My roommate and I were equally excited to get back to New Mexico. She was born in Farmington, which is in the northwest corner of the state, and hasn’t been back since she was about a year old. My New Mexican experience was a trip about ten years ago to Sante Fe with my father and sister.
New Mexico is an intriguing and culturally-rich state. As our host put it, it’s “tri-cultural,” blending American, Native American, and Spanish traditions. I imagine that this tri-cultural climate shifts and favors one tradition more as you travel toward the Mexican border, the New Mexican urban centers or the Indian reservations.
Farmington is near the town of Shiprock which plays host to part of a Navajo reservation. Our host in Farmington is a former teacher on the reservation and she drove us all through it. The concept of reservations is certainly a tricky one, and there is tangible tension between the residents and the people in the neighboring towns. The white New Mexicans seem to doubt the competence of the Native Americans on the reservations, what with the high rates of alcoholism and poverty; on the flip side, the Native Americans no doubt resent the American government for a lack of control.
Shiprock, so-named because it just kinda sticks out in the desert
As with the rest of my tour of the Southwest, New Mexico is stunning. But this was the first opportunity we had to experience real life in the state we were visiting. My night in California included a couple of bars and a stop at the Golden Gate Bridge — basic touristy stuff. Las Vegas is something out of this world, hardly a glimpse into the life of the average American. And Utah and Arizona were excellent, but they were for scenic purposes only on our drive.
There’s a lot of life in New Mexico: the site of culture clash tends to be a real hub for traditions to flourish and morph (think New Orleans, Louisiana). We stopped at a flea market on the reservation to peruse the goods and pick up some much-anticipated fry bread. Fry bread looks like fried dough, but it less crispy, more chewy, and very delicious. The woman we bought our bread from was selling dough for a buck right out of the trunk of her car. She was kind enough to let me take some pictures:
She began by tossing the dough back and forth between her hands. When it was flat enough, she put it in a skillet over a fire right by the car and fried it in some oil, all in a matter of minutes. As an alum of the Altamont Fair in New York, I was expecting some powdered sugar to go with my fry bread, but she handed us salt instead. Different taste buds, but YUM! My roommate and I split a piece then helped our host finish hers as well…
Fry bread: well-worth the empty calories and the time it would take you to drive to New Mexico.
