Hierve el Agua

9.6.09

My return to Oaxaca was further vindicated when I was recruited into a group heading for a day trip to Hierve el Agua, a mineral spring a couple hours away. We were 6 solo travelers, 3 girls and 3 guys, spanning 6 countries and 4 continents - USA, Canada, Colombia, Argentina, Switzerland, and Australia.



One more example of how solo travel is practically an oxymoron....

doshkeno

I followed up my tranquil evening in Llano Grande with a guided hike to the 3280 meter high Piedra Larga, supposedly the highest point in the Sierra Norte.

I was not sure why I was leaving for Oaxaca on this day. I imagined the city interrupting my peace and growing lung capacity. But I was also alone, and on the other hand, felt like I needed more social activity. This mountain solitude, useful as it can be, can make a city girl restless.

My doubts wer e assuaged when I jumped into a Oaxaca-bound colectivo, a makeshift taxi out of a pickup truck, with 4 people, including the driver, speaking a languge I didn´t understand - Zapotec. It´s like Japanese with an Italian singsong, if you could imagine, or maybe it´s just me. All were middle-aged men, one easily mistaken for Asian, and one carsick child. The man next to me was friendly enoughed, so I asked him about their language. It is disappearing, he said, because schools are taught in Spanish. I got up the gall to ask him a couple words:

hello - bujush
yes - ahwe
no - bee
thank you - doshkeno

a universal thirst

9.4.09

During the day in the town, it´s very quiet. Don´t come here expecting a bustle of activity as in the cities, or even to find people sitting aroudn for hours on end gossiping in stoops or cafes. The comedor, at 5 o´clock, is empty, except for the keeper, watching an episode of Sponge Bob in the kitchen. But she has a chicken leg and potatoes and beans in a spicy stock ready to heat up as needed, and it was more than I could ask for, or say, more than I expected after eating blander quesadillas for the past 2 days. The flavor was perfect.

Anyway, if you walk through the pueblo, the infrequent times that I have, you see women doing laundry or tending a small plot near the house. Between the occasional truck of lumber clankering through, this is activity that you have to look for.

I guess it´s because here is not a marketplace (not even is there a place to buy socks! I didn´t expect it, but I did hope...). There´s no hawking or trying to attract any attention in the hopes of potential client. Maybe that´s the difference between the city and a place like this.

Just when I wonder how, peaceful as it is, anyone can live in such prolonged silence, someone turns on a radio playing countryside songs that can be heard through the whole pueblo, to remind me that the thirst for music could be universal....

the most peaceful place

9.4.09

It´s pouring cats and dogs outside here in Llano Grande, as it does every day for about 2 hours during this time of year in Oaxaca. The door to my cabaña is wide open to let in the sound and the fresh air of the rain. There´s a fire glowing in the fireplace. The tranquility of this afternoon is surreal.

I have food, a source of warmth, a comfortable bed to sleep in, a book to read and a book to write in, and some of the freshest air I´ve ever breathed. I am simply living. The only sound comes from the rain, and other than maintaining the fire and reading my Laberinto de Soledad, I have no worries.

They say something like God controls the universe...

... but the Devil controls the timing.

Is there no Devil here, where timing is almost non-existent? You just wait, and trust that it will come to you. Your server, guide, or hot water. There´s a different kind of trust here. At home, trust is based on timing. Here it´s ever or never, I suppose. Or at least some time today, or never.

So when I realize with a start that breakfast is taking 20 minutes longer than I told the guide it would, I remember that he´s probably not keeping track.

Recovery

9.4.09

I woke up this morning thinking I wasn´t going to make it to Llano Grande, waking up with a headache in my 40 degree cabin. I was almost sure I would tell my guide to come back tomorrow, until I sat outside in the sun that was pouring on the front porch, which completely refueled my energy. Once I was up and moving, I was surprised at how fast and how much my body had recovered from yesterday´s abuse. My muscles were achy but not cramped. Only once I started walking down the cobblestone steps outside my cabaña did I feel the pain (tetanus, Dr. D?) in the front muscles of my thigh, which reminded me that the nice, flat path today to Llano Grande would be my best option.

me next to a giant maguey

Today´s 5 miles went by pretty smoothly, with a guide making all the difference. The trail was pretty gentle most of the way. There were a couple steep, but short, slopes, that brought back painful memories to my legs. Other than that, it made for a perfect recovery walk.

Hiking alone on a poorly marked trail without a guide and without at least 2000 calories worth of food...

...at a 3 km altitude is not a good idea.
- note to self, Sierra Norte, Oaxaca, Mexico. 9.3.09


Today may rival the worst travel day of my life (hitherto Spain to Morocco via Ceuta '07).

Well, I could count my mistakes, including all of those noted above, but it's better to accept it as calculated recreational hazards. I have to take the bad with the good. And today was bad.

<--- not a bad place to get lost, right??

