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Oaxaca, Monte Alban & Mitla


Ruins of Monte Alban / Oaxaca

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There are also plenty of mercados - markets - in Oaxaca. We visited the Mercado de Artesanias and were impressed by the number and variety of crafts practiced in the Oaxaca valley. These crafts are not just on sale at the craft market, but all over town in up-market galleries, at simple sidewalk stalls and even by women and children hawking their wares around the Zócalo. Included are the carved wooden figures called 'alebrijes' from San Martin Tilcajete, the famous black pottery of Doña Rosa from San Bartolo Coyotepec, hand-woven rugs and wall hangings from Teotitlan del Valle and of course the beautiful embroidered clothes that seem to be too numerous to allow an individual seller to make a living. We have the same problem every time we visit one of these craft markets - our method of travel and mode of transport are not conducive to shopping for concrete memories. We have to satisfy ourselves with photos instead, despite the fact that we find much of what we've seen incredibly attractive and very tempting. Although, this time we did buy a small alebrije - a stylised lizard for our dashboard.
We also visited the produce markets and found the usual fruit and vegetables on sale along with the more unusual item of cooked grasshoppers doused in chilli. They are called 'chapulines' and by all accounts are crunchy and yummy - sorry, I have limits on my desire to experience the local culture and this is definitely beyond them, so I can't confirm that assertion, even though they were displayed so invitingly. In fact, most of the food items for sale are displayed in an attractive way, although if choosing your own produce you must be careful not to choose the one at the bottom of the pile - it's embarrassing when it all comes tumbling down! One vender was preparing a fruit that was a deep burgundy colour - later we discovered it to be 'tuna', the fruit of the 'prickly pear' cactus, and in El Tule we tried it as a frozen treat - not bad at all.
One of the things which impressed both of us about Oaxaca is the colour. It is present everywhere you look. The traditional clothing of many of the people is very bright. There are many art galleries which display a wide variety of art, all of it using amazing colours. The buildings are painted incredible shades. Juergen has a bit of a thing for interesting doors and windows - we now have an ever growing collection of photos of these (which we'll publish separately) and they also come in all colours and styles. To add to the colour that is there all year round, the Poinciana trees were in full bloom while we were in Oaxaca and their brilliant orange-red added another dimension to this colourful place.
As well as the interesting things we spent our time doing, we also managed a few useful things. A couple of repairs to the truck were accomplished - and it is an accomplishment when you have such a minimal grasp of the language! Fortunately the workshop managers and workers were extremely helpful and tried hard to understand and to make themselves understood. Hairdressers, laundry and finding just the right supermarket for items we were lacking all take up time and are part of the adventure in their own right! We also found a good English bookshop, yielding books which were both interesting and useful. In between times we took the opportunity to try out a few of the local restaurants - some were good and others not so. We ate (on separate occasions, of course) sushi and crepes - not very Mexican but excellent in both cases. We are both still surprised at how much culture from other countries has been absorbed into Mexico, and food is an obvious part of that. Most of these places make a living from Mexicans, not from the few tourists.
We also visited the ruin site of Monte Alban. It needed about half a day and was most inspiring. Monte Alban is perched on a flattened top of a mountain and, had it not been so hazy, it would have afforded great views of the city below as well as the countryside in other directions. It was built by the Zapotecs beginning in about 500BC and lasted until about 850AD. It was a centre of economic, political and religious power since it was the first urban complex in Mesoamerica. There are a lot of buildings remaining, and the excavations of tombs as well as these buildings have allowed archaeologists to piece together a fairly accurate picture of the city's inhabitants and their way of life. As with the previous ruins we have visited, I found this place fascinating and a little overwhelming - a few too many vendors though.
Thursday arrived and it was the day to collect my glasses. They weren't ready until early evening and when I was in the city to collect them I was handed a booklet which outlined the programme of the Humanitas Fiestas de Mayo [official link in Spanish]. We had seen posters advertising this around town all week but didn't really know what it was about and hadn't bothered to find out as it was due to start on May 4, the day we were planning to leave. We both had a look at the programme and on Friday morning, when we had been planning to leave, we made the decision to stay for the weekend and see what the festival had to offer.
