uprooted

quelites

days go by in monochrome

desk

transplanting roots

new little garden

the smell of communism

While in Croatia with Sunci, strolling in Hvar, at the sight of this flower Sunci exclaimed "That is the smell of communism" As it was planted all over the country during the communist time, then in Russia I spotted the same flower and asked a Russian friend about it, who gave me the same answer, yes in fact during communist times this flower could be found all over.

All the weight of the word "communism" becomes irrelevant, it shaped lives and countries, yet is does not cease to be man's construction. At the core of human beings, where only existence can be sensed, and our sensorial perception before being rationalized and going directly to the unconscious becomes our connection with the world and reality, such a complex idea in an instant is condensed to smell. Suddenly there is simplicity, just a smell, a flower, a memory.

This reduction also shows a side of existence, regardless of the situation, we are living and our senses awake. As long as we are alive we are sensing the world, never silent, never neutral.  

Barra de la Cruz, Oaxaca

black earth, crisp air

Walking the Iztaccihautl

Extracts from - The Walking Man - by J.M.G Le Clezio

One can waste the better part of a lifetime in walking without actually being a walking man. That's obvious. And on the other hand one may have walked very little, really one may never have cared for walking, never been good at walkig, and yet be unquestionably a walking man. Such is the law of all deep-seated life, according to which beings and objects exist only in terms of a pattern peculiar to themselves, an achievement for which they are granted no handicap, no limit and no appeal. 
* * *
Paoli strolled like this along a succession of streets, some of them shady, others sunny. A mysterious force had entered into him, had distended his muscles and sinews, and was propelling him forward, over the resonant concrete. It was rather as though his body were inhabited by a perfect mechanism, where nothing was left to chance, where each movement followed naturally upon the one before, simply owing to the play of the driving-rods pivoting on their axes, of valves commanded by complex, decisive systems of gears, wth smooth wheels and cogwheels, ball-bearings steel pins and an infinity of screws. In his brain, nothing was clear. No idea could manage to take shape, not the tiniest thought. It was an expanse of fog, prevailing from end to end of his skull, from which nothing emerged except the rock, the tense cry of determination. A sort of tightrope, stretched to breaking-point, extending straight ahead of him, as far as the horizon and even beyond, along which he was walking without understanding. 

yesterday's sunset

Monte Alban, Oaxaca

after the rain

Mexico City - Cerro de la Estrella, Iztapalapa.

On Saturday Lore, Luis, Caco and I climbed to Cerro de la Estrella, a little hill with an archaeological site at the southern edge of the city in Iztapalapa.
Desolate parks, horse training, old cars, a dead iguana which we could not figure out if it had been a pet or part of some witchcraft, or whatever else...what is certain is that it was out of place.
At the top of the hill you get probably one of the best views of the city than anywhere else. This spot used to be the site for the New Fire Ceremony practiced in prehispanic times every 52 years. Now they do a representation of Christ carrying his cross, and there are some remains of some contemporary hippitecas (Aztec hippies) doing probably some sort of rituals. The crowd varies from local families, athletes, lovers, redeemed criminals, us, etc. Towards the hill there is a sign encrypted in the concrete steps "I met you in the 03947 police patrol and I fell in love with you"

It is an interesting place. 

grasping time

Nothing is more of a unique mark of an specific moment as the sky.
It does not matter how contrasted or subtle...light is the greatest reminder of the present.
Photographing the sky often is like marking time in relation to absolute concepts of existence, and time regardless of all the social, visual...etc.
.. no moment in the sky (or anywhere) repeats itself.
+ + +
Right after writing about the sky I turn to it and it is very rare and magnificent as if vowing to its acknowledgment... being in the car it is impossible to get a good picture...
The moment is gone.

Pictures taken in between October-November 2011 through Lebanon, Russia, France and Switzerland.