You know how grateful I am for the terrific arts scene we have here in Mazatlán. Our neighbor, Enrique Patrón de Rueda, is one of the people who makes our city so incredibly, artfully awesome. Last night, his niece starred in La Traviata. My heart didn’t stop beating for a good two hours after the show finished. It was INCREDIBLE! Click on any image to view it larger or peruse a slideshow.
To think that we have 500,000 people in this small city, and our talented arts school is able to put together singers and musicians of this caliber, and that we can afford to attend… I am so thankful.
The theater was packed to the gills; all three levels of the balcony and the orchestra seats were filled.
Conselva: Coasts and Communities is a local non-profit, founded in 2008, dedicated to preserving the natural heritage of Sinaloa. You won’t want to miss the fundraising dinner they are hosting on Tuesday April 14th, at El Presidio (1511 Niños Héroes), that will bring together seven of the best chefs in Mazatlán—Mariana Gomez Rubio from Pedro y Lola; Julián Portugal, from El Parador; Luis and Ignacio Osuna, from Grupo Panamá; Héctor Peniche, from Hector´s Bistro; Diego Becerra, from El Presidio; and Marino Miranda, from Pueblo Bonito. The chefs will delight us with a once-in-a-lifetime gastronomic adventure that will also help us protect Sinaloa’s biodiversity, ancestral cultures, and sources of water.
The state of Sinaloa is blessed with natural riches in its dry tropical jungles that are quite possibly even better than those of Costa Rica. In addition to their beauty, the western Sierra Madres bring us fresh water, and we have species of flora and fauna that are not found anywhere else in the world—the result of millions of years of evolution.
Conselva is dedicated to conserving the jungles and coasts of northwestern Mexico, and to the sustainable development of its rural communities. It is comprised of academics from the Center for Research on Food and Development, the Arizona Sonora Desert Museum, and the Secretary of Agriculture, Cattle, and Fisheries. Conselva has worked in the communities of Guásima and Concordia, Sinaloa for over six years, and together with those local communities was able to obtain Protected Area status for the region from CONANP (National Commission of Protected Natural Areas).
The dinner on April 14th will support Conselva projects that have successfully implemented models of conservation and rural sustainable tourism in four agricultural areas. Everyone is invited to attend this event, to enjoy the culinary delights, support this initiative to sustainably support our jungles, and to learn a bit about the biodiversity of our region.
Tickets are 1000 pesos/person and are available at Restaurant El Presidio, ask for Beatriz, tel 910-2615. You can call Conselva for more information, in English or Spanish, at 669 668 0911, or via cell phone, 669 146 4315.
Thank you for following us all this time on BlogSpot. We have now moved over here to WordPress, primarily because we want to use just one interface for work and family/personal. Thank you for joining us in this new location: https://vidamaz.wordpress.com
If you notice a post that hasn’t made the transfer intact, something missing or in need of correction, please let us know! It’ll take us a while to get everything spick and span! Thanks!
Once we do, we will close down the old Blogger site.
While I never met Micah, I will say he has been an inspiration for me. His apparent commitment to and respect for the land, nature, the local people and their way of life, to cross-cultural partnerships or convivencia, was wonderful to witness.
It has been a lifelong dream of mine to travel to Turkey. The home of so many civilizations all in one place, the intersection of European and Asian cultures, the architecture, food, people, handicrafts. Highest on my list were visiting Aya Sofia in Istanbul, and hiking amongst the fairy chimneys of Capadoccia, which I’d first seen in National Geographic as a child.
As luck would have it, two of our Cultural Detective authors decided to conduct a facilitator certification workshop in Istanbul, sponsored by our professional association, SIETAR Europa. And I had the blessed privilege to facilitate the course. It was held in an absolutely beautiful venue called Cezayir, the former Italian trade union building, off Itsiklal Cadessi in Istanbul. We lunched each day in the garden restaurant, and had a view of the Marmara Sea and the Bosphorous that was incredible. The participant group was very talented, experienced, and diverse. We had a terrific time and I believe everyone learned a lot and improved their skills. Click the slideshow below if you’d like to see the Cultural Detective workshop participants and the venue, or keep reading below for more on the sights and sounds of Turkey.
And, fortunately for me, I had two free days in Istanbul before the training, a partial one after, and two full days to tour Capadoccia before returning home. In a place so rich with experiences to savor and places to visit, these five and a half days were only a meze/appetizer, but they were surely an awesomely good one!
I have so very many photos that I felt the best way to show them to you would be in the form of a few slide shows. I have set the slide shows to some traditional Turkish folk music. Please pour yourself a cup of chay/tea or Turkish coffee, or Capadoccian wine, and enjoy!
The slideshow below, includes photos of Istanbul:
Galata Tower
New Mosque
Spice Market/Egyptian Market
Train Station/Oriental Express
Rüstempasa Mosque
Süleyimanye Mosque
The Grand Bazaar
Basilica Cistern
Aya/Haggia Sofia
The Blue/Sultan Ahmet Mosque
Tünel
Itsiklal Street
Topkapi Palace and Harem
Turkish Handicraft Center
Istanbul Handicraft Center
Bosphorous Boat Cruise
Military Officer College
Maiden’s Tower
My trip to Capadoccia included a hot air balloon ride over the region, extensive hiking, and a private tour by automobile that included an underground city and a gorgeous thermal hot spring. The Capadoccia/Kapadokya slide show is below:
Hot Air Balloon Tour
Göreme Open Air Museum, including Dark Church
Anatolia Cave Pension
Rose Valley
Red Valley
Love Valley
Pigeon Valley
Fairy Chimneys
Çevusin
Avanos
Kaymakli Underground City
Uchisar
Turasan Winery
National Rug Weaving Cooperative
Bayramhaci Hot Spring
Göreme Village
We of course live in the land of hand painted tile work, Mexico. With that existing love, it was quite easy for me to absolutely fall in love with the tile work in Turkey. OMG I saw UNBELIEVABLE tiles! Below is a slideshow of some of the tilework.
As you saw above in the Capadoccia slide show, I took a hot air balloon ride. It was an incredible experience. I will post a few videos here if you’d like to take a look. The first one is taking off in the balloon.
The second clip shows the pilot of our balloon as well as a shot of the fire shooting up into the balloon to take us higher. It was awfully warm when that torch was blowing!
The third one is a short clip of the people in our balloon. There were loads of large tour groups, and it seemed that anyone traveling alone or in pairs was kept aside and made into a “group” for the ride. Interestingly, we all ended up being women, and we were from all over: Japan, Singapore, UK and Mexico. We called ourselves the “beautiful girls’ club.” Take a look.
The fourth video clip is of our high-tech landing. The crew, these guys landing us, were all terrific fun. And it was just hysterical to watch them pulling and running, over hill and dale, getting pulled through trees, in their quest to land our balloon.
My final video clip is of me opening a petori kebap for dinner in Göreme with my tour guide and the waiter.
Please let me know what you think! It’s always nice to know someone’s is reading/looking.
You know how grateful I am for the terrific arts scene we have here in Mazatlán. Our neighbor, Enrique Patrón de Rueda, is one of the people who makes our city so incredibly, artfully awesome. Last night, his niece starred in La Traviata. My heart didn’t stop beating for a good two hours after the show finished. It was INCREDIBLE! Click on any image to view it larger or peruse a slideshow.
¡VidaMaz! 