sabbatical sheila

The Sonoran Desert

2010-07-15T10:27:00.000-07:00

flor del campo

2010-06-28T11:00:00.002-07:00

I would be remiss if I neglected the main hurrah of my sojourns into the desert, the flowers. It is easy to notice the noticeable, the majestic cacti in this arid terrain, but this spring ride was full of El Nino blooms. The high chaparral and its blooming tansy and incenso created allergy havoc with the cowboys. They resorted to using bandanas as face masks and stuffing their nostrils with tissues. To my mind they looked like sneezing ningas with machetes.

Botanizing is a way of life on the trail. The locals know the names of plants, mostly based on whether they are malo (garbancillo) or bueno for the animals. Luckily for me we managed to slow the pace in the process of pointing and talking about the growth all around us.

For tea we located wild mint in moving water, and I picked tiny berries (drive by style sitting in the saddle), called frutia, which sounded like a word worth eating so I did.

On a few occasions I have been treated to the sought after and hunted wild chiltepin; a staple on every ranch table. These diminutive palate pleasers are best ground in small containers and sprinkled on the beans or cheese, or better yet goat stew. The taste is fiery, but I attempt a few each meal when they are offered. By late season, the supply dwindles, and some cowboy will set out to the stomping grounds to collect, carefully dropping them in to a bottle, as many as the bush will bare. Have a view at this web site I enjoy reading called Sabores sinfrontaras.

Sabores sin frontaras

You will see the effort going into saving and collecting seeds in desert regions. You can learn about events in the borderland, namely Arizona.

where there is music ( mexico)

2010-05-20T10:04:00.000-07:00

Here in the desert joyful subtleties, like a patch of singing frogs holed up in the bottom of the canyon, hold me captive. The truth is resident amphibians can’t compete with the brawny vocals of the living legends, the vaqueros of baja, who are guides and daily companions on our mule trips. There is even a song about the cowboys of baja in English. You can find it on the DVD called Corazon Vaquero. The other morning we sang the chorus on the trail below rancho Guadalupe. The guides all know the song. They should know it; they are the movie stars in the film about ranch life and 200 year old traditions in the mountains. Many visitors to the famous cueva pintada sites have been interested in ranch history for some time. The system of guiding in the World Heritage Site, organized with support by the government (INAH), and the existence of remnant adobe mission structures and indigenous history has prompted many americans to spend enough time in the mountains (researching and playing) to subsidize their existence. The movie, made in 2008, highlights the unique characteristic of the people who populate the landscape in the sierras which I have grown to love.

On a recent spring ride, called Eva’s Annual, these very guides sang ranchera musica into the night. Eva’s favorite is You are my Sunshine and she submits her requests nightly (the original Spanish version, of course). Teddi, a baja lover in her own right, brought her guitar and brought me to tears with a soulful folk song about the region.

In a different mountain range to the south, the Sierra de Guadalupe, we were treated to a 6 day ride into an expansive valley of mesquites. We camped in a stone corral above an arroyo and met a family with a boy who wants to be a tocadora. His exposure to the world is through a radio with dedications and announcements offered each day from faraway Guaymas. He is ten and he has memorized a corrido about the latest hurricane called Jimena that not only stormed though the mountains creating wider arroyos, but dumped giant guejibos and palms on the Pacific side of the peninsula. The winds and rains stretched northeast hitting the Mexican mainland where some famous group wrote the song. He entertained us with the song played on his homemade guitar.

Here is some info about the history of Mexican corridos found in the Cowboy Encyclopedia, by Richard W. Slatta, 1994.

"Because vacqueros were illiterate, they left few personal records. Some vaquero folklore passed into Mexican Corridos. These folk songs have eight-syllable lines, with the second and fourth lines rhymed. Regional variations are legion, for example, the Huasteca variant often includes cowboy yells (gritos de vaquero)."

Listen on youtube to a new song... Los cenzontles

La malaguena

2010-05-12T21:01:00.001-07:00

The Huasteca music is not common where we travel, yet the yelling part is lively and it is my favorite. Here are the lyrics to a familar Huasteca song, from a different region in Mexico. I have heard it plenty, and reportedly it is in the Huapango style, dating back to 1820’s. I’m still looking for the words to the new corrido about Jimena that our ten year old host sang for us in the Sierras.

