Sunday, March 18, 2007

Staying Well in Mexico

"There is nothing equal to wearing clothes and eating food." Zenrin Kushu

The long interval between entries is due to my 4 day stay in Las Latas, way up in the Sierras, followed by a still ongoing bout of traveller's diarrhea which incapacitated me for several days. Read about the trip to Las Latas in my next entry, On the Road Again, but for now let me reflect on the joys of eating food and having your body do what it is supposed to with it!

Well, it took 10 weeks in Mexico before Montezuma took his revenge on me. I have travelled many places around the world and this is the first time I have been struck by the dreaded traveller's diarrhea. I am always pretty careful about drinking boiled or bottled water when I travel, but other than that I eat what the locals eat. After spending over 2 months, buying and eating local foods -- cheese tamales and atole de avena in the square in Matehuala, tamales de frejoles from Dona Bertha in Wadley, champurrado and gorditas or chocolate and pan dulce in Real, helado in Catorce -- and cooking and eating sopa de arroz, quesadillas, aguacate, tomate and other veggies, often eating whatever we could find on the road, and after 4 days eating the food that Masauke and his companion, Linda's, co-madres provided in the Wira community of Las Latas, it was after we had dinner at our first 'good' restaurant, a seafood restaurant in Zacatecas, that I was struck by the bug.

Ah, as Zenrin Kushu says, there is nothing equal to eating food! After a night of projectile vomiting, when I really couldn't tell what was coming out of which end, I spent the next 2 days of not eating food and kicking myself for only bringing preventative remedies and nothing for treatment. But of course, I never expect that I, Ms Healthy, would get sick ... that only happened to other people, not to me ... I always do the preventative stuff, the good old oil of oregano and olive leaf tablets, blue green algae and vitamin C and never expect to get sick.

I had a very brief bout with the vomits one day about 5 weeks into my trip, but Dona C, the healing centre's caretaker, had soon fixed me up with teas of estafiata and ohasein, two very bitter local herbs widely used for stomach problems, followed by a limpia with a raw egg, to remove the mal ojo, or evil eye, that Dona C suspected was the cause of my sudden illness. Dona C's reading of the huevo that time confirmed that indeed I had been zapped by the dreaded evil eye. Whether it was the herbal teas that cured the vomits or the limpia with the egg that removed the evil eye I will never know, but certainly by the next morning I was fine. This time it was not so simple.

I had learned how to do the limpia with the huevo to check for evil eyes, so, in between running to the bathroom and lying prone for lack of energy, I did the pasos on myself.. Voila, I thought as I broke the egg and dropped it in the bowl of water, expecting to see more evidence of mal ojo than there was last time, since by that time I had been sick for 3 days instead of only a few hours the time before, but, though I had learned to read the 'easy' cases, I still was a novice at the egg trick, so the complicated picture before me was too much for my sick, tired and unskilled brain to interpret. But, the Spirits are kind... only minutes after I sat down baffled by the egg in bowl, Dona C showed up to check in on me.

Masauke and Linda had gone off to Real and I was alone at the healing centre. Dona C stopped by just in time to pour over the bowl and inform me that indeed there was no mal ojo this time! Well, could it be something so ordinary as regular bacteria, maybe a little amoeba or two, how terribly mundane for me who never gets sick, to admit to being stricken by a common microbe and not something infinitely more interesting, something from the realm of the world of spirits. Well, this time it seemed that the mundane world had won out. The next morning when Dona C came by again, she chastised me for not remembering to drink the herbal tea and marched me off into the desert to identify the two herbs that we needed to make the tea.

We walked down a dry river bed, where there was a bit more moisture than most places, I was looking all around not seeing either of the herbs, as Dona C began to say, look down, look down. I am sure she had spotted the tiny herb long before and was tired of waiting for me to see it. Finally I saw the small sprig of estafiate she was referring to and later another small twig, enough to make the tea she assured me. The ohasein, I had completely forgotten how to identify, though I had spent an afternoon with Dona C and one of her daughters identifying local medicinal herbs about 6 weeks before. Dona C took pity on me and pointed out the second plant we needed for the tea. Heading back to the healing centre, she boiled up a batch, and though it did help in the short term, it did not completely cured the runs.

What to do, Masauke was waiting to make sure I was better so that he could drive back to San Antonio to drop off Linda who had spent a week with us, those adventures are to follow. If I didn't get better, I would be alone at the healing centre, with the runs and none of my usual natural remedies. But, the truth is I was still expecting that my preventative measures would work sooner than later and that I would be fine to head South to the Purhepeche pyramid for the Spring Equinox celebration and to visit with La Guardiana again, while Masauke and Linda headed North to Texas.

What to do, what to do, I consulted the spirits of the desert, asking them before I went to bed on Thursday night whether I should go to the pyramid or stay at the healing centre. Two of the guardians of the healing centre, both teachers of Masauke who have now pass over to the other side, appeared to me that night, but neither had an answer to my question. As I woke up I had three prophetic dreams, in the first I was riding on the back of a dolphin, the second I was watching a group of models that I was about to give a class to when their chief instructor told us all to 'walk this way', and as I was waking up someone whispered, the Ottawa School of Nursing. Well, what kind of mumbo jumbo, is that message, I thought. I was certainly no clearer about what the answer to my question was.

I was feeling much better for the first time in days and joined Linda and Masauke and spent a wonderful day with a collective of women who make natural granola bars in Las Margaritas and visited Dona Domitila, the local curandera and her family who live close by, more to follow in later episodes, I returned to the healing centre and so did the runs! So, what to do what to do. I posed my question to the spirits again that night, but this time, at Masauke's insistence I asked whether I should go north to Texas as well as the other options. After, packing all my bags to prepare for whatever answer would come, I spent an almost sleepless night with the return of the runs. I had not a single informative dream. Disappointed, in the morning I asked the spirits for guidance, we already told you the answer to your question was the reply I received. It was only during my morning meditation that I realized that they had indeed replied before I had asked the question. Walk this way, Ottawa School of Nursing = Go North, Young Woman! It was not an option that I had given them at the time I had asked the question, but the answer was clear.

So, with as little pouting as I could manage, and constantly repeating the phrase of the Great Master, "not my will, but thy will be done" I gave up my plans to head off to the pyramid and caught a ride with Masauke and Linda back to the land of health food stores and holistic remedies. And here I am, chowing down on Acidophilus, colloidal silver, bentonite clay and other wonderful natural remedies for diarrhea. I had forgotten how much of a health food junkie I was until I stepped into the Whole Foods Store and saw all the aisles and aisles of options. I did not miss the traffic, the big houses, new cars and SUVs, but boy, did I miss big health food stores! A synchronistic meeting in Whole Foods with Miranda and Mario, the only two other people of the Spirit that I know in San Antonio, reassured me that I had indeed listened to the directive of Spirit. So here I am waiting for Spirit to guide me on my next steps on my journey. ...

Lessons learned: 1) Eating is such a joy. You never really realize how much until you spend a few days not eating! 2) Always be prepared ... whether it is to follow the directive of Spirit, or to treat diarrhea. 3) The mundane world, the world of microbes and bacteria, deserves just as much respect as the world of brujas and spirits ...

Stay Tuned. StayWell, and Travel with Spirit, Spirit Traveller.

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