Castilla elastica Castilla elastica Castilla elastica, the Panama rubber tree, is a tree native to the tropical areas of Mexico, Central America, and northern South America. It was the principal source of latex among the Mesoamerican peoples in pre-Columbian times. The latex gathered from "Castilla elastica" was converted into usable rubber by mixing the latex with the juice of the morning glory species "Ipomoea alba" which, conveniently, is typically found in the wild as a vine climbing "Castilla elastica". The rubber produced by this method found several uses, including most notably, the manufacture of balls for the Mesoamerican ballgame "ōllamaliztli". The Aztec
Stranger, Bear Word to the Spartans We... indeed in his old school: his own handwriting in chalk on the blackboard: "Stranger, bear word to the Spartans we..." The story was first published by Verlag Friedrich Middelhauve in 1950 as the title story in a short story collection. Today, "Stranger, Bear Word to the Spartans We..." is one of Böll's most famous stories and is one of the best known of examples of Trümmerliteratur ("Rubble literature"). The unnamed first-person narrator begins the story in a truck and is transported through a partially burning city that he cannot identify, and is also unable to accurately gauge the amount of