1 Martin's cousin Citlalli López helped us with introductions and the logistics of our trip. She is an authority on Mexican amate. Her dissertation, "The Endurance of Mexican Amate Paper: Exploring Additional Dimensions to the Sustainable Development Concept," was published by Twente University Press, Enschede, in 2003. The process of making amate by hand beating fibers into sheets has not changed except that the original amate bark fibers, from ficus trees, have been replaced, due to over-harvesting, with a number of other native plant fibers, including white and red jonote, tule, and mulberry. The visual effect and consistency of the finished sheet look the same as the original amate. We wanted to learn as much as we could about the materials and processes of making these papers. To get to San Pablito we hopped a taxi to take us down the mountain and then up another one to the village. With each passing moment, we moved further and further away from modern amenities and finally into a world where time seemed to have stopped. The land of the Otomi people. In San winter 2013 - 27 Pablito there were women dressed in traditional, long, white, embroidered dresses, stately chickens, feral dogs, goats, and the occasional cow, all sharing the same rough, cobbled streets. The taxi driver told us that the symbol of the town is a double-headed eagle, as shown on an arch at the entrance to the town. In village lore there arrived an eagle who took up living in their mountain, and suddenly people began to get sick and die. Another eagle arrived who fought with the first eagle, and they both flew away. The sickness stopped. We found Mr. Fausto Santos Rojas's amate workshop by asking passersby, and were generously greeted by him and members of his family. Martin and Citlalli had arranged this visit by telephone ahead of time. We were shown all the parts of the studio— the space where the fibers are beaten and sheets formed, the outdoor area where papers are dried on boards, the place where numerous large buckets of prepared fibers are stored, the fiber-cooking area, and the store where they sell small and wallsized amate sheets. Large stones surrounded each of the three fire pits where fiber is cooked in beautiful, old, steel pots. Amate embody the spirits of the Otomi peoples. Used in rituals, they help secure a good harvest and a good life. Special papers are often requested by those keeping specific crops, such as pineapples, mangos, and corn. In the amate sheet, these stylized fruit, vegetable, and occasional animal images are found within the overall pattern. A family will request an amate sheet for their mango field, but must take it to a local shaman to activate its powers. We were told that in the village of San Pablito there are five shaman, and that not all of them work on the good side. We saw one amate sheet with devils on it. Martin and I presented the bundle of Alabama kozo to Fausto and his sons, Jorge Luis ("Jorge") and Hernan, to see their reaction. To our astonishment Fausto declared that we would cook it immediately to see how it compared to their mulberry fibers. But not before the brothers tugged at, smelled, and tasted the bark. They declared the taste "sweet" in comparison to their local mulberry bark (do you hear the refrains of "Sweet Home Alabama"?). They started a fire using oak branches and logs, and heated up a cooking pot filled with water. In the meantime young Hernan put oak wood ash into a cloth bag and began the first of two siftings, to get rid of charcoal bits. When the water began to boil he added about 11 cups of wood ash2 and about 1 cup of slaked lime to the water. They put the unscraped bark, by handfuls, gently into the water to cook. They turned the fiber just once during the cook. The brothers wanted to show us a traditional cook using wood ash and lime. Wood ash alone, they said, does not soften the fibers fully enough to pound into an even sheet. So lime is added to further soften the fibers. Sometimes they use soda ash, especially for strong fibers. But it is important to them to continue their woodash cooks so the tradition will not be lost. It was clear to us that the family viewed their amate production as not only an occupation, but a mission and a legacy. By the time Martin and I walked downtown, a few short blocks, and had a bite to eat, and then walked back, the cook was fully engaged. The water was an opaque, medium green color, unlike our clear, dark mahogany liquor when cooking mulberry fiber with soda ash. Jorge's wife Maribel attended to the cook. The brothers tested the fiber by trying to pull apart a length of it, and decided that our fiber was tougher than theirs, and that it would take a longer cook. We decided to stay an extra day so the fibers could fully cook and steep in their juices overnight so that something could be done with them. We took a taxi back to Pahuatlan