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Part of what I like about New Mexico is the sensory deprivation: the silence, no lights at night, the quick ability to get into to get into unpeopled space... especially when winter rolls around. Optimally, a person has the ability to alternate between sensory stimulation and sensory deprivation, so that you receive new ideas and information, then you can process those thoughts / experiences without interruption. Otherwise a person ends up over stimulated and anxious. Think about music, sometimes the pauses are the most powerful.
People are hyper focused on sight and taste, it's interesting to think about how the other senses are present in our day to day life, both pleasant and unpleasant, but don't receive as much attention.
^ Sure, there are great aspects to voids, silences, and non-sensory matters. There's a place for them. I don't think anyone is knocking those qualities. More variety and choice is a plus. But that's not what this specific thread is about.
^ Sure, there are great aspects to voids, silences, and non-sensory matters. There's a place for them. I don't think anyone is knocking those qualities. More variety and choice is a plus. But that's not what this specific thread is about.
The point is that more / overload isn't necessarily better, or else the feast turns into an assault on the senses. If you're enjoying eating your shrimp or listening to horses clatter or smelling the ocean breeze, you don't want blaring music and flashing lights. To really focus on the enjoyment of one sense you kind of have to turn out the others. Just how the brain works.
Colonial architecture in New Mexico will have some resemblance to 1000 year old traditional Pueblo construction due to the same techniques and materials being used. The exception will be churches, and there are many that date to the colonial period of New Spain. They may appear to be plain but robust on the outside but somewhat ornate inside. Another difference will be the fortress design used in the old haciendas and ranchitos built around interior placitas. The Spanish Governor’s Palace in Santa Fe dates to 1610.
The French Colonial architecture in Missouri was brought in from French Quebec.
^^^^If you take a trip to New Mexico, your taste buds will enjoy the flavor of fresh roasted Hatch green (or sometimes red) chili peppers. They go good with almost any meal, and if I recall correctly are even shown on one of the recent versions of a NM license plate.
An event rather than a place... I was recently invited by a friend to attend a Pueblo feast day. The Indian Pueblos have feast days associated with certain patron saints or various holidays. That was a “feast” with mounds of food, good friends, lively conversations, smells from the food sold by vendors and the horno ovens, and the community dancing in the Pueblo central plaza of several hundred people in ceremonial dress engaged in the dance movements in unison to an echoing drumbeat. The dance might be 500-1000 years old. It is hard to describe the experience except as a feast for the senses.
Events like professional football of baseball games, NASCAR, Balloon Fiesta, World Cup, maybe county/state fairs, etc. would also be sensory feasts.
Maybe I'm just being cynical, but my first thought was about places that are, uh, whatever the opposite of "feast" is for the senses. What popped into my mind was Chinatown in New York:
Sight -- an impossibly cramped, overcrowded environment, filled with signs that I can't read.
Sound -- loud urban cacophony, accompanied by crowds of people speaking in a language that I can't understand. And, no offense to Chinese speakers, but I find the language (Mandarin or Cantonese, I can't tell the difference) to sound unpleasant to my ears.
Smell -- overpowering aroma of Chinese food (most of which I don't like) mixed with the odor of garbage.
Taste -- I can taste the food just by walking past the restaurants, but since I don't like most Chinese food, I don't like the taste.
Chinatown definitely overwhelms my senses, so I suppose it qualifies for what the OP is discussing. But not in a good way, at all.
Incidentally, I can see what the OP means about Williamsburg. I'm not sure I would regard it as a "feast" for my senses, but I do find it to be a very pleasant, relaxing experience for all my senses.
I used to live in Williamsburg. People keep mentioning Williamsburg as this great colonial sensory experience, but Colonial Williamsburg is a few square blocks in the middle of a modern tourist town. Cars are still allowed to drive through the area and park there (people fight for parking there on occasion). Busch Gardens amusement park is a couple miles away from Colonial Williamsburg. You can hear the rollercoaster induced screams for miles around the park. Golden Horseshoe and Kingsmill are huge golf resorts in town. Then Outlet Malls/shopping are still a viable trip-worthy event in Williamsburg on HWY 60. The Colonial park is great to visit and relax in from November to April, but during peak tourist months its and overcrowded nightmare of people making sure they 'experience' their colonial past for an afternoon before moving on to more active vacation activities.
An event rather than a place... I was recently invited by a friend to attend a Pueblo feast day. The Indian Pueblos have feast days associated with certain patron saints or various holidays. That was a “feast” with mounds of food, good friends, lively conversations, smells from the food sold by vendors and the horno ovens, and the community dancing in the Pueblo central plaza of several hundred people in ceremonial dress engaged in the dance movements in unison to an echoing drumbeat. The dance might be 500-1000 years old. It is hard to describe the experience except as a feast for the senses.
Events like professional football of baseball games, NASCAR, Balloon Fiesta, World Cup, maybe county/state fairs, etc. would also be sensory feasts.
What kind of food do they have at those Pueblo feasts? Green chile, fry bread or something more exotic?
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