St. Turibius, protector of Indians

It's the first day of October and the cover of Magnificat, the monthly magazine I use for morning devotions, shows an angel and a small child. Except it's not like anything I've seen before. So here's the story:

"In 1580, Saint Turibius became Archbishop of Lima (Peru), at that time the largest archdiocese in history, extending from Nicaragua to Tierra del Fuego. First he set out to reform the clergy; then, equipped by the king of Spain, Philip II, with the title and full powers of “Protector of the Indians,” he liberated them from the mercantile trafficking that victimized them, and created for their benefit an effective system of social security. Furthermore he did not hesitate to order that the property of those suspected of having accumulated wealth at their expense be seized and redistributed to the Indians. To console those who had been expropriated by his zeal, he told them: “You will thank me in the next world, because the poor Indians are banks; through their intervention your treasures are now capital invested for you in heaven.”

His great work, however, would be to promote, again for the benefit of the Indians, the establishment of little autonomous Christian republics in which the citizens would be able to live under the direct protection of the royal crown. Governed by democratically elected Indian chiefs and organized by the Franciscans, then also by the Jesuits, these republics—later called Reducciones (“organizations”)—were centered on a group of institutional buildings: a church, a school, a hospital, a residence for the elderly, and several centers for professional and artistic training. [by this point in my reading I'm beginning to think it sounds like, "Northwest Ordinance" which preceded our U.S. Constitution and Bill of Rights]. The native Incas showed little aptitude for commerce and industry, but a real genius for arts and crafts, and so priority was given to developing those talents. Hence the founding of admirable schools of art, such as Cusco’s school for painting. Music, dance, and the liturgy flourished, too, giving rise to a festive civilization that expressed its genius and joy of living on every Christian feast day.

The painting that adorns the cover of this issue of Magnificat bears witness to the final lights of this Christian epic in which, in the spirit of Mary’s Magnificat, the humble were blessed to be so. For unfortunately, in the 18th century, in the name of “Enlightenment” philosophy, the “enlightened despots” who were reigning in Spain and Portugal abolished the Reducciones and left their citizens at the mercy of ruthless men who looted and profaned their institutions; then, these were exploited, and irreparable sufferings were inflicted on these native populations of South America."
And there's more at the website: https://us.magnificat.net/magnificat_content/angel-of-god-my-guardian-dear/

That's what I like about Magnificat. Because it's outside my church experience (Anabaptist, UCC which is a merger of many protestant groups, Lutheran), and my public school education. I learn so many things about history, art and philosophy.

Bursitis and walking update

Finally, I saw a sunrise. I'm getting 6-7 miles a day in walking, and mornings are best. All broken into small segments of one mile or less so I don't risk inflammation.  I use only the flat, east-west streets of Lakeside which indicate where the shore line was about 8-10,000 years ago.  We had a glacier in this area of the U.S. and then that darn climate change and global warming.  It was very hazy today, and promises to be very hot, but those first few moments as the sun pops over the horizon are glorious.

 I've seen several people using hiking poles, and when checking I seek trekking, hiking, walking, shock absorbing, ultralight, women's, cork, rubber, etc. Sure looks better than using a cane. https://www.rei.com/learn/expert-advice/trekking-poles-hiking-staffs.html

One woman I saw with walking poles is getting ready for the 500 mile Camino in Northern Spain where hikers stop at monasteries, villages and churches. She did it several years ago, and is planning another one. She talked about it for a Women's Club program.  http://www.dailymail.co.uk/travel/article-2159915/Walk-lifetime-Why-epic-Camino-trail-Spain-route-true-happiness.html

Walking vs. stationary bike

"Exercise expert Dr. Kenneth Cooper ranks walking and stationary bicycling as two of the six best exercises. He writes that walking is particularly good for previously sedentary people and older people. He recommends stationary bicycling because it simultaneously strengthens bicyclists’ arms and legs and causes far fewer injuries than jogging and outdoors bicycling. The Merck Manual Home Health Handbook’s “Choosing the Right Exercise” report lists 10 exercises, including stat...ionary bicycling and walking. Walking is praised for being “relatively easy” on joints throughout the body and being better than stationary bicycling for people with knee problems. Stationary bicycling improves strength more than walking and lets people change the intensity of their workouts by changing the bicycle’s resistance." Walking is almost out of the question for me except for brief errands. That's why I just love my stationary bike, a power spin 210. http://healthyliving.azcentral.com/stationary-bicycle-vs-walking-exercise-9889.html

". . .the latest research reveals that the magic number for maintaining cognitive fitness with age and preventing Alzheimer’s is to work up to a level of 150 minutes per week of a combination of cardio exercise and strength training. Great ways to get in your aerobic exercise include brisk walking, jogging, dancing, swimming, and playing tennis, or going to the gym and utilizing an elliptical, treadmill or stationary bike." http://www.alzheimersprevention.org/.../exercise-and...

Walking in Spain with a cane and strong friend.

