¿Como se dice.. It starts to click?
I woke up the next morning refreshed and ready for day 4 of class. On my walk to school I reflected on how much I was enjoying my mornings in Oaxaca: the small breakfast of fruit and eggs or memelas, being greeted by and reading with Vanessa, and my quiet 25 minute walk. For someone who doesn’t usually like slow, I was loving it, likely because it was a routine and I’m a sucker for those.
I arrived and found Micheal and Elizabeth suffering quite a bit.. after dinner I’d opted to go to the gym and get some more endorphins while they opted to go out and have some mezcal. Though I know mezcal is very much so a part of the experience of being here, their state was a friendly reminder of one of the reasons I don’t partake in drinking and made me feel a lot less bad about missing out on “part of the experience.”
That day in class, it felt like things were finally starting to click. I’d put a sentence together or make a correct conjugation and Miguel’s eyes would light up with what I interpreted as pride (and definitely some surprise). It fueled my fire!
For lunch that day our dinner group went to a little organic market of sorts. It was a place recommended to me (shoutout Sofia) and it did not disappoint! The food was fresh and bursting with flavor, which I was coming to understand was just how food is here. Most notably, I tried tejate, a traditional Oaxacan corn and cacao drink. It is also known as "the drink of the gods" due to its importance in pre-Hispanic ceremonies. It is made by grinding up roasted cacao, cacao flowers, mamey, and corn that’s been cooked with ash. Water is then added and the ingredients are beaten together to blend. This beating also creates a fatty foam of sorts that sits on top of the drink. It is served cold and I enjoyed how different it was from the hot cacao I had come to love already. It was refreshing, and the foam on top had an interesting texture that didn’t necessarily add to the
drink but didn’t make me dislike it either.
After lunch was the school’s daily activity and I was stoked! They’d scheduled a Cineclub and we were to watch a film, “El Ultimo Vagon” in Spanish. It was a story about a young boy who struggles to read and who attends school in an old train car/wagon with his friends. He adventures with them and works with his teacher to overcome his difficulty in school. Excited to watch something I felt I could connect with, I took my place in the back of the small room with a projector and the film began. It took all of 2 sentences for me to realize that this was going to be one of the hardest activities.
I tried for the first 20 minutes to just watch and read the Spanish subtitles, hoping that the bit I’d learned would carry me. Alas, I recognized I was using my limited vocabulary and the pictorial clues to figure out what was going on instead of truly working on my Spanish. I got out my notebook and Google translate and choose one word a sentence that I didn’t know or understand. I’d write it down, translate it, and eventually the film got easier to understand and watch. Plus, I was learning! I ended up enjoying the film immensely, and would highly recommend, in whatever language you choose.
After Cineclub was another intercambio, but my brain had had it for the day; I had had three hours of class in the morning and then two hours of the film. I didn’t think I could take much more, so I wandered. This wandering every day is very new for me, as most of my trips I have adventures or things I want to do during the day. School was my plan and it didn’t leave time for big adventures, so wandering to find small ones was the name of the game.
I stumbled upon an outdoor food mercado unlike what I’d seen before. Most mercados had lots of cooked food or artisan goods and this one had lots of sweets and fruits. I enjoyed the bright, fresh colors and sights, snagged myself some fresh fruit with chamoy (there’s nothing better) and remembered that I wanted to 1) get Vanessa a present and 2) go to the Subterraneos collective studio, a collective of print makers who are local activists. They create large, detailed, engraved and then printed street art that is representative of Oaxacan heritage, rural culture, and some with political messages. Their art is found all over the city.
On the way to their studio, I found an office supply store to get Vanessa her present and then arrived and spent an hour looking all of the the remarkable small and large pieces in the studio. A class was going on, so I quietly observed how the engraving process works and the use of negative space to create an image.
That night when I got home I gave Vanessa her present: two larger whiteboards, one with the alphabet to trace and a blank one, and also a set of whiteboard markers. I figured that she had enjoyed tracing her name with me so much that perhaps she’d want to trace other letters or be able to draw. She was quite shy about receiving something from me, but seemed grateful. I wasn’t sure if I’d accidentally made her uncomfortable.
