Reverse Culture Shock

I realize I haven't quite finished the posts about my trip, but I will get around to it eventually.

I have been back in the US for just under a week now. It is good to be home, it really is, but it is so weird. Reverse culture shock is crazy, almost worse than just regular culture shock. When you first arrive in a foreign country, culture shock is expected. Everything is new, different, foreign. Eventually though, it becomes routine. Coming back after an extended amount of time away is so strange. You expect to be comforted by the familiar, but instead everything familiar is foreign at the same time. Everything I do, think, feel, is followed by a "Oh, weird, I have been doing this thing this way my entire life? In Mexico we do it this way." It is a strange, almost unsettling feeling.

Other than getting around to writing about the last three days of the Oaxaca and Chiapas trip, not a lot will be happening in this blog until late January when I go back to Mexico for Part 2 of the year abroad.

The Great Adventure: Day 6

Day 6

We decided to check out Cañón del Sumidero, and take a boat ride through the river that runs through it. Not being able to find much info on hour to get there ourselves, we took a taxi to the national park where we thought the boats departed from. Our cab driver, Alex, was super interested in our lives. He told us that not a lot of Americans come to Chiapas (especially to Tuxtla), and asked us all about everything about the States during the drive there.

We got to the park, which is basically a road leading up a steep hill. Along the way, there are five miradores, or lookouts, which look down on the canyon. We kept crawling up the hill, and were starting to get really confused about the whole boat idea. Finally we got to the top, and there was nothing up there. Lisa asked someone about the boats, and we found out that they leave from a different city on the outskirts of Tuxtla. We had our hearts set on the boats, so we negotiated a cab fare with Alex to the city.

At the docks, we had to wait about thirty minutes for enough people to come to fill up a boat. We were ambushed by curious workers, they said we were the first people from the States they had seen in a very long time. They were even more curious than Alex about life in the States.

The boat ride through the canyon was incredible. We saw lots of crocodiles and a monkey or two! About halfway through, we reached an area full of trash. During rainy season, trash washes into the river and gathers in certain spots. Our boat driver said that at some points of the year, the trash is so thick that boats can't pass through it. It was absolutely heartbreaking.

After the boat ride we called up Alex to bring us home, then spent the rest of the evening hanging out in the house. We worked on the Thanksgiving dinner for the next day, watched Friends, drank some beer, and met a few family friends that had come to the house for their daily group yoga class.

View of the canyon from one of the lookouts

The Great Adventure: Day 5

Day 5

At this point I was starting to get a little worried, because what I thought were just allergies seemed to be turning into a bad cold. After being so sick for so long, I couldn't even comprehend the thought that I was getting sick again, so I just kept taking my Vitamin C and completely ignored the cold.

Day 5 was pretty uneventful. We flew out of Oaxaca into Mexico City early in the morning, and had a few hours to kill before our flight to Chiapas. We got on the metro and ended up at a pretty little plaza somewhere downtown where were sat in the sun for a few hours. We had the most amazing street tacos that I have had so far in Mexico, complete with some really delicious horchata, then got back on the metro to head back to the airport.

Somewhere between passing through the gate to board the metro and getting off the first line we rode, I DROPPED my wallet. I know for sure that no one stole it, because I was SO paranoid about it getting stolen that I guarded my purse like a hawk the entire time. I have no idea where or how I managed to drop my wallet, and since we had a flight to catch we couldn't loop back to look for it. Luckily, all that was in it was about $15 and my UG student ID. I'm more pissed about losing the actual wallet, I have had it since third grade. It is ancient, but I love it. I still haven't gotten around to buying a new one, but that is my mission today after I finish at least half of this paper.

When we got to Chiapas, Lisa's friend that we stayed with (also named Lisa) came and picked us up from the airport. During the ride home, she informs us that the international school she works at is having a Thanksgiving feast, and she was in charge of cooking 4 turkeys and mashed potatoes for eighty people and could use our help. We get to the house and start on the turkey, then head out to a dinner. We went to a little Italian place, and I had some of the best pizza in the world. In Chiapas.

