And Now I Want Some Corn

so, in my pre-PA days as a social worker, i had to complete an internship for graduation. mine was in farm country with (mostly) mexican migrant farm workers, working with their children in a head start program. it was an amazing experience, and quite an education for me. witnessing the challenges of making a living in the field, with the health risks and dangers, getting a glimpse into the legal issues immigrants deal with while working seasonally, observing the family dynamics as the parents left their kids at our program as young as 2 wks old for 10 hrs a day so they could return to the farms. and there's was a very nomadic life as they followed the crop. most of them made enough money in the 6 month growing season of spring/summer, that they returned home and lived very comfortably, many not having to work at all in the winter. and there was the cultural intrigue for me, too. although some of the families were from columbia and cuba, most were mexican, either from mexico itself or from florida or texas.

we were a school, a daycare center, a resource center, and a health clinic, and i focused more on the financial and health aspects of it. (i also helped teach an adult ESL class which was a total head trip- do you KNOW how messed up the english language is? like "por que se usa 'i' antes de 'e'?" to which i would have to reply, "it's just how it's done. no idea. move on."

so, anyway. i learned of many fascinating cultural traditions, especially as they pertained to health and wellness. here are a few of the folk remedies that i recall. and bear in mind that a lot of these people were from tiny villages deep in mexico where they had only to rely on their own small community and had no access to big city resources. many didn't speak spanish, but rather native dialects.

- "Mal de ojo"... it was my understanding that if your child started acting sickly or strangely, you would suspect that they had had sort of a hex put on them...but it was not totally a malicious thing, it was more like an adult complimented the child or looked at them with envy or pride or something of the sort. to remove the "bad eye" when you put the child to bed at night, you would crack an egg into a glass of water and place it under the bed. then, in the morning, if the egg had cooked, you would know that the curse had left the child and gone into the egg. here is a little snippet on this to read further. apparently the "evil eye" is seen in other incarnations in other cultures, too.

- Fussy baby... if an infant child is being temperamental, you could asses their soft spot (fontanelle) and if it was sunken, you would either put your thumb into the roof (hard palate) of the child's mouth and push up or you'd hold the child upside down by the ankles and pop them on the bottoms of their feet. supposedly, if you correctly diagnosed the problem, you would hear a "pop" when the soft spot went back up. this one is addressed here. apparently it is called "mollera caida" and there are even more interesting remedies available. there is definitely something to this one as a sunken fontanelle can mean dehydration which would make for a fussy baby. you can see how a little education can go a long way.

so, i've always remembered those and found them very interesting. i loved so much the opportunity to learn about these cultures and experience their customs. the people i worked with were so warm and welcoming and eager to teach me new things. and they fed me! really well! to this day, i put mayonnaise, chili powder, and lime juice on my corn on the cob.

try it. ud. lo amará!!