El Tule

Aside from meeting my lovely host family, I think the highlight of my weekend was having the opportunity to go to Tule to visit the huge tree there. This was the first activity I did with Sra. Mireya and Abuela Semiramis after we had a nice lunch at El Milenario. I´ve already had an opportunity to try three different moles. I´ve decided I don´t like the green one all that much.

Here´s a picture of the huge tree. If you look carefully, in certain parts you can see different animal figures. Sra. Mireya told me there´s a lion, deer and elephant. I also got to witness a funeral the first day I was with my family. In Mexico, there are grand processions with mariachis and a parade to the cemetery. I already have so much supplemental material for more research regarding Day of the Dead. It´s been fun to get a local perspective on death rituals and the upcoming holiday in November. I´m sure I will be describing all of this more in the coming months.

Amigos del Sol

I started my Spanish courses at Amigos del Sol Escuela de Español this past Monday. My friend Natalie and I are in the same classes. It´s been very nice to have individualized attention to our grammar and language practice since there are only two of us. Today we visited the cemetery located near our school. This is a picture of what the cemeteries look like in Oaxaca. You can imagine how happy I was to actually see a Mexican cemetery in person after doing a year of research about funeral rituals, Day of the Dead and the distinction between cemeteries in the states and those in Mexico.

This afternoon I had a discussion with my program coordinator Augustin. He told me that I´m going to have the opportunity to visit other communities in Oaxaca during the week. Natalie and I will be visiting one of the towns by bus every few days to work on a new exhibit that is going to displayed in December. I will have more details to share regarding my project in the coming days. I will be meeting with my ¨boss,¨ Teresa Morales and her husband Cuahtemoc in a few days to share my ideas about what I would like to do and how I think I can help.