I learned first thing the next morning that I had not when I came down for breakfast and she was sitting at the head of the table with the markers standing in a line, tracing the alphabet and demanding that Sam, another guy staying there, draw her pictures on the blank board.
Sam and I also learned that morning that the Tooth Fairy is not a thing here. Instead they have Ratòn Perez who I interpreted was a rat who takes your teeth and leaves money instead. Sam and I had a field day about that one, shocked by how creepy that felt compared to a fairy but throughly appreciating the extra tidbits we got to learn from being in a home stay.
I noticed as I walked to school that a switch had seemingly flipped in my brain… as I had English thoughts, I then tried to translate them in Spanish. Overjoyed doesn’t even begin to cover how that made me feel; I still had an entire week of learning and I was already so much more confident and making leaps and bounds in my abilities.
Miguel felt the same, you could tell, as he couldn’t hide his surprise every time I nailed something in class. He smiled so widely every time I confidently conjugated and spoke something. My heart soared- the teacher’s pet in me lives for that kind of validation.
Our activity that day was an extra class on slang terms. It was much better attended than the movie; obviously, everyone would want to know all the curse words they can in another language. Antonio did not disappoint, starting the 2-hour class off with a round robin of “what’s your favorite bad word” and then his Spanish translation of it.
It was comical, it was helpful, and it was good pure fun (ok maybe not good or pure). The second half of class was a PowerPoint (ew) about a specific slang term “chinga” which can be a verb, a noun, or an adjective apparently and I’m going to be honest… I don’t remember much past that. I hate PowerPoints and I’d spent 4 days, 5 hours a day minimum in direct Spanish instruction. I couldn’t concentrate and definitely didn’t retain.
Friday ended with a literal bang. There was another convite, this one down a different street. I got there beforehand and got to chatting with a couple on the bench beside me. As was the theme so far, I understood most of what they said but couldn’t say much back. The festivities started and within the first 5 minutes the man I’d been talking to and I almost got set aflame by a firework shooting cow. It was terrifying and invigorating and I hope it never happens again.
More positively, there were even more stunning dancers and adorable small children in traditional garb participating in whatever ways they could; One even threw me some very tasty lime chips! The sense of community and culture pride was so strong and started as early in life as it could. I wondered how that feels, to be so connected to one’s culture from so early on and really to have any sort of strong culture to begin with. That concept wasn’t one I understood well.
I decided to partake in the mezcal that different groups were pouring after being given a small bamboo-like drinking tube by one of the groups. Throughout the entire celebration I had about one shot total, leaving me sober still but also having done “the thing” of not leaving without trying mezcal.
Sufficiently learned, scared for my life, and awestruck, I made my way home. I had an early day the next day, to Hierve el Agua, with some ladies from school!
Hierve del Agua is a set of travertine rock formations outside of Oaxaca that look remarkably similar to waterfalls, despite being made of rock. For this reason they are often referred to as “petrified” waterfalls. The formations are actually created by fresh water springs, whose water is over-saturated with calcium carbonate and other minerals. As the water runs down the cliffs, the minerals are deposited, kind of how stalactites are formed in caves!
Our journey started with a longer than usual walk to the baseball stadium to catch the hour-long bus to Mitla. Once in Mitla we had to take a collectivo, which this time was a pickup truck with seats in and a metal cage over the bed. we waited 45 minutes for the collectivo to fill up and then journeyed another 45 minutes up and down a dirt road on the mountain. Along the way, the three girls I was traveling with, Hannah, Katie, and Jackie spoke with the three other people in our truck. They are all close to fluent and it was inspiring to watch and listen. Literal goals…
Once we arrived we walked downhill some more and came out on the top of the “waterfall.” There were large pools of water to swim in, though I wasn’t all that tempted given that they were brownish and I’m not a water person. The rock we walked on was laden with different textures, patterns, and features: winding curves, ripples, divots, and natural plateaus on the rock, much like the calcification one sees at Yellowstone. Remarkably, the water here was cold to temperate. This was confusing because the name Hierve del Agua literally means boiling water, but I realized why when I stumbled upon a little hole in the rock through which water was gurgling and bubbling up. It wasn’t hot though and I still have so many questions as to how.
We wandered around, staring at the ground and admiring all of the art that the calcification had created. It was a wonder.
