I would like to start by paying a moment (about four lines) of respect to my blanket. You have served me well, and kept Miguel and I warm for long weeks. You have protected me from the dirty sheets and biting freeze in Hierve el Agua, may you keep having the same fulfilling purpose of life in Oaxaca with one of the Mujeres Artesianas, where I left you. Goodbye.

So the 14-hour bus ride in line with expectations was long and not fun. There were only two people who actually were on the bus for the whole ride. Me and the bus driver. I think that is actually absolutely prohibited for him to drive for that long. I still wonder what he was on. I am staying in El Panchan, a wonderful congregation of cabañas surrounded by actual jungle. It sounds like there is a rock concert outside my window. I arrived here around 8, had a quick breakfast and caught the local bus to the ruins of Palenque. I let myself be talked into a ^guided tour of the jungle^. I was a bit sceptical at first, but it was absolutely worth it. Fifty minutes of just my boy Oliver and I fighting our way through the green. He showed me calbo (not sure about the spelling) that the locals chew against toothache, camfor, cocoa and many other plants. The guides gather every second month with a biology professor from the nearby university, to study and learn to spot different local plants, from dangerous trees to poisonous mushrooms. He showed me sweet water shrimps and despite my srong wishes he attempted to find me a flying spider that is as big as a palm. Thankfully, he didn^t succeed. Getting back to the ruins of Palenque with the amounts of tourist was a dramatic break in our peaceful walk. Nevertheless, they were beautiful.

Got back to El Panchan just in time to catch the bus to Mislo Ha and Cascadas Agua Azul. Met two lovely Mexican and two equally lovely Israeli ladies. The waterfalls were absolutely amazing, the road was nauseating and terrifying, curvy as crazy and everytime we took over a car my life was flashing in front of my eyes. Regardless, Chiapas feels like a big, fuzzy, green pillow, where, no matter where you fall, you will never hit yourself. Everything is covered with all shades of green and nature is crawling, reaching and growing out of control. This is one of the reasons, why I decided to postpone the crossing to Guatemala with a day and tomorrow I will pack up my stuff visit Yoxchilan and Bonampak and spend the night in an ecological reserve and only the next day head off to Flores. If this entry feels a little rushed, it^s because it is. It is a Saturday night and I have a michelada and some live music waiting for me in a bar where the roof is made of dried banana leaves. Hasta mañana!

Getting to Hierve el Agua was actually a bit more difficult than I expected. The fancier minibuses that took me to Monte Alban only took people there who wanted to rent a guide and a round trip. I wanted to spend the night, and wasn´t having any of that. So I made my way to the periferico where taxi compartidos and buses honk and literally are on top of each other, and you can just fight your way through 3-4 lines of traffic and hop on. The bus to Mitla was late (no wonder, I could have walked faster in that chaos) so I waited around. Some locals, true to form, this happens almost everywhere, advised me to keep an eye on my stuff, because there are a lot of scumbags around. As my feet touched the ground in Mitla I got yelled at ´Hierve el Agua?´, it was a guy hunting for tourists. He told me that so far I am the only one, but because he usually takes up 6 people and makes 300 pesos he´ll take me for 200. Needless to say I wasn´t gonna eat this up, so we waited around and eventually I hunted for him two german girls. So I paid 50 pesos, which was still the double of what local buses ask for, but I was getting anxious as it was nearing 4 and we still had 20 kilometers of mountain road to get through. When I finally settled in the cabaña where I was to spend the night, I went outside to the patio, where the whole mountain range was laid out underneath my feet. Hierve el

Agua means the ´boil of the water´, or something along those lines.

Well, there wasn´t much boiling going on, nor it was very hot (although after it turned out that there is no water in the room, I considered some splashing around) it contains some heavy minerals, which, dripping down on the side of the mountain produce something that can only be described as a frozen waterfall. Sitting on the top, I looked around, feeling nature´s every heartbeat yet when I looked to my right the waterfall looked like as if one of these heartbeats just froze in time. It was one of the most magnificent and humbling experiences of my life. I went to bed around 8, exhausted, but not before the guy-at-the-gate came around to hit on me a little bit. The night was more than eerie. The strong wind made not only my terrace and entrance door creek and thump like crazy, but the chair inside was also shreeking in the dark, like someone was shifting around on it to get comfortable. I killed a spider before going to bed, I know it´s bad luck, but I can´t have that thing climb in my mouth or something. A Mexican grasshopper (by this I mean it was big, brown and making drilling noises) scared 

the living shit out of me as it hopped on my bed just as I opened my eyes at half 5. What was, I presume, a breathtaking sunrise, unfortunately was more or less covered up by clouds. As I made my way through the small paths to discover and see more, and besides encountering numerous large bees that were defending their territorry and admiring the colibris and, what I suppose were eagles, I also got completely terrified by the death fight of a bird who was dragged away by god knows what. Had a strong coffee at the village (of about 15 houses) which was to the

