Five more days in the mountains

Last Friday was an amazing last tour here in Oaxaca. The morning had an interesting start, we heard a lot of commotion coming from the main street as we were walking to school. Firecrackers were going off and horns were honking. This was nothing unusual seeing as there seems to be a different occasion for a party every day here in Oaxaca—seriously though, we hear firecrackers going off pretty much every day, including early morning and late at night, and it’s normally a church related celebration. When we got to the main street it was completely clogged with taxis, which were slowly crawling along behind a band complete with trumpets and all. These were the most adorable taxis you can imagine, the all had huge bows on the front and looked like they were ready to be given away as gifts. A lot of them also had very ornate bouquets stuck on the front. There were so many of them that they were taking up the entire one-way street casually crawling along at about two miles an hour. There was a white globe at the font of the of the procession proclaiming that it was taxi day! There seems to be a day for everything here, it is very common to see processions parading through the streets celebrating one occupation or the other, but there are normally on foot rather than made up of dolled up taxis so this was pretty interesting. From school we took a public bus to an area where they hire out a lot of taxis. Our guide arranged for a taxi to take us, before we could leave however we had to wait for the taxi driver and his taxi buddies to finish decorating their car. This took a few minutes since it needed a giant bow on both the front back and side doors! The driver took us to a town a little out of the city called San Agustin de Etla. It was an absolutely beautiful drive. We got to see more of the country and more mountains! I am in love with the mountains here they are so beautiful I can never get used to how gorgeous they are. We arrived at an old paper factory which has now been converted into an absolutely beautiful museum. It overlooked the valley where Etla is, and had an amazing view of more beautiful mountains.

The museum was pretty amazing because it was completely free, it had a beautiful collection of photographs and an area where they offer free concerts and dance performances at times. They also have a program where they exchange artists with other countries. An artist will come and stay there and work for a few months and show their artwork, in exchange a Mexican artist goes to that country the following year and does the same thing in an institute in a foreign country. It seemed like a pretty cool program.

(a nearby church) Getting back from this museum was a bit of a struggle however since it was the day of the taxi, so most taxi drivers were partying rather than working. So there were very few taxis working. In fact, while we were waiting for a taxi an entire parade of them went by, but none that were offering rides. The taxis in the country were even more extravagant looking than the ones in the city had been, they had so many flowers on front that it is a wonder they were able to see well enough to drive. Many also had a framed image of the Virgen of Guadelupe displayed in the very front or on top of the taxi. This really shows how important The Virgen is to the culture here. Most of the Taxi drivers had their entire families sitting in the back, they were all on their way to go to a dinner which was prepared in their honor. Furthermore, there was an entire mass earlier in the day dedicated just to them. It seems like they have quite the day! Finally, we were able to find a taxi to take us to an area where a bus goes to the city. This bus was extremely crowded, we were standing in isle and there was hardly room for us to get on. I think my favorite way to get around is by crowded bus, you get to see so many people, and really feel like you are getting around like a local. Plus, you can enjoy whatever happens to be on the radio. It was interesting because they were playing the Spanish version of the Justin Bieber song “sorry”, they had taken some of the lyrics and translated them into Spanish while the chorus was still in English. I liked the song way better this way, because somehow the lyrcis don’t sound as petty in Spanish although they are saying the same thing. Later on Friday I went with a few friends to check out the local Walmart which is huge and quite impressive, probably nicer than a lot of walmarts in the USA. Saturday was an absolutely amazing day, we took a bus to an area called “Hierve el agua” or boiling water about an hour and a half away. I loved the drive because the scenery was incredible. As I said I can’t get enough of the mountains. I just can’t. Hierve el agua, are little pools on a mountain which are far from boiling (they were quite cold in fact). We took the long way to get to them, they are normally a short walk from the parking lot, but we decided to take the scenic route. We walked down a dirt path down the side of the mountain underneath these giant outcroppings made out of deposited calcium carbonate which look almost like waterfalls. It was gorgeous. I thought I had died and gone to heaven just looking around. It was undoubtedly one of the most beautiful places I have ever seen because the view of the mountains in the distance and above was crazy. I’m pretty sure we took the wrong path because it was a pretty tough climb up to the pools, the path was definitely rustic and we got pretty close to someone’s cornfield but we made it up to the pools an hour or so later. The pools were very pretty, they were right against the edge of the outcropping, so you could swim to the edge of the pool and look off the cliff at this crazy view of that stretched for miles below.

