clothes hangers

hello from oaxaca my esteemed readers (of which i hope there are some left somewhere in the universe)

today i hung all my clothes up for the first time since the 24th july 2008. this was very very exciting, and i will never take wardrobes and clothes hangers for granted ever again, i had forgotten they existed. quel luxury! how strange to be so enamoured by clothes hangers but i really am. no more the scrumpled up creases in my trousers. once more into the breach my friends. i think the excitement has intoxicated me.

another first today was i just had a moka frio - also known as a cold coffee. i`m not sure how i feel about them, for now i will give it 65% as an experience, but it was a bit too chocolatey for my liking, which made it lose 30% and the other 5% it lost for having too much whipped cream and therefore being bad for my arteries. whilst partaking of said coffee, the waiter asked me where i was from, and when i explained what i was doing here - planning to teach english - he asked if he could learn with me, as it is very important to learn english etc etc. so perhaps he will be my first student when i return in el ano nuevo.

whilst rating my coffee i made a list of strange things i have noticed the mexicans do:
put chili on everything and i mean everything
get themselves crucified during semana santa, so they can share jesus`s pain
drink coffee through very thin little straws
have an obsession with soap operas
celebrate day of the postman
make huge bizarre animals from the pulp of a certain type of tree and wheel them through mexico city in a big parade called desfile de las alebrijes (written about in a previous blog)

i will keep updating this list as i go along but that`s it for now.

on saturday i finished reading middlesex while eating my hostel breakfast. a very good book, i give it 96%. i felt it was almost too dense (not meaning stupid) in parts, and also there could have been more dialogue perchance, but an amazing story and so well told. has anyone read the virgin suicides which he wrote previous to this? is it the same as the film of the same name? i am now trying to exchange middlesex for another good book but no luck as yet- the last hostel had such literary gems as jeffrey archer and stephen king to offer. have started reading remains of the day, by kazuo ishiguro which so far is typically very impressive.

***stop press - i have decided to ban my usage of the word nice from my blog as on reading it back i realised i use it far too much***

after my breakfast i ventured into the cold of mexico city with scarf and new school uniform cardigan to keep me warm. i went first to el museo de la ciudad de mexico. the actual permanent exhibition was closed, the one about the history of the city of mexico, but there was a really amazing exhibition of luis barragan, a mexican architect who hung out with david hockney (he was in a photo with him at one point anyway), and designed a house in napa valley, california for francis ford coppola but this house never got built. it was pink and purple and had an observatory. you can read more about him here if you like, his house in mexico city is a unesco world heritage site
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luis_Barragan
dad, have you heard of him? he only died in 1988.

the next exhibition was of la lucha libre - mexican wrestling. lots of wrestling masks and great photos and film footage of crazy wrestling matches. i couldn`t work out if it is a bit like the wwf in that do they just pretend and act it all up a bit, but i think it`s fairly real, there`s real blood and they seem to take it quite seriously, though i don`t know how they can when they`re all dressed up like big nancies.

then there was an exhibition of photos of day of the dead altars from various parts of mexico, mainly from michoachan, where they make a very big deal of it. this mainly just reminded me that i don`t have a camera at the moment. and also does anyone else when they go to art galleries, instead of looking at the actual art just look at your own reflection in the glass of the frame? i suppose it`s an interesting philosophical comment on how art is a reflection of life. or perhaps it`s just a really stupid comment from someone that can`t be bothered to properly appreciate art.

i recovered by having a tuna sandwich and looking at some book shops, this always renews me when i`m tired. then i carried on along avenida hidalgo (miguel hidalgo was the founder of the mexican revolution and lots of streets are named after him) to museo nacional del arte. lots of great bits of art by diego rivera, clemente orozco, david siqueiros, and jose velasco gomez. my feet were hurting by now so i went to sit down outside the palacio de bellas artes, then moved to have a nap in the park nearby. as i was wandering in the square later on the way back to my hostel a random mexican came up with some postcards and i had to tell him which were my favourite 3. sadly he didn`t want me to give them all percentages, which i would have been happy to do. then on one of them i had to write something inspirational, for which i couldn`t think of anything (how could this be from such an amazing writer as you lucy i hear you cry), so i plagiarised a line from max ehrman`s desiderata ha. then he said they send the postcards to people, and i get an email but i`m not sure exactly why or when or how. i gave some money to the organ grinder man who was grinding his organ (oo er) nearby, mainly because they must never get any money from anyone and i was feeling sympathetic. then i did some more wandering, and bought a sudoku book because i am middle aged. nothing else of note happened that day. the strange metallurgist from montreal i had met the previous night while eating my free spaghetti was nowhere to be seen which was a relief as he was quite strange in a napoleon dynamite way but without the coolness. he had regaled me over the spaghetti with a very detailed and boring tale of how he had nearly lost his shoe on the metro in rush hour that afternoon.

