NaNoWriMo

I like this.

Ooooooooooo wahaka.

I survived my vacation. In fact, that was easy. The difficult part is that I had such a good time, I don't know if I'm going to be able to stand Cuernavaca for six more weeks. Boz was the first with the correct guess: I was in the lovely state of Oaxaca (colloquially pronounced WaHAka). As soon as I can track down Rockapella, I'll send them over to sing you a song and give you your prize.

I ditched school on Friday so that I could get an early state on my vacation. Thursday night, we (as in the Iowa State group) went to see Ballet Folklórico in el Distrito Federal. I definitely had my doubts (whenever "high-brow" artists try to convey traditional ceremonies, it tends to blow), but I gotta admit that the show was pretty awesome. Except for one dance where a guy was pretending to be a deer, and he got shot by some hunters, and took about five minutes to die (complete with extensive death throes). WTF, mate? Fortunately, the rest of it was good.

After the show, the rest of the group went back to Cuernavaca. Yo, no. I hopped on the metro over to the western bus station, saw some elderly woman taking a piss in a corner of the bus station (skirts are handy that way - and what the hell is it with old people pissing themselves whenever I go to Mexico City?), and took an overnight for 25 bucks to the city of Oaxaca. I arrived just before sunset and walked through the quiet streets in search of a hostel to crash in. Oaxaca actually struck me as being a fair bit like Iowa (in terms of climate): hot and humid during the day, cooler at night, and with surprisingly good sunsets.

After awhile, I stumbled into the Zócalo (town square). Just a few people were milling around, so I just made the rounds. I met two people here. The first was a bum who started talking to me when I was reading the sign of a hotel that was on strike - he told me it had been going on for years, when the sign clearly said that it had been only been one year (still a helluva strike). He started talking about how the employees needed to get some explosives. Uh, right, dude. As I walked away, he called me a cabron. I grinned happily - finally a chance to swear at someone - and told him to go fuck his mother. Yessss.

The next guy I ran into was the opposite - so polite that I knew right away that he was a Jehovah's Witness. C´mon, who else is going to be smiling that early in the morning? He gave me his little brochure and we chatted awhile. Unfortunately, I didn't have the heart to tell him to go fuck his mother.

Still without a hotel but hungry, I moseyed down to Mercado 20 de Noviembre. This is a huge building that occupies an entire city block. Around the outside are various shops; there are four halls leading to the center. Each hall specializes in a different thing; one was for butchers, for example. I have never seen so much sausage in my life (except maybe at ISU house parties), not to mentioned the severed pigs' heads. Finally, in the center of the market is a vast open space filled - wall to wall - with comedores, or little kitchens. It's like a building full of open-air Grove Cafés. You know I was in heaven already, but when I tried my first taste of Oaxaqueño hot chocolate - it was what I have always expected to taste when I drink hot chocolate, but I just never realized. I must be part Mexican, though - I have always known, biologically, that a hot chocolate this good existed. Plus chorizo with quesillo (Mexican sausage and Oaxaqueño cheese) - I was in the heaven that God will go to when he dies. And it cost four bucks.

I broke down and bought a guidebook, too. I had been borrowing a friend's, but I have grown to like Mexico so much that I thought it would be a worthwhile long-term investment. I think that this book, combined with the help of friendly locals and a reasonable-sized pareja de cojones, are the three factors that made my vacation such a huge success.

I located an excellent hotel - unbelievably good. And you know what? I'm not going to name it here. I don't want you dirty bastards going there and taking up my space. Suffice it to say that it was superb, and I paid ten dollars a night. I spent six nights there for less than the cost of any one night in a room in the good old Holiday Inn Express (Hotel & Suites) back in Ames.

I was fairly worn out by Friday night - I had barely slept on the bus and had been walking all day - so I just went and found this little movie theatre called Cine El Pochote. It was free ninety-nine, but had a box for donations; I chipped in five pesos. The movie was Ararat, an indie film that wasn't too bad. But the experience of watching in it this goofy little theatre in México with Spanish subtitles (which overlapped the English ones, sometimes) was amusing. It was about the repercussions of the Turkish massacre of Armenians in the early 1900s has (or fails to have) effects on the modern day. It wasn't as bad as that sounds, I swear.

After the movie, I started walking back to the hotel. On the way, I ran into a street festival - a dance school was celebrating its 20 anniversary with a slew of traditional dances. The dances ranged from very well done to very sloppy, but after each one assistants threw something to the crowd. After the sugar cane harvest dance, they threw bits of sugar cane to nibble on; after a dance where people wore hats, they threw cheap straw hats at the crowd. And then there was the pineapple dance. You're thinking right now and saying, "No way did they do that." They did. I think only one guy got hit in the head. I would later realize that Oaxaqueños really, really love to throw things.

After that, I slept. I can already tell that this is going to be the work of a week; so come on back daily for the story of another day in Oaxaca, the city that loves me. I'll try to get my pictures developed so I can post some visual accompaniment (I had to spell that three times to figure out how to make it sound right without using the ñ - damn Spanish).

Finally, some responses to comments: First of all, Boz. Again, congratulations on your correct guess and may I say that you are totally insane. That's a hell of a drive. Jorgito: Don't worry about that; I imbibed plenty of alcohol to keep my system sterile. Jagass: I know, take it. BbB: I can't believe you actually learned something from that show. I guess I just spent too much time making fun of the a capella group. And finally, Teh Ogre: Damn right, you need to pipe up. And thank you, I will continue to rock out with my cock out. It's getting a little sunburned, though.

