Month: August 2014

Leave a comment Posted on Language, Living Abroad

Top Cat Lives . . .

. . . in the suburb of Santa Rosa on the hill above Oaxaca near José’s brother’s house, where we were taking a walk and suddenly ran into the whole gang on the wall behind a restaurant.

IMG_0709 I can still sing the song: The indisputable leader of the gang, 
He’s the boss, he’s the pip, he’s the championship — 
He’s the most tip top
 Top Cat! (Now that I think about it, he was really a mafioso boss, wasn’t he? Or at the very least, a wise guy with his own gang of not-so-smart hoodlums like Benny the Ball). It only ran for one season in the 60’s when I was a kid, yet here’s Top Cat in Oaxaca: poetic justice since a cat in Mexico only has seven lives, not nine like in El Norte.

Continue reading →

1 Comment Posted on Language, Living Abroad

Never Say No

The problem about asking directions in Mexico: people want to please you so much that they’ll say almost anything to avoid saying no, they don’t know. In fact, you pretty much just don’t say no here.

Heads or tails, eagle or sun

Heads or tails, eagle or sun

We norteamericanos see answering yes to save face and not to actual intent as a teeny stretch of the truth, just short of an out-and-out lie. The other side of the coin (which is not heads or tails but eagle or sun) is that when we – honestly, we think – give a straight-up no, it’s considered incredibly rude and brusque.

Continue reading →

Leave a comment Posted on Living Abroad, People, Places

Vino Indio for Whatever Ails You

Paco wasn’t expecting us, but then we never call first. Every branch of José’s extensive family tree is just pleasantly surprised whenever we show up, whenever that might be. Someone’s always home to answer the doorbell, which in Tío Julio’s case involves a rope running down the staircase from his second-story apartment that somehow opens the door on the street.

Orizaba

Orizaba

Continue reading →

Leave a comment Posted on Events, Fiestas

Guelaguetza

Last year was the first year I was here during Guelaguetza, the cultural festival that takes the city by storm for the last two weeks of July. Even though I’ve lived in Oaxaca for more than four years, I’m usually gone when it’s going on. By this July, I’d moved from living under the white auditorium so close that the sounds broke through closed doors and windows, and the fireworks left debris on my terrace.

IMG_0600 Continue reading →