This article is about two distinctly various trips. The first to Costa Rica, and the 2nd to Mexico.
It truly is a clear, moonless evening when we assemble for our pilgrimage to the seaside. I can not comprehend how we are going to see anything in the blackness, but the guide's eyes appear to penetrate even the darkest shadows. We commence walking, our vision adjusting gradually.
We've come to Tortuguero National Park, in northeast Costa Rica, to witness sea turtles nesting. After the domain of only biologists and locals, turtle-viewing is now one particular of the more well-liked activities in ecotourism pleasant Costa Rica. As the most critical nesting site in the western top caribbean resorts, Tortuguero sees much more than its honest share of site visitors. In truth considering that 1980, the annual variety of observers has gone from 240 to 50,000.
The manual stops, points out two deep furrows in the sand - the sign of a turtle's presence - and spots a finger to his lips, generating the 'shhh' gesture. The nesting females can be spooked by the slightest noise or light. He gathers us close to a crater in the seaside inside it is an tremendous creature. We hear her rasp and sigh as she brushes aside sand for her nest.
In whispers, we comment on her plight and the solitude of her job, the lower survival price of her hatchlings due to the fact only 1 of every 5000 will make it past the birds, crabs, sharks, seaweed and human pollution to adulthood.
We are all mesmerized by the turtle's bulk. Though we are not permitted to get also close, we can catch the glint of her eyes. She does not appear to register our presence at all. The whirring sound of discharged sand continues. Soon after a bit the guidebook moves us away. My eyes have adapted to the darkness now, and I can make out other gigantic oblong forms labouring slowly up the seaside in a silent, purposeful armada.
As the chanting reached a crescendo and the incense thickened to a fog, the chicken's neck snapped like a pencil. The seemingly ageless executioner sat on a carpet of pine needles, surrounded by hundreds of candles, his eyes fixed on a brightly painted saintly icon, The guy took a swig from a Coca-Cola bottle, a sign not of globalization, but of the expurgating electrical power of soda due to the fact the Tzotzil individuals feel that evil spirits can be expulsed by way of a robust burp. Right here, within the church of San Juan de Chamula, such faith doesn't seern all that far-fetched.
This is the Zapatista heartland of Chiapas, a lost planet of dense jungle and indigenous villages in which descendants of the Maya cling to the rituals of their ancestors. During the region, the iconography of Subcomandante Marcos, guerrilla leader and poster kid of the struggle for indigenous rights, reveals a continuing undercurrent of rebellion. San Cristobal : de las Casas, one of Mexico's most alluring towns, was the web site of an armed Zapatista revolt in 1994.
Outdoors San Cristobal, the village of San Juan de Chamula is literally a law unto itself, with its personal judges, jail and council. Timeless rituals are unveiled here, the place women promote brightly coloured, hand-woven garments in the main square, returning residence at midday to put together a meal for their husbands, many of whom are shared. Guys can have up to 3 wives at a time, and I'm not certain to be envious or not!! Every year during the pre Lenten festival, maybe the most interesting time to go to, the village's males run barefoot by way of blazing wheat.
4 kilometres from Chamula, San Lorenzo Zinacantan is equally fascinating. Here, the guys, in red-and-white ponchos and flat hats strewn with ribbons, which are tied if they are married, loose if not, launch rockets skyward to stir the gods into sending rain. The women pummel tortillas and weave textiles, constantly with a watchful eye on the sky because a lot of homes have gone up in smoke as a result of rogue fireworks.