Hasta mañana, chavos.

Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego?

I still can't reveal the location of my first stop on Nomadic Bear Tour 2005, but I'll give you a clue:

I ate grasshoppers for lunch today.

Freaking delicious.

No manches, güey.

Things are pretty quiet down here. I've been taking classes and... taking classes. Not much to report.

Saturday, I cruised up to el DF for the third time to check out a couple of museums. One was an exhibition of Juan O'Gorman (Mexican-born to an Irish family), whose worked I liked a lot. The colors, man. They were intensely vivid. The stylized nature of his paintings. I don't know why, but I have a severe weakness for Mexican muralists - O'Gorman, Diego Rivera, and others. Don't know why. I still haven't figured out why Frida Kahlo is so insanely popular - however, I have yet to see any of her work in an actual museum. My exposure has just been a slew of artbooks, all of which have yet another set of her self-portraits. I dunno, maybe it's just me, but such blatant egomania isn't really all that appealing (I like the subtle kind). I'll withold a solid judgement until I've gotten some exposure to a more comprehensive collection, but still: bleah.

Note to Kahlomaniacs who might stumble across this page: do not even think about posting some pissy rant in my comments. I don't give a shit. Cabrones.

The second museum was way out to the southeast of the city, beyond the reach of the metro. It had a wide array of lesser-known works from a lot of European artists and a few others. Dali, Rodin, Van Gogh (some tour guide told me I look like Van Gogh; I smirked and showed him that I still have both ears), and more. Lots of religious artwork, which never fails to bore me shitless. Except: there was a lovingly crafted painting of Mary breastfeeding Jesus. Baby Jesus, that is. It was a nice museum and all (except for this one couple that was making out right in front of a painting I wanted to see; pinches mexicanos), but it was a long way from any part of el DF that I knew. I ended up riding a bus for an hour, walking for an hour, and then riding the metro for yet another hour just to get back to the bus station. Naturally, I then rode a bus for almost two hours to get back to Cuernavaca. Ah, well. It's dirt cheap to travel to the City, and I ate some freaking fantastic tacos al pastor. Tacos al pastor = mi vida.

In other news, THE FUCKING WORLD IS FALLING APART. I don't know how much this news is getting to the US, but Mexico is getting brutalized by hurricanes. Guatemala is even worse: entire villages are just gone. Mayors are asking that their towns be declared mass graves because the effort of digging out and then reburying the hundreds of dead is too much for the handful of survivors. And then there's Kashmir (which I'm sure you've heard about). Jesus - like that poor little patch of earth isn't soaked with enough innocent blood. 20,000 dead at the minimum. As many as 40,000. I'm actually grateful that I live in Iowa, where we just have to deal with the occasional tornado. Everywhere else is either getting shredded by hurricanes, shaken to the ground by quakes, or blown up by some overzealous asshole.

Ah, well. At least I'm safe, as are my beloved readers (I hope). I'd like to thank all of you who either introduced yourselves or made fun of my girlfriend last week. Mucho gusto, and/or much obliged.

Excursions can go well?!

This is going to be a bit short because of time constraints, but you'll get the idea. Saturday, I went to the little town of Tepoztlan with a group of other extranjeros. I adored it. Small, peaceful, with more character than Cuernavaca. High up in the mountains above Tepoztlan is a little temple that some totally insane indigenous society built. It took us an hour to make the ascent on foot, and it was hard work. Very steep. Two of the girls got altitude sickness because we ascended so rapidly. The temple itself was only remarkable because of its location, but the view was spectacular. The mountains near Tepoztlan are incredibly jagged, heavily forested, and ridiculously beautiful. I could retire there happily. Interestingly, Tepoztlan has a weird hippie streak - there's a surprising amount of influence from the Far East there. I think the closet hippie in Andrea would love it there.

Sunday, we went Taxco (pronounced Taz-ko) with the school excursion. It was actually the first excursion that went reasonable well. Taxco is the silver capital of México, and it shows. There are literally hundreds of silversmithies in Taxco, from the junkiest junk to 5000 dollar tea sets. The prices were fairly reasonable, though, and some of the craftsmanship was mind-blowing. I definitely didn't have enough time there.

Taxco's main church, however, is both my favorite and most hated in Mexico. The outside is made of two tones of pink rock - probably sandstone - and carved with some really amazing statues. It's gorgeous and eyecatching. The inside is a bunch of god-forsaken baroque retablos painted gold. I've seen baroque, but this is beyond that. This is the essence of baroque distilled into a single church. Disgusting. Oh, well. I'm just not going to go inside again.

In other news, my ten-day vacation is upcoming. Since I know there are at least a couple of Mexican readers of this blog who are unknown to me (Hola, mexicanos. ¡Presentense!), I'm going to refrain from doling out my whereabouts. But, I'm going south, and it's possible there will be beaches involved. Speaking of which - it is is officially confirmed: I cannot tan, ever. Not a big deal, but the conjecture has been made fact. I just turn a deeper red.

Also, a scad of new photos on Flickr. I dunno, I've heard of some problems from my whiny girlfriend, so let me know if you can see this (and if you can, post a snide comment about her competence):