"The Big Trip" seems to be in rhythm with the Universe once again

Our next stop was Janice and Joseph Day’s trading post, Tsakurshovi. Joseph, who the Hopi would call a pahaana (white guy) and Janice met 40 years ago when he was working as a Head Start teacher in Flagstaff. As Joseph tells it, "The Hopi word for us is pahaana and it is not slang but a real word for Euro-American. I always tell Hopis that the literal translation is "honkie and proud" with a fist in the air."  Joseph is a very funny guy! There are very few pahaana living on the Hopi mesas and Janice and Joseph’s bicultural marriage allows for a rich multicultural atmosphere made evident by their slogan, "Don’t Worry Be Hopi." Their trading post serves the local community with ceremonial clothing and supplies for Hopis and other Indian people and also sells fantasic Hopi arts and crafts and cultural items. For more on what the Days are all about visit this fantastic website sponsored by National Geographic http://www.fourcornersgeotourism.com/content/tsakurshovi-trading-post/fca39A462782BA0E3C02.

 Joseph is a wealth of information and when I told him about my roots music trip he first let us know that reggae is huge on the Hopi mesas and many of the legends of reggae have performed there. A lot of them are also wearing their wonderful T shirt and the shop has a wall of photos proving it. It turns out the Joesph’s dad, Bobby Day, was a professional saxophone and clarinet player with a long career that included a stint with the legendary Woody Herman Big Band in the 1940s.

 Joseph is also a huge music fan and had spent a good deal of time in the south and in New Orleans in particular. I loved both the irony and synchronicity of engaging in a lengthy chat, maps in hand, of all the places we needed to go, taking place in a Hopi shop, close to what the Hopi believe is the center of the universe. After more than an hour on music, where to go and stay in the Mississippi Delta and most importantly where to eat in New Orleans. . . .we learned that there would be a Buffalo dance occurring nearby in the village of Sipaulovi the next day. Joseph took me into his house to play me some cuts of a recent recording of Buffalo dance music and to show me the web site for the Shack Up Inn located in  the Mississippi Delta . . . You gotta love it.

Janice and Joseph Day standing in front of just a few of their amazing Kachina Collection (updated photo:))