Get the popcorn ready—winter’s coming

There's a good reason you don't see me review many films; I rarely go to a movie. However, an 8 hour flight across the ocean with a lot of movies on the back of the seat in front of mine gave me the opportunity to see recent releases. Right before touch down in Philadelphia I finished "Clouds of Sils Maria" (2014) with Juliette Binoche which went to DVD this July. Good, absorbing movie about relationships for your next movie night at home. Another one I recommend which I watched in flight is "Age of Adaline" (2015) with Blake Lively, about a woman who remains 29 years old for 80 years. Cast includes Harrison Ford and Ellen Burstyn.

While I was watching a rather elderly Ellen Burstyn (an outstanding actress), my husband next to me was watching her 40 years younger in “Alice doesn’t live here anymore.” (Later adapted for a TV series Alice.)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7UzSekc0LoQ Trailer for Adaline.

http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2015/04/20/way-up-high  Review from New Yorker for Sils Maria, with the reviewer narcissistically giving us much more about what he knows than is necessary, but still fairly accurate.

Hola. We're home from Spain

We're home from Spain after a wonderful 2 week trip for our 55th anniversary. Home. Where the big stories when I turned on the TV were a new Oreo flavor (Cinnabun) and a stolen dog instead of the visits of Xi Jinping, Pope Francis, Putin, millions if refugees pouring into Europe, and the richest province in Spain (Catalonia) trying to secede because they pay too many taxes and don't want to speak Spanish. Ah. Finally. Important stuff.

Your post cards should arrive in a week or two, but it's probably not worth it (if you're planning a trip). It costs one euro (about $1.12) to send a post card to U.S. (less in Europe), and you don't even get a pretty stamp for your trouble, only a label. Generally, things in Spain are a very good buy for people with Euros, just not at the post office.

In Spain we were hosted by our Finnish friends, Martti and Riitta Tulamo, who are friends from 1979-81, their years in Columbus as students, and are now a retired horse surgeon and architect, enjoying the good life, and the most fabulous tour guides ever. An added bonus was seeing about 600 photos of Virve's wedding in May at a castle in Estonia plus the places we visited in 2006 in Finland when we visited there. They provided the apartment and all the driving to special tourist spots, plus critical information we needed. 

I'm a news junkie, so in Spain every accommodation we experienced had different cable channels we enjoyed. In our Madrid hotel (Sidorme) we watched American series reruns of Monk, Closer and Castle along with spaghetti westerns in Spanish with Spanish subtitles; in Torreviaja our apartment cable selection was different than our hosts’ selection, and was primarily international news channels in English--China, BBC, Russia, Arabic, Algeria, France, Japan, Korea--great coverage of business and international events, wonderful documentaries with revisionist history (from our view point), and zero criticism of their own countries' government and policies. Hmm. We could learn from this. Oh, and the women journalists were lovely but well covered--very modest by our standards.

During our two wonderful weeks in sunny Spain, we encountered rain only one day on tour. Our umbrella and rain gear were back in the hotel (of course), so we were soaked while I was attempting to use a cane on slick stones. So one of my souvenirs is a new pink umbrella purchased in the village San Lorenzo de El Escorial at the monastery El Escorial, NW of Madrid.

I didn't gain a pound in Spain despite the fabulous meals which included very few vegetables (unless chocolate counts). After virtually no cheese or bread in 6 months, I had them at least once or twice a day. Perhaps walking with a cane on cobble stone streets takes a lot of calories? Our cat, who lived for 2 weeks with our daughter and her tiny Chihuahua, seems to have gained some. Little beggar.

I had no Facebook or e-mail, and really, didn't miss it. We made conversation the old fashioned way—face to face.  We met many wonderful people waiting in line for various tourist spots like cathedrals, mountain castles, Roman fortresses, Moorish architectural wonders, and great restaurants. Belgium, Holland, England, Finland, Montreal, Colombia, Poland, Philippines, Japan and even Bellefontaine and Marion, Ohio. Tourism is enormous and critical to the economy--and snatching a few minutes in garbled English about best places to visit was fun.

We almost couldn't find bad food, and the supermarkets were fabulous with very reasonable prices and great variety. Always look for "Menu del Dia" a mid-day special usually with 2 or 3 courses including bread, wine and dessert. Super highways and secondary roads put ours to shame.

Except for waiters and hotel staff and the ubiquitous China stores (Chinese immigrants thrive in Spain), we met few Spaniards, but Spain seems the most monochromatic, ethnically similar place I've ever visited. Spain, except in the southern most regions of Andalucía and Valencia near Morocco, must be about 98% white. Really handsome people, with gorgeous women and great flair for fashion. Only after 50 do the women pack on the pounds. A few gypsies, and some Africans, but TV and employment opportunities seem entirely Caucasian. Each province and state and city has its own culture, language, fiestas, and regional food, but in skin tone, not much difference.

The worst problem we saw was graffiti--it's everywhere from high rises, to highway overpasses, to ancient ruins, to construction sites. Very ugly and I never got used to it.

