Time Slip Trip

Finally, I set foot in Arizona and New Mexico. It's like a time slip. I felt like I went to another time on this trip. First, I went to the Indian period. I can visit some pueblo villages such as Taos and Acoma. Acoma is on a mesa, like a hill, Taos is near mountain and a river. Their houses are made from clay which is called adobe. It is really smooth and thick. I was shocked to see their real life. I learned a lot of things about them in the Southwest class, but actually, I couldn't believe some of the thing that I learned about their life like the mesa, the kivas, the adobe, so I felt kind of shocked at that time. After that I fell into a feeling of sadness because the guide who is a Pueblo Indian, told us calmly the real story about the Spanish and Native Americans. I knew about that, but it didn't feel real, just a story. Therefore, when I heard from a real Native American about the true stories and proper places, I felt there was force in what they told, because they spoke with great conviction. These experieces impressed me, especially because they told us about their culture slowly fading away into the modern culture now. There are no people who can fix their original adobe houses, also people who speak their particular language are becoming fewer and fewer little by little. I can't imagine what it would be like if Japanese vanished in the same way. I really want them to keep their original culture accurately. I felt that strongly in the Acoma elementary school. The teachers teach students about their culture and language. Even now children can't speak their native language. I realized how important and difficult it is to keep culture at the school. I'm glad that I met those Native American chidren and we could have a really precious experiences.

At the end of this trip I felt like time slipped to 250,000,000 years ago when dinosaurs still lived on the earth. It's called the Grand Canyon. That was amazing I thought. I took a lot of pictures of the Grand Canyon, but it didn't work. I can't express such a fabulous landscape at all in the pictures, so I tried to remember that scene. As a result, the scene is still very vivid in my memory. It would not have been strange to see a dinosaurs come out from anywhere. At first, I was really afraid of heights, but I was gradually getting used to looking over all of the cliff around there. It was sooooo dangerous. After the trip, I looked over my pictures of this trip, I had goose bumps because I had stood at the edge of the precipice. I think it's better if I hide the pictures of the Grand Canyon from my parents. If I show them, they will probably scream.