A bit of Oaxaca, tourist-style: Second Batch

Sarah was interested in a Cooking Class. So I offered up mi mamá Mexicana as her teacher. Azucena kindly acquiesced and took us to the open market at Parque Llano where we purchased hordes of veggies for our feast, and a little something with which to make orchata. Here's a picture of our beautiful sopa de guias. Guias is a very traditional soup made from the leaves and branches of the squash plant. Added to that is corn and the actual squash itself. Finish it off with a mild red salsa and a generous squeeze of lime. yum!

A typical morning in Oaxaca for Aaron might include, donning his newly-purchased hat de palma, eating a sweet bread and chilling on my flamboant coach for a spell in his undies. That might be a typical morning for Aaron. I can't be totally sure he ever really did that. It's not like I have pictures of it, or anything.

A favorite day of mine was when we headed out to San Agustín de Etla, a pueblo about a half-hour outside of Oaxaca. The artist Francisco Toledo began a project years ago to remodel an old textile factory into a art gallery/design school/paper mill all with the idea of sustainable production and green building in mind. I traveled to the site of this factory in 2003 when it was just a run-down building. The structure that sits there today is incredible. And you can see why they nicknamed this spot "Vista Hermosa," (beautiful view).

After we'd toured around the place, we hiked it uphill towards the center of town in search of a place to eat. When a collectivo taxi strolled by we flagged him down for a recommendation. He suggested a little place around the corner called Comedor Juquilita. It couldn't have been more perfect. The family that ran the place was so friendly and accommodating I wondered if they'd ever had tourists come through before; they seems surprised to see us. They hefted a table out back for us so we could eat while taking in the view off the hillside. We munched on freshly made tortillas (mine a blue Tlayuda--a bit thicker and crispier than the typical variety) stuffed with beans, avocado, tomatoes and cheese. Someone even brought us a tiny glass of mezcal sweetened with wine (or was it honey?) I can't remember. Delicious!

It was easy from there to hop another collectivo taxi back into Oaxaca center, where we stopped off at Iglesia de la Soledad. Out front of the church is a large stone plaza where we fell upon a card game, to which we invited ourselves. The game was chased by a ice cream parlor glass filled with nieve (snow), mine was a double scoop of rose-flavored and mango.