I hope you have learned some new things about New Mexico, and I hope I have incited you to want to go visit. I had the joy of visiting when I went back home over Thanksgiving and I really loved it. To be back in the culture, climate, and food made me happy. In the end, New Mexico is a very interesting place with a broad history from ancient Puebloan cultures to the birth of the atomic age. The food and modern culture is unique to only New Mexico. And to top it all off it has a wonderful climate and landscapes with unmatched sunsets that will make you long to be back after you have left.

You may be wondering now, why does anyone live in New Mexico? I mean it has a massive arid region in the south, mountains in the north, and not very much land for growing anything, except green chile of course. Why would anyone be attracted to New Mexico and live there? There is not much going on. And how does it possibly have a population of two million if there is actually nothing there? Well while part of the state is dedicated to the little farming there is; most business, industry, and engineering jobs in the state come from the Air Force Bases and National Laboratories located there. You see New Mexico in World War II had almost nobody living there which meant it was a perfect place to build a top-secret research facility to develop the atomic bomb, Los Alamos National Laboratories. At the same time in Albuquerque, Kirtland Air Force base, back then known as the Albuquerque Army Air Base, was used for bomber pilot training. Elsewhere in New Mexico, there was Cannon Air Force Base and Holloman Air Force base, which both exist today as well. By the end of World War II multiple air bases had been built along with weapons storage facilities. Further, the White Sands Test Range had been established, in the Jornada Del Muerto desert, along with Los Alamos National Laboratories in Los Alamos New Mexico and Sandia National Laboratories in Albuquerque. As the Cold War progressed these labs and air force bases attracted thousands of scientist and engineers to New Mexico. In turn the labs and air force bases grew and thus required more economic support and people. Thus, in the areas surrounding these locations cities grew even larger due to more and more jobs being created to support these facilities with engineering and contractor services. As the Cold War progressed most of the nuclear weapon research and development occurred in New Mexico. While nuclear weapons were tested in Nevada and in the Pacific, missile testing occurred at White Sands test range. The massive amount of empty land provided a great place to launch and test missiles. In fact, they are still doing missile tests there today and if you are down in Las Cruces, near the range, you may sometimes catch a glimpse of a rocket shooting off into the sky, in fact White Sands test range is so big that they can launch a missile at one end and shoot it down with another missile at the other end. Actually, White Sands was the birth place of the U.S. rocketry program and NASA traces its root back there. Today Los Alamos and Sandia take part in very high level research that stretches far beyond nuclear weapons. Their main mission and goal, however, is to ensure the nuclear weapons stockpile is fully functional. However, the research they do there has long lasting impacts on improving our lives. Some of the research they conduct includes how to neutralize chemical weapons, how to make computers faster (try 10,000x faster), cold fusion, and lots of other impressive and interesting things. They even do work in other green energy fields such as biofuels and hydrogen fuel cells. New Mexico is home to the majority of the government’s scientific research and development, and it all grew from WWII.

New Mexico is one of only a few states where a majority minority exists. That means that most of the people living in the state are part of a minority. In this case Hispanics. Hispanic means simply that they can trace their heritage back to a colony of Spain. However, that is very broad group of people and can refer to people who live in the Caribbean to people that live in Mexico. However New Mexico Hispanics are different than both. While they have more similarities to the Mexican culture than any other Hispanic culture however, just like in my New Mexico food blog, they are different. The language spoken by the culture is Spanish however they also speak English. At school, many students who are Hispanic spoke English everywhere except at home where they spoke Spanish, and for some they did not speak Spanish at all. They have no accent since they learned and have been speaking English since the time you and I learned English (very young) they simply learned English and Spanish concurrently and interestingly some have both English and Spanish as a first language. That means that they have the option to think in their mind in either language. I find that very cool! Another interesting part of the Hispanic culture in New Mexico, and the New Mexico culture in general, is the Spanishization of Native American words. When the Spanish empire pushed into what was to become New Mexico they encountered Native American cultures, namely the Navajo and Puebloans. They took their words and names for things and, much as English does (Anglicization), they Spanishized certain words. That means that you get town names like Chilili and Tajique (I challenge you to pronounce those names). Both were originally Native American names for places that were changed by the Spanish. Thus, some words are very, very odd indeed and have no basis in English words at all, compared with other parts of America (*cough Lewistown, Lewisburg, Lewisberry). Many places in New Mexico are in Spanish or have Spanish pronunciations. So, while I cannot speak Spanish at all, meaning I cannot put my own sentences together, I can pronounce Spanish words, phrases, and if I can read sentences or they are spoken slowly I can discern what is said. I have a fairly large collection of Spanish nouns memorized due to street and location names. Knowing Spanish, however, is not a requirement for visiting New Mexico. Back to the Hispanic culture, it does permeate daily live everywhere. Quinceañera’s do occur and I have had the privilege of attending one in fact. They are very grand and exciting with lots of singing of words I do not understand. One cannot live in New Mexico without being exposed to this culture and it is interesting to be a part of. I wish I could go into more detail but it is hard to describe differences between the culture there and elsewhere since I have lived there my whole live. I sense a difference when I go out of New Mexico but I cannot place my finger on exactly what that difference is. Thus, I have only been able to give you a brief overview of the language and certain interesting parts of their lives. As I have always said before you just got to visit to understand it.

