There's this indigenous tribe of people from Chihuahua, Mexico called the Tarahumara. Maybe you've heard about their running ability? They're capable of running great lengths of distance in their primitive sandals made of tire rubber, a hundred miles or more, and Tarahumaras recently set records at the 100 mile Ultramarathon distance. They are among the most poor people on earth, eating a diet of beans and tortillas three times daily, a diet largely donated in two ton truckloads by an American foundation, for the Tarahumara have been stricken by a nine year drought that has almost halved portions of their population.

I learned all this a few days ago, when my new neighbor, SueEllen the Angel Talker, invited me to go see the Tarahumara perform native songs and dance at one of the eleventy-billion healing centers a stone's throw from my seated ass.

Ordinarily, I don't like to participate in this kind of thing. It seems so condescending. They parade the natives out, and everyone oohs and ahhs at their primitive native clothes, and asks the interpreter condescending questions that make the questioner feel "global" and "caring" and don't really do much to bridge the monstrosity that is the cultural gap between the American and the Tarahumara, though the native politely answers them, and at all times it is so apparent that we Americans are piggish assholes who have everything, while people like the Tarahumara have nothing.

I repeat: We have everything. All the stuff. The Tarahumara have nothing. No stuff.

But I'm new in town, and I figured, why not? I miss boobs. Maybe there'll be some boobs in attendance. Shallow, but whatever. I've gotta be me.

The Tarahumara trio consisted of a violin player (who makes his own gorgeous violins, though he can't play them very well), a guitar player (who was amazing), and a dancer who wore around his ankles, strings of dried butterfly cocoons which were filled with pebbles and sewn up, so that the strings rattled like the rain. The players would play a song that sounded not unlike La Cucaracha, or the Mexican Hat Dance, and the dancer would shuffle in circles with rain around his ankles.

They wore pirate shirts, colored red and orange. The interpreter explained that they had picked up the puffy shirt trend when Cortes came to their villages, and it became "a classic," for they continue to wear it today. I guess when you can barely put food in your kids' mouths you don't have much time for trends. Shortly after, the Jesuits came to the villages, and the Tarahumara adopted Catholic ceremony, which they twisted to their traditional religion, replacing the content and the sacramental wine with their home brewed corn beer. Sometimes, the Catholic church sends food and a bishop to their villages to make sure they're still part of the flock, and sure enough, there are the faithful Tarahumara, enjoying the body and blood of a deity no Catholic bishop has ever heard of in a language Catholic bishops thankfully can't speak.

You have to like anybody who fucks with Catholics, don't you? I know I do.

But these poor bastards. They played and danced for all the rich, white hippies--who coincidentally drove Subaru Outbacks, exclusively, all of which had dream catchers hanging from the mirrors, as if any of us needed another dream to come true. The violin player lost three kids to starvation last year, and he was pleased as shit to be playing for us. He was the eldest of the three, and he sort of ran the show. The other two looked to him for guidance. He would begin sawing at the violin for a few bars, getting the tune right, and then the guitarist and dancer would join in the song. He never looked at his violin, not once. I can assure you this is difficult. I played that infernal squawk stick for almost ten years, and rarely, if ever was able to look away from the neck to finger it properly, but then I was obsessed with accuracy. He didn't seem to care about accuracy at all. He was in the moment. He had huge eyeballs, almost all black--like olives, like my Heeler--and his face riveted up into a topographic map that suggested the presence of thousands of previous smiles, a map accentuated by the force of the violin at his chin. He smiled at me many times. I liked him, and I wanted to give him all of my money, but there was the problem of me not having any.

I could make him a web site, I honestly thought. That's pretty stupid, Erin. What use does he have for a goddamned web site?

When they had finished playing, the interpreter was asked what the Tarahumara liked most about America.

"The food," he said, quite sure about his answer. "They love Chinese, and 'Pipza.'" Excellent selections. Refined palates among the three gentlemen. "They've each gained thirty pounds a piece while traveling through America." The crowd giggled. Bellies shook. Let's face it: the food is good here. Not a lot of starvation.

A hippy--bald and graying, with a braid of some sort down his back--asked, "Do they feel sorry for Americans? Do they think we're shallow and superficial?"

The interpreter asked the three men to answer the question. They whispered to each other, and then consulted with the interpreter in their native tongue, which sounded not unlike Spanish, clever Tarahumara, assimilating without actually assimilating.

The interpreter said, "They don't think we Americans have everything. They think we have nothing, and they feel most concerned for American women, who have to be so much like men."

The crowd made that confusion noise, or "Blurrrffft?"

"They say that our God is very deficient. They are sorry for that. They say our God is missing its female parts, and there is much wrong between men and women here. Women must think, every day, 'I am a servant,' while men must be like the God. There is great imbalance and so much is missing for the women."

And so here's a potent example of the importance of the immaterial. While we all sat about in the best, wicking, fine-feeling, trendy clothing, with Pipza digesting in our well-defined stomachs, a Subaru Outback waiting to take each of us to our well-appointed homes, we were suddenly made very aware of how little self-esteem, connection to one another and the world itself we possess by three men in sandals made of tire tread. Men who sometimes don't eat. Men who lose children to starvation look at our lives and find them severely lacking.

I bought a Guatemalan Tree Frog Spirit Log and chatted up SueEllen the Angel Talker, till I had to excuse myself to piss out four dollars worth of Cappuccino. It was while trying to find the bathroom of the healing center that I wandered into the break room and found the violin player pouring himself a cup of coffee. He waved to me, and I waved back, suddenly quite aware of and embarrassed by my very masculine attire, my confused soul, my selfish life as a boob-obsessed woman with no mate, no understanding of the world and no children to care for. I felt pretty naked; bad naked.

"Adios," I said, backing out of the room self consciously, wondering if he knew what that meant.
"Adios," he replied. Smiling.

Isn't it funny how I was worried about the natives feeling bad for themselves?

Posted by The Bunny at 11:05 PM

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