–2018小童行走美國(guó)探路之旅記錄
Some notes from our trip yesterday. We drove across southwest Colorado through New Mexico, Utah, and into Arizona to camp near the Grand Canyon.
By the way, it’s a full moon tonight so every night has been super bright out here in the desert and mountains — absolutely gorgeous. We don’t even need a flashlight at night insider our tent the moon is so bright.
I sent some pictures of the cliff dwellings, Jack with his Junior Ranger badge and some pictures of the canyons and mountains. It’s beautiful here! We feel like we are learning so much and are excited to share with everyone.
28 February 2018
Mesa Verde National Park, 7000 ft
The mountain west of the United States has its own distinct culture. If there were one word to describe it, I would use “independent”. Or “stubborn”. Or “private”. OK, so there isn’t just one word; no one is that simple. But if you remember that most European-descended Americans who have made there way west over the years and stayed there, it was because they wanted to be alone and live off the land; or were forced to.
The great distances across the mountains, the deserts, and the plateaus create a paradoxical environment of mistrust and instant community. You have to size up a person quickly and determine if they are a friendly neighbor or a sour hermit. And of course the really crazy ones are the one who get most of the attention in the news, from Hollywood, or popular culture - they are sprinkled around here and there like the guy with the UFO watch tower near the highway we passed by. Or the pot growers just up here to “relax”. Or the old guys living off old junk and hunting for their food.
But if you dig deeper, you can imagine a different world, the world of the Navajo Indians or the Pueblos, or even the Mexicans who later claimed much of this land. A great place to see this is Mesa Verde National Park. Thanks to our recent study of Latin with Jack, we all knew that Mesa Verde means “Green Table”, and we watched as the horizon changed on we passed the San Juan mountains. Giant slabs of rock projected above the ground thousands of feet with their own ecosystem on top.
It was here we could see the ancient ruins of the Pueblo Indians who lived in Central America and southern North America from around 550 A.D. to 1300 A.D. They mostly grew corn and lived in communities or villages called “pueblos”, which I suppose is how they got their name. Later they built homes on the sides of the cliffs, but eventually left the entire region due to drought. This National Park is amazing and takes a while to drive through, but there are numerous archeological sites that were easy for the kids to see and experience. Jack even studied the guide book throughout our exploration so he could earn a Junior Park Ranger badge from the Park Service. Now he knows how these ancient peoples farmed, lived, built temples, and died off—and he had fun doing it.
We also read our history book on the drive about the U.S.-Mexican War in 1848 since the land we were passing through used to be Mexico's. Interestingly the war started with European settlers from the United States settling in the Mexican land of northern Texas against the will of the new Mexican President. Eventually after the US forced a treaty, they paid Mexico $25 million dollars for Texas, most of the southwest including California and even all the way up to Wyoming. It’s an interesting point in history considering one of the hottest political topics here today is illegal immigration from Mexico into the United States, and this history makes it really easy to explain current events to our boys.
But on the way southwest, we got to drive through Navajo land. As a midwestern American, I grew up with just basic knowledge of Native American tribes and culture in the U.S. Unless you live or travel to remote areas like some of these places, you don’t really have any idea how the U.S. government pushed most Indian tribes off their hunting land or even settlements they built. But I got to talk with a Navajo painter at the Four Corners, a monument on Navajo land where Arizona, Colorado, Utah, and New Mexico all meet, the only place in the US where four states touch. This old Navajo indian said he grew up on the reservation - the land the US allowed them to keep and govern themselves. He said the land inspired him, and his paintings were beautiful. We chatted and he told us a little of life for the Navajos, their humor and habits. If he didn’t pause to speak Navajo to another old Indian man, it would have been hard to imagine he wasn’t just a regular European American. Since the tribes get to govern their own land, I think unfortunately, they are mostly known for their casinos since gambling is illegal in each US state except for some special areas. So out in the middle of a dusty prairie or desert owned by Indian tribes, there’s always a glitzy casino surrounded by poverty and hardship.
It feels a little strange to be in your own country and feel like a foreigner. How much stranger does it feel for the Navajo people to feel like foreigners in the US when their people were here hundreds of years before Europeans, Asians, Central Americans, Middle Easterners, and others? And isn’t this the story of different people groups all over the world as different powers win and civilizations fall and start anew? These parts of America afford a great opportunity to teach our boys about being a global citizen and the good and bad in all peoples’ hearts. This is just one great thing other cultures can teach us.