Que bonitos ojos tienes
Debajo de esas dos cejas
Debajo de esas dos cejas
Que bonitos ojos tienes

Ellos me quieren mirar
Pero si tú no los dejas
Pero si tú no los dejas
Ni siquiera parpadear

Malagueña salerosa
Besar tus labios quisiera
Besar tus
Labios quisieraMalagueña salerosa
Y decirte niña hermosa
Que eres linda y hechicera
Que eres linda y hechicera
Como el candor de una rosa

con tus ojos me anunciabas
que me amabas tiernamente
que me amabas tiernamente
con tus ojos me anunciabas
ingrata me traicionabas
cuando de ti estaba ausente
cuando de ti estaba ausente
de mi pasion te burlabas

Malagueña salerosa
Besar tus labios quisiera
Besar tus Labios quisiera
Y decirte niña hermosa
Que eres linda y hechicera
Que eres linda y hechicera
Como el candor de una rosa
Como el candor de una rosa

Si por pobre me desprecias
Yo te concedo razón
Yo te concedo razón
Si por pobre me desprecias
Yo no te ofrezco riquezas
Te ofrezco mi corazón
Te ofrezco mi corazón

where there is water ( Mexico)

2010-05-11T09:57:00.000-07:00

It is not easy to explain my utter fascination with all things in the desert. Part of the charm is the access to clean fresh water in a drought prone land with less than 9 inches of rainfall annually. The Baja Peninsula itself is one of the longest in the world; a rocky place isolated by sea water and and often abandoned because of the limiting factor of arable land.

The joy of it all is that I get to swim in the noonday sun !! I get to hear the chorus of the spring peepers at nightfall, and I gleefully fill my canteen from a little straw sticking out of a crack in a wall on the sunnyside of the canyon below some wildly impressive pre-hispanic art.

Water is the essence of life and roaming the canyons, on hand-crafted paths, will always lead you to or away from a water source. You encounter pilas, posadas, tinajas, epresas, oases and functional acequias or canals built for the pleasure (or pain) of the Jesuits during a 70 year period of occupation. In many places today miles of mangera lead the way to the next huerta. They are black tubes transporting water to the corrals: an example of one of the many systems that still supports life in a place many call hostile and rugged.

Read what was written in 1866, by explorer J. Ross Browne, after the last of the missionaries gave up on the land and the people.

"All the vegetation visible to the eye seems to conspire against the intrusion of man. Every shrub is armed with thorns; the cactus, in all its varieties, solitary and erect, or in twisted masses, or snake-like undulations, tortures the traveler with piercing needles and remorseless fangs. Burrs with barbed thorns cover the ground; the very grass, wherever it grows, resents the touch with wasp-like stings that fester in the flesh; and poisonous weeds tempt the hungry animals with their verdure, producing craziness and death. Add to this the innumerable varieties of virulent reptiles and insects that infest those desolate regions in summer; the rattlesnakes, vipers, scorpions, tarantulas, centipedes, and sand-flies; the rabid polecats that creep around the campfire at night, producing hydrophobia by their bite; the scorching heat of the sun, and the utter absence of water, and you have a combination of horrors that might well justify the belief of the old Spaniards that the country was accursed by God."

Nubian Texas

2010-04-05T09:49:00.000-07:00

It is big in Texas but there is no place named Nubian. On my way to the annual ARARA (American Rock Art Research Association) conference in Del Rio I toured the west in a yellow beetle. I visited the Alamo in San Antonio with brother Jay and family and I attended a Nubian vault-building workshop with Adobe Alliance in the Big Bend country of West Texas. This was vault building with the most basic materials. You can create an earthen roof without the use of any type of form. No nails, no wood, no metal parts at all. Of course the walls were already finished when I arrived making the job of creating a vaulted ceiling in a week easier.

The vault, a series of mud-brick catenary arches, literally goes up in mid air. We spent time chipping away at the adobe bricks and placing them upright. Always looking up created this fill in the sky feeling. Each day we created more roof, more shade, more miracles. The bricks stuck together upside down. What a trick!!

The patch of blue became smaller by day. After lifting and placing and chipping for hours at a time it was clear something was just not sitting well. By the last day we were forced to knock it all down. There was a budge on the outside and that created a wave. The look was lovely,but the structure wasn't. Some in the group simply hated the whole idea and to say the least there was not a smile on Simone's face at all when she realized her detached attachment technique for this stage of the project ( She already has masterminded a house and a dome guestroom) was not working. I found pleasure in the destruction. I was attached to the learning process as opposed to the product and the act of taking it apart was as systematic as putting it up was. Attempts were made to save each 50 cent block of adobe, and well, I had fun.

If you'd like some big Texas sky and a earthy project, this would be the place to go. Simone Swan studied with Hassan Fathy who is no longer alive but some say she is the authority on adobe dome and vault construction in the USA. For more info about efforts in the past to shelter the masses you should read this Hassan Fathy’s “Architecture for the Poor”.

Gracias, Si ! (Mexico)

2010-04-04T13:59:00.000-07:00

Just a word about being in baja california. This is a place serious about coffee time. It goes beyond the actual drink into a realm meaning time to have coffee, la hora de café. You shouldn’t miss it if you are invited and invited we were. It is what you do in the sierras.

