Mandinga

After class today we went to Mandinga, which is a little coastal inlet / lake area just South of Veracruz. Today in Mandinga we had some great seafood, then took a boat ride around some of the islands in the area. I guess this place was where rivers meets the ocean there was a mix of freshwater with the sea. We saw a jellyfish, that our boat operator tried to pick up out of the water with his bare hands! We also saw some other wide life too, fish, crabs, and a variety of birds. This included an island where a ton of these birds were nesting and hatching their young.

Special Note: The Mandinka, who are an ethnic group located in West Africa, were sold into slavery in large numbers during the early colonial period.  Many of these slaves are believed to have landed in the port of Veracruz, Mexico.  The linguistic similarity of "Mandinka" to "Mandinga" is obvious and we can see the historical link of West African slaves being brought to this area of Mexico supports this as well.