The Water Boils -- Oaxaca, Mexico

I took a day off from vegging out at the local English library to put on my significantly less adventurous adventure boots and go on a tour. With a guide. In a van. With air-conditioning and water bottles and nice-smelling, well-off, middle-aged lovers of Mexico (as opposed to other hairy hippies like myself). The two Dutch fellows and the Australian who were going to rough a similar journey colectivo style invited me to join, but I wanted something simple. I didn’t fancy the idea of waiting in the hot Oaxacan sun for a colectivo that may or may not stop. Traversing Mexico, as a whole, still unnerves me slightly (and occasionally makes me very, very nauseous). Going between La Punta and Puerto Escondido was a piece of chocolate (I’m allergic to cake, shut up), but catching multiple colectivos and buses in and out of cities and small villages and mountains was… errr… more ordeal and less adventure. 

Remember what you learned whilst hitchhiking through the Balkans with Tessa. If life gives you an adventure, HOP on that beast and enjoy the ride. If life gives you an ordeal and you have the choice to, you know, NOT hop on it… maybe do that. The not hopping. 

Erick had told me to meet his friend for the tour on Humboldt and Alcala at nine fifteen. After getting quite lost, accosting an innocent passerby with “DONDE ES HUMBOLDT… CALLE?” I managed to make it to the pickup point at precisely nine fifteen. Soaked with sweat and a puzzling mixture of shame and victory. 

No one was there. 

WHAT? 

As I’d already paid for the tour (the less adventurous adventure boots always cost more) and had planned my day around it, all that invigorating victory melted away into a puddle of defeat. 

Where’s the tour group? Did it get canceled last minute? No. I mean, clearly there’s a mistake. 

I walked over to the tourist office where Erick had booked the tour for me the day before. 

“Disculpeme, cuando es el tour?” I asked the receptionist sitting inside. 

“Tour?” 

“Si, el tour… hierve de agua. Cuando?” 

“Umm…” 

I don’t have a ticket to show her because Erick booked it… I don’t know how to tell her I was told to wait over there across the street until someone arrived to pick me up… ARGH. 

“Habla ingles?” I optimistically tried my luck, even though I realistically knew what my luck would be. 

“No, no hablo ingles.” 

“Umm… Mio amigo… err… comprar billete ayer. Para el tour hoy. Donde el tour… umm… guide.” 

The woman just shook her head helplessly. 

“No entiendo.” 

But I’m TRYING SO HARD. 

This is a problem I’ve noticed with the language barrier in Mexico. In Italy, people quickly resort to body language and have phenomenal success at getting something similar to what they want to say across. In Mexico, people either immediately give up or just keep speaking to you in Spanish, the same thing, over and over and over again. In my experience, anyway. 

“Es el tour hoy?” I said finally, caring not a bit that I was slaying the Spanish language with each syllable. 

The woman shook her head again. 

“FINE,” I said a few decibels above polite. “I’ll go back to wait and just see if anything happens.” 

“Okay,” the woman said as I walked away. 

Nine thirty-five. Oof. Well, it’s Mexico. Twenty minutes late is a bit excessive… but… it’s Mexico. I’ll give it half an hour before I decide to retreat to my nook in the library. 

“Hola, are you Aimee?” asked a short, well-rounded Mexican fellow. 

“Yes. Are you Erick’s friend?” 

“Si. We didn’t have enough people for the tour today, so we put you on a bus with another company. We have to walk just a couple of blocks to get there.” 

“That’s fabulous,” I heaved a deep sigh of gratitude. 

Nothing like being understood. 

The tour didn’t start until ten o’clock, so with my ticket in hand, I meandered off to grab a cup of hot chocolate from a vendor’s bicycle tamale/hot chocolate cart. 

All cities ought to have tamale/hot chocolate carts. The world would be a better place, I thought as I handed over ten pesos and a “muchos gracias” in return for my medium cup of steaming hot chocolate. Things about Oaxaca City I will miss when I fly back to Colorado in eight days. This. 

I boarded the van at ten o’clock and found myself surrounded by the anticipated crowd of middle-aged, recently showered lovers of Mexico. 

