Today we celebrated Paula's birthday. I felt really useless this morning because I didn't know what to do in order to help out. When I asked Paula, she just told me I could sit and drink an atole, which is a hot rice drink. Frustrating!!! I went in my room to read my book so that I wouldn't be in anyone's way.
After a bit, Paula came to my room and asked if I wanted to go buy cilantro at the market with her. I jumped at the chance. We ended up buying cilantro, cheese, and meat there. I'm really not used to how unsanitary the food treatment is here. The meat was out hanging on metal rods with flies buzzing around it and the woman pulled it off with bare hands, cut off a piece, and then put it on the scale before handing it to Paula. We had that same meat for lunch. I supposed it would be all right after being cooked, or at least I hoped so. We ate it with salsa, tortilla, and quesillo and washed it down with atole. After eating, I went with Paula and another woman to the molinero. We had two big buckets full of things to grind, so we took one of the little taxis that have three wheels and no doors, kind of like a motorbike with a roof and floor. One of the buckets was full of ingredients for a bean mole, and the other held ingredients for horchata. At the molinero, they have lots of big machines to grind up different things. Certain machines were used to grind dry items and others for wet items. Other people were there grinding ingredients for hot chocolate and coffee. Paula took a pinch of the chocolate mix from the machine and told me to taste some. It was good. Really sugary. A woman poured all the ingredients for the bean mole into one big machine and added water to it as the machine passed it through and back into the bucket. She and the other woman we came with were pushing it down with their bare hands and then scraping their hands on the side of the machine to get the excess off their hands. They passed it through the machine about three times before they were satisfied with the texture. The horchata was easier to grind, and I think it only needed one pass through the machine. I just couldn't help thinking about cleanliness again. They weren't using gloves and there were flies buzzing all around there too. We were waiting for another little taxi to come by and Paula and I went across the street to get some decorations for her party at a small store.
When we got back to the house, more family started coming to the house, including Jesi and Chucho. They wanted to play games with me again, so we started off playing loteria, a bingo-like game that uses pictures instead of numbers. This time I was not so fortunate and I lost all my money, which really wasn't my money since Paula had given us some pesos to play with. We played a game with a bottle after that. The person who the bottle was pointed at had to pick truth or punishment and the person who the other end was pointing at asked a question or gave the punishment. After a bunch of truth questions, Chucho finally picked punishment. We rolled him up in a rug like a taquito and later on made him wear Paula's straw hat. He didn't want to do any of the punishments we told him to do, especially when I wanted to take pictures. Jesi and I eventually endured the same punishments and we took pictures of each of us.
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| Chucho wrapped up like a taquito. |
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| Chucho not wanting to be photographed with the straw hat. |
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| Finally a picture of Chucho's face!!! |
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| Me as a rug taquito. |
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| Me and the straw hat. |
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| Taquito de Jesi. |
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| Jesi's supermodel pose with the straw hat. |
After that they wanted to play encantados (enchantments) but that required running around and since it was so hot, I was not really up for that. Marta asked us to get some more "limones" and this time I pulled down 12 with one big pull. We went out to go to a small store near the house and Jesi and Chucho bought sweets, lollipops, and gum with the money they had won in loteria. They gave me some gum and a lollipop. I noticed that one of the pieces was rum flavored. Really? Gum for kids flavored like rum??? haha Chucho wanted to stay outside to wait for the guys to come back with the goat. He was picking off these little tubes from a corn plant on the side of the road. He said that you could blow on them and it made a sound that would call snakes. I asked him why we would want to call snakes. He ignored my question and just started blowing into the tubes until he got one to whistle. I finally got a few to work as well. We gave some to Yesi and we were all whistling in no time. Thankfully I don't think we summoned any snakes. :) The chivo (goat) came in a big tub in the back of Chencho's pickup truck. They unloaded it and brought it into the little shed by the garden. They served me first, giving me goat meat, guacamole, beans, tortillas and consomme. They also served me horchata. Jesi noticed that I didn't have any sangriento (I think that's what she called it) and brought me a bunch in a bowl. It really just looked like congealed blood. I tasted a little bit of everything, including the sangriento, but stuck mostly with the goat, tortilla, beans and guacamole even though the goat meat was really heavy and greasy. I wasn't a big fan of the consomme or the sangriento. The horchata was cool and refreshing. They had added melon in it. After we sang happy birthday to Paula, I watched as they served the cake and gelatina (jello). Marta was serving the cake with the knife, but the woman who served the gelatina would cut a slice, stick her hand in the container to grab the piece she just cut, and then plop it out onto the plate. When I got my plate, I picked at the inside of the gelatina but couldn't bring myself to eat it all knowing how it had been served. The DJs started playing music and people started dancing. I danced with Jesica the whole night. Chucho was sulking because he wanted to play not dance.
After almost everyone had left, Nando started talking to me about Ejutla de Crespo. He asked if I had ever tried Mezcal and I said no. He had a bottle that he had been soaking fruit in. He gave me a few drops of it to taste. Wow, that stuff is strong!!! I talked further with Nando and Beto about what else I could do around Oaxaca while I was there. Finally, they left too, and I took a shower. I got to call my mom finally to let her know I had gotten there okay. Marcos told me that we would try to find an internet cafe the next day...
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