Hermione Wrote:
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>
> There was a little folk-museum at St. John's, run
> by a very nice lady who was fighting a bit of an
> uphill battle trying to get people interested in
> it. Because my friend and I were obviously
> interested in matters Native American, she rang a
> friend of hers, a Navajo lady, who rushed round
> with various books, from some of which I took
> copies.

I think people would be surprised at how willing the tribes can be to help educate visitors about them. It's kind of like the Navajo elderly man who quizzed my son on his Navajo every time we saw him at the grocery store.

> Well, IIRC, we never actually got inside any pawn
> shops ... although I know what you mean about some
> of the non-pawn shops being, as you say,
> exceedingly strange!

One thing that we saw that was just weird in a store was kachinas suspended in the middle of dreamcatcher...what the heck?!? I saw these "things" first and had to bite my lip to keep from laughing. When I pointed them out to my husband, he took one look and burst out laughing. It seemed to me that this particuliar contraption would be kind of offensive actually. A dreamcatcher is hung over the bed to catch bad dreams...and it caught a kachina! A deity! LOL The stores can be very strange...lol

> We paid a (mercifully) brief visit to the Sky City
> casino, which was full of Native Americans
> immersed in gambling, etc. etc. It struck me as
> appalling and sad that this once great people had
> been reduced to frittering their lives away in
> such depressing surroundings.

The Navajo Nation has been having alot of internal battles in regards to casinos. They don't operate any themselves. I think that the casinos can be very dangerous out here. There are so many in the tribes that are impoverished. The idea of going in to a casino and coming out with enough to feed the family for even a week must be very appealing to the ones whom poverty has hit worst. Desperation can be so bad.

>
> Well, if I'm ever fortunate enough to return, I
> shall certainly try and visit Yah'tah'hey ... I
> think I vaguely remember Gallup, actually ...
> Gallup and Grants ... I think it may have been
> Grants where my friend and I stumbled across a
> mediaeval re-enactment society, of all things ...
> the young men were very charming, and carried our
> luggage ...

Well, the flea market there is pretty much the only thing in Yah'tah'hey...outside of a few houses, lol. What makes it popular is that it is right at the intersection of two highways and is consisting of two narrow, long covered areas. Gallup has alot of stores and pawn shops but, honestly, the best place to go shopping in Gallup is at the restaurant called Earl's. Especially on a weekend.

> Normally, my husband insists on doing all the
> packing whenever we go away, because he thinks I'm
> no good at it. But, when we returned to Houston,
> I found myself faced with the problem of somehow
> packing one suitcase with all the stuff that I'd
> brought back from New Mexico ... how I did it, I
> don't know: it took me most of the afternoon.
> Fortunately, everything survived the onward
> journey ...

Congratulations! I picked up a nesting doll when I was in Russia and it ended up cracking on the way home. I was so bummed!

Stephanie



In every man there is something wherein I may learn of him, and in that I am his pupil.--Ralph Waldo Emerson