Oaxacan Reverie

So, the past week I've been diving a half dozen times, gone snorkeling, been to daily mass, and read two books.  


I've been eating out at the same four or five restaurants, usually only doing soup and salad once a day.  I'm tired of meat, having eaten far too much of it for weeks before I got here.  I've also been eating (okay, binging, because I'm usually eating 6-8 a day) Mexican twinkies and a sleeve or two a day of vanilla/butterscotch creme sandwich cookies for snacks, which are even more disgustingly delicious than the Hostess ones we have at home.  I drink a lot of bottled water (unsafe tap, here) and a couple liters of calorie free fruit drinks, of which there are several brands here, and they too are all nasty and super delicious.


So, the virtue of the soup and salad discipline is balanced by the sponge cakes.  Miraculous effects upon the physique, naturally.  I plan on becoming all tan and chubby, a sort of big bellied American Budda Baby in exile, only bearded, and bobbing serenely in the surf.  Instead of a bohdi tree and figs, I'll subsist eating banana splits under an umbrella, my ass cheeks rolled like cannoli in the sand.  


That last image is meant to poetically evoke powdered sugar.


Besides the Laguna (see previous post) I've done little else than this.  Which explains the dearth in posting, here.  I've been mulling a few posts about things like the quirks and beauties of Spanish, the differences of custom at mass here, mildly racist meditations on Oaxacans (they're such cute little fellows.. I have this urge to try and date one of the girls, just so I can make up funny little pet names for her like mi gordita or Malinche - I'll of course be Carlos Cortes, of absolutely no relation to Hernan..),  and my visits to Guadalupe and the other Mexican shrines.  But I've only scribbled a few notes, so far the muse has left me mute..


I figure I should enjoy this last hurrah of Gringo ascendancy before all hell breaks loose.. 


Soon, we could well be begging for - and not bitching about - these Mexicans coming North to work for us, I reckon. We don't appreciate what we have, and we deserve to lose it, I say.  You never appreciate the value of cheap labor until you are the one doing the work.  When the money power contracts away from the average American and European to the international plutocracy, these salad days when a chump like me can take a trip like this on a dime (a privilege we've enjoyed since WW II) will seem a sueno perdido..


All the more reason to enjoy it, now.  Manducemus et bibamus cras enim moriemur..


Tonight, I'm branching out and doing a night dive (with expert instructors) from the beach here.  I'm scared crapless about it, actually.  There aren't that many things that scare me, and I tend to avoid the very few things that do.  But I figured I should face this fear.  I used to be mildly scared of diving at all, but now that I've done it so many times, I've grown to love it.. Everyone I've talked to says that a night dive is seeing the sea in a completely new way.. That's the great charm of diving and snorkeling for me, seeing all these hidden underwater worlds in all their variety and profusion of life, which means that going at night is the next obvious step in the ongoing revelation..


Anyway, enough of my day to day activities and that tiresome editorializing, let me slake your overweening curiosity and give you all pictures of this little piece of paradise down here..  

My desk by my window, where I sit and type this - no balcony, but this is the next best thing.

The view of the Playa Principal and Bahia from my window.

My room: 250 pesos, or 18$ a night.

I'm very proud of this: my snorkeling inner tube.  I had to make a foray to an auto parts and then a hardware store to acquire it.  13 bucks for the tube (camera de lleva) and 4 bucks for the paint and rope, all negotiated in Spanish (which, for the record, I have never formally studied, but have taught in an American public high school (this is the sound of me belly laughing my ass off at how wonderfully absurd life is..)).. I use it when snorkeling along the levy, beaches and cliffs here, to avoid being run over by boats or drowning in a rip current or some such nonsense.. 

This is the cover page of a book I found in their great little swap library here at the hotel.  It's a bio of Teddy Roosevelt, who other than Eisenhower (and I'm counting Lincoln) was the only worth while Republican president we've had.  The book is loads of fun, a great beach read, and is a signed copy, but has had the crap beat out of it, and was orphaned by its cruel and capricious owner here in Oaxaca, which makes me laugh..

Don't tell Sam Bam (my dino obsessed 2 year old nephew) but this is his.  I bought it on the street here from a little Indian woman.  It's hand carved and varnished, and the neck and tail are both spring loaded..  It's pretty cool, I really hope it makes it home intact for Christmas..

This last is the painting - and actual painting, not a print - that is on the wall of my room.  It's awesome, really evocative, and makes me happy to look at.  If you look closely (the painting is large, and in person this is obvious) you'll see all the little campesinos working away throughout the landscape.  I may have to steal it or something.  Art theft from a hotel room?  Maybe they'll sell it to me?

It reminds me of my favorite painting of the Turkish landscape that our art teacher neighbor did, that Rich & JD have in their living room now.  It's very different stylistically, but just as lyrical in that I can study it for hours and it leaves me in mild bliss..  It's the type of thing that I'll want if Oaxaca and I develop a long term relationship..

And who knows what could happen?



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