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When I was teaching, I would sometimes have parents who wanted to pull their kid out of school for two, sometimes three weeks, to go on a family vacation. The rationale was that they could learn more by being at some exotic locale than in my classroom. I would wince in pain but usually relented knowing that if the parents were determined, there was little I could do. I always thought it was a terrible idea. I must admit that with our recent travels, my opinion of this type of "educational experience" has more merit than I was earlier willing to admit.

One of the inherent joys of RVing is the ability to stay in an area long enough to learn about the local culture and traditions. These "flavors" of an area are fascinating to both of us and we seek them out with much enthusiasm. A good example of this was on our trip from the Green Valley south of Tucson ,AZ west to the famed Organ Pipe National Monument on the border with Mexico. The road took us through the Tohono O'odham Indian Reservation. Tohono O'odham means "people of the desert" and this is some of the driest, most desolate desert we have ever seen. Just the thought of surviving in this environment, let alone living there for hundreds of years is mind boggling.

As we drove through the reservation, past the famed Kitts' Peak Observatory we began to notice memorials along the roadside. First one, then another, and soon one every few miles. We have seen crosses along the roadside before but these were more like shrines or grave sites. Many were very elaborate. There were colorful wreaths, statutes of the Virgin Mary and painted rocks surrounding small grotto like structures. We started counting them. I remarked to Sara, "I wondered why an Indian tribe would bury their death along the roadside." She remarked that they were probably places where someone had died on the roadway but there were so many of them. We then tried to determine if there was any pattern to where they appeared as we sped down route 86 toward Organ Pipe National Monument. Sure enough, there was a pattern. It seemed that every time a sharp curve appeared or a bridge abutment lined the roadside, there would be another series of shrines. I pulled over and looked in some of the structures to find candles, pictures, eagle feathers, small statues and even a model of the White House. There was rarely a name associated with the shrine but sometimes a picture of the person being honored. In the last 50 miles of the reservation we counted over 35 memorials.

We stopped at a small station for gas and there was one of the ever present white and green striped Border Patrol vehicles parked in the lot. To satisfy our gnawing curiosity, I approached the truck said to the officer, "Can I ask you a questions?" The biggest officer I have seen in a long time got out of the truck, with his 9mm side arm and loaded police belt in full display. "What would that be?" he said, and I asked him, "What are all the shrines we have seen along the roadway?" His answer dispelled the mystery in one sentence. "They don't allow no booze on the reservation, so those are all where an Indian got wasted off the reservation and then tried to get home and got killed and they think their spirit is still there."

I wonder if anyone has every thought of changing the laws so that the peoples of the Tohono O'odam reservation could drink at home and not have be on the road. It may not solve the problem of alcohol abuse but at least it could slow the carnage on the road.

We drove carefully the rest of the way and continued to count......................................and got a lesson in the culture of the area.

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