The house that we stayed at was absolutely gorgeous. Lisa works at a school and lives with a well off family. They have an incredible house complete with a pool and multiple housekeepers. Most of the family was out of town, so we didn't get to meet them, but the older brother had stayed behind to work. Lisa warned us he could be really rude, but everything was fine and he was very friendly. He was a bit of a weird guy though. First of all, whenever he needed one of the housekeepers, instead of walking two seconds to find them, he would call them on a megaphone. It was super awkward. Second, every night from his room in the pool house he would have these raves with two of his friends, complete with blasting music, lights, and a fog machine. I would think that with three people that would get really boring, but they seemed to enjoy it.

Day 6 will come later, I should be writing my literature paper at the moment.

Capitan, the dog living at Lisa's friend Lisa's house

AMAZING street tacos in Mexico City. The french fries actually came on top...

The Great Adventure: Days 3 & 4

In case you missed it, I just added a post about days 1 and 2. So read that before reading this one :) I already wrote about day 3 a few posts ago while I was still traveling, but it was so amazing I have to talk about it again. Parts of day 3 are copied from the older post, but I went through and added more details.

Day 3

We woke up early, ate breakfast, and headed out to catch a bus to Mitla and then Hierve el Agua. The bus ride to Mitla was just over an hour, then we got in a collective taxi for the hour ride through a winding dirt rode up to Hierve el Agua.

First we hiked around and to the base of the waterfall, which was absolutely gorgeous. We hiked around for a little over an hour, taking pictures of the waterfall from different vantage points. The trail was full of staircases made for people twice my height, so it was a little exhausting (and my legs were so sore the next morning!). To cool down we went swimming in the pools at the top. Jumping in was one of the most relaxing moments of my life, I did NOT want to leave. The pool looks out over the edge of the waterfall from the top, and has a gorgeous view of the surrounding countryside. The water was a little murky and made me a tad bit nervous, but it must have a super high mineral content or something because afterwards my skin was ridiculously soft. Some people claim the water has healing powers.

We swam for a little over an hour, then dried off in the sun. We bought some tamales for the drive back into Mitla, which were delicious. One was with black beans and the other was some sort of plant of grass. It wasn't bad, but not as good as the black bean one.

We were still hungry after, so we walked around until we found a nice looking restaurant, where I had my first tlayuda. SO GOOD.

It was starting to get late, so we headed back to Oaxaca. The bus ride back had more stops and took twice as long. We realized we had no idea where we should get off (buses here aren't as easy as in the States. Especially in smaller towns. No published routes, and no real sense to the route). We randomly got off in somewhere that looked sort of familiar, and realized we were on a street that intersected with the street our hostel was on a few blocks down. It could not have been more perfect.

After that we just relaxed in the hostel, drinking some mezcal and eating bread in the lobby, trying to figure out what to do the next day. We talked about going to the beach, Puerto Escondido, but found out that it was a six hour drive. Not exactly doable for a day trip.

That night, we met a cool guy who has been traveling throughout South America and Mexico for almost a year now. He was middle aged and had retired from his job, but was so bored he couldn't handle it. So he works part time from his laptop for his company and spends the rest of his time traveling around. He has been to Peru, Argentina, Brazil, Ecuador, and I think more but I can't remember. He was really inspiring to talk to.

Day 4

We got a slow start on day 4, taking a really long time to eat breakfast and come up with a plan for the day. We decided to head out of town again to San Agustin de Etla, a tiny town up in the hills of Oaxaca with a pretty museum. It took us forever to find the stop for the collective taxi up there, but it was well worth the search. The museum had a random display of Japanese art, which was a little weird, but the rest was pretty cool. The museum was a lot smaller than we expected and we finished in under an hour, so we headed back into Oaxaca.

We ate lunch (more tlayudas!), then headed to Monte Alban, ancient ruins on the outskirts of the city. We took a bus up, but no one told us the bus stops 2 km away and you have to wait for another one.The road is too narrow and windy to safely walk, so we had to wait. We waited, and waited, at this sketchy bus stop. Finally it came, and charged a ridiculous amount for the ride that lasted under a minute. But since we have school ID's for a national school, we got into the ruins for free.