If you are on a horse, in a truck or on foot, and if you pass a ranch you had better check to see if anyone is home because they might want to have coffee with you. It means come in, sit in the shade, or stand around the open fire stove. It means dump a load of sugar in the hot cup and eat the tortillas and queso fresco hidden under a brightly embodied panuela. It means talk, chat, laugh a little and listen in the background to the radio airwaves broadcasting little bits of news across the repitadoras from one arroyo to the next. It means how are you and it can happen any time of day.

I had a hard time refusing the coffee call. Real hard to say no and not totally polite to refuse but when that coffee comes around with the New Year’s day buenulo, you’d be smart to say “gracias, si”.

The other great coffee tradition is café de chiva, or cowboy coffee. We had ours prepared on the side of cliffs or on rocky porteros by the one and only Chente, the masterful trailblazer, mulero, sportsman, singing cowboy with hands the size of a grizzly. He can bang out coffee faster than starbucks. It’s the purest, thickest mountain mud I’ve ever had. In the end you do spend time spitting out the loose grounds, but who would have guessed the seriousness fashioned to this man of the mountains when it comes to coffee time.

“Café?…Gracias, si!”

A look at San Borjitas Rock Art

2010-04-02T20:44:00.000-07:00

To see the real thing, in true color, you should visit the site near Mulege, called San Borjitas, off of Highway one. Short of that just click on the image to see it larger.

Pits not to FAll in

2010-03-04T13:08:00.001-08:00

My most recent travels in North Carolina got me stuck in a one-room airport with the TSA opening 2 weeks worth of dirty clothes while searching for the shampoo I had left in the ditty bag. He located it and then examined all my things; even spoke to me about the tea tree oil soap. I'm not kidding. I now know his wife uses it. He spied my seashells and sand and asked about the beach. My bra and undies were dangling in plain sight. Ughhh, I was dumbfounded and could barely utter a response.

The other unfortunate tidbit of the travel part of life was the woman with the dog. She sat down with the tiny mousy dog in her lap and held it there for the 5 hour flight to Charlotte, NC. She told all who could hear that she had a doctor’s note, and those who were not in earshot flagged the attendant and asked why this woman was allowed to have a pet and peevishly asked how they too could do that, bring their own pet on board next time. A bunch of whining ensued. The woman with the disability got lots of attention. Perhaps that is was what the doctor ordered.

Beyond all this, traveling to places is really boring, as in not fun, when you are flying. I should mention the two minor mishaps I had at the airport and the one breakdown on the road. On that same trip to the east coast I had boarded US Airways in SFO but sans Droid, my new telephone i.e. smartware device which was plugged in at home. I frantically called home with a payphone card when I finally found a pay phone. I waited some, and called again and ended up leaving messages for Jon.

The plane boarded on time and I settled in to my seat and like a winged love note, an attendant asks, “Are you Sheila,?"

“Yes” I responded while she handed me my phone.

Then she informs me she will wait until I call my husband on the phone. Stunned I was feeling as if we were in reality TV and from a distance all were watching my hero Jon make the great race against time to prove his love and concern for me. I was safe and sound with my Droid and he had driven all the way home (with a stop for coffee) listened to the messages, got my phone, returned to SFO, parked the car, and wrangled a counter person ( thank you United) into hand delivering my Droid!! Phew. If he wasn’t such a hero I’d have deleted the whole event.
And of course there is the tire. We have a trusty 1998 4runner. It gets rave comments whenever we travel the backroads. This past Christmas eve, on our way to el capintero, the left front wheel just gave out. It was a thud, and it felt as if we hit a pothole. The deep in the desert road we were on was one of these one-way only deals and we were straddling the middle, on an incline. Stuck. Hard to believe, but after a few attempts from our rescuers (two hours later) we simply left it there, unloaded our belongings, and proceed to the ranch for festivities. The truck part we needed was broadcast on the radio and a local from Mulege, passing by, delivered it to the side of the road so our friend Chalito (a visiting fisherman/rancher) spent a few hours fixing it. So here we have yet another hero (the Toyota and our friend). We owe you one Chalito!

Flying High

2010-03-04T13:00:00.000-08:00

Last year I bit the bullet and am now a proud owner of a frequent flyer credit card. My statement claims that I can boost 58,000 miles after receiving doubled credits for the promotion. I’m working hard for those miles (remember mine is a travel sabbatical) so I’ve decide to do a little running total, which will include driving time, but exclude mule, swimming, boat and hiking miles. I’ve started the calculations from my trip to Tanzania so the summer trip that started in July 2009 to New York and the UP won’t count.

20,000 SFO – Dar es Salaam, Tanzania flying (plus boat rides)

2,060 SFO- Mulege, Baja CA, Mexico round trip driving (plus mule ride)

1,060 SFO- Mexicali, Mexico round trip driving

600 SFO- Zzyzx, CA round trip driving

2,500 SFO – West Palm Beach, FL flying

607 West Palm Beach,FL – New Berne, NC flying (plus boat ride)

2,560 New Berne, NC – SFO flying

588 Rosemond, CA driving

This is one traveling fool with nearly with 30,000 real time miles in 6 months, averages to 5,000 miles per month, which doesn’t bode well for my carbon footprint even if I don’t do plastic.

