Caleb in Mexico

I’m hoping to keep this blog pretty concise so you’ll enjoy reading it. I’ll try to intermix my stories, my reflections, and my discoveries so that you get an idea about what I’ve been up to and what types of things I’m working through now. January 3rd, 2008 we departed Austin, TX for Mexico City for a month-long “cultural immersion experience” as part of our M.Div program here. Some of the goals for our trip were to get more comfortable with speaking Spanish, learn more about Mexico, and gain some first hand experiences to carry with us as we think about ministry. This trip was a requirement of my seminary program, and a prerequisite for our theology class concerning “Mission.” Josh and Marilyn, fellow seminarians, were also part of this little adventure.

This song was on the radio ALL the time. Good thing I already liked it before we got there!

I really love music. This is not new, not to me, not to you, not to the Austin area libraries. My folder of Spanish music had been embarrassingly meager. How is it that I know more about music of Finland and Turkey than I do about Mexico? How is it that my favorite band is from France, my favorite singer Israeli, and yet I only know a few artists south of the border? Well that has all changed. haha. There is a thriving informal economy in Mexico that enabled me to sample many popular bands and find some great new music. I’ve included some of the songs throughout this blog, check them out. I knew that my suspicion was correct that Mexican music did not always involve a trumpet and accordion, but I didn’t have much to support that hypothesis. It turns out that Mexico has a recording industry that, in many ways, casts a wider net than ours. I searched and found Mexican pop music, Mexican rock music, and Mexican folk music. As my parting gift for my host family I left them a CD I made of various country-western songs of which I approve. Music is a great way to start the conversation; it proves that you don’t need to understand all the words.

This was one of the my new finds!

Mexico City is HUGE. I can’t really describe it, I don’t have anything to compare it to. For the first few days we joined seminarians from across the U.S. at the Lutheran Center in Mexico City. (Here’s the website ) Basically it’s a place where Lutherans can come and be reasonably within their comfort zones and still get some meaningful interaction with our neighbors to the south. I pretty much hated it. I didn't come to Mexico for another cultural "intinction" (as a fellow seminarian put it); I came for an immersion. Things I loved: Meeting and hanging out with fellow seminarians, walking around a lot, easing into Mexico. Things I detested: Being herded around, ice-breakers, unbalanced presentations and pretending that I was being immersed. I’ve been to Mexico before, but only the border towns. Mexico City was much closer to realities that I’ve encountered before (Hutchinson, Chicago, Oakland, Austin, Be'er Sheva). We visited some impoverished parts of town, but mainly we did some introductory sightseeing, and heard lectures full of material that I considered to be a bit biased. I like footnotes, I like handouts, I like knowing where statistics come from, and I like hearing the other points of view. However, I did feel like Kim, the director of the center, was a little more diplomatic than I remember from the summer. Maybe that’s because some of the other seminarians had backgrounds in law, business, and theology. I think if we’re going to have some meaningful interaction abroad we have to quit demonizing groups (e.g. Wal-Mart, Coca-Cola, The Catholic Church) in situations in which we are not directly involved. I really wished I had brought my laptop so I could do my own research....I did as soon as I got back.

You can see my caption by clicking on the photo. There are about 60 photos in all, so it won't take you too long. To get the full slideshow experience click here The big version is much better.

For a lot of people the language barrier is insurmountable. I know I have a fondness for languages that many do not share, but my philosophy is that if the culture is ok with me messing up- then I’m fine making mistakes. How else will I learn? So I spoke…a lot. I’m not claiming any sort of proficiency, but I did manage to overcome that hesitancy that many people have about Spanish. I guess I just really like Spanish, I think it’s a gorgeous language. I also learned as many bad words as I could fit in my head. When my teacher asked why I wanted to know them I told him, “I’ve gotta know what people are calling me!” To think that 6 months ago I probably couldn’t construct a single sentence, and now I can understand most of the news on Telemundo…I’m doing pretty good. Maybe I should have written this whole blog in Espanol? naaa, I just started the Subjunctive.

