We are living in the Jalatlaco neighborhood. It's pronounced barrio ha lot la ko. We like this area a lot; it's close to the center of everything, there are cobblestone streets and lots of brightly painted walls and murals on the walls, and there are interesting coffee shops and little shops.
Something else that's nice about our barrio and Oaxaca in general: when you pass people on the street, they always greet you with "buenos dias," or "buen noche" or sometimes just a head nod. But there is an acknowledgement, just about every time.
Also, in Oaxaca and all around the area, women are often wearing traditional dress. In the villages it's mostly the dresses with lace collars and pleats and the apron over it. This is also the dress of the tamale saleswomen and the house cleaners. In the city (of Oaxaca) there are several different styles. And the hipster women wear them and the teenage girls wear them and they're in the windows of the shops around town. There's embroidery in 4 main styles and designs. I bought a couple last time and I get compliments on them when I wear them in Berkeley. I bought a couple more this time.
This last picture is our house, once you open the gate
We had an adventure a couple weekends ago. We went to a weaving village called Santo Tomas Jaleiza and saw many women weaving. The kids mostly liked the exercise equipment nearby, but Josh and I liked to see the style of weaving that is done there. Then we went to a balneario, or a waterpark that was nearby. We've been going to many balnearios and the kids really like the slides and whatever play equipment they had there, which was also swings and seesaws. We met a woman and her two kids and had really interesting conversations about when she came to the US at age 16 from another nearby village. She later invited us to a birthday party in her town (she lives in San Diego now but visits every year at the village where she grew up, and she has a house there). (Getting home was fine, and I won't go into the details of us standing on the highway flagging down taxis, or about Aviva getting attacked by a cactus).
So the next day, we went to Santiago Apostal, near Ocotlan, where Maria's family member was having the birthday party. We took a colectivo to Ocotlan, and then a shared taxi the rest of the way, and Maria wanted to talk to our taxi driver to give exact directions to the house. But I have to say, we could tell when we were getting close because we could hear the 10 or 15 piece band (trumpets and cymbals and many horns). It was Maria's grandma's 92nd birthday party, and the way they do birthday parties is with this band (of people who live in Santiago Apostal) and people bring flowers, and the parties go from the afternoon until late at night. She told us this one was until 1:00 am. They fed us and did some game where the kids all scramble as a few people throw tons of candy out of baskets. We haven't finished what Noah and Aviva collected - not the beer-flavored lollipops or the corn-flavored hard candies with chili sauce or the violet gum. Some people were dressed up and some weren't. Someone was con tinually circling the area, offering beers and then mezcal shots. The music - songs were something like 30 minutes long, and there was dancing which was two lines facing each other, and every now and then everyone does a do-si-do and changes places. They invited us to do it too. So we did.
These girls are wearing
traditional ribbons braided into their hair, like the older women do.
Maria's son Noe (pronounced No-eh) took us on a tour of their village and it was mostly dirt roads and a couple restaurants. We saw their house which was two rooms and a bathroom half-built, outside, and a separate area for showers.
We left the party at 8:00, with difficulty, because we were asked to stay until 1. But it was getting late. So we got a truck-taxi-thing back to Ocotlan without too much trouble. But in Ocotlan (which is still 40 minutes or an hour from Oaxaca), we could not find a taxi. We hadn't anticipated how things are closed and taxis don't work on Sundays, and especially late at night (it was now about 9:00). We looked and hoped and asked and tried, but couldn't find a taxi. We thought we might have to spend the night in a hotel, which I'm sure would have been an interesting experience (especially since we didn't have things we needed like a contact lens case for me, and other stuff).
There was a colectivo driver who offered his services if we would pay $30. The price is usually probably $7. We bargained him down to $25 and he drove us to our door. That was $25 well spent. We got home around 11:00.
We found a babysitter who took the kids to a balneario, or waterpark, and to a village to work with clay. They love swimming and their twice-weekly swim class, and all the waterparks they've been to. Their swim class required a doctor's note with their blood type, and we tried. There were emails to their doctor and many trips to many pharmacies where we could supposedly easily get a doctor's note once we could print the emailed one we had.... In the end, Josh just wrote one, made up their blood type, forged the Kaiser letterhead, and paid 20 cents to print. It was accepted without a problem.
There is a church on the other side of town with a big plaza area filled with ice cream restaurants and vendors. Maybe 10 different places, with tables and chairs around the fountain area, and they are all for nieve, or ice cream (it's more or less ice cream). We call this place the Ice Cream Church though it's really called Basilica de la Soledad. There are probably 30 flavors offered at each place, including grasshopper, or chapulin.
Some of the flavors are broken rice, cheese, beet root, cucumber, and oat.
Aunt Joyce is visiting us now, for our last week here. She took us out to eat last night and we ate good things. We had a big bowl of guacamole to eat with tostada chips, and it was covered in mango pieces, carved radishes, and chapulin. We all ate it.
Last post will be highlights of the trip. Until then, hasta luego....