Hunting with strangers (Bay Area)

2010-01-21T13:55:00.000-08:00

Jon and I have been hunting for edibles all season and just yesterday we were alerted to some blewits under the cedar lined parking lots of a nearby school. I didn’t enjoy that foray, there was too much trash, and signs of disturbance, which is exactly why blewits are popping up, because they can, because it has been cleared and is free of duff.

It occurred to me today that on a recent foray I had been hunting, in a foggy forest, with strangers. Hunting with no target, nothing goal driven, and as Terry S. (the trip leader from the Mushroom Society of San Francisco, MSSF) who posts weekly trips claimed, no promises. The mushroom hunt was more of a rambling. For me it was pure freedom. We set off of the path to wander under the fir, and madrone and like neon road signs in a unlit forest we noticed polypores galore, and just past the firs we discovered an edge habitat with shrimp Russulas in distinct stages of maturity.

Each fungi offered an opportunity for Terry to unearth the Latin name, the meaning behind the names and reasons to look for a stiff chalk like stem or a staining red or yellow mark. After investigating you soon realize that you don’t do ALL the tests for all the species, just the ones you may confuse with look alikes, or in the case of edibles, the undesirables. So the Cortinarius were out, the Suillus slimy, the Polypores were trailing on the logs; some cedar, some pine, and we sat in the sun drenched meadow in Marin for my first picnic of the year, albeit, minus mushrooms, with a few strangers.

I recommend hunting with strangers. There is no commitment, no race for the prize, and most importantly, no cleaning and cooking necessary.

Oh to Ride the great Mules ( Mexico)

2010-01-13T12:08:00.000-08:00

Scenes from Christmas ( Mexico)

2010-01-12T20:24:00.000-08:00

Animals in the driveway

the young , green one

sunrise on Christmas morning from the back, waiting for warmth

(?)Que Hago? (Mexico)

2010-01-11T09:23:00.000-08:00

There I was, high on the slope of yet another canada, being led like an infant uphill. Our mule guide, Chente ( whom I’ve decided to call 'el oso' because of his massive hands), was towing me. He was on his horse and had a machete in one paw, and loaded rifle attached to his saddle. My tow-rope was in his other hand. He called my macho a lazy Mexican and yanked as hard as he could as we traveled in a switchback fashion ripping past towering cardon cactus, and a few thorny biznagas.

The tricky part was the prickly brush and palo adan in my face not to mention the joy of redirecting the beast left when Chente was really pulling the rope straight above me. There was no up, only curve after curve with the stubborn animal stopped dead after each hump. Somehow it collapsed, my macho, face on the dirt and body stuck in a hole. Chente missed the cue to stop. I yelled “Que hago? Que Hago?”. Chente seemed to tell me (all in Spanish of course) to stay put. He claimed the animal only wants to stand. I was unsure, but I had no real place to go if I did get my feet out of the stirrups and my legs out from under the thick layer of leather called armas and butt off the saddle. Actually getting off didn’t appear easy. I was not stuck, but I was fatigued. There was no panic in his eyes and beyond my yelling and heart pounding all was still. The mule straightened up, Chente mumbled a few words of encouragement and we were back in motion again; trudging uphill to see the next cave with pinturas repustres in the Sierra de Guadalupe.

It only looks easy (Mexico)

2010-01-11T08:58:00.000-08:00

This is an on going course. Every year I make attempts to learn the art of tortilla making in Baja California and my friend Delia is an expert at all things. She marvels me with her skills and grace. At home I have my very own comal, and palo, yet inspiration seldom strikes. Improvements in this arena are unnoticeable yet my documenting efforts have reached youtube worthy status . This was a fine batch of thin ones. The ranch had a crowd for the holidays. I challenged the youngsters to make a few and the 17 yr old son displayed great talent. The day before we made New Year's day bunuelos (a royal pain) and ate them with the morning cafe.

Sheila makes Tortillas
	2 min 26 sec - 14 hours ago Sheila makes tortillas at Rancho Carpintero on New Years day. www.youtube.com/watch?v=ISKCksj8y9Q

Shamba/Baobob house building update!!

2010-01-10T09:51:00.000-08:00

I left Tanzania with the house not yet finished but everyone was geared up to finish the walls, both inside and out. Here is a picture of a big work crew on one of our last days.

BEFORE: sent from Teri in December 2009. Arches for doorways and windows are complete, now all are awaiting the roof. Maybe 2010!!

AFTER

2010 New Year's update from Kyle... interior firebrick walls visible and cap placed on walls. You can see the half wall for the outside, graywater shower system started. Im not sure how the design will work in regards to privacy. We simply had buckets and used banana leaves for cover. Oh the long lost days of air drying!