One day I was sitting on a bench in the city square in Cuernavaca. It was dusk and the square was pretty empty. No one was within at least 20 feet of me and I was enjoying the personal space. When out of NOWHERE, a giant crowd of teenagers descend upon me! They just surrounded me, sat by me on the bench, and started setting something up 2 feet in front of me. I'll be honest. I was pretty freaked out. They were dressed like punks and speaking too fast for me to understand (although no one was talking or even acknowledging my presence on the bench). Then they started dancing. Break Dancing actually. Before I knew it, I had my own personal "Step Up" happening right in front of me. It was insane and exciting. One kid introduced himself to me, his name was Maurice, he spoke pretty good english, and told me that they do this a lot. He learned english from our music (which is how I'm learning spanish)...but he had a question. "What does "get sprung" mean?" he said. I told him that it had a few meanings and explained them as best I could. I don't really know what "get sprung" means. I haven't been in middle school for a while. Then I had to leave and meet up with Josh, but not before deciding that people are usually nice and I should try not to freak out when sporatic break dancing happens near me. haha.

Take a little tour through the Cetlalic Language School where we studied for three weeks. Here is their website

The next three weeks were spent in Cuernavaca, Mexico. This charming city is about 30 miles southwest of Mexico City. I didn’t know what to expect there because all I knew about it before the bus stopped was that lots of rich people from Mexico City (who could afford to) lived in Cuernavaca on the weekends. Cuernavaca is known for a few things, weather – being called “land of eternal spring”, language schools –which is why I was there, and being generally progressive and a bit artsy fartsy. Having just spent my first semester in Austin, these three characteristics made me like this city so much. We got to see some beautiful and some heinous parts of the city. I like being exposed to both. In the city square there’s a McDonalds, Burger King, and Domino’s among many local venues. I explored ALL the time. If we had an afternoon off, I went somewhere. I got a map and literally went to town. It was awesome. I surprised myself at how quickly I felt comfortable there.

Years from now when I look back at this January, I’m reasonably sure that my favorite part of the experience will have been the people that I was able to meet. From the Lutheran Seminarians to the other Cetlalic students, to the people who helped make it all happen. I really enjoyed everyone. Going to a small seminary can be difficult sometimes because there just aren’t many of us. In a lot of ways this was the most social interaction that our tiny group has had in months. So what about our trio? How did we fare spending a whole month within arms reach of each other? I think we survived. Josh and I got used to each other’s idiosyncrasies without any fighting. Marilyn kept up with us just fine and while she is still recovering from some painful leg/back issues, she’s been a real trooper. It’s nice to have other people to kick around my thoughts with. I hope to be able to see some of my new friends in the future, either here in Austin or in their cities.

The second week we got to translate some songs. This one was particularly beautiful. Its about the Invasion of the Bay of Pigs from the other side.

American's like to have some space in between one another. Usually more than Arms' length. I prefer a little more. Turns out...no such thing in Mexico. I touched a lot of people. Thousands. I'm sure I looked pretty funny on the crammed bus or subway -- at least the first few times. Unexpected bonus: It didn't stink at all! I also like to make up little games sometimes. I made up a few good ones over the past month. My favorite being the "use a funny voice to translate for someone else" game. When things are getting tense, a good way to relieve stress is to translate for someone using a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle voice. Try It!

Our home-stay family is a somewhat different matter. Don Tito and Mago were awesome. They opened their home to us, spoke very slowly and clearly, and shared their stories with us. Unfortunately we met some palpable tension during the second week. I had sort of expected to form some sort of life-long bond with these people I lived with for weeks. It didn’t happen. There are probably several reasons for this. The major one being that, after hearing their struggles and their successes, I grew to respect them a lot. As a matter-of-fact midwesterner I refused to let myself “pity” anyone I saw, because in reality they have accomplished so much more than I will ever do…I could have utter respect for them. I think by remaining conscious of these types of issues, I detached myself from forming any type of lasting bond. Other factors like generational difference, short time period, multiple other stressors, PLUS stomach trouble just made the whole family situation a big “miss.” I think this will probably take me a while before I can fully articulate what happened. In spite of the awkwardness in our household, we still managed to have a pretty good time. I ended up doing a fair bit of the translating and conversing, so Don Tito started calling Josh "the Bishop" and me "the secretary!" Which is pretty hilarious. I'm thinking that humor is a good way to start to overcome asymetrical interactions.

Join me on a walk-through of the house where we stayed during our time in Cuernavaca, Mexico. Don Tito is a painter, so brace yourself for color.

One day when Josh was "worshiping at the porcelain altar"...I decided to take a trip. A friend recommended that I visit the Mexican National Museum of Anthropology in Mexico City, being one of the best museums in the world. So I did. By myself. I went to the third largest city on the planet alone. You're never actually alone with 20 million people around you. The museum was incredible. You can check it out here. It was pretty fun actually. I held my backpack in front of me on the subway and didn't talk to many people. I was able to make a short side visit to Chapultapec Park, which everyone learns about in their first year spanish textbook. Unfortunately, I did not meet Lupe from Dime Uno or Raquel from Destinos. I was proud of myself for being so brave in the persuit of a good museum.

