by Shenzhan / 申展
该文有中文版本“走进中美洲（一）：Oaxaca与墨西哥之旅——前言”
Cover photo: Oaxaca, May 2019
One might say the best to bring home from a trip are the memories. But I fear memories will fade before I know it.
Less than a week after I came back from Oaxaca and Mexico City, I stand at the bus stop on Broadway in Astoria, waiting for Q101 to take me home while flipping photos on my phone nonstop. There is a fear growing in me that those still pictures, and only the pictures will replace my memories. I fear because I believe there should be something more than that.
In Oaxaca the streets are lined up with colorful 16th-century Spanish style two-or-three storied buildings in red, blue, yellow, pink, etc.; the bright red flowers blossom on top of the trees outside of Santo Domingo Catholic Church as if someone is screaming on top of the lungs; the bleak black and white wood-prints on the wall of a street corner cry to condemn the corrupted government for brutally murdering its own students and teachers; the cloudless clear blue sky seems very far and very close at the same time, with dazzling bright sunlight everywhere; the agaves, of course, the agaves, thrive in this dry highland (being over 5,000 feet does have an effect on some people) with all their teeth and claws, yet hundreds of years ago people figured out ways to tame these animal-like plants to get what they need for a good life here: fiber for weaving goods, vegetable for food, and Mezcal…
Agave in Mitla, Oaxaca, May 2019
It’s the end of the dry season here, I was told. June is the beginning of the rainy season in Mexico, which could last till November. Sitting in the well tree-shaded Zocalo Oaxaca where “beggars, vendors, locals and visitors” (in that order, from a 2007 Lonely Planet) all gather and supposedly you could watch the world passing by endlessly, my friend M and I only experienced a very brief sprinkle of rain that was largely unnoticed as we tried to decide whether we should try Chapuline (the Mexican name for crickets, grasshoppers and locusts, essentially a delicacy in the local diet) with guacamole ---- and we did.
Zocalo Oaxaca, May 2019
When the first night arrived, M and I were sitting at Gozobl, a rooftop bar near Templo de Santo Domingo sipping Mezcalines, a cocktail with pineapple, jalapeno and Mezcal. From the top of a 2-storied building, we could see the shadows of giant dark blue mountains as the backdrop, a reminder that the city is located in the Central Valley of southeast Mexico, the very heartland of indigenous Mexican people and culture, as well as a colonial past, and present.
From Gozobl, Oaxaca, May 2019
It was only 8 hours after we landed in the very small Oaxaca airport via a 3-staff (1 pilot and 2 very friendly flight attendants) airplane from Huston, Texas. With a Mezcalines in hand watching the scattered lights blinking halfway through the mountains surrounding us, it felt as if I have been here for a very long time, if not forever.
Astoria, New York
6/5/2019
Related article:
Entering Mesoamerica (2) : Exploring Oaxaca and Mexico City - from the Street to the Church
Entering Mesoamerica (3): Exploring Oaxaca and Mexico City - A VERY Brief Glance of the Ancient Civilizations
Entering Mesoamerica (4): Exploring Oaxaca and Mexico City - La Casa Azul/ Frida’s Blue House
Explore more of Shenzhan/申展’s blog: Making Sense. 意