It started with the tour guide at Benito Juarez, the village where I would begin my 3 day trek through the Pueblos Mancomunados of Sierra Norte in Oaxaca. Well meaning, he assured me that the trail to Cuajimoloyas could easily be done solo. Otherwise I could wait for a guide, who would arrive in another hour or so. I figured, if anyone says it can be done solo, I can certainly do it. How bad could 5 miles be? And it would not have been if I had not spent the first 2 hours looking for the trailhead. There were, in fact, other trailheads, but the wrong ones, and I followed them to dead ends. One time I wandered off and while trying to figure out my next move, I practically fell into this huge bed of ivy, or something, that stung the whole side of my lower leg. Minutes later it was covered in tiny welts, and the skin felt very tingly (I later found out that this plant, likely the one called malamujer is used medicinally by the Zapotecs as a topical analgesic).

By the time I got to the real trailhead, after backtracking 3 or 4 times from the steep slopes of the others, I was already exhausted, and only then had 5 miles to go. There were markings, but they were sparse, and then nonexistent about 3 miles in. Until then I had asked everyone I had seen occasionally walking along if I was on the right path, and they would kindly indicate the way.

And then there was no one, not a sign of soul or trail marker. Just me in some of the most beautiful countryside I've ever seen, fatigued, and down to a couple pieces of bread and water. I wasn't sure how far I had to go, or even if I was going the right way. Though the path was clear, it had no signs, so it could have been going nowhere for all I knew. Every step was like a shockwave through my legs, the ground pushing up and my backpack pushing down, and my heart was pounding. Almost every few hundred feet I had to stop and rest. To top it off, I heard thunder behind me, so when I stopped to rest, I forced my way forward.

I don't know what would have happened if I had really lost my way, or if I had exhausted myself before I got to Cuajimoloyas (Coalamojitos? I thought at one time while brain functions started lapsing). I figured I would, at that point, just sit (or lay) down and whistle as loud as I could til someone found me (I actually did whistle a couple times as I walked and got really scared from the thunder). Until then, the only option was to keep walking. I almost broke down a couple times, but I (suprisingly) kept myself relatively together and harshly reminded myself how much precious energy that would waste. Breaking down would pretty much mean giving up, because I believe and believed that if I sat down to cry, I might have passed out immediatley after.

So I saved it til I got to my cozy cabaña in Cuajimoloyas, tipped over the edge by the local who showed me to the room. The last leg of this trail was a steep, beautiful, painful, upward climb. From a few hundred feet I could see a big building and indications of a paved road. I had never been so happy to lay eyes on civilization. The tourist office was just a hundred yards away from the path along the road, where I met an older man who didn't look much like a tour office attendant but indicated that I follow him. Once he opened the door and handed me the key, he charged me for the room and "el guia," or what I thought was a collection for himself or for the reserved guide who never came with me today. I didn't protest or inquire, all my wits lost and completely thrown off by the idea of anyone trying to swindle me for the first time on this trip. I found out later that he was a temporary stand-in for the actual tour office attendant, charging me for the guide which I had reserved for tomorrow, which was just protocol that he was told to do.

In the meantime I just cried, exploded, and swore I would leave this accursed place as soon as possible. So I made my way to the office for an explanation and a bus schedule, and found the real tour attendant. He explained everything and thus restored my faith in humanity. Of course, I only thought later to request if he would ask the older man to forgive my presumption, though I don't believe I made that much a show of it. Then again, I was pretty compromised, so I just thought it in a sort of pseudo-prayer. In any case, I changed the next day's plans of a 10 mile trek to Latuvia for a flatter, gentler 5 mile hike to Llano Grande.

I could look at today as a grand failure, but I choose not to. I hadn't really hiked solo before, and I learned more about my limits. I think of it as the motorcycle accident they describe in the Motorcycle Saftey Manual, where they tell you that there is not one singular cause of an accident, but rather many, and your job is to minimize the risks. If you tweaked any of the conditions described above, the day might not have turned out to be such a disaster. No single one is my fault, but they are all variables that I will know for sure to keep in mind for next time. The part I regret most is that I missed savoring the spectacular views. I had the wherewithal (or madness) to take some pictures, holding on to the expectation that I would make it out of there and be able to enjoy the views at least virtually once it was all over.

(The last flower pic here is actually from before I was near-mortally lost, but one of my favorite pics from the day.)

Oaxaca

After giving up on a restless night of loud TV and people walking in and out of an eight-bed dorm room, we made it to Oaxaca around 4 this afternoon. ¨We¨is me and Julia, a German biologist taking 3 weeks of her enviable vacation time to travel around Mexico. She decided, in the haze of last night´s persistent rustle, to pass up Puebla for Oaxaca with me today. You have to try really hard to travel completely solo most places, and that turns out to be the best part - that you´re rarely really alone.

After checking into a hostel dorm, we headed to El Zocalo, the main downtown plaza flanked by your typical cafes, shops, and itinerant trinket vendors. The atmosphere is lively and comfortable. We took a table at a cafe to refuel after the long, though beautiful, 7 hour bus ride with Coronas for Julia, soup for me and chiles rellenos to share. People sat on the benches in the plaza or milled around, some passing through, enjoying the dusk hours after a long day, some selling, some begging, all including children. After being raucously refused our offering of bread to a small boy who instistently demanded nothing but pesos, we got into some conversation and a toast with some guys at the table next to us. After walking around, we closed the evening with a milkshake and hot chocolate.