The girls then were trusting enough to let me lead them on what I claimed was a hike but that had no signs. There was some doubt along the way (sometimes I forget how adventurous my friends at home are and then I’m reminded when others aren’t nearly as down for things), but when we arrived at the base of the “waterfall” and got to look up and close at its detail and grand scale, they were stoked. The calcified water draped down, creating curtains and folds of grey, cream, and black. To see up close the features that create the look of the rock being a “petrified waterfall” was a sight. We marveled at the fluidity that had become solid.
I then led them around and up the initial waterfall we had been at the top of when we first arrived. They were the most skeptical they had been on this section, not fully believing that I’d clocked the route as a trail prior to our descent. With some assurance, I got them to follow me and we made it back up top, sweaty and ready for a dip in the mineral water! By then the tours had arrived and there were loads more people. We found a quieter, less populated pool that was farther from the entrance and took a dip in the remarkably refreshing water!
Hungry and concerned about some dark, ominous clouds that were approaching, we changed and got some food from the stands up by the parking area. I treated myself to some more fresh fruit with Tajin and chamoy, as well as some memelas with different meats. It felt a little like I was living on the edge by ordering meat this far out in the middle of nowhere, but I was willing to take the chance. While we ate I watched some men working on paving the end of the walkway for the entrance. They had laid concrete and then were throwing down a rubber mat and pounding it with a flat metal plate attached to a pole. I was curious as to why they’d be doing this to the concrete, and then I watched them pick the mats up. I learned that the cobblestone design was created by these mats! They had a cobblestone print on the side facing the cement, and then pounding imprinted the pattern into the not-yet-dry cement. Fascinating.
Less fascinating was how quickly the storm had approached. It started to rain and thunder and lightening could be seen and heard not too far off. Katie minorly panicked; She expressed having no interest in being in the back of a pickup truck with a metal cage on it in the middle of a storm. We agreed and dashed to a pickup truck, finding ourselves in the back with the exact same group as our ride up. What were the chances?
I spent the entire trip back, which started a with some rain and then quickly became dry and much more comforting, listening to the girls speak, once again, in rapid Spanish with our truckbed mates. I understood so much and was so proud of how far I’d come even with understanding, but I really struggled to contribute and that got to me a little.
Back in Mitla, we boarded a bus and headed back to Oaxaca, finding that as we approached town it had apparently been raining in the city all day. This had resulted in a lot of the main roads being flooded. We continued on anyway, with the bus driving through a few feet of water on some streets in order to get us all to our destinations.
The next day it was dry again, and I didn’t have much in the way of a plan. I had hoped to rent a bicycle and bike to the Tule tree, the girthiest tree in the entire world, but when I left the house after breakfast I couldn’t find a single bicycle shop that was open. I was quite frustrated by this, as Google Maps had told me that each of the three shops I visited that morning would be open. Alas, they were not and I spent so much time that morning trying to find one that was that I no longer could catch a bus to another town or to the Monte Alban ruins and still have enough time before needing to return.
So, I did what I’ve learned to do best and made the most if it! I spent the day shopping and visiting museums. I found great spots to eat, and I had a really slow day. Normally that would have driven me crazy and I’d have felt like my day was wasted because I’d started with the entire day to do whatever I wanted with, but I reveled in the pace and how easy it was to not want to go-go-go in this city that I was growing so comfortable in.
The change of plans and pace meant that I got to see the city slowly transforming for Guelaguetza as well. The streets I walked were slowly gaining more colors, or statues that were covered for some big reveal down the road. It also meant that I was in the perfect place to get asked by a group of young students who are studying English to participate in an interview for a project. I obliged, allowing them to ask me a series of questions that very clearly were for them to practice the English they were learning. It was heartwarming and it felt great to help them practice; I knew how much that meant to me as a student of language! As a thank you, they, much to my surprise, each gave me gifts of bread, cacao, and sweets!
One of my favorite things that day was a free museum and cultural center that had been built by Alfredo Harp. Elizabeth, Vanessa’s mom, had just told me about him the day before, as she and Vanessa had gone to a children’s museum he had built. She explained to me that he is a very wealthy man who used a lot of his money to build cultural centers, libraries, museums, and do a variety of community outreach and conservation projects. To stumble upon one of his buildings and contributions felt serendipitous, and I got to see firsthand the amazing ways that he is giving back to his community. The art was modern and stunning, a series of sculptures and poems, and within the museum was a large library and study space.
