Food, glorious food!

I've been to markets and large Mexican grocery stores. I love to cook and bought lots of exotic ingredients.  I've been asked, "What is that and what are you going to do with it?"  My reply? I'm not sure but there must be some answer on the web.  So I am cooking some but the restaurants are so fun and when we're out and about... we have to try them. Here's a sampling, a taste of Oaxaca!

We're not in jail- we're inside, away from the pesky pigeons. 

The two in the background are small botanas or appetizers- pickled carrots and spicy peanuts with a squirt of lime. Delicious.
The frothy drink is a virgin pina colada- very refreshing on a hot day.
And the soup was a wonderful classic tortilla soup with a large chili in the middle. I didn't eat the chili. 

This is an Oaxacan tamal.or Zapotec actually One tamale. They plaster the masa or ground corn on the banana leaf and add chicken and dark mole sauce.  It's not like a wonderful green corn tamale in Tucson. So far- my least favorite dish. 

Last but not least... a lovely dish of fresh lettuce ( I didn't eat that either- was it washed? Who knows?) But I did enjoy the fresh tomato so clearly I'm not a purist here. The frioles or beans were yummy. And the brown in the tortilla shell? Chapulines. Translation? Grasshoppers. Fried. Tastes like bacon with a slight aftertaste of...dirt?

They are collected only at certain times of year (from their hatching in early May through the late summer/early autumn). After being thoroughly cleaned and washed, they are toasted on a comal (broad flat cookware) with garlic, lime juice and salt containing extract of agave worms (more yum....), lending a sour-spicy-salty taste to the finished product. Sometimes the grasshoppers are also toasted with chili, although it can be used to cover up for stale chapulines.

One of the regions of Mexico where chapulines are most widely consumed is Oaxaca, where they are sold as snacks at local sports events and are becoming revived among foodies. 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chapulines#/media/File:Chapulines_de_Oaxaca.jpg

You see them all over the markets and I had to try them once. I've eaten worse things. 

And they are full of protein. 

Another adventure in the land of friendly people
and
tasty new food!

Zapotec church service- this is why we're all here

One of the helpers for our school time is a former homeschooling mom, current librarian and with her Zapotec husband is translating one that branches of his language. Turns out there are dozens of Zapotec dialects... and they all need Bibles. 

She took us to this sweet evening service. Her husband leads the weekday service in his native Zapotec. He speaks some English- he was her language tutor 25 years ago...:)   

This is their third church- home, garage, now a poured concrete building.  Heavy rains caused a small stream in the yard- we just waded over on rocks.  This is in a decent sized Mexican town, not their Zapotec village in the mountains.

What more can I say...so heartfelt. 

And true to the gospel. 

The evening got late for some. 

Everyone else was quiet and attentive.

The pastor spoke using slides from his computer!  He was great at soliciting questions and answers from the congregation. 

I tried to include a wonderful little video but it doesn't seem to want to load. It's too late at night to figure that out. I have to teach tomorrow!

Mitla on Mexico's Independence Day

Here's a small taste of my home for the next three weeks-

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HaMM7JJNj3Q

Clearly, this drone was flying at five am in the summer- I don't see much traffic.




No overloaded trucks, no taxis and no cute little micro- taxies.

Micro-taxies It cost three of us ten pesos to get home.
Total, not each. You do the math. 

But today is Mexico's Independence Day- the day the Catholic priest Miguel Hildago y Costilla from Delores led the peasants- mostly indigenous Indians and mestizos with a cry of defiance.

September 16 is Independence Day in Mexico since it was proclaimed such a day of 1810. The popular Spanish term for this celebration is the Scream of Dolores .

·      The independence of Mexico was demanded for the first time in 1810, but it did not become official until 1821.

·       El Grito de Dolores is the most famous moment in the history of Mexican independence

El Grito was the proclamation of independence given by Miguel Hidalgo y Costilla , who had rebelled against the Spanish government in power. Feelings of independence had been incubating for some time, due to the American and French revolutions, as well as the French occupation of Spain in the early nineteenth century. After learning that the government intended to arrest him, Hidalgo sounded the bell of his church in the southern coastal town of Dolores, went up to the pulpit and announced his plans to rebel, encouraging the other parishioners to join him. After several hours had gathered an army of people ready to rebel against Spain. This uprising against the authorities was the trigger of a revolutionary war that would last a decade.

We walked to the center of town, looked at the construction all over the plaza, avoided the persistent street food vendors and ended up squished under a tent in a downpour with thousands of friendly Mexicans.  And listened to this for two hours. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aY3u0M3owdo
Mostly warming up the trumpets.

It had been drizzling and we wondered and waited some more. The people watching was great! Just as the rain really started, the parade of the beautiful young woman came toward the tent.  One had a huge headdress of peacock feathers and a ballgown with local scenery painted on it. And I left my camera behind because it was dark....

We listened -all in Spanish, of course, and watched as each local official was introduced and brought forward a Mexican flag. Then each of the six schools did the same. The young women sang the national anthem while people milled and bumped into each other as more pushed in to avoid the rain, now torrential.

The anthem has ten stanzas but the girls only sang four.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZpFQ0I8AcF0

Fifteen minutes later, my feet were killing me and we had a long wet walk home.  They started retiring the flags with the same pomp and ceremony; we started for home.

We missed the Grito!- the great war cry, but one of our group stayed behind and it was all over soon after we left.  They didn't do the great grito after all but it was great fun to be a part of a local party. Normally there would be a parade today but not this Mexican Independence Day.

The night was a more subdued celebration with reference to the many who have died from the latest earthquake in this beautiful but precarious land.

I'm back to the blog...and out of the country!

I just realized it's been almost a year since I last blogged. I do miss the musing and writing but I've been busy with so many other projects, this has fallen by the wayside. But I'm in Mexico for a month and thought I'd use my poor neglected blog to collect my own thoughts and share my adventure.

I arrived last night- late, around midnight, to San Pablo Villa de Mitla.  I think that is a village designation, not the name of a villa.

This is NOT my digs....

This is my home for the next month... it's perfect.

I'm in a rather spartan one bedroom apartment on the center for linguists and translation here in Milta, Oaxaca (the "state") in southwest Mexico.  It's less than 100 miles from the hard hit town of Juchitán de Zaragoza, Oaxaca but there is little damage to see here. I'll be out and about in a few minutes.

I added some color asap and will bring home fresh flowers.  Check out the formal coffee table! 

Cooking on GAS- LOVE it!

I could have a slumber party on that bed. 

I'm here to teach the English speaking children of international translators for three weeks. The center hosts the children and their families twice a year to give the homeschooled children a classroom experience. The irony is not lost on me- I spent twenty years homeschooling and maybe two as an occasional substitute teacher. But I can create a classroom experience- I hope!


This morning I'll go with the education director to pick up another teacher and find a grocery store. In my careful packing- "I will NOT pay extra to bring unnecessary stuff to Mexico!", I forgot to pack some protein bars. So breakfast was a spoon of hemp and dry peanut butter reconstituted with chai tea. It was actually delicious.

The water has boiled so I'll wash my face and get ready to meet Mexico. Off to buy fruits and veggies (directions to soak them in bleach or iodine in the apartment manual).

But I have faster wifi than at my house and gorgeous bougainvillea outside my front door. The chai was lovely and the day is new.

For my SD  friends....yes, Harley Davidson is available right in the Mexico City airport!

I was too busy ogling the view and forgot to take a better picture of the amazing beauty of Mexico City at night.
 That is on BIG city.