Natalie Ann - 8-24-2004 at 09:17 AM
Bob H - Your beautiful photos of Mulege brought back memories, some of which I'll share here. And thank you for my daily hit of Baja photos!
Flying in to Mulege.
Natalie Ann - 8-24-2004 at 09:17 AM
The old jail:
Natalie Ann - 8-24-2004 at 09:18 AM
Restorative construction is taking place at the Mission.
Natalie Ann - 8-24-2004 at 09:19 AM
Migue y El Viejo
Natalie Ann - 8-24-2004 at 09:20 AM
Amparo (shelter).
Natalie Ann - 8-24-2004 at 09:21 AM
And to end where Bob began, palms.
Bob H - 8-24-2004 at 07:56 PM
Natalie Ann... that photo of the old man is taken at the window from El Cadil.... I can tell. I've seen that so many times.
Thanks for sharing your photos.
Bob H
Natalie Ann - 8-25-2004 at 07:04 AM
Yes, Bob, El Viejo seems to continually show up in the "window frame" of El Cadil. The discussion taking place in my photo is in regards to the
failing batteries in his radio. Mi amigo y mi esposo left for awhile and reappeared with lots of batteries for the radio. I've now picked up a small
solar powered radio which we plan to deliver on our next visit. 
Bob H - 8-25-2004 at 07:56 AM
Rumor has it that this man will talk to you for 200 pesos. But, maybe someone at the bar was making a joke. You see him moving around all over
Mulege all of the time.
Bob H
Natalie Ann - 8-25-2004 at 01:17 PM
He'll talk, Bob, for free.... on and on and on and on. Didn't ask for anything. 200 pesos - that's funny.
My friend Migue is fluent in ranchero espanol and says El Viejo is just another lonesome old man, looking for a little companionship, his mind a bit
coming and going. We knew his radio batteries were running low as Migue asked to hear what the old guy was listening to. When the boyz returned with
batteries from our gear, El Viejo was real surprised and at first reluctant to take them. Migue convinced him that his batteries would work just fine
for our needs.
For me he's as much a part of Mulege as the palms.
Bob H - 8-25-2004 at 05:37 PM
The last time I was sitting in El Candil, having breakfast...errrrr sipp'n on an early margarita, he came walking by, right by the windows of the
place. I don't think he can see very well. He knows exactly where he is by tracing his fingers across the window frames. Then, he gets so far and
turns around. We were there last April for 10 days and I think we saw him each and every day. We had fantastic shrimp tacos at the little taco
stand, just before you would walk under the bridge. This taco stand is made out of the truck bed of an old pickup. I've got a photo somewhere of it.
I'll dig it out and post it. These Mulege threads get me yearning to visit the area again, real soon. Oh and ofcourse stop in San Ignacio to make
some photos for Mike H. The road by the lagoon was really washed out when we visited in April... but it was passable. A lot of water ran through
there during the hurricane, I guess.
Bob H
Mulege Taco Stand
Bob H - 8-25-2004 at 05:41 PM
Here's the taco stand in Mulege I was referring to above. Real nice folks. That's my wife Audrey sitting at the table.
Bob H
Damn Right! Photos of El Rosario.
Mike Humfreville - 8-26-2004 at 09:50 PM
I just got updated on both of your threads after a day or two and was reading about Migue. Mary Ann and I and Miguelito lived in Benalmadena-Pueblo,
Spain, just South of Malaga and Torremolinos a while back and we discovered that Castilians "come su ultimo sylabo", they "eat their last syllable"
when speaking. In other words they don?t pronounce it, just as in some circumstances the final letter of French words are dropped. Thus, my name in
Spanish, "Miguel" in Mexico, became "Migue" in Castilian Spain. So maybe your Migue is originally from Spain. While I'm not knowledgeable enough
about Spanish to recognize all the variances, there are, mostly rural as I've noticed, many "slur the last syllable" habits in Mexico too.
Thanks to you both for the good shots.
[Edited on 8-27-2004 by Mike Humfreville]
Natalie Ann - 8-27-2004 at 03:35 PM
Interesting, Mike, about language.
Because all my school-learned Spanish was Castillian I thought nothing of the name Migue. I have been told that Castillian Spanish is still spoken or
understood by some of the elder-elders all over Mexico.
My Migue, however, is the "adopted" son of Irma and Antonio at Alphonsina's - he's extremely close to the family. They began calling him Migue as in
Mikey, an apparent term of indearment.
