Living in Oaxaca

Oops, I forgot to publish an older post. Check it out below.

Anyway, things have been very busy lately. I´ve started taking a spanish class for 2 hours every day. In addition to that We´ve tried to squeeze in other activities such as visiting other pueblos in the surrounding valleys, going to the market to buy food, exploring other parts of Oaxaca and spending time in our apartment.
Spanish classes are difficult, I realize how little I actually know and how much there is to learn! But I´m very glad I´m taking them.
We´ve finally figured out the busses (sort of) and are able to get into town and back home every day. Although it seems like we get on a different bus each time. I think the drivers actually pick their own route depending on their mood. And somehow all the streets here look the same and stores move from one street to another in the middle of the night because It can take forever to find that one place that I swear was right on that corner yesterday! But we´re surviving.

We´ve figured out the cooking thing and are wishing to learn how to make many Oaxaqueñean dishes. Last night we made guacamole (with totopos = tortilla chips) and tacos of onion, chile, lime and cheese. hopefully I will learn to make my own sauces so I won´t have to buy the ones from the supermercado made by nestle or blackwater or someone. We´ll see.

But today it´s Haloween and all the kids are dressed up is scary costumes in the streets. Haloween seems to work a little differently here. Instead of going around asking for candy the kids run through the streets and ask for money (so they can buy the candy of their choosing I assume, or cigarettes). There are also big bands everywhere (because there are always big bands for celebrations in Mexico)(which is just about every single day). But tomorrow is the first day of Dia de Muertos (Day of the Dead). It should be an interesting couple of days. We´re trying to figure out now how we want to participate/observe. Apparently a lot of tourists come here for Day of the Dead and treat it like a normal tourist attraction. We don´t really want to do that. We helped the woman who runs the spanish school we go to create an altar for her parents (which I think Kira wrote about) and we are making one of our own at home. We´ll do some other stuff too but it´s too soon to tell. Now off to the park for peletas and then home for dinner.