What a wonderful, beautiful and huge place! We spent the day from 10:45 to 4:30 at the National Hispanic Cultural Center (NHCC) in Albuquerque, New Mexico. The NHCC is located at 1701 4th St SW, Albuquerque, NM 87102 (Ph: 505-246-2261 FAX: 505-246-2613). Their website is: NHCC. We even had lunch there which was some of the best mexican buffet I've ever had. Toni (Martha) spent most of the time until 1:00PM researching the Mares family. She didn't find much new information but found the staff there eager to help in the research. We found one of the staff was even married to a Mares. They also suggested she try going to the Special Collections Library, located at 423 Central Ave NE, Albuquerque, NM (404-848-1376 SpecialCollections@cabq.gov) Their web site is at Special Collections Library.
At 2:00 PM after eating lunch we went to the Performing Arts Center in the NHCC to listen to lecture by Louis Serna and Ema Moya. The lecture was intended to explain the history of the Cryptic Jews of New Mexico and more pertinent to Toni (Martha), Southern Colorado. The format was each speaker was given 20 minutes to explain their portion of the history of the Spanish people of New Mexico. Louis started by going back to Mesopotamian times and due to time constraints quickly covering the 40,000 years since then to illustrate how all the peoples of the world could be traced back to Mesopotamia. Ema then explained the relationship of all the Hispanic names and their role in surviving what they called the Mexican Inquisition which was a derivative of the Spanish Inquisition. We found the Rodriguez family lineage had suffered the most severe retribution of all the families due to the Inquisition. Ema explained why she did not care for the current use of the term "Cryptic Jew" since the expression "Cryptic Jew" was first coined in 1838 to describe the conversion of Jews to Islam under the same threats and intimidation used during the Christian Spanish Inquisition. After the lecture we spoke with both Louis and Ema. Both were delightful to talk to one on one. Toni (Martha) had been emailing with Louis for some time and both were delighted to finally meet. I don't know what it is about me, but after the meeting I voluntarily picked up some copies of two papers that Ema had prepared for the meeting and ended up mobbed and handing out papers for 10 minutes. After the discussions following the meeting I again ended up packing up Ema's pictures and documents and carrying them to her car. This ended up being a unique and treasured experience. Some of Ema's material showed a Albuquerque Mares cemetery stone with Mares and a star of David. Ema explained that there had only been six Mares brothers originally and that she to was related to the Mares family herself. Both Toni (Martha) and I found we would love to spend much more time with Ema as she has so much experience to share.
In just the nick of time we managed to reach "Old Town" to buy gifts for our granddaughters. We found we had plenty of time since typically the New Mexican practice is to close on their own time. Last night Alexis had told us she wanted a Indian feather hat which we interpreted as a Indian Headress. As we drove through the Old Town Square I dropped off Toni (Martha) expecting to circle until she bought what we needed. Instead on my first trip around the square I found a parking place directly in front of the San Felipe de Neri church built in 1706 (see pictures). After that Toni (Martha) and I walked the square buying gifts and a book on Cryptic Jews. For the girls we bought a Indian Headdress, a drum, a Tom-Tom drum and two small dream catchers. Hopefully the girls can keep the dream catchers throughout their long lives and have only good dreams involving their grandmother and grandfather. We also bought Green Chili stew packages and Green Chili peanut brittle. If you haven't already noticed, we love Green Chili.
After shopping, we had an early dinner at the Church Street Cafe behind the San Felipe de Neri church. Toni (Martha) had sopapillas and I had Green Chili Chicken soup and a Chef Salad. I'm catching a theme here involving Green Chili. We left Old Town after dinner to return to the hotel and post this blog.
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