I bought Tasia a postcard like she requested, but somehow it fell out of my bag (running theme in this trip, wait for day 5). There was just over an hour left until the site closed, and we basically had the place to ourselves. We climbed up a really tall staircase that led to a pyramid and looked out over the site, and decided we were perfectly happy just sitting there. We ate yummy oranges and relaxed. It was an incredible view.

After Monte Alban we headed back to the hostel to relax and enjoy our last night in the city. We went up to the rooftop terrace of our hostel to finish off our mezcal and chat with fellow travelers. We met Thor, the god of thunder, from Iceland, an Australian guy, and a girl from London. It was lots of fun. They all ended up going out that night, but Lisa and I had an early flight so we headed back to our room early.

Hierve el agua

At the top

Swimming in the pools at the top

Tlayuda and a beer after a day of adventuring

Lisa at the top of Monte Alban

The Great Adventure: Days 1 & 2

I know I already wrote a little bit about the trip, but I keep remembering things to add. So I am just going to write about it in more details a day or two at a time. Here we go.

Day 1

We left Guanajuato around one and took the bus to the bus station. I have never been on such a crowded bus in my life (I used to think Portland buses were crowded...that was nothing!).

Our bus to Mexico City was fairly uneventful. Primera Plus is the nicest bus line. They give you these adorable little lunch packs and play movies. The first movie we watched was Passengers, which is all about a plane crash. That felt like a rather ominous way to start the trip as we were boarding a plane the very next morning. Also, that movie was really boring. As were the others they played.

From the bus station we took the metro to our hostel in the Zocalo. We had no problems on the metro, but we got hopelessly lost once we got off downtown and wandered around for a little over an hour. It didn't help that there was some show or something going on, so there were thousands of people that we had to push through. Eventually we found our hostel, checked in, had an oh so healthy dinner of chips, guacamole, fried cheese sticks, and BARBECUE SAUCE!!!! That was the first time I have had BBQ sauce since getting to Mexico, it was amazing.

After dinner we went back to the room and passed out. The hostel was pretty nice but since it was right downtown, it was super loud, and I kept waking up. I probably only got about two hours of sleep that night.

Day 2

Our flight to Oaxaca left really early in the morning, so we were checked out of the hostel and on our way to the airport by 6 AM. I could not believe how many people were on the metro that early, it was so crowded.

We got to the airport with plenty of time to spare, and had an uneventful flight to Oaxacca (thank goodness, Passengers had made me a bit paranoid). From the airport, we took a collective taxi (colectivo) to our hostel. I love collective taxis. They are vans that are going to the same general area, and the fare is split among all of the passengers. It makes getting around so much cheaper, as you will read about later.

By then it was almost 10 but we couldn't check into our room until 2, so we went for a nice long walk through the city. The 20th of November is a holiday, so there was a parade through the center (complete with an army of Spongebob's and Patrick's dressed up as revolutionaries). There were also about 80 different Kung Fu clubs in the parade, I kid you not. They just kept coming and coming.

Eventually we got bored of watching all the Kung Fu clubs walk down the street, so we went back to our hostel to eat lunch on the rooftop terrace, which has a pretty view of the city. While we ate there was the biggest man I have ever seen on my life sunbathing and randomly chiming into our conversation, which was not awkward at all. Finally it was 2 and we checked into our room. We were planning on going back out to explore, but we were so exhausted we passed out and took a two hour nap.

I already wrote a little about what we did after napping. Mainly we just went around town eating. Jicama with chile and lime, helotes, and mezcal sampling. We bought a bottle of it for us to share throughout the trip, and headed back to the hostel to wind down.

That is all for now. I have one more week in Guanajuato with nothing to do except for write a paper, so I will have lots of time to keep writing about each day.

Eating helote on the street

Sampling mezcal

In Love with Oaxaca

After a rough week full of essay writing and battling of another return of the throat infection, I´m finally in Oaxaca. Lisa and I left Guanajuato Friday afternoon, spent the night in Mexico City, and flew into Oaxaca Saturday morning. We walked around the city for awhile, checked into our hostel and took a nice long nap, then explored some more. Oaxaca reminds me a lot of Guanajuato except for the city layout is more planned out. It is absolutely gorgeous.