I am so happy to be here. A half world away from Mexico City, I look forward to tomorrow being the first day I will wake up and sleep in the same place. Plans are simple. Orientation day. No rush to go anywhere fast, as I still have over two weeks to go.

puedo sentarme contigo?

- man sitting alone at a table behind me at dinner today

After tossing my bag in my hostel dorm, I wander out looking for dinner. I sit down at the first place that could fix a good, cheap meal. Consome de pollo, pechuga asada, y arroz. Couldn´t go wrong. As I´m eating, a man sitting alone at the table behinds me asks if he could sit with me. Como? No, I say dismissively, and though he respectfully turns back to his meal, what I really want to ask is Why? What makes you think I would say yes? Do you always ask women eating by themselves if you can sit with them? Would you ask a Mexican woman? Is this how Mexican men approach Mexican women? If so, what makes you think that I, a foreign woman, would think it acceptable? Or do you think because I am alone and clearly not Mexican, that I would not think it´s not unusual for you to approach me with such an invasive request?

It´s not just here, though. I´ve been similarly approached in Morocco, and I recognize it more as a consequence of being a woman, traveling solo, really, than anything else, because I have no other explanation. It´s not that I´m naive about motivations, which I know that, although they can even be multi-faceted, are rarely mutual if I am the one being approached (or so goes my general rule), nor is it that I am necessarily offended. But I really want to know what they are thinking when they do approach me. Where do they get the idea that this would somehow be unrejectionable in my mind? Is it TV? Is it other Euro-American women? Does foreign automatically mean easy or naive? Do American men talk to solo foreign women this way?

These are questions I don´t know if I´ll ever get the answers to, because the lines between what are gender vs. nationality-based perceptions are blurry, not to mention the various backgrounds of my solicitors. At least, it reminded me that I´m not home.

impresiones primeras

I expected to find Mexico City with 1) at least twice the cars, 2) at least twice the people, 3) 5 times as many motorcycles, and 4) insufferable air quality. Al contrario, on the way from the airport, I had to ask the taxi driver what was going on that the city was so quiet. The people have not left work yet, he told me. At 6 p.m. it would be crazy.

My first impression is that I don´t feel that I am in Mexico as much as I would feel I was in say, Colombia, when I was in Colombia. It is still a big city, but it´s not hot, not as congested, not as polluted as I was told it would be. As my first impression of Mexico, it didn´t seem like a place that thousands of people would risk their lives to get out of every year. People walk with the same airs of purpose as they do in Philadelphia. Working, shopping, etc, which I suppose you could expect in a downtown area. As for myself, I really feel like I blend in, I want to say, more to the credit of the city´s cultural proximity to my home country than to my own fitting in. I didn´t feel people´s eyes on me as much as other places. On the other hand, for all I know, I may just be getting used to Latin American cities. Maybe if I go back to Cali, Colombia, it won´t really be as congested as I first remember it. I can´t really be sure if it is myself or the city that is different than expected.

To be honest, happy as I am with how comfortable I feel here, I am glad that I did not plan to stay here for long. You could almost say that I´m unimpressed with how impressed I am. First thing tomorrow morning, after breakfast, is to take the first bus I can to Ciudad Oaxaca.

Mexico City preparando para el dia de la Independencia, Sept. 15

diaspora

For the past couple weeks, reality has been suspended in a kind of Alice-in-Wonderland-like dream for me. After over 10 years in business, my restaurant closed its doors for good earlier this month. B___ was a sort of Hotel California, a place you could never simply leave for good, and always waited for you to come back, because you knew you could always pick up a shift or 5 a week when you needed. That's how I stayed there for 5 years. Now, the spell has been broken, and I feel like one of a diaspora.

My plans to travel to Mexico pre-date the closure, but the timing has turned out to be just about right. The idea was to look for a new job once I came home, albeit, a new primary, likely restaurant, job, while keeping B___ for a shift or two a week... you know, just in case. The point was, after waiting a year to see if change would come through my e-mail inbox in the form of an acceptance letter, I could not wait any more to pursue it on my own. I would start by going to the city, away from the cultural dead zone that is the Philadelphia suburbs, and bank entirely on the holiday season in a place where you weren't as complacent about making less than $50 a night because you were so comfortable there, and then... well, the only goal, after sealing all my grad school apps, was not to be here in 2010, not waiting another year for the world to come to my doorstep.

The only surprise is that Mexico will be more of a continuation of this all-play, no-work dream, than a gap in the grind. I should say, a rich intensification. I actually want the dream, I mean, the sense of shifting reality, to continue well after my return, and I will be working toward that. Many things are changing, inside and outside. Life is becoming a series of experiments, and getting to the right places will require a persistent questioning of comfort zones as well as anarchy. This trip will be a great segue into the materialization of these approaches. For the record, I will be in Mexico for 2.5 weeks, and this will be my longest planned "solo" trip ever. My external intentions are simple. Exploration, meeting people, and growing my Spanish.