(If you want the real details..click on the link on the right that says Rotary Club Sideshow)

BACK in the BAY (California)

2009-12-07T10:15:00.000-08:00

Don't eat these

I'm back in the bay area in time for fungi fun!!. The Mycological Society of San Francisco's annual Fungus Fair always has a display of freshly caught mushrooms and we joined a foray led by Bill Freedman to make a sizable contribution to that display. We got the golden key to enter the Crystal Springs Reservoir terrain and found bundles of the usually suspects under leafy oak and madrone. Most showy were the deathcaps but later this week we had a nice batch of boletes and have spent time harvesting California blue mussels from our favorite rock. One bucketful is about the 10 pound limit. The chore is the "debearding" job that Jon gets to do. If he is equipped with special gloves it goes smoothly. We made some nice meals with that one collection. Too bad our annual fishing license needs renewal soon.

You should eat this one

Bagamoyo -In and out of town

2009-11-16T18:17:00.000-08:00

Im home now. Just have a look at what I am missing; a bunch of friendly faces, happy builders, and fun in town and on the road!!

cowson and moogey beer

georgie porgie puddin in pie

Say Nzuri

Kyle with his hands full

More news of the project and other images coming soon!!

A GOOD HAIRDAY ON THE FARM

2009-11-14T11:17:00.000-08:00

Today is a fine day to take off my hat and go to the hairdresser. Wish you were here.

Learning curve-- week5

Well, I finally did it. It is not quiet basketry, but it is weaving. The women folk gather papyrus and make mats. I had a marvelous teacher, Mos, or mama Rama. I’m not skilled enough to start the weaving on my own but I can say I enjoy every part of the process. After posing questions (in general showing eager interest in the best I understand you -you understand me non-language full body communication I could muster), she gleefully dusted off her mat which was inside on the wall. This, by the way, is the only Tanzania house that I have entered. I think she said she wanted me to actually take it home as a gift, but the tears welled up in my eyes and I left the house before she could take it down.

To split the fibrous veins she used a knife and then cut each blade into 4 strands, leaving two attached. They served a function later, when they were woven. The halves were held in place, near her hands while she wove until she needed new material, thus saving the step of picking up new pieces from her lap. Thank you Mos for your kindness and for calling me your rafiki (friend).

niceness

2009-11-13T14:50:00.000-08:00

I watched last evening from the high perch of the tenant house as a handful of kids returned from the citrus grove with oranges tucked in their clothing. We sat on a mat and they filled the void between the fiery sun and the shadows. One by one each kid peeled an orange. The orange (which was green) was hard skinned and required peeling and then cutting, then sucking and a great deal of seed spitting. The part I found woefully painful was the waiting. There was only one machete, but each child waited and there was no frenzy, nor need to distribute pieces fairly. The little ones watched until their time came. By then the old boss kids (10 years as opposed to 4) would help. I was touched by the lack of demanding it took and scared watching these babies with a giant machete navigate a tiny round orange. In the end it was no big deal.

It has been weeks here in Tanzania and I’m just getting the hang of how to eat the oranges. These days, with 40 or so citrus trees at our fingertips, I am less then motivated because they are pithy, full of seeds and sour. I lend out my knife often, and do relish the fluids, yet nothing to get too excited about.

Luckily we have the gardener- turned- watchman to assist with gathering. On most nights Mr. Afunday (well that is how it sounds) sits poised with a borrowed flashlight (darkness finds us at 7) reading his bible. He speaks about praying, God and going to church. This man is our orange hook up as well. He finds us oranges in the cover of darkness, so I never really can figure which direction to walk in for potentially superior oranges. He somehow climbs the tree, and later peels a few oranges for our enjoyment, while we are busying ourselves for the evening.

It is such a simple gesture and a welcome choice for an after ugali and mchicha meal.

Farm food for beasts and builders

2009-11-12T21:50:00.000-08:00

Feeding the fuzzy bunnies stems of mchicha

Our daily meal..swahili sized mounds of ugali

baby duck but where are the eggs??

Our favorite dish made with fresh coconut milk!!

From Bags to Blocks ..Bagamoyo week 4

2009-10-31T14:03:00.000-07:00

One kaput wheelbarrow, one hammer, and a handful of nails and we are building a house!! The sandbag foundation is complete. It is to be an earthen house made of stabilized earth blocks or compressed earth blocks ( CEB's) as they are called. We are attempting to use mostly materials found on the site, and that means sand from below the topsoil and clay from the termite mounds. There are no trees, save for a few large mango so who really needs nails anyways? Each time we need skilled labor Elke goes through the same process of explaining the need to reduce the amount of cement in the mix. They can hardly believe it. We have reduced it by 1/3 of the typical amount needed to make cement blocks. Yesterday we spent time testing the various blocks made with the new block press donated by Earthrising.