On our way back I bought perfectly ripe mango sliced up and drizzled in Chamoy (or sort of sweet and salty and not too spicy chili sauce).

It was a great day, but once we got back to Oaxaca it was back to work. This week in school we have three papers due, two presentations and an extra credit project so unfortunately there has been plenty of homework to keep us busy. It is crazy and a little sad that I have less than five days left to enjoy this beautiful city, but I am also super excited to come back home to see everyone.

Comida, comida, comida

The time has been passing by really quickly in Mexico. These last few weeks I have been really enjoying getting to know the city better. I have been trying to experience as much of the city as possible as my time here quickly slips away. Yesterday we were able to go hiking in the mountains, which was super fun. It was amazing to be able to see a view of the city from above. Along the trail there were numerous signs against littering, advocating protecting nature. It was a beautiful hike, but my legs are definitely feeling it today.

Yesterday morning, we also went to a very cute café. We sat there for hours watching life in the city pass by. In the three hours we sat there, we saw an astounding amount of VW bugs, both vintage and new in an assortment of pastels and cherry reds.

On Friday night we went to a Mezcal festival. There was a huge array of samples not only of every kind of mezcal imaginable but also of many different kinds of foods, including, chocolate (my favorite of course), cheeses, moles and salsas (including grasshopper and worm salsa!).

Speaking of food, we have tried some interesting foods lately. The other day for lunch our host family made us little nopal sandwiches. Nopal is a type of cactus. So for lunch we had mashed beans and cheese between two cactus leaves with rice on the side. We also have been given cactus juice. I have to say that nopal doesn’t have a bad flavor, but I think it may be an acquired taste... Nopals also produce a fruit called Tuna. Among other things they use this fruit to make a flavor of ice cream called tuna and burnt milk. I was feeling especially daring the other day and decided to try it… That was not a good call. It was the worst taste I have ever experienced. It literally tasted like sweet, smoky BURNT milk… Not my favorite flavor, but it must also be an acquired taste because it is very popular here. Another interesting food I tried is called Dorilocos. My conversation partner from school took me to the town center to try them. They are a bag of doritos cut open, and smothered in Chamoy sauce (a sweet and sour chili sauce which isn’t too spicy) and shredded carrot and jicama (which is a bland light green vegetable), and topped with chili coated peanuts, gummy worms and of course more chili sauce. Shockingly despite all the contrasting flavors they were delicious. Although I had to eat them with a full bottle of water because they were incredibly salty.

My favorite traditional foods, are probably Chiles rellenos (peppers stuffed with blended bean sauce and cheese), Tlayudas (giant crispy tortillas that look almost like a pizza, covered in beans cheese and meat or in my case veggies), and tamales (which we often eat for breakfast).

Tlayudas It is interesting because we never really eat what we consider breakfast foods in the united states, instead our most frequent breakfast is quesadillas, with thick queso Oaxaqueno (that most resembles a richer, denser version of string cheese) and often squash blossoms. We have also got to try some traditional breakfast drinks such as champurrado, a very thick hot chocolate which has a gravy like consistency from the corn flour it is prepared with. They also have normal hot chocolate which is often prepared with water and is very rich, dark and cinnamony. In the market the other day we also tried some interesting baked goods, one of which was a dark red colored bread, which was soaked in wine. It was bright colored purply-red, and had a very pungent wine flavor. Something that I have really enjoyed here which seems a little counter intuitive is the Italian food. There are a lot of delicious Italian resturaunts. For example we tried Gnocchi for the first time the other night, and wow...

As of today I have thirteen more days left in Oaxaca which feels very bittersweet. I will definitely miss all of the new smells, sights and most of all tastes (as you can probably tell). By the way here are some pictures of school just because it's pretty..

Also a lizard I met on the street yesterday :)