and enjoyed the evening. At supper Martin and I spoke about the process and concluded that Alabama and San Pablito were now joined in papermaking by bringing our fiber here. We hoped that they would consider making a decorated amate sheet from our kozo that would share symbols from both places. The next morning we taxied back to San Pablito. The brothers had already rinsed a handful of cooked fiber and without cleaning it, they pounded out a sheet. The tool they used for pounding is a rectangular piece of lava rock almost 3 inches thick, 2.5 inches wide, and 5 inches long, with a groove cut along the length for fingers to hold while pounding. The sheet was on a board that had been treated by wetting it and applying bar soap, so that the sheet would release after drying. They put the board out in the sun to dry and were pleased with the results. We presented to the brothers the idea of making an amate piece with the base layers being Alabama kozo. We suggested using their dyed mulberry paper for the cutout figures to include el- The finished, collaborative amate piece. above left: Fausto Santos Rojas, the father, hydrating Alabama kozo fiber. above: Pounding carefully arranged fibers together with a lava stone tool. The mulberry strands are arranged on a soaped board. facing page left: Maribel, Jorge's wife, showing the quartillo box used for measuring wood ash. facing page right: Juan Santos Rojas, Fausto's brother, the designer and cutter of the images. ephants, birds, and the double-headed eagle. That would embrace their town's symbol, the state bird of Alabama—the yellowhammer, and The University of Alabama's mascot, the elephant. They were eager to work on it, so we plotted size, the fiber pattern, the crimson color ("Roll Tide!") for the cutouts, and the location of images on the cutout piece. To get it done in one day they said they would need our help cleaning and preparing the kozo fiber. We started by rinsing the cooked fiber in several sequential buckets of cold water. After that we squeezed the fiber into several large balls. At that point we went to work picking the small bits of bark as best as we could. Then came a fascinating part. Thin strands of multiple fibers were laid on the table and then rolled with open hands toward the papermaker. This created long lengths of kozo strands, 1/16-inch to 1/8-inch in diameter. Once we accumulated enough of these strands the amate maker began to assemble his sheet. Jorge took regular pieces of cooked bark and created the outside border. Once he shaped the perimeter he began using the lava stone beater to pound the fiber, macerating and opening it up. His pounding was firm and strong. He used a piece of cardboard covered with packing tape to straighten the outer edges until he formed the rectangular edge of the sheet. He began arranging the long kozo strands horizontally across the sheet, every inch, from top to bottom, overlapping the strands with the fiber forming the perimeter. Then he laid the shorter pieces on top of the long, horizontal pieces, vertically across the sheet, also an inch apart. He deftly pounded out the fiber to attach fiber to fiber but also to create the beautiful crosshatched pattern so characteristic of amate. He left a rectangular open space in the middle of the sheet, and into this space he put a layer of kozo fiber we had opened up even further by tearing it into very thin feathery pieces. He pounded this even pile of fibers into a middle solid piece of paper. The framework was now set. While Jorge was assembling the sheet, his uncle Juan Santos Rojas was cutting the animals out of a folded sheet of their thin, crimson-dyed mulberry paper. This was a very delicate and precise process. When he finally unfolded the sheet, magically there appeared the cutouts of elephants, birds, and the double-headed eagles! He carefully placed this cutout sheet in the center of the wet base sheet and gently patted it into position. Using the lava stone beater, Juan made sure that there was complete contact between the base and cutout sheets. We all stood back and agreed that it was a very beautiful thing. Nature's spirits—both native (double-headed eagles) and imported ones (Alabama elephants)—are very alive in the village of San Pablito, and come alive through the hands and work of its Otomi amate makers. ___________ notes 1. Often referred to as "amate paper," amate is technically a pre paper or a proto paper, not a true paper that is produced from beaten fibers reduced to pulp and formed into a sheet. Instead, amate is made by hand beating and matting together strips or clumps of bark or inner bast fiber. In this article, we refer to sheets of this material as amate. 2. The wood ash is measured by volume using a quartillo, a 5 x 4 x 4-inch wooden box. Two quartillos of wood ash is approximately 11 cups

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