My friend Aidan from high school posted a picture on Facebook the other day. He went to UNM which is in Albuquerque so he is still in New Mexico. I should point out that while he is an amateur photographer he does a fabulous job and has some professional credit to his name. The picture he posted made me tear up because I miss New Mexico. I miss the physical state of New Mexico. The geography there is far different than here. There is not as much green and specifically in southern New Mexico there is nothing and I mean nothing. Nothing but long vistas with a mountain range in the distance and wispy clouds floating in the clear blue sky. However, in the northern part of the state there are massive mountain ranges. You drive along winding roads thousands of feet above the floor of the valley as you make your way through the mountain passes. This is scary to drive on as you may guess but it is truly breathtaking. Every once in a while, you can pull off the fairly empty road and step out into a moment of silence of all human made things. All you hear is nature. I know I’m sounding crazy now but honestly you only hear the wind rushing through the valley and blowing past your ears. You hear birds in the trees around you. All of this while across a grand valley opening below you. This is a direct opposite to southern New Mexico where you can sit on an empty dirt road and watch as the colors change while the sun sets across the long landscape and dips below those mountains in the distance. You can feel the crisp night air start to roll in as the sun sets and night begins. Then if you wait, and since there is not much civilization out there for literally hundreds of miles, the sky lights up with thousands and thousands of stars. The Milky Way can be seen clearly in the sky as it arcs overhead. Even nestled down there in southern New Mexico is a beach in the middle of a desert. White Sands National Monument is simply a dune sea of tiny white gypsum quartz crystals that stretched for miles. The emptiness and view across the dunes is awe inspiring. I liked New Mexico a lot for the views and what it had to offer even before I left. The warmness of the sun even on cold winter days to the dry heat that made you want to just fall asleep sprawled across the dunes, all of it was lovely. But now that I am gone from there I love it even more. I miss New Mexico so much and every time my friend posts a new set of pictures I pour over them for minutes at a time wishing I could be there. When I return for winter break my friends and I are planning to go camping. I cannot wait to go not only because they are my friends but because it will allow me to envelope myself in the beauty of New Mexico again.

All the photos are courtesy of Aidan O’Hara. In order to give proper credit his Instagram is @aid.ano and a direct link is “https://www.instagram.com/aid.ano/?hl=en” he has far better pictures on there that show what I am talking about and you should give it a quick peek if your reading this. (Side note: A few of the pictures on his Instagram are not from New Mexico but the majority are.)

These however are all in New Mexico.

If you look up in the sky in Albuquerque this week at around 7-8 in the morning it will be filled with hot air balloons. Now it is not just one or two or even ten balloons; there are dozens even hundreds. This is the international balloon fiesta, the largest hot air balloon event in the world as well as the most photographed event in the world, that is held annually on the first week in October in Albuquerque; on average it attracts six hundred to seven hundred balloons. They range in all shapes and sizes from normal balloons to special shapes such as the Wells Fargo stagecoach, Smokey the Bear, and even a family of bees. It is quite an amazing sight. The reason it is held in Albuquerque is due to the weather. At ground level the wind blows predictably to the north and once they get high enough (about seven hundred to one thousand feet) the wind switches to blow to the south. Thus it creates a convection effect that allows the pilots to land back at the same place (Balloon Fiesta Park). The festival includes other events as well as the mass accessions, as the mass launches are called. Some of the other events include dropping sand bags on targets. Another event is the cross country hydrogen filled balloon race. These balloons are filled with hydrogen and compete to see how far across the country they can go, usually they are in the air for a week or two. Usually in the evenings they host balloon glows. If you have ever seen a hot air balloon you would know that a giant propane fueled burner is what heats up the air. This flame is very hot as well as bright and thus can illuminate the balloon. So at these balloon glows they fill the field with the balloons and have them all burn at the same time filling the field with incredible colors. Quite a sight that is.

Now you make ask what is a balloon fiesta event like? Well I have gone to these ever since I was a little kid and have always loved it. The balloons require colder air to launch due to a difference in air density (hot air rises in cold air because it is less dense). Thus if one is to go see a mass accession you have to get up at about 4:45 and drive down there. As you approach the traffic gets very heavy and it’s a long line of cars to get in (this event attracts tens of thousands of people) but it moves fairly well. I usually sleep while waiting in the traffic. Once you get in and past the gates you are free to mill around the field where the balloons are being unfolded and then inflated. To inflate a balloon, you start by unfolding it and using a massive box like fan to inflate it at first. Once it has enough air in it they point the propane burner into the balloon to then heat up the air. As it heats up it rises and sits on the ground ready to go. The balloons are lined up in lines and the referees/launch officials (called zebras because they are covered in black and white stripes and usually will embrace the title and wear even more zebra attire) will come to the line and allow that string of balloons to launch. They then move back a row and launch the next. The whole field will usually launch two waves of balloons. In a matter of about an hour or less six hundred or more balloons have launched. It is an incredible sight to behold and you are free to watch them fly away. If you wait long enough you can watch them land, which is practically a controlled crash.

I always love the balloon fiesta and I am sad I am missing it this year. I encourage you all to attend one if you get the chance. It is worth the time and traffic.