I spent an evening in the bar...
Mike Humfreville - 8-27-2004 at 04:43 PM
at the Red Lobster (on left when entering the main drag in San Felipe), first listening as the tender talked to his pals in Spanish that I could
understand perfectly. After his friends left he and I got to talking and I asked where he was from because his dialect was different. He was from
Mexico City. I learned Spanish off the streets of Cuernavaca, just down the way. Since we were from the same region we could better understand each
other.
Working at the Fox Studios
jrbaja - 8-27-2004 at 05:47 PM
I (of all people!) had to translate between the crews from Mexico city and the crews from up here on the Titanic movie.
Down in the hills, a lot of the old people speak a language that I don't recognize. These guys are descendants from people who thought that Mexican
Se?oritas and mangos under a palapa looked a lot better than going back to sea.
Spain and Portugal seemed to have a lot of names who's priorities were straight. So you have a mixing of Spanish, Guaycura, Portuguese, Sp. , and
who knows what else being thrown around in those days.
It is most embarrassing not understanding one single word being spoken. Fortunately, everyone else seems to know what's being said so they can
translate for me in Spanish. Then, I get to try and figure it out from there
JESSE - 8-27-2004 at 06:34 PM
That Jail looks like it has heard and seen some amazing stories.
Markitos - 8-27-2004 at 08:33 PM
I met some guys from a village in Oaxaca.
I had no idea what the heck anyone was saying. My freind told me it was Mistaco(?) And even he realy had a hard time with it. Amazing how little
villages have there own tone. If you think about it thou, alot of the village folks never leave and they just kinda start they'r own thing I guess.
Code for Pin*%# whato maybe
Speaking of that,
jrbaja - 8-27-2004 at 09:50 PM
In Borneo there was this British colony of oil workers. We spent some time with them and I never had a harder time trying to understand English in my
life.
They had been there for a while and I think they not only hung onto their language, they learned to over pronounce everything so much so that it
sounded very little like english.
Catillian Spanish
academicanarchist - 9-1-2004 at 02:56 PM
Natalie Ann. Standard Spanish spoken in Spain and the Americas is Castillian, which simply means the dialect from central Spain. This dialect has been
codified as the official version of "Spanish" by the Real Academia, which also produced the dictionary of standard Spanish. In Spain, there are still
variations with influence from southern France and Portugal. Catalan, spoken in the Barcelona area, is influenced by southern French dialects.
Gallego, in northwestern Spain, is similar to Portuguese. In America, there have been other incluences. In Mexico, the primary influence is the
infusion of Nahuatl words, or what are called Mejicanismos. Tomato, for example, is a Mejicanismo. Bernardo de Sahagun, a pioneering Franciscan
ethnographer in the 16th century, prepared a dictionary of Mejicanismos. In the Andean region thee are inclusions from two native languages, Quechua
and Aymara. In Argentina, there are inclusions from other European languages of immigrants such as Italian, and the Portenos from Buenos Aires speak a
regional slang that nobody understands. But they all speak Castillian as the base language.
Natalie Ann - 9-1-2004 at 03:19 PM
Thanks AA. Now I understand... perfectly.
First time I was in La Paz I got into a discussion of language with one of the potter's daughter. She told me that she was about 10 when her family
left Mexico City for La Paz... and that when they arrived they could not understand the people of Baja. Said it was like a different language was
spoken. She says people in the La Paz area tend to leave off the last syllable of the first word and the first syllable of the second word when they
speak rapidly (anyone noticed this?) - and this took the family awhile to learn. She also talked about idiom being very different in the two cities.
[Edited on 9-1-2004 by Natalie Ann]
Pronunciation
academicanarchist - 9-1-2004 at 03:49 PM
That has more to do with the regional variations in the language, of which there are many in Mexico and the rest of Latin America. The Portenos I
mentioned in my earlier post also pronounce words differently from Mexicans, for example.
movinguy - 9-2-2004 at 02:33 PM
Ever hear that Don Francisco guy on "Sabado Gigante"? I can't understand a word he says (heavy Castillian lisp action) but obviously a LOT of
Mexicans can.
Natalie Ann - 9-2-2004 at 05:14 PM
Hmmm, Castillian being the basis of all the Spanish language variations... makes sense. And interestingly, I find I understand far far more than I'm
able to speak, perhaps because of all those years of Castillian. But the first time I said something with that "ly" sound instead of the Mexican "y"
sound, everyone was chuckling at me.