This is actually a really nice change, I thought as I listened to the conversation flow between the recently showered couples. I’ve spent the last three months surrounding myself with people just like me, so I haven’t had the eye-opening experience of feeling socially out of place in quite a while. I mean, I always feel slightly out of place culturally, but I’m usually with yogis or couchsurfers or volunteer hosts who understand this kind of life. So connecting with those around me is something that comes naturally, easily, immediately. I mean, they’re my people. I wonder if I’ll be able to connect with anyone on this tour today…

Our first stop was in the small town of Santa Maria del Tule, home of the Tree of Tule. The tree is a Montezuma cypress (although its Nahuatl name is ahuehuete, meaning “old man of the water”), has a circumference of 42 meters and a height of 43 meters. 

“Like a good Mexican,” our guide joked. 

I flung my red daybag over my shoulder and walked towards the imposing 2000 year-old “Old Man of the Water”. 

“Telluride Film Festival?” a Standard American Accent (according to David Alen Stern) addressed me from behind. 

“Yeah,” I looked over my shoulder at a smiling brunette, pleasantly surprised that someone knew about Telluride. 

“We’re from Boulder.” 

“Oh,” I exclaimed. “My brother and his wife live in Boulder! What brings you to Mexico?” 

“We love it here. We come all the time.” 

Who’d have thunk. Someone from my home state just happened to be on this tour that I only joined because the original tour company didn’t have enough participants. 

Our next stop was for a weaving demonstration in Teotitlan. 

A good deal of Oaxacan dye is produced by the carminic acid producing cochineal beetle that lives on the nopal cactus. 

The female beetles create an intense blood red when squashed. 

It takes between 80,000 and 100,000 beetles to produce one kilo of dried beetle dye.

The female cochineal beetles

Different natural dyes. Chamomile, marigold, beetle and different herbs whose english names I didn't catch. 

When the cochineal beetle is mixed with acid, orange is created. When it's mixed with alkaline, the blood red turns purple. 

All the reds and oranges are created using the beetle and various acids/alkalizers. 

Carding the wool. Most of the greens and yellows are produced using marigold and pomegranate mixed with limestone

limestone and pomegranate 

Our next stop was for a tour and tasting at a mezcal factory conveniently located across the street.

I'll let the pictures explain how mezcal is made.

This is the most popular agave plant used in the production of mezcal. I think. 

The leaves are removed and only the heart is used. 

The heart is cut into four pieces and placed in an oven covered with dirt. And smoked for days. 

Cooked and quartered agave heart. 

The agave is squashed -- 

and sliced  -- 

and fermented -- 

and heated -- 

(HEATING) 

and condensed -- 

and dribbled out. 

We tried various types of mezcal at the tasting room.

Mezcal with pear -- 

Mezcal with snake --

So much mezcal. 

Sleeping Zapotec woman. Can you see her?

Then a tour of some Zapotec ruins in the town of Mitla. Part of the ruins included a church built by the Spaniards in the 16th century. The Spaniards had a delightful habit of squashing local cultures and religions by leveling temples and building their churches on top of the local people’s place of worship. This church is called “San Pablo,” and as it’s built over a Zapotec burial site, its unique purpose was to keep the “devil from escaping”. 

Spanish church

Because this area of Mexico experiences earthquakes on a fairly regular basis, this entire religious structure was built without the use of mortar. 

Zapotec ruins

Then a lunch. At a criminally expensive buffet in the middle of nowhere, so other options were not available. However, as Erick had taken me to try the best tlayuda of all time ever the night before, I was still not even remotely hungry. 

The best tlayuda of all time ever is, um, not small. 

So I just sat with Roy and Laura (the couple from Boulder) and shared travel stories. Their daughter is currently vagabonding in Brazil as a massage therapist and their son worked as a chef in England before he overstayed his visa and had to move to Italy. We had an absolutely marvelous conversation and they invited me and Boy (surprise, Boy!) to their home in Boulder for dinner and wine (Roy makes his own). 

This, Bourget. This is why you need to constantly explore the social world as well as the cultural world. You never know with whom you can experience a meaningful connection. 

Our last stop was Hierve el Agua (“the water boils” ). 

The water is over-saturated with calcium carbonate (and other minerals), so when water flows over the cliff, its minerals lag behind.  

And all those minerals work their mineral magic and make this. 

Some people lose their sense of self in cities.

Some people lose their sense of self in art.  

I lose my sense of self in places like this. 

Egoic forgetfulness. 

I forget my story. 

I forget my plans. 

I forget any sort of “me”. 

There is a gap. A pause. A stillness. 

A quiet which calls me to presence. 

The 70-km journey back to Oaxaca was bumpy, silent and full of goats in the road. Who just bumbled along and bleated in front of our van, adamantly refusing to get out of the way. 

... Mexico...