Since I’ve started this whole crazy Seminary thing I’ve sorta been curious about the Virgin of Guadalupe. When it comes to Latino ministry, she’s a stark reminder that we’re doing something different than the other seminaries. She’s everywhere… I always thought Lutherans weren’t supposed to be all big on Mary? But there she is. In Mexico it was seriously unfathomable. She’s LITERALLY everywhere. So I was determined to make some progress in understanding what the heck is going on with her. We learned about the story of Juan Diego and we watched the movie “La Otra Conquista” about the introduction of Mary during Spanish Conquering. We learned about how there really isn’t one interpretation of the Virgin of Guadalupe. The one that I liked the most involved her being a sort of “cover” for people to continue worshiping the Aztec mother goddess Tonanzin in a different form. Woah. So, in some ways (not the majority by any stretch) she can be interpreted to be a big “f-you” to the oppressive colonizers. Ingenious. It got me thinking more seriously about the millions of different theologies that are floating around just within North American Lutheranism. So…as for the V de G….I love her…I don’t really understand her, and that’s ok.

Juanes' new single was also playing a lot.

We’ve begun the lengthy process of debriefing our experiences and learning from them. Part of this will be done within the “Theology for Mission” class I mentioned earlier. I’m pretty weary of “mission”…I’m not into converting anyone. And I don’t think that I have some special corner on the religion market that says I have the right answer at the expense of others. The last time I lived abroad was in Israel, where the vast majority (still a small minority overall) of Christians are nuts. This time everyone was Christian, so the religious distance was not as great, but in many ways the cultural distance made up for it. Instead of being seen as a possible proselytizer, I was seen as a possible do-gooder. Instead of reassuring people that I did not want to convert them, I felt the need to reassure them that I was not here to fix things. People in my position have a nasty history of trying to fix things. I was there to listen and learn. I’ve been wondering if there’s something inherent in Christianity that drives us toward wondering about what other people are up to. Usually that question doesn’t work out so well for the other group, but maybe there’s some way to navigate these boundaries while simultaneously respecting them. Also, many of the Jesus’ in churches in Mexico have real hair. Um, ew.

So this is a sample of a type of music that's gained a lot of popularity over the last few years. Its called "reggaeton" and its a combination of Reggae and Hip-Hop. I like it a lot, but I admit that the beat sounds identical in every song. oh well!

Frequently in Mexico I found myself longing for something familiar. For one thing, Mexican food that I know is apparently not actually “Mexican” food. That’s fine, I still liked it, but didn’t recognize the things on the menu. One day Josh and I were just about to lose it, so we went into town for dinner. Josh went to McDonalds and I went to Burger King. I think there is something to be said for product control and reproducible results. I didn’t need it always, I don’t need it always here, but it’s nice to know what I’m going to get sometimes. Chocolate is not really available in Mexico like it is here. We ventured into a supermarket one day and spent 30 minutes trying to find some actual chocolate. We didn’t really find any, BUT we did find Dr. Pepper. (Which is in the running to be my vice)…it was made with cane sugar, like all pop there. It tasted great! … Then I got a big-time stomachache like little kids do when they eat all the Halloween candy on Nov. 1st. Sweet pain. All in all, we were ready to leave when January 26th eventually rolled around. For me it was not that I was uncomfortable in Mexico, but just that I was ready to see how this experience would play out. I didn’t have any returning culture shock, it was a nice 76 degrees here and I wore shorts and went for a long walk.

Here's a video of Marilyn's goodbye speech (which I translated into spanish for her).

When I look back at my January, I am relatively under-whelmed. I think for many people these types of trips are life-changing or paradigm-shattering…it just wasn’t for me. I had a good time, I want to go back...a lot. But not to force a socio-cultural interaction. I enjoyed learning from our Mexican neghbors. But some of the "shocking" revelations were not so new for me. I knew that this reality/inequality existed, I knew that I had a real stake in creating and perpetuating it, I wanted to change some of my habits, I wanted to adopt new ones. I think some of the more important reflections about this whole experience are yet to come. I’ve started my second semester here at LSPS with a couple classes that will help that to happen. I guess the good thing about having Grace be such an integral part of your theology is that its not so imperative to have everything figured out all the time. So I’m going to sit down and get comfortable with awkwardness, ambiguity, and confusion; we’re going to be partners for a long while.