

Wild trompeta mushrooms for sale in the Pátzcuaro street market (with a child's hand to show scale) Full Image

After his morning espresso, Dancing Dog enjoys wondering through the street market in Pátzcuaro. The lively energy and the many strange foods, exotic fruits and weird vegetables are ever intriguing.

But it's still the summer rainy season here, and this afternoon, as it has every afternoon since D.D.'s arrival, it rained. Dark gray clouds moved in from the south and west, followed by large splats on the paving stones in the street, then an hour or so of tropical downpour to the percussive accompaniment of rolling thunder and dazzling flashes of lightning. A nuisance, if one is out and about, but otherwise an entertaining show...

One blessing of all the precipitation is the abundance of edible fungi available from vendors in the market. Today, a couple of Purépecha ladies had lurid orange trompas de puerco (“pig's ears”), also called trompetas or cornetas, for sale. D.D.'s amateurish stab at mycology leads him to believe these are Gomphus floccosus, but supposedly this chanterelle-like species is inedible. A very strong, earthy flavor when cooked; D.D. only took a nibble.

Patita de pájaro (“parrot’s feet”) (about the same scale as trompeta above Full Image

Many more vendors had patita de pájaro (“parrot’s feet”) or escobetas (“brooms”) (Ramaria flava) for sale. Buckets of this stringy fungi, resembling coral in various shades of pink and buff, were lined up on the sidewalks just outside the main market arcade. (Recipes are here.) Both of these mushrooms are harvested from the high pine forests in the mountains outside of Pátzcuaro and brought to the market each day.

Close-up of huitlacoche, a.k.a. “corn smut” Full Image

And then there's the famed huitlacoche, much in vogue these days in “nouvelle Mexican cuisine.” This is a type of fungus (Ustilago maydis) that infects corn kernels. It's regarded as a pathogen among maize farmers in the U.S., where it's known as “corn smut.” But it's considered a delicacy in Mexico. The soft, swollen silver-gray galls are scraped off the cob and sauteed, or used in soups or as a filling for enchiladas, where they impart a distinctive “smokey” mushroom flavor. Recipes are here.

Huitlacoche is available canned in the States, and is rather pricey. Perhaps to polish its smutty image a bit, it's been nicknamed “Mexican caviar” or “Mexican corn truffle.” The two cobs of corn infected with huitlacoche shown in the photo were only 10 pesos in the market. Enough for an omelet or two...

AdeS Soy-Based Fruit-Flavored Drink

AdeS soy-based drink Full Image

Dancing Dog usually doesn't do product endorsements, but this stuff is pretty tasty.

AdeS is a sweetened soy-based drink (like soy milk) flavored with various fruit juices, including apple, orange, peach, mango, and my favorites, guanabana and guayaba. Also “natural” flavor with reduced sugar.

AdeS is widely distributed throughout Central and South America. D.D. believes it was developed by Unilever, but is manufactured by Cocina Productos de Maíz, S.A. de C.V., here in Mexico.

A bit pricey, at 13 pesos (about US$1.10) for a 1-quart “brick” (TetraPak) at most large grocery stores. Also available in “minibrick” packaging. Great for hikes!

Nutritious and all that stuff, and probably healthy, although Greenpeace Mexico claims AdeS is manufactured with GMO soybeans (transgénicos).

Brugmansia — Trompeta de Angel

Brugmansia aurea Full Image

Dancing Dog is enchanted with the Brugmansia that line the courtyard outside his humble casita. Dozens of pendant flowers brazenly drape themselves on healthy tree-size plants. Each white or pale yellow trumpet is about as long as my hand.

At night, their sweet fragrance permeates the still air within the courtyard. When D.D. returns from his evening walks, his busy monkey-mind is often elsewhere, rambling from one anxiety or desire to the next. But blundering into this invisible aromatic curtain immediately returns his awareness to the present moment, a pleasurable little tug inviting him to linger and focus on his surroundings.