This was another good decision as it turned out to be an arts festival with contributions from Italy, Michoacán (Pátzcuaro, Morelia and Uruapan are in that state) and El Istmo (the Isthmus of Tehuantepec, which is the narrow strip of low-laying land dividing North America and Central America). The opening ceremony on Friday night was held at the Plaza of the Dancers and consisted of an amazing dance on stilts by an Italian troupe. The music was a classical compilation and it was incredible to see them waltzing to Strauss without getting tangled up in their partners stilts. I've always considered stilts to be a gymnastic performance, but this was really an artistic one. We returned to the same place on Saturday night for the Fiesta Michoacán. This was a collage of music and dancing by different groups from Michoacán. It included the 'old men' we had become so familiar with in Pátzcuaro and there were even some dancing horses. The evening was a mix of great music and inspiring dance with a smattering of unintelligible jigging on the stage of groups whose performance left us confused. One particular group were dressed in strangely inanimate masks and dazzling sequined costumes and when they opened their capes, they were lined in plaid - their performance was as incongruous as their dress and the unenthusiastic nature of it all led me to state that 'Dead men do wear plaid'! I guess knowing the historical and cultural context of these performances may have helped. During the time we had been in Oaxaca, we had experienced thunderstorms building up in the afternoons which sometimes brought quite a lot of rain in the early evening. Fortunately this didn't happen on either night as it seemed that most of Oaxaca had turned out to see these free performances.
Link to a sound snippet from the festival [wav file 1,600 kb]
As well as the two evening performances, we also visited an exhibition which included some excellent photographs by an Italian photographer and some impressive paintings and other artwork by various artists from the three locales represented at the festival. On Sunday in the Zócalo at the regular band concert an Italian band performed, followed by one from Michoacán. The Italian band, Banda Fiati Sprecati, was an energetic group who really seemed to enjoy what they were doing. They had an extremely relaxed attitude and this came through in their music. Banda Ecor de Tingambato from Michoacán was a complete contrast, being more conservative and traditional in their approach, but were nevertheless quite accomplished musicians. The most interesting thing about the big Mexican bands is that they are usually without any stringed instruments and still manage to perform classical pieces that would normally require them. Interspersed with these formal parts of the festival programme were also a number of parades around the town, full of people in colourful costumes. We never really know what they are about, but they provide even more colour in this incredibly colourful city.
On Monday we did manage to leave - the festival would continue until the following Sunday, but we felt it was time to go. We weren't going far as we had a list of things to see between Oaxaca and Mitla and then planned to drive to Hierve el Agua and spend the night. Our first stop was El Tule, a small village with a big claim - the world's largest tree! Whether it is or not, the tree is estimated to be more than 2000 years old and is 42m high, 14m in diameter, has a volume somewhere in the vicinity of 800,000 cubic metres and is estimated to weigh in excess of 600 tons. And if that is not enough to class it as spectacular, it is a beautiful tree which shelters a lot of very noisy birdlife, which is justification enough to hail its existence!
Link to a sound snippet of the birds [wav file 550 kb]
Our next stop was the ruin site at Yagul. This was a great experience because we were the only people wandering around this small but impressive site. It has one of the most perfect ball courts discovered to date and the palace of 6 patios is a maze worth getting lost in. As we were leaving a small group of people were arriving - the perfect way to explore a ruin site, and no vendors trying to sell 'autentico' or reproduction artefacts.
Mitla is also a ruin site and is impressive mostly because of the completeness of some of its components. It is possible, like nowhere else we've been so far, to really imagine the life inside these buildings. Unfortunately the Spanish built a church right in the middle of one of the buildings in the 1700s and used the remainder of it for stables and living quarters for the priests. Part of the Mitla ruins are in the midst of the town. It is unfortunate that these are not better cared for as they are entered by some members of the population who like to write graffiti on the walls and leave their garbage behind.
After visiting Mitla we drove on towards Hierve el Agua which offers petrified waterfalls and mineral pools. We followed the road signs to it over some pretty bad roads only to find the last few kilometres blocked by large rocks, a deep ditch, and a fence. It was impossible to find out why this was so as there was a village in view and surely they needed to be able to use the road. We couldn't discover another way in and both of us were disappointed that we wouldn't have the opportunity to see this place. It had been recommended to us and the photos we had seen looked impressive. We gave up and drove back to Mitla and parked in the car park of the ruin site for the night. It was a night disturbed by roaming dogs, noisy youths until midnight and roosters early in the morning, but unfortunately it had been too late in the day to consider driving further on.


 
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