Here are the samples showing the ratios. sand :clay: cement.

Beyond the main mission of building with a limited amount of imported items, we find ourselves stuck with super crummy tools. There is a limit to the usefulness of items brought to the property where we are staying, where we are creating a mini eco-village. The tenant farmers don’t contribute much to the waste stream, but those visiting do, us included. We bring building supplies and things from town (mostly beer), as opposed to things you can grow or things gathered from the land, like green bananas. During the last workshop a wheelbarrow was purchased and when we located it, it was patched but functionless. Which seems to be the method, put it aside for another use. This barrow had a pulley- system created since it is impossible to move when it is full of clay or sand, and it is designed in such away that you need to stay lower so as to avoid rutting into the sand, a two-system team. The Pacifica Garden Club from California donated eighty dollars ( thank you) to this project and I used it to purchase a new red wheelbarrow. I went for the top of the line (not much of a choice here) and put it to good use hauling sand to the site. Additional tools are always welcome but the real chore is in fixing the broken shovels. After one week of use look at Bill, the fixer man, working his magic with a dull machete.

The earth is rising in Tanzania (Bagamoyo week 3)

2009-10-26T01:05:00.000-07:00

Outside my tent, spitting distance away, is a field full of green machicha. It is the one and only green veggie visible in these parts. A leafy plant similar to spinach. It gets watered daily and the hose is wrangled between our tents predawn ever since the day our gardener turned into the night guard. We are sleeping in the shade of the future office for the Baobob home, a natural building created from cob with a palm thatched roof that looks lovely but still needs some tweaking.

The earth is rising here at the shamba. The wind blows in a predictable direction each day (southeasterly) and it is full of dust. Initially, because things were not in place for construction of the second building we chipped away at the lime based plaster which made thick fortress for the termites. At times dust blew in our eyes but we chipped away with trowels, machetes and broken bits of tile. The cob underneath is dry now, but the new buildings will be a challenge and Elka, mistress of problem solving and tireless bagger has reconfigured it. I'm anxious to see how the compressed clay will be placed and she is masterminding how to purchase a machine to have on site.

We have spent days moving the earth/sand - shoveling, sorting, piling, bagging, and tamping it all into the correct place. The focus is on the earthbag foundation. Putting sand in bags is seemingly simple, yet this is not so. Each load needs a mix of cement,clay sand and water. Each 50 pound load bag needs to be hauled to the other side of the building, and individual bags need to be plopped in place without spillage. And about 500 bags later we have just filled in the tunnels that were dug. We sweat and rip our pants on the barbed wire that lays on top of each layer, but we trod along with help. The Tanzanian volunteers do a giant chunk of the labor in the intense heat and we put in long days until these clumpy, back breaking, arm wrenching bags are ground level. Yes, it is all done with only one hammer, a level and a line of string!!- an impossible task without you Boys from Baobob. Asante SANA!!!

2009-10-05T07:38:00.000-07:00

Tanzania..week one

The quandary of 'who made that?' circles daily. In the Tarangerie National park, where large mammals reside, disrupted only by the need to follow a source of water in these dry times, I'm stuck looking at the poop. In the books they call any leavings from animals stoop and I childishly laugh at the 'stooppoop'. The dusty floor is covered with all matter of dung. Think of zoos, think of cow farms, think of trying to track an animal in all of this. And look closely and ask in wonderment who made that? Here are some choices: to help you along:

Elephant,

giraffe,

baboon,

mongoose,

waterbuck,

water buffalo,

antelope,

wildebeest,

giraffe,

zebra ,

warthog, or lion.....

Both the caves and the park have earth-trodden, dusty, dry floors. My direct contact with Tanzanian animal poop, aside from photographing it from a safe distance, is what I call a small sacrifice for love. Endeavoring to photograph every painted rock in the Kondoa region has led us to a few enormous sites. These big boulders were once (no one can say for sure when) slabs for ancient artists/healers. So above, under, and around these rocks we climb. My new task (well not totally new) is the oh so important and dignified job (remember I am on sabbatical) of being
the sign holder and scale placer.

Hidden underfoot I sit, squat and scramble in bonefide, African, rock hyrex shit (sorry no pictures). You can see my earnest effort to be still and await Jon's orders. The best moments of the tour are when somebody else takes over when I fain faint, or limp with a stubbed toe. In the rock shelters the red images of all these animals, and elongated people with mushroom heads, baffle us daily. 'Who made that ? ' is predominate in our minds at the dinner table during our specialized camping safari.