Double-white trompeta de angel Full Image

D.D. has always known the flowers as Datura, but apparently these “tree daturas” have recently been assigned their own genus. They are actually natives of the Amazon basin and were transplanted to Mexico and Guatemala during the colonial era as ornamentals. Interestingly, Brugmansia is unknown in the wild. All living forms of Brugmansia are believed to be cultivars, deliberately planted and bred by man, an indication of the great antiquity of their involvement in human affairs.

In the States, the Brugmansia take on the innocent-sounding name, “angel trumpets,” and here in Mexico, they are commonly known as trompeta de angel or floripondio. But the Brugmansia and their cousins, the Daturas and the Solandra, have a dark side. They contain powerful tropane alkaloids such as scopolamine and atropine, and are capable of inducing an intensely violent narcotic intoxication, hence their other name in Mexico, arbol loco or “crazy tree.” In many parts of the world, they are still used as a tool for divination, sorcery, and shamanism.

Looking skyward from underneath Full Image

In Mexico, the Datura are also known as toloache, a word with roots in the Náhuatl language. Their reputed use in witchcraft has entered the language in the phrase, Tú me diste toloache! (“You've given me toloache!”, “You have bewitched me!”), a phrase uttered by a lover in an attempt to explain an inexplicable obsession with another.

Some people report that the plants have a “presence” about them, that one can sense the the plant is alive and has a consciousness, and that the plants seem to “communicate,” not through words, but telepathically, via a mental/emotional connection. D.D. hasn't experienced this phenomenon, but is content merely to enjoy their alluring presence.

More information is here, here and here.

Giardia

Giardia lamblia trophozoite Full Image

Dancing Dog won't go into all the stinky details, but after three days of not being able to venture far from toilet facilities, with plenty of opportunities to contemplate his symptoms, he arrived at a diagnosis of giardiasis.

Giardia lamblia is the most common intestinal parasite in the U.S., and is endemic throughout the world. It is a frequent cause of traveler's diarrhea, and it takes as few as ten of the microscopic parasites in a glass of water to begin a severe case of giardiasis in a human.

D.D. is aware of the dangers of self-diagnosis, but the symptoms were a very close match (a Google search will uncover much more info).

Pfizer brand tinidazole sold under the brand name Fasigyn. About 40 pesos at the local farmacia. Full Image

Fortunately, a cheap, effective over-the-counter treatment is available here in Mexico. Tinidazole (also spelled Tinadazole) is sold here as Fasigyn. Just a single dose is all it takes. The only apparent side effect was a headache (like a mild caffeine-withdrawal headache). Good as new the next day.

In fact, better than new. It occurred to D.D. that, before the advent of modern antibiotics, home treatments for “worms” were common for both livestock and people. Today, we still “worm” our pets on a regular basis, but worming ourselves is not something we give a great deal of thought to. Could be my imagination, but in general, D.D.'s intestinal function has been significantly better after the tinidazole, even before the obvious symptoms of giardia manifested. Perhaps D.D. has been long overdue for a “deworming”...

Tinidazole also kills most amoebas and is regarded as safer than Flagyl for treating giardia. Long unavailable in the U.S., the drug has recently been approved by the FDA for sale under the brand name: Tindamax.

If you're really into infectious agents, you can announce your interest with a giardia necktie from Infectious Awareables. D.D. himself has an allergy to collars of all kinds...

T-Shirts — Playeras

T-shirts for sale near the main market in Patzcuaro. I find the juxtaposition of the bold airbush art, the images of the Virgin of Guadalupe, and the obscene sayings fascinating (Me vale Madre = “I don't give a fuck”).

The t-shirts on the right are for sports teams (top to bottom: Cruz Azul, Club Deportivo Guadalajara, Hidro-Rayos del Necaxa, Club America [all soccer] and Diablos Rojos [baseball]).

Interestingly, D.D. has never seen anyone in Patzcuaro actually wearing one of these. This is a fairly conservative town; these are for tourists.