sunday i got a minibus shuttle bus from the hostel all the way to oaxaca - this was very handy as if this didn`t exist i would have had to lug all my bags to the bus station in a taxi and get on a proper big bus. there was me and 3 australian girls on the minibus, and the driver ricardo. i acted as translator as they had no spanish and i have a little and ricardo only had a little english. we stopped off to see various cactuses of note along the way, one that was 500 years old. ricardo also pointed out other interesting varieties of plants, and told us that 60% of all cactus varieties in the world exist in mexico. you can imagine my delight at hearing a percentage fact, so i noted it down at once. we (or rather they) took photos of the big panoramic views from the tops of the curvy roads, and ricardo told us that these mountains (the sierra madre occidental) were formed when the tectonic plates of the pacific and the sea on the other side (um i can`t remember its name) crashed together. he pointed out different colours of rocks and told us what minerals they contained to make them those colours. he pointed out all the smog above mexico city when we were leaving, and told us it wasn`t smog or pollution, but steam. he said the same as we approached oaxaca. i`m not sure i believe him. he was a nice man, and knew a lot of things, and i wouldn`t want to argue with a mexican about his own country, but i have to disagree on this one fact. how and why would mexico city be covered in a layer of steam? they don`t even have kettles here. but they do have a lot of pollutant rich cars. hmmmm. the plot thickens.

we stopped at a little restaurant for lunch and read the menu and asked lots of questions about it for some time, then i ordered queso fundido. this is essentially a big lump of melted cheese, with a few bits of chorizo and mushroom with it, that you put in a tortilla. it was filling, but not very exciting. the australian girls were very amiable (note non-usage of the word nice) and i have since updated my stereotype image of australian travellers, as i had also met a nice one in my hostel in mexico city, and met 2 more later in my hostel in oaxaca. i thought the first one must have been a glitch in the matrix, but 6 nice ones in 2 days was too much to be a coincidence, so they have gone up on the virtual percentage scale considerably.

another thing we saw on our journey in the little shuttle bus was lots of men running with a torch at the side of the road, then passing the torch on to the next man who then starts running, and a little lorry follows infront of them, which they run on to once they have run their little bit of the running. we found out that this is all to do with the celebrations of the virgen de guadalupe, which happen on 12th december, which is this friday. they are basically doing a sort of pilgrimage in honour of the virgen, and this all culminates in big fiestas and ceremonies on friday, which will be interesting to see in oaxaca. the mexicans are very fanatical catholics, there are images of el virgen everywhere, she is more important in catholicism than jesus i believe. every house or shop you go to or taxi you get in is usually full of very religious iconography, and there are loads of churches everywhere, and shrines by the side of roads etc. i think by the end of my time in mexico i will be a devout catholic. mexico is around 85% catholic, there also exists judaism, christianity, mormons. it is interesting that it is so hugely popular and strong when it was a religion enforced on them by the conquistadors when they invaded. anyone got any suggestions? semana santa (easter week) is obviously the most important, but more on that later (ie in march or april).

we got to oaxaca sunday early evening. ricardo took me to the house i am staying at, but there was nobody there, and nobody answering the mobile phone, so i went to hostel paulina on the other side of town. it was very clean and comfy, and i met the 2 aforementioned nice australians, and a girl from denmark called cristal. reminded me of crystal tips, a book i used to read when i was younger. we went for a walk around el zocalo (the main square, what in europe would be la plaza mayor). my new mexican mother, who is called teresa, and who will therefore be referred to from now on as mother teresa, then called me as i had left her a note, to ask me what happened etc. it is hard to figure out in a foreign language on a mobile phone if someone is cross with you or not. she had gone to the bus station to pick me up while i was at her house ringing the door bell. this was a misunderstanding, i had mentioned in a previous email that i would probably arrive at 4pm but would ring to confirm. and i hadn`t, so i am prepared to take 50% of the blame. after this i ate a sandwich and some crisps and slept deeply and homelessly.

today - monday. i went to my spanish school which i am doing for the week. we had 2 hours of grammar with judith, who has very long hair and looks like she`s probably an artist too in the afternoons. we did the subjunctive mainly. then we had 2 hours of conversation with nora who had a blue headband on. we talked about christmas and religion, and superstitions and the queen. there`s 2 of us in this class, me and jenny who is from california. in the grammar class there is also a girl called laura who is from america but has a polish surname and a mexican boyfriend. again my lack of knowledge about the country i am from was highlighted - can anyone inform me re the queen - is she just a public figure, tourist attraction, or does she have a lot of actual power, eg political, governmental? then i went to my house and finally met mother teresa. she is short and round and friendly, and has a beautiful house. which brings me full circle to my clothes hangers. there are also lots of canaries, like in rosa`s house, and a little dog called winnie. he is noisy and playful and has long hair over his eyes. if i knew more about dogs i`d tell you what type of dog he is, but i don`t. i have a double bed, a wardrobe with clothes hangers as you know, some tables, and my own bathroom with really hot shower. there is a a roof terrace too. i could barely bring myself to leave the room to go and wander round town as i was so overwhelmed at having all this space to myself. in the end i left and here i am now. i have been carrying my dirty washing round town all evening as i couldn`t find a laundry. now i`m going to go home to mi casa bonita and do my homework for tomorrow.

bonus points if you read this far, you get a free mexican fact of the day. nora told us that here they don`t believe in santa claus, but in the three wise men, it is them that bring presents to children in mexico. and also that to expel evil spirits here they wave an egg infront of you because an egg is neutral and therefore absorbs all the bad energies from your body. then you break the egg in a bowl and it changes colour infront of your very eyes. nora had done this and it is really true.