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Phil_K · Joined: 25 Jan 2007 Posts: 2041 Location: A World of my Own

Regarding the wrapping up thing - I'm working, sometimes, in a maternal hospital, which is Sec. de Salud - i.e. as cheap as it gets!

I asked my student, a gyno (can't spell it!) , why so many of the young mothers wore headscarfs, wooly hats etc, when leaving the hospital.

She said that this a myth , that if you don't cover the head after childbirth, you will get terrible headaches!! (My student says there is absolutely no truth in the myth)

I've since found out that my wife's sister-in-law forgot to do this after the birth of one of her 3 daughters, and swears she got the headaches as a result. Very Happy

(I'm still here!)

MO39 · Posted: Wed Dec 10, 2008 1:52 am Post subject:

girlcabbie · Joined: 26 Nov 2008 Posts: 25

MO39 · Posted: Wed Dec 10, 2008 7:34 pm Post subject:

Girlcabbie, thanks for the very complete etymology and definition of doula. I have the feeling it's a fairly recent addition to the colloquial language.

john_n_carolina · Joined: 26 Feb 2006 Posts: 700 Location: n. carolina

.....regarding the head scarf idea -- it probably has some truth/effect. there is a lot of grinding of teeth, clamping your mouth shut, screaming, and working other parts of your mouth during heavy, constant, long term breathing.

maybe all that muscle movement in the jaws pushes around the head muscles = therefore, the scarf is kind of like a compress or placebo that makes you forget about what you just went through for 10-30 hours.

my wife's face looked like a bad VanGogh painting after her 38 hours of labor. and she said her jaws and head muscles really hurt, but she didn't notice the whole labor time.

geaaronson · Joined: 19 Apr 2005 Posts: 948 Location: Mexico City

Noticed another interesting roadside detail. In my neighborhood in which many of the small shops have pots of flowering plants in front of them, several people have also planted tomato plants twirled around huge trees in those little uncemented sidewalk squares. Anyone see anything like that in their neighborhoods?
I am also amazed by how many woodworking businesses there are in each neighborhood. I have a kid brother in connecticut whose true love is cabinet making on the high end but never could make a living at it in that state. I have tried to entice him here to Mexico City as there seems to be either a frame shop, upholstery business or woodworking store on every block.

nortenagirl · Joined: 21 Nov 2008 Posts: 16

What I like is how much more people laugh and smile here and really savour life. I also love all the colors you see on the houses, on the packaging, on billboards and on stores/businesses. I love how people say "con el favor de Dios" putting God/the Universe first, it makes me feel like I don't have to be in control of everything! Smile

Nortenagirl

MELEE · Posted: Tue Dec 23, 2008 5:12 pm Post subject:

Jumping back to the birth thing, since I hadn't read this thread until now.

It's a known fact that we loose a large part of our body heat out of the top of our heads. It's also a known fact that childbirth (particually as it is practiced at the Secretary of Salud hospitals! Razz

) is taxing on the mother. If she is worn out from the birth and becomes chilled, she is more suseptable to infection. So a simple thing like putting something over your head won't hurt and just might help. I did it.
Also in traditional Mexican view on health, certain things are essentially hot or cold. Nothing to do with the actual temperature, they are just seen to have that essence. Kind of a yin, yang type of duality. The Birthing process is thought of as being cold, because you've lost the heat that that baby was generating in you, the baby grew slowly so you slowly became hotter, but it was birthed rather abruptly so the mother is at risk because internatlly she's suddenly much colder than the day before. That is why a post birth temascal is essential in traditional communities.
For our two pregnant friends here, I'd be happy to arrange one if you feel up to travelling down here 40 days after your birth. You shouldn't miss out on the "complete" Mexican motherhood experience. My mother-in-law and aunt-in-law are postnatal temascal practitioners.

Guy Courchesne · Joined: 10 Mar 2003 Posts: 9650 Location: Mexico City

Just came across a BBC story 'debunking winter myths' including the well known heat loss through the head. I was surprised at some of the things they've written here.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/7789302.stm

MELEE · Posted: Tue Dec 23, 2008 5:34 pm Post subject:

geaaronson · Joined: 19 Apr 2005 Posts: 948 Location: Mexico City

I believe this will be my last posting on this message thread.
I went to MUNAE museum last weekend for an incredible lithograph exhibiton. Lithos are generally not popular with the art appreciation crowd so I don�t expect many hear ye, hear ye responses to this comment.
there was a dissected Octavio Paz folio of his poem BLANCO displayed on the first floor.
let me quote

contemplated by my hearing/horizon of stretched music

smelled by my eyes/bridge from color to smell

caressed by my smelling/scent nakedness in the hands of the air

heard by my tongue/song of the flowers

eaten by my touch/feast of mist

I have noticed these sensual oxymorons before in Spanish literature, most particularly in other poetry. What gives? I don�t have a clue as to their meaning.
When stateside I used to teach 1st graders how to make masks with pictures of their hands over the openings of their eyes. this was Latino imagery inspired as they imagine how it is that the blind can see with their hands. In my dog and pony talk with my students I would explain that point but for most it was beyond them, they just enjoyed running around the playground with their newly made masks.

Is this an artists�conjuration of spiritual bliss in which the moment of sexual extasy in which all the senses merge and are subsumed transcend to conscious feeling? Or what? Anyone out there know how to make sense of such poetry?

And as long as sex is the subject, the same show at the MUNAE has an example of the only act of male onanism in an art exhibition I have ever seen depicted, complete with the protruding member.

MO39 · Posted: Tue Dec 23, 2008 9:36 pm Post subject:

Guy Courchesne · Joined: 10 Mar 2003 Posts: 9650 Location: Mexico City

Following this line of thought, Octavio Paz's The Double Flame is a must read.

An English translation excerpt:

The Kingdoms of Pan

Perceptible reality has always been a source of surprises to me. Of proofs as well. In a long-ago article, written in 1940, I referred to poerty as "the testimony of the senses." True testimony: its images are palpable, visible, and audible. To be sure, poetry is made up of words linked together, which give off reflections, glints, iridescences. But what it shows us, are they realities or illusions? Rimbaud said: "Et j'ai quelquefois vu / ce que l'homme a cru voir" (And I sometimes saw / what man believed he saw). Fusion of seeing and believing.

Samantha · Joined: 25 Oct 2003 Posts: 2038 Location: Mexican Riviera

I think it's more the way that the Mexican culture views and reacts to death. They don't seem to fear death the way we do, and accept it in a different way. "It was his time" is something I hear my husband or my friends say when I choose to discuss someone's premature demise or some horrid event. My Mexican family and friends are not violent people, nor do they enjoy seeing carnage. They simply react differently to it than my culture does. I accept that.