Tanzania week 3..Zanzibar Island of spices

Today was the first day without a guide, driver or armed guard. Most everything we have done in Arusha town, the World heritage site in Kolo, Tarengerie National Park and Arusha National Park has been with high fees, and mandatory guides. You begin to feel unsafe ( but all is really calm around us) when you need to pay a Maasi guard with a machete to walk you 20 minutes to the river to see monkeys. The idea is to employ people, yet here it is difficult to access the beauty around us with our being safarified...But now here we are in Zanzibar. Set yourself free in Zanzibar. We have found our way to a fine powdered beach teaming with bronzing Europeans and white sand. For ten bucks we rented a double kayak and paddled to the north tip of the Island to see the surf break on the reef. The coast is jam packed with orderly, idyllic resorts juxtaposed with thatched roofs and billowing curtains. We paddled for three hours past unattended canoes, outriggers, sail dhows (all wooden) and a few snorkelers. I saw a flying fish and a handful of dolphins not far off shore. This is the first thing we have done, in our 2 weeks in Tanzania, which I could actually recommend to some one and guess what, it didn't require a guard! This freedom will be short lived since tomorrow we are aiming for the fabled spice tour in Stone Town. Oh, I just realized I had better save Jon from the swath of unaccompanied Italian women lingering near his hammock. No guards required here.

The Nibs are Packed

2009-09-10T21:27:00.001-07:00

I’ve weighed my bags, two fifty pounders. I’ll be paying 50 dollars for an extra bag. That is $1.00 per pound. Like the cost of what, organic carrots perhaps? My quest will be to unload all the items I am dragging with me. How do I unload it? Who wants them? I’ve got seeds, books, shoes, snack bars, plastic balls, and those dam pen nibs. Yes, I said pen nibs. If I indeed find a home for them then I will rest in peace. Really. Today they have changed my view of writing. At least the chore of writing doesn’t seem like “cursive cursive” anymore. Alas, I can say this because I have a year off and when I teach I never teach penmanship anyway. I teach keyboarding (thank you Mavis Beacon).

Now, I’m bringing 20 boxes of 141 nibs to Tanzania, and nobody asked from them. They asked for nail clippers, pens, globes, shoes, sheets, and Parmesan cheese, but not nibs. Well, I never get what I ask for (does my sabbatical count?), so these folks will get Esterbrook school medium firm nibs. Like it our leave it.

"Put your pointer finger..

2009-09-07T22:27:00.000-07:00

...on the equator," I told the boys.

I didn't have time to say much more about my trip as I rifled through the enormous reading selection housed in the mediation room on the second floor. Liam was reading and Shane was smiling with a wet head. "We are going on a two part journey to Tanzania. See if you can find it, 'cuz it is there where I'll have my next swim", I yelled as I left.

Actually, I was thinking about tsetse flies and bug nets and weighing my bags each day not swimming. I get 50lbs per bag, and I'm hoping to use it all. I have a tent, a pad, powerbars and wetones, and I've frantically making art. It is a portable type of art and I'm thinking I can share some of the pictographs from our trip to the sierra de Guadalupe in (Baja California) with our future friends in Arusha, Tanzania. I started with making patches for backpacks and now I'm framing little pieces of cloth with pine needles and bark(riveting isn't it Jack?).

So, two 50 pound bags for what?? First we will be heading to the "bush", as Seppo calls it, and visiting sites near Kondoa. A well know place in the Rift Valley full of pictographs of people and animals. Reports of vandalism have reached our ears, and we know how faded images get, but it takes seeing it, and we are ready. Jon is armed with cameras and battery packs and his secret weapon, dstretch. We are leaving everything up to our email correspondent John Cavallo (Rock Art Conservation of Tanzania) . He is researching and documenting the sites, and lucky us, we will be joining him.

Part two includes a visit to the coast, to a place near Bagamoyo. I've signed on with Earthrising to create a natural, sustainable, home. This project is the passion of our leader Elke Cole, a builder/architect living in an eco-village in British Columbia. She is incredible talented and I've decided to join the group for 6 weeks.

That is all I know. I've been told the beer is 2 bucks a bottle and that there is a great place for Indian food in Arusha. The big T......... is still a big question mark????

Start counting..week one

2009-08-21T15:45:00.000-07:00

I began counting my weeks when school let out in June. Then I stopped, or the days simply escaped from under my barefooted feet. After awhile I would just make up a number. Now it is real. I am on the real week one. My friends have drifted back to West Portal for a few days of hubbub followed by a year of teaching without me and I'm spending my days collecting berries and chanterelles in the wet north woods. Yes, berries and mushrooms!!! Jon proposed a hike to find the beavers, and we managed our way through cedar swamps and bogs to look at a pile of sticks in the rain. The delight was in the getting there. We were shoulder deep in ferns and under a canopy of maples and low and behold berries. Crimson little gems. They were not hidden they were just dangling there in the drooping wetness of it all. Jewels.

