South American way

[sparks]

Looks as though the buildings are holding up a lot better than the track!

[Admin]

All abandoned, though some of the old housing still being used. Clean, intact, rather charming. Railroad not active since 1984.

Citizens in those parts must be a cut above ours. In NZ, that place would be covered in graffiti and home to a dozen meth addicts.

[grayman]

All abandoned, though some of the old housing still being used. Clean, intact, rather charming. Railroad not active since 1984.

Citizens in those parts must be a cut above ours. In NZ, that place would be covered in graffiti and home to a dozen meth addicts.

Same in the U.S. except ours are still in business.

I love the photos, Prez.

[stanky]

Yeah, top notch.
What are using to take them?
(if you don't mind)
A phone?
Are they that good now?

[President Bush]

Yeah, top notch.
What are using to take them?
(if you don't mind)
A phone?
Are they that good now?

FL's fone.

thumbnail - 2024-10-30T094718.379.jpeg (48.51 KiB) Viewed 124 times

hey stanky, FL watched a Fred Rodgers documentary called "Won't You Be My Neighbor" on the flight and I remembered your story about the time Fred Rodgers gave you a ride hitch hiking... do I have that right?

[stanky]

She don't look all too happy about it.
Wait 'till she goes through customs, on this side.

(Unless it's gotten better. Last time I left, there were big dogs sniffing and long lines. Felt like livestock.)

[President Bush]

She don't look all too happy about it.
Wait 'till she goes through customs, on this side.

(Unless it's gotten better. Last time I left, there were big dogs sniffing and long lines. Felt like livestock.)

It's real fast now, all based on facial recognition software. But they didn't catch us.

[stanky]

Oops, forgot this:

Yeah, i was hitch-hiking with my 2 year old daughter and an old couple stopped. They explained how they don't normally, but the kid...they were Mr. Rodgers parents. They were quite credible and polite.
Another semi-exotic ride i got was with Richard Nixon's chef. He had stories of the immense hassle and expense, any time a president travels..and Nixon, more so. He was paranoid and took an entire kitchen with him on a separate huge plane.

[President Bush]

Bolivia can be very entertaining, this celebration was today...

Yesterday morning was a very special day for little Miguel. His family had taken pains with his appearance on this day, and he looked resplendent. Bundled warmly against the cold morning air, he was taken to a chapel in their native La Paz, Bolivia, and seated with pride directly in front of the altar. This could be the beginning of a story about a child’s Baptism or first Communion. But despite Miguel’s diminutive size, he is not a child. Nor in fact is he a living person.

Miguel is a human skull. Not just any skull, however. He is what is known as a ñatita, a local Bolivian slang that means a “pug-nosed one,” roughly referring to the flattened appearance of human crania, but one which exercises certain beneficial powers. How and when death came to the person from whence this skull came is unknown—it gives the appearance of having been that of a teenager, and was acquired nine months ago from a friend at a dental school. At the school, it was simply a specimen, but given over to a family, one which subscribes to local beliefs about the powers inherent in skulls, it became kin . . . it became Miguel. And it became a ñatita. Cared for and treated as an esteemed member of the household Miguel used his abilities to protect his newfound family and bring them good fortune. And yesterday he was taken to his first Fiesta de las Ñatitas.

...

These and so many more were present in the chapel at La Paz’s sprawling Cemetery General, which every November 8 holds the most elaborate Fiesta de las Ñatitas. Estimated to be the largest ever, yesterday’s celebration saw over ten thousand people come through the gates. They came to celebrate an incredible bond, one that is simply unimaginable in modern Western society, where the dead have become ghettoized and stigmatized as an abject group. The bond is not between the living and the dead, however, because to those assembled at the Fiesta the “dead” are in fact still a vital and sentient group. The bond is simply one between friends, who on one side happen to be living, and on the other side happen to be dead. But that difference is seen as flimsy and inconsequential, because for those who subscribe to the powers of the ñatitas, the divide is easily crossed. For those who do not, however, it is wholly perplexing phenomenon.

It’s possible to find people at the Fiesta de las Ñatitas carrying skulls of loved ones—one woman with whom I am acquainted brings the mummified head of her husband each year, and others bring fathers, mothers, aunts, uncles, or even children who died prematurely. Outsiders tend to assume that there must be some preexistent relationship between the skull and the people who care for it, but in fact this is seldom the case. Take, for example, Miguel in our introduction—there is no known provenance to the skull, and the family which now treats him as one of their own has no idea who he (or perhaps even she) may have once been.

The skull which becomes a ñatita is, in the vast majority of cases, that of a total stranger. Anonymous crania may be acquired from various sources, including medical schools and archeological sites, but most commonly they are acquired from grave diggers. At La Paz’s General Cemetery, for instance, gravesites are not purchased outright, but rather leased, and when some future generation eventually lapses in payment the bones of the deceased will be removed. Those who have been exhumed are supposed to be incinerated, and their ashes dumped in a common grave, but their skulls are often brokered by those who work at the cemetery.

https://www.orderofthegooddeath.com/art ... s-natitas/

[Admin]

I think that's a healthy attitude to death. I've been a proponent of families being given the skeletons of dead people forever.

Elephants know how to do it.