A specialty of Oaxaca is a drink called mezcal, which is made from the same plant as tequila and tastes pretty similar. Walking through towns, a dozen stores sell it, and basically give you unlimited free samples. There are lots of different flavors, and between all the samples I am pretty sure we tried them all. We bought a big bottle for the few days we are here (flavored chocomente) and I bought three tiny bottles to take home with me (coco, pina colada, and nuez).

Today was absolutely amazing. We left first thing in the morning to go see Hierva el Agua, one of two petrified waterfalls in the world. We rode a bus for about an hour into Mitla, then took a collective taxi from there to the waterfalls. First we hiked around and to the base of the waterfall, which was absolutely gorgeous, then to cool down we went swimming in the pools at the top. Jumping in was one of the most relaxing moments of my life, and when I was swimming around it was like all of the stress from this past term dissapeared. I wasn´t thinking about money, about tonsillitis, about final papers, any of that. I was enjoying the view. The edge of the pools look out over the hills of Oaxaca. It is absolutely gorgeous. I want to go back, right now.

When we were done swimming we bought some tamales for the road. We headed back to Mitla for lunch. Driving into Mitla I was not impressed, it looks like a tiny boring town in the middle of nowhere, but we walked a few blocks in and it was really cute. We had lunch then headed back to Oaxaca. Unfortunately we didn´t get to check out the archealogical site there, maybe another time.

One of my favorite parts of traveling is the food. I love trying new food. So much. Friday night we bought some jicama with chile and lime (that is not new, we eat it all the time in Guanajuato), then sat in the park to eat it. For dinner we went to a little diner type place and I had a chorizo torta (have I mentioned how much I love chorizo?). Afterwards I was still hungry, so I finally decided to try some helote, which is roasted corn on the cob slathered in mayo, cheese, chile, and lime juice. They sell it everywhere in Guanajuato, I just have never gotten around to trying it. And it was surprisingly good, even though I hate mayo. By far the best new food I have tried so far was the tlayuda, which is a little like a crunchy quesadilla filled with cheese, meat, beans, salsa, lettuce, and some other stuff. Washing it down with a cold beer after a day of swimming and hiking makes for the perfect day.

Tomorrow is our last full day in Oaxaca, and we aren´t quite sure what the plan is. On accident we budgeted for seven nights in a hostel when we are only staying four nights, so we have a little breathing room. We were going to go to the beach, Puerto Escondido, but it is a six hour drive both ways. Not worth it, sad. Instead, I think we are checking out the market to buy some food then headed to another place to hike and swim. This is the most relaxing vacation ever.

Off to Chiapas on Tuesday!

Can I just stay on vacation forever?

You may have noticed that the frequency of these posts have been increasing. Blogging is a great method of procrastination. I leave for my trip in three days and I still have tons to do, but now would be a great time to update everyone on what has happened in my life since my last post. Basically, nothing, but I can't write anymore about the 1968 student movement right now.

Today in my Spanish class we read an article about poverty in Mexico, and I learned some really disturbing facts. By far the worst is that in the state I live in, a large percentage of the population lives in levels of poverty comparable to sub Saharan Africa. In one town, Xichu, 83.6% of the population lives in the lowest level of poverty. I had absolutely no idea that it was that bad, because you don't see any of that at all in my town. We just have the occasional beggars in the streets. That threw me off a little, and I haven't been able to stop thinking about it all day.

We also briefly talked about immigration and its effects. In most of the villages that have such extreme levels of poverty, there are literally no men over the age of 13 or 14. They all went to the US to work, and only send home remittances in some cases. Next term I will be taking an entire class on immigration, which I am really excited for.

My throat seems to be healing nicely, as far as I can tell. Tomorrow I start the new antibiotics. I'm all stocked up on cough drops, Tylenol, and Vitamin C for the trip. Hopefully I can stay healthy for the week. That would be really nice.

In Chiapas, we are going to be staying with a friend of my travel buddy. Today she emailed us to let us know the plan, and closed the email with "there is a lot of outdoor activity, so bring tennis shoes and bug spray!" Since I have been locked up in the house dying for the past three or so months, when I read that I almost exploded. I am SO ready to get some nice hikes in. Also, it is going to be nice and warm, which will be a nice break from the freezing cold wind here. AND, as if it could get any better, her house apparently has a pool. This trip is going to be great!