This was a place unlike any berry patch I had ever encountered, not like the Himalayan berries of the coast, cascading into the Russian River. (Those hairy little beasts were discovered when teacher friend Debbie and I paddled to the Guerneville bridge and back this summer. ) They are not at all like the blackcaps of New York, where long-sleeves and armor are required to tackle the brambles and the bees. It was field, and meadow, and gully after gully of dripping red raspberries like I have never seen before!!

And to top that off, I moved a leaf only to uncover a bush, right next to the thicket of berries, blueberries. Tiny, easy, tumbeelina sized blue balls trickled into my hands and into my mouth.

Oh, I have never been so unprepared for berry picking. We managed to get a few mouthfuls, a few handfuls and then we needed room for the golden chanterelles we had spied near the car.
I prepared a North Woods meal, complete with brats and no mustard. Truly delicious!!

into the clay

2009-08-17T19:07:00.000-07:00

I'm into the primitive thing and ever since the passing of our summer program along the Mighty Onesquethaw, (circa1999) I’ve been outta sorts, disconnected. Luckily for me, hubby Jon (pictographs) is an old flint knapper and rock art hound. This means we spend hours searching and documenting ancient sites with pictographs and petroglyphs. We keep our noses to the ground for flakes and rock aliments. I do get my fix. I find mud and fire and all sizes of hiking trials here in California each spring, summer, winter and fall, but nothing like the freedom of an open field, a woodlot, a riparian area and a few stonewalls during a New York heatwave to remind you what it’s all about.

I’m reminded of long “upcreek” walks where we unearthed crayfish and slid on limestone slides. We lifted moss from the creek’s pools and draped our hot bodies with green bikinis for fashion shows. The days were sweltering, so any excuse to stay soaked was fine. Often we took the newly formed blonde clay from the curvy banks and pinched pots only to discover animal tracks covering our creations the next day. For refreshments we picked blackcaps and wild onions and declared ourselves worriers of a firebreathing clan. And on the those few fortuitous, yet still steamy afternoons, we searched for the mother of all snacks, a watermelon we had left floating in the shady depths of the creek, near the old Sycamore bridge. We did everything.

So, at one point this year Joann and I decided a substitute was needed. We found a place with life, a history and a person with natural charm. This is how we met Priscella Queen of the Desert. I liked her first off. We talked on the phone and she provided an unsolicited weather report. I relayed one back. This was going to be the place for Joann and I to have our little rendezvous, the one no one gets invited to. I was excited for the workshop (3 days, but we missed one). We coiled and recoiled the micacous clay mined on ancestral property in the Galestio Basin in New Mexico.

Priscilla’s (www.priscillahoback.com) pots were all cured and ready to be fired in a pit and each one survived the process with special black cloudbursts embedded inside and out.

I learned that it is all about hand-building and structure. Joann’s pot clasped (which only means she should get one of mine). Someday I want to actually cook with mine. The clay casserole styles are popular but I’m thinking about outdoor fires and cooking in the adobe or cob oven just like our wondrous host Priscilla did for the final day’s feast.

DArjit it!!

2009-08-17T15:17:00.001-07:00

This is the stuff. It is the bomb (ww w.darjit.com). Having never attempted any 3D work, and certainly having no experience with cement or concrete (oh, well I did spend a summer jiggling the side of pools with Steve the pool builder), means this is a gigundo learning curve for me. I made mushrooms some posionous some edible and all made out of darjit.

Others had very clear ideas of what they wanted and they created large animals and birdbaths, and even a butterfly chair. TFace made a water/splash sanctuary for me. She used our specially hand collected oh-so -long- ago shells and now it sits outside and she has returned to her college bike riding art school life. And me..well stuck in Fogland.

Teresaface

2009-08-17T15:12:00.000-07:00

She arrived clutching a largish balljar. It was wrapped in red rags and a towel. She had had it on her lap on the plane from Minneapolis to SFO. She told me we had collected them on a beach in California when she was little and now there they were in my kitchen. The shells were varied, non- descript, yet clearly not store bought. It was to be part of the art project, part of the mosaic in the sculpture she wanted to design on the weekend. We were getting ready to take a class with a funky arty material call Darjit at the Mosaic Institute of Art in Oakland.

I can smell it

2009-08-04T22:16:00.000-07:00

It really does happen. Close encounters with marine life right outside my door. Have a look at me and my playmates.

not moving yet

2009-08-04T09:09:00.000-07:00

You can hear them first, before you see them, since it takes a great force to make the little white plane/birds lift off the base. And then they click, and click some more. You can stand around and wait. It is a smelly place and there is wind, but it takes a bit for lift off.

That's me. I'm waiting for lift off. Freedom has its own challenge. Choice. I'm responsible for all that happens during my escape. My list grows and time shrinks. Im not really moving yet. Just like this gadget I discovered at Fort Mason. Even the winds of the afternoon couldn't make them fly. They are rated to move at 15 miles per hour and up to the top bar when it reaches 25 mph . I'd like to try it...I hope I'll know when I am at top speed.