Food-wise, my favorite part of the day was going to a pretty upscale restaurant that Elizabeth had recommended for a mole tasting. The restaurant was completely empty when I arrived and remained so for the entirety of my visit, but I imagine that had more to do with me being there at 3 and less to do with the food. I got the seven mole tasting with veggies and beef and WOWEE. The moles each had so much flavor and were so distinct from each other; I hadn’t known that was possible. I thought mole was one thing, a brown sauce made with chocolate. My favorite of the seven were the two green ones, which had a slight sweetness to them and also clearly were made with at least a few peppers. I found that I really didn’t care for your darker, more traditional moles. They were too bitter and strong for me.
In the late afternoon, Michael sent a message to our school group chat asking if anyone was up for a baseball game. I welcomed the variation and excitement that would add to my day of cultural experiences, so I said yes.
On my walk to the stadium I saw one of my favorite pieces of street art. It wasn’t anything particularly beautiful or special, but it cracked me up.
It was Raton Perez’s house!! Had I not just learned about him a few days prior, I’d have walked right by this little piece of art and not known its significance. More serendipity!
For a whopping 150 pesos, I got into the game. Interestingly enough, you buy a ticket for a section and then sit wherever you want within that section. We chose to sit all the way at the top of the bleachers, which was really only 30 rows back, at most. This stadium was pretty small compared to the professional games I’d been to in the states. The size sure didn’t matter though, because the energy was so much higher than anything I’ve experienced in American baseball. There was loud music, tons of fun noise makers, hilarious videos and pranks on the big screen, and so much good food!
Instead of going somewhere to order, individuals walked the stands advertising their food. You ordered from them and eventually they brought it to you. It kept the rows and aisles so much less chaotic, and allowed you to the enjoy the game without people getting up or crawling over each other. They offered all kinds of things: tacos, tortas, nachos, taquitos, micholadas, fruit with chamoy, churros, donuts, small cakes, puddings, and the list goes on.
Additionally exciting to all of the food available to us for a reasonable price, was Michael getting a foul ball within the first two innings. It did almost take him out, popping off the bat, ricocheting into the awning over us and coming down real hot right next to his head. We thought that would happen over and over again throughout the game, and though the balls were jettisoned into the crowd and into the awning many a time after that, they never did come our way again. More than anywhere else, they flew over the awnings completely and directly into the road. This must happen quite frequently, as the sound guy had car window smash sounds and car alarms to play as a joke every once in a while.
The most exciting thing of all, however, was when, once it got dark, bugs started to fly around the very large stadium lights overhead and then plummeting without warning straight down onto people’s heads. We first noticed this when an exceptionally large bug fell from the sky onto the hat of a woman sitting two rows in front of us. All three of us (Michael, Elizabeth, and I) jumped up, covered our mouths in horror and shock, and looked at each other for what to do. We watched as the people directly in front of us and directly behind the poor woman did essentially the same thing. None of us knew how to handle this.
Soon enough, a brave soul tapped the woman on the shoulder and made her aware of the friend she had acquired. From then on, everyone around us was on high alert. The bugs would swoop down a little too close and people would flinch, jerk, or swat. One landed on the boy next to Elizabeth and he screamed, flailed, and eventually sent the thing off into the crowd to be someone else’s problem.
Elizabeth and I became paranoid, unable to focus on the game and only able to focus on where the massive bugs were at any given time. None of us were safe. The closest encounter we had was when one fell directly behind our heads, between us and the wall. I turned myself around to assess what these things actually were and honestly, I wish I hadn’t. They were huge, with spiney legs, and a huge nose, much like a dung beetle. Ignorance had been bliss. Now I was REAL terrified of having one land on one of us…
The game was pretty close for majority of it, making it rather exciting and heckling with Michael was a joy. But once the kamikaze bugs started and the Guerros, the Oaxacan team, got run after run after run in the 8th inning it became clear that it was time to think about going. The 9th started and the Guerros shut the other team out! We walked away with a victory on all fronts and a great night to tell Miguel about at school the next day.