 brim of its absorption level with sugar. I think it will never fail to surprise me when my coffee is made with real fire in a large tin pot, and when drinking it I have as many chickens and dogs running around under the table as children. Three to be exact. The chickens may have been more, I can´t distinguish them. Got on the first bus, which was for the locals, no tourists arrive at 8.30 in the morning. Six people in the front, in the actual car, and seven of us at the back of the pick up, and one hanging off the back. The little girl was wretching in front of me. Thinking that when I was a kid I would vomit in the car, on an asphalted highway, for me she was a hero. No surprise she couldn´t hold it on a 2-meter wide dirt road, U-turns, in the back of a pick-up car (because it definitely wasn´t a truck). Caught the bus from Mitla, and on the way I realized that I had forgotten to pay for my ride down. This is how much this trust-based manner of handling things hasn´t sunk in yet. Of course it also could be the fact that sometimes I fail to pay any attention. To anything. Nevertheless, I felt so ashamed! Now I´m back in Oaxaca, I have four hours until catching my lovely 14-hour ride to Palenque, Chiapas. So I am off to see this city a bit.

Actually arrived earlier than expected, so I bummed around the bus station until 6 waiting for the first bus to the center. Chatted with a guy from Switzerland, and I realized that I already forgot how much less friendly most Europeans can be. Although it is also entirely possible that I wasn´t at the top of my conversation and entertainment skills at 5 in the morning and I just simply scared him. Brushed my teeth and cleaned myself up a bit in the bathroom and caught the bus, from which, of course, i got off about 10 blocks away from my intended destination. So I wandered, and watched the city wake up. Later I found Calle Mina which

is full of buses heading to Monte Albán, my first destination. The gentelman from the phar

macy, just opposite to Hotel Rivera del Angel, who sold me the ticket, advised me to spend

my time until the bus leaves at half 8 at the nearby chocolate factory/breakfast place on the corner of Mina and 20 de Noviembre. I am not a sweet tooth generally, but the sound of the machines, the sight of the workers turning the massive brown paste, and the sweet smell while I was sipping on my hot and delicious chocolate, dipping sweet bread in it and reading the newspaper, was truly a cosy experience. The sight of the Sierra Madre from Monte Alban, and just the positive energy oozing from the place is unexplainable. The cattles of shrieking and obnoxious tourists remind me how wonderful it is to travel alone, or with somebody that shares a similar rythm and calm with you. Thankfully, it was relatively easy to ignore and lose sight of them in the massive spaces of the ancient city. I am now on the hunt for taxi compartido to get me to Hierve el Agua, a place at 3000m with hot water springs, where I plan on spending the night.

Wanderings in space and time

'-Have you ever transcended space and time?'

'-Yes. Space, but not time. No, I have no idea what you are talking about.'

I am leaving behind today at midnight Mexico DF, which has been my welcoming home for almost three months now. Welcoming, except of course for the time when Christos, my flatmate was robbed by two guys and a gun outside our door. But I try to pass this off, because it can happen anytime and anywhere, especially when you live in such a huge and chaotic city.

I promised (myself, I didn't let anybody else know) that I would keep a brief, funny, entertaining yet insightful diary of my stay here on this very blog; keep an account of the difficulties and wonders I may encounter when interacting with this different and sometimes puzzling culture. Needless to say (and clear to see) this did not happen in the slightest. So hereby, I am making the promise in 'public' that I will try to document the next 3 weeks and some days to come, when I will be rushing through some of Central and South America in my desperate attempt to see all the wonders of this part of the world. Let us see if this time I can live up to the plan. Following is my itinerary, for numerous reasons: so you can keep track of me, appreciate in one breath the 'locura' of the situation and not the least to already make an excuse if all this does not happen, 'Just look at my plan! There was no way I was going to be able to find a computer, let alone reflect in writing on anything that is going on!'

Nov. 25. Taking night bus to the capital of Oaxaca state, Oaxaca.

Nov. 26. Visiting Monte Alban and then setting out for Hierve del Agua and spending the night there

Nov. 27. Seeing a bit of Oaxaca, before taking a 14-16 hour busride to Palenque in the southern state of Chiapas

Nov. 28. Take a 5am. bus through Yaxchilan, cross the river to Guatemala, take another bus to Flores

Nov. 29-Dec. 1. Enjoy the island of Flores, the city of Santa Elena and the Mayan ruins of Tikal

Dec. 2. Arrival to Panama City and reuniting with Camden

Dec.3. 5am jeep taking us to the other side of the country to take a boat (sailboat, yacht or a tanker? unknown as of now) to Cartegna in Colombia

Dec. 3-8/9. Fighting sea-sickness and visiting some of the uninhabited islands of San Blas

...

Further plans are fuzzy. Depending on arrival of the boat, hopefully visiting Medellin and on the 13th flying out of Bogota, Lima bound. There I am at the mercy of my dear and totally crazy friends. Budapest bound on the 22nd of December. Hope you hear from me soon.

Because everybody is talking about it

Just a quick thought on Michael Jackson's funeral. I find it simply odd, how people are so passionately mourning somebody who gave kids wine and taught them to masturbate. If we must employ the old and rubbed down cliché of the artist being separate from his art, then can we just let the pervert with an unfortunately disturbed mind-set rest in peace, and celebrate his music that lives on forever? Cheers.

