A Tale of Two Jungles
From the Mayan jungle to the concrete jungle
© Sam Anaya
Sensing Life in Quintana Roo & Mexico City
A symphony plays before me in an outdoor theater. The sun passes through a roof of leaves, tree branches crawl up and around the doorways, and rain delicately drizzles upon the earthen seats. This is the Mayan jungle in Quintana Roo, Mexico.
I had arrived here from another theater where sunlight illuminates towering structures and passes through glass windows. The red, yellow, and green of signal lights reflect in the puddles of afternoon rains. This is the concrete jungle of Mexico City.
Sometimes you have to see—feel, taste, and hear—things differently in order to sense their similarities. From 2015 to 2016, I lived in both a thick tropical forest and a crowded city. Although these two environments could not be more different, I found my sensory experiences...
