Random Descriptions of My Travel Adventures

I'm currently sitting in the Mexico City airport waiting for my flight back to the inferno that is Phoenix. I'm very sad to leave Mexico and all the great people I met there but I guess it is time to head back to the real world and start writing the dissertation. Yikes. Not looking forward to that. I decided to take a taxi to the airport this morning instead of a prearranged colectivo so that I could have an hour or two more to get things in order before I left. We live right next to a fairly busy street so typically walking out to the corner and standing there less than 5 minutes is all that is required to procure a taxi. This morning I dragged my VERY heavy luggage to the corner (lots of books) and waited (sweating profusely after carrying the luggage) for a taxi to pass by. I waited, and waited, and waited, for about 15 minutes, but no taxi. Finally one came by with streamers all over it and I flagged him down. He informed me that the cost to the airport would be 120 pesos ...

This past weekend some friends and I went to Puebla. Road trip! Puebla is about 4 hours away from Oaxaca towards Mexico City. A big bull on the drive to Puebla. Street scene. Tiled building facade. Cool window. Wonderfully bright building! Hotel sign. Puebla is known for being a very pious city, there are literally churches on every corner. Catholicism is king here and the amount of jesus (not capitalizing jesus or christ out of protest) oriented souvenirs, photos, etc. is mind boggling. While we were cruising up and down the pedestrian walkway in the historic center we encountered people cleaning the street for christ and painting light posts for christ. Yes, seriously. One of the more ridiculous jesus-centered items were photos in which your child was superimposed sitting on jesus's lap, or standing in a field with jesus, or generally in some way interacting with a super white and healthy representation of the man. One photo I saw depicted him with what appeared to be ultra whit...

A poster on the street that says basically (bad translation) "to the police Guelaguetza, I'm not going" except someone scratched that last part off. Elaborate stencil on the wall. Arranging the flower baskets the women will wear on their heads while dancing. Sunshine en la boca!

This is a short video of one of the dances at the Mitla Guelaguetza, the bullfighting dance! The women act as the bulls and knock the men, the bullfighters, to the ground. What fun!

This past Sunday some friends and I headed out to the town of Mitla, about 40 minutes outside of Oaxaca, to attend the Guelaguetza. It was a great afternoon, the Guelaguetza was a small celebration, compared to the event in the city of Oaxaca, and this smaller venue made you feel a part of the festivities. Click on the photos to enlarge them. Dancers.... Dancers waiting their turn... The danza de la pluma..... The organizers and dancers handed out drinks, hats, tortillas and dolls made of yarn among other things to the attendees. The first drink we were offered was tepache, fermented pineapple juice, in a cup formed from half of a gourd. These young gentleman are enjoying their beverage. Then a bit later they came around with free mezcal! This is me enjoying my free mezcal in a bamboo shot glass. Notice the look of deviant pleasure on my face...that is what mezcal does to you. Makes you a deviant. Who enjoys things. Notice behind me the man pouring the mezcal out of a green plastic g...

Much has changed since I was here in 2006, the year of the conflict in the city. The official Guelaguetza did not happen that year and most of the festivities and tourism surrounding it did not happen either. This year it is quite a different scene, the streets are filled with tourists, Mexican and foreign alike, and there are too many events to possibly attend. Saturday we stood on the street to watch the parade of dancers show off their traditional costumes and dancing skills, sort of a preview of what is to come at the official Guelaguetza event. Some pictures and video below. As you can see the event was quite popular Spectators of all kinds, including roof dogs. A woman from the Isthmus of Oaxaca. Freaky dude! Masked dancers. Walking home that evening we happened upon a truck unloading some maguey plants for the mezcal tasting fair. Yummy, mezcal...

My time in Oaxaca is coming to an end, at least for this year, I will return home August 12th. Unfortunately all the things I have been putting off, interviews, archival work, other boring research activities, I now have to accomplish in a very short amount of time. Yuck. It is also raining constantly here, or at least that is how it feels. I almost miss Tempe and the sun. Almost. When I return I will be teaching a little so no doubt I will have interesting stories of student mishaps, stay tuned. The guelaguetza (see prior posts) also begins this weekend so I'm hoping to have some great pictures to post from these festivities. Below are some pictures of a Triqui wedding I went to in March, I have been meaning to post these but just haven't gotten around to it until now. I wasn't officially invited to the wedding, rather I went with someone from the Centro who I bumped into on the street. I loved the image of the red huipiles worn by the Triqui women juxtaposed with the trad...