I think you can learn a lot about a group of people by the way they dress and by what food they eat. This occurred to me as I read about the Mayan people. It was very interesting to read about their farming and cornfields. “If there are no tortillas served, you have not eaten a meal.” I thought that showed just how much they use tortillas. It was pretty amazing to read about how many things they make from corn and that everyone grows it. Even though the dollar output would be better if they grew vegetables, they produce corn because it is a reliable source of nutrition. Also, a cornfield is not just made up of corn, the list kept growing of things grown in a cornfield.

At the museum we visited last week it was really neat to see the progression of the Mayan’s clothing. Those people are really good at making clothes and finding plants to dye the fabric. I think it is good that they didn’t conform too much to the Spanish in terms of clothing. They really value their history and traditions. I think it is important to realize where each of us came from and have something to remember that by. In the reader it said how the Mayans dress to set themselves apart from the rest of Guatemala. Although we do not dress like our ancestors, I’m glad to see that people cherish their history.

The writing on the historical sources of Catholic power also intrigued me. In the 1800’s here the church used to hand out mortgages and collect the interest on them. Being a business major I’m trying to keep in touch with the current issues. In the current economic crisis you hear all these different companies being affected, but I have not heard the church’s name in the midst of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. It just seems very odd to me for the church to have acted as a bank. I have never heard of that happening before so I just can’t picture what it was like for them to be in control of land and mortgages. If I knew more about the history of banking this may make more sense. If someone or something has money, they also have power and leverage. They can get things done and control what happens. The Catholic Church had money and so in-hand came power.