Madrid; including side trip to El Escorial, on YouTube

El Escorial is more than an impressive palace for a divine monarch. It's packed with art and history — offering an evocative trip back to Spain's most fascinating age.  Rick Steves 

We’ll be seeing this during our trip to Spain in September for our 55 anniversary.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_OUIKm8e7Y0 (short)

Quick look at the majesty of Madrid; I plan to skip the pigs’ ears.  Happy pigs eat acorns.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hifYpfW4NjI (extended)

Valley of the Fallen, memorial for the Civil War

Granada and Cordoba. “Andalucía's Moorish heritage sparkles in the historic capitals of Granada and Córdoba. And the pride of the Reconquista and the power of Queen Isabel and King Ferdinand enliven the region's great sights.” Rick Steves

Only God is victorious is repeated 9,000 times in the palace, The Alhambra. Spain was a Muslim country for 700 years.

Cordoba: http://www.spainthenandnow.com/spanish-history/cordoba-historical-overview/default_41.aspx

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=36UPumotJQ8

A patriot's history of the United States

History hasn’t been this interesting since 5th-6th grade in Miss Michael’s class in little Forreston, Illinois. My husband and I are thoroughly enjoying A patriot’s history of the United States by Larry Schweikart and Michael Allen. And I’m still in the pre-USA days of New Spain, New France and New England, a period longer than our post-revolution years. An excellent reminder of how the colonial powers that searched for wealth and sent settlers all had very different systems. I love becoming reacquainted with all those names of the conquistadores we had to memorize and their incredible explorations, visions and dreams of wealth that lead them nowhere. Even the Italian Columbus died in poverty.

Spain stole gold mined by the Indians for their rulers and kept it all in the hands of the government. Spain was vastly outnumbered by the Indians, but it was able to defeat them through advanced technology and a superior social/cultural/political system which wasn‘t dependent of a rigid hierarchy of power. France too searched for a passage to wealth, but ended up bartering with the Indians for another kind, furs--so apparently even Indians could be influenced by greed (shock and awe!)--but didn’t do the hard work except for exploration and founding a few outposts along rivers. Also, France’s peasants were better off than those in England or Spain, so they had little interest in relocating to the unknown, difficult wilds of New France.  The few French Protestants that crossed seeking religious freedom were slaughtered by the Spanish even after founding colonies.

England got in the game late, and English pirates (I think in school these were called by the nicer term “privateers”) stole from the Spanish what they’d already stolen from the Indians. The authors don’t say it that way--that’s my interpretation. But the English had a different idea of wealth than the Spanish--grow it. They only of the colonial powers understood that wealth could be increased and developed, that it wasn’t a fixed commodity to be hoarded by the royal family. Hmm. Isn’t that interesting. Everyone’s wealth belongs to the government and don‘t take risks--a failed colonial (European) system except for a tiny island of entrepreneurs and investors that saw wealth differently.

From the publisher‘s page: “For at least thirty years, high school and college students have been taught to be embarrassed by American history. Required readings have become skewed toward a relentless focus on our country’s darkest moments, from slavery to McCarthyism. As a result, many history books devote more space to Harriet Tubman than to Abraham Lincoln; more to My Lai than to the American Revolution; more to the internment of Japanese Americans than to the liberation of Europe in World War II.”

Yes, since the 1970s when the homegrown, anti-American faculty wonks began to take over the college humanities and social science departments with the media and entertainment culture of TV and movies adding the icing, U.S. young people have been fed a steady diet of guilt, shame and lies. Marxists and socialists had been down this road in the 1930s and had to pause to fight the common enemy in WWII to save the Soviet Union.  But they had a vision, and it's coming to fruition today.  No wonder this book is a best seller and used by home-schooling parents whose children go on to out perform public school graduates. It’s a breath of fresh air.

Waterboarding Sotomayor

"The Caribbean before the landing of Columbus served almost as a bridge between the north coast of South America and Florida for the Amazonian tribes in the south and the north american inhabitants. When Christopher Columbus on his second trip in 1493 landed in Puerto Rico and claimed it for Spain, he found the island populated by as many as 60,000 Arawak or Taino indians, which for the most part, were friendly compared to the Carib indians in some of the more southerly islands which were warlike and to some degree cannibalistic.

The conquest of the island didn't take long, and the peaceful Tainos were put to the task as slaves for the purpose of mining the gold that was found on the island. The gold didn't last long and in 1511 there was an uprising of the Tainos, who up to this point had believed that the Spaniards were Gods, and took a soldier by the name of Sotomayor and dunked him head first in a river for several hours to see if he would die. Just in case, they had prepared a feast for the Spaniard if he came out alive. However, it wasn't the Spanish sword that took most of the lives of the Arawaks, but the diseases that were brought from Europe and for which the indians had no defenses."

I haven't checked the authenticity of this story--just thought it had a familiar ring.

Puerto Rico was ceded to the U.S. after the war of 1898 with Spain. It became a commonwealth of the U.S. in 1952, and hoped to become the 51st state. In any case, Sonia Sotomayor isn't the daughter of immigrants, but citizens.