On the importance of participation

"Sok kicsi sokra megy" is a Hungarian saying, meaning something along the lines of "lots of little goes a long way". Earth Hour is an initiative to encourage people to switch off their lights for an hour today, the 28th of March at 20.30 their local time. When I say "lots of little goes a long way" I'm not really talking about a significant change in the consumption of energy. Sure, for this particular hour there is certainly some detectable change, but what really goes a long way is these 60 long minutes that I, personally will spend with some dear friends, candles and some wine. Those 60 minutes, that usually just fly by unnoticed during the course of the day, will be spent reflecting on the direction we are headed. It is a collective doom, towards which we are speeding faster and faster with every minute of every hour of everyday, and these 60 minutes are a reminder of our belonging together as a damned humanity. Most importantly, these 60 minutes are a lifeline to regain faith in ourselves as conscious individuals and active participants. There is a way to slow down the slide towards oblivion. We are not a mindless mass that marches towards its own destruction. We vote Earth. We vote life. We vote decision.

http://www.earthhour.org

Banksy, Lights, Hip, Camera. Action?

I remember the Leake Street tunnel, near Waterloo, when it was a convenient shortcut to get from the side of the Thames to the Cubana on the other, but it was just as dodgy. The old taxi station, abandoned when the Eurostar moved from Waterloo, smelled like piss, and the presence of the many homeless was all the more accentuated by the trap-like feeling of the tunnel. For a moment both them and I were stuck half-way towards the light. Then I emerged, had a drink and tried to shake off the feeling with some heart-lifting Latin music.

Now the tunnel is one of my favourite spaces in London. There is still a faint whiff of piss lingering but the cigarette and spray-paint smell almost over-powers it, and rather than speeding off towards the comforting other end, I loiter from side to side wishing it would never end. And it doesn't. The changes occur in front of the eyes, new sketches emerge, covering old ones, day after day; depicting, criticizing our world in a cruel and direct way, that seems to be largely absent from any form of media that is poured down our neck minute after minute. Pictures say a thousand words, because the words are ours. We are not told what to think, our mind is shocked by an impression that can trigger thousands of individual interpretations. One of the few things praised by the works is the individual. The thoughts we can think, the love that we make, the changes we can create. But the fear is detectable. You are capable, but what you do with your gift remains a question.

Graffiti is a form of expression (artistic or not, let's not get into it here) that is, through its originally clandestine nature, temporary. Then came Banksy. You think of rats making political statements, you think of kids with balloons flying over the Western Wall, you think of some chick sitting on the Queens face. Banksy made it huge with his talent, and the somewhat elegant style of cruel criticism of basically everything, and because nobody new his face. If he is really Gunningham or not is quite irrelevant. He turned the art of graffiti from illegal destruction into constructive hip. 

Banksy makes a load of money. (Or at least I would think so, he published a number of books, and his works are being sold for crazy amounts.) Good on him; his art can be dispersed to an even wider audience, making hopefully more people think. His works haven't seem to lost the piercingly cynical attitude, just look at his recent 'pet shop' in New York, where chicken nuggets eat ketchup, the monkey watches monkey-porn and Tweety still dangles in the cage, some 20 years on. The twisted relationship of man and his animals. Some we dress up, some we eat. 

The Cans Festival kicked off sometime in the beginning of May last year. It lasted for three days at the Leake Street tunnel, with large installations and the possibility for the spectators to participate with stencil works of their own. It was a day or two before my Italian orals, but I just couldn't miss it, so I queued for a couple of hours with my quickly purchased Il Resto del Carlino. When I got in finally, in my momentary crowd-spirit I regretted not bringing a camera. Everybody seemed to be taking pictures around me. After a while, it just got very bloody irritating. I couldn't spend time reading, looking, admiring something, because there was always one sucker who, glaring at his digital screen, was flashing around like a maniac. I kept ducking, until I had enough. I emerged on the other side, had a drink and tried to shake off the feeling with some heart-lifting Latin music. 

Apparently it was 'hip' to be at the 'Bansky-exhibition'. There was of course a number (countless actually, including the participant turned spectators) other artists involved. But Banksy is famous, he is controversial, we don't know who he is, but I was there, therefore I am cool by association. It is besides the point, that I can't remember anything I saw without looking at my camera. 

I need to emphasize, as an enthusiastic amateur photographer myself, that there is nothing wrong with taking a photo, as long as it is a personal interpretation of the world as you see it. When applied in this context, it is the perversion of the concept and intention of graffiti on a number of levels. First and foremost it denies the inherent quality of graffiti as temporal, and therefore destructs its value in leaving an imprint on your mind rather than your camera. The spectator who is asked to be the interpreter remains a spectator, hiding behind a machine, not coming into worthwhile direct visual or emotional contact with the work. 

Feel the atmosphere, reflect. Let the work speak to you. Let yourself appreciate what you see, and how it is making you feel. Take a picture if you want. But enjoy it first. It maybe temporal, but it won't disappear in the next 5 minutes. Graffiti is hip, fashionable these days. But it can speak to you through the same clandestine channels about the different ways to see the world as it did decades ago. Just listen.