Colonial Cities Part 1: Gazpachos and Catrinas in Michoacán

I’m finally writing again hooray!! I can hear the cheering now…

It’s taken some time, but I’ve finally decided to write about a trip I recently went on around some of the colonial cities in the centre of Mexico with a colleague from work (perks of brand job yeah). Our first stop on our mega 2-week trip took us to the lovely city of Morelia in the state of Michoacán. It felt very much like Merida, just quite a bit colder! The city is famous for having pink stone architecture but the buildings in the historical centre are much darker which gives the city a more sombre feel. The parks full of people and streets bustling with vendors make it an extremely pleasant city to wander around. At one point we found children performing a traditional dance dressed as elderly people bashing their sticks and shaking their creepy masks at the delighted crowd. We also strolled down to the aqueduct which is not far from the centre and seems quite out of place in a central Mexican city. Here you can see the pink stone more clearly. It’s one of the only structures like this to remain in a good condition in Mexico and it is an extremely important part of the city.

An essential aspect to our trip was the opportunity to taste some food from different parts of the country. We didn’t waste any time in trying some traditional tamales on our first night but the true adventure lay in tasting the bizarre combination of flavors of a gazpacho. This is possibly one of the weirdest things I’ve ever tried but I’d been told that a visit to Morelia without a gazpacho is no real visit at all. So, despite being extremely unconvinced, we found a small stall in the park and watched as the lady served us a cup of the strangest ingredients; jicama, mango, pineapple, watermelon, lime, onion, salt and pepper, crumbled cheese, orange juice and a dollop of spicy sauce on top. It’s as weird as you’re imagining. I really wanted to like it, honestly I did. It was just a bit too much weirdness… We also ate corundas, which are similar to tamales but triangular in shape, and sopa tarasca, a delicious soup of beans, tomatoes, sour cream, chiles and strips of fried tortilla.

Our other stop in the state of Michoacán was in Patzcuaro. I quite quickly fell in love with Patzcuaro. It’s a much smaller city with 2 central squares lined with cobbled streets and old buildings painted white and brown. All the buildings have the same appearance by law and the views of the mountains in the backdrop give it a true Mexican feel. I actually spent a night wandering the centre alone as my travel buddy was ill and I felt extremely safe and comfortable here.

We did quite a lot of exploring of the areas around Patzcuaro. This included a rainy visit to the island of Janitzio. I ended up lending my umbrella to our Mexican guide who was getting soaked – I’m a Brit, raised in Devon and educated in Cardiff, I take an umbrella with me everywhere. We walked to the top of the island where there’s a giant statue with a million steps inside. This would have been much nicer if it wasn’t pouring with rain. Another stop was to Santa Clara del Cobre which is a Magic Town town where artisans create beautiful objects, pieces of furniture and works of art from copper. This was great fun as we stumbled into a workshop and spent an hour learning how to make a pot from copper. We also had a great morning on the lake Zirahuen where we borrowed a small rowing boat and paddled in circles for about half an hour. Our guide, wasn’t too impressed about this but I was just happy that it wasn’t raining and we were doing a grand amount of exercise!

On the road between Morelia and Patzcuaro there’s a small town called Capula which is the home of the Catrina. This is what you see many women dress up as for Day of the Dead celebrations. This was a tiny town but a stroll up the main straight will take you past many small shops and workshops making and painting these intricate Catrinas. They also have a very distinctive style of pottery which I could have spent all my money on. I didn’t. But I will in the future when I have money to fly to a small town in the mountains just to buy plates and jugs.

This was just the first stop on our journey through the colonial cities and it was only the start of a really great experience in a part of Mexico that, until now, has seemed completely alien to me. Mexico is so so huge and each state has its own character, people, and gastronomy and visiting them is like taking a trip across the countries of Europe. Stay tuned for Part 2, coming soon…

Hammocks, Nachos and Iguanas

A couple of months ago, Papa Sleath finally made the 5,000+ miles journey to visit me in Mexicoooooo. Words cannot describe how excited I was in the weeks leading up to his arrival. The night before was like Christmas Eve and I cried when he walked through the doors at the airport the following morning. Living far from home can be challenging sometimes and moments like that just make everything feel okay.

I could write a million words about Papa Sleath’s Mexican adventure and I have about 100,000 pictures to go with it. However, I’ve decided to focus on the three things that we enjoyed doing the most: relaxing in hammocks, eating nachos and photographing iguanas. I feel these three activities best describe our 2 weeks together.

Stop. Hammock-Time

In a quest to give Dad the best Mexican experience imaginable, I arranged for a bit of a road trip that, in theory, would show him the best that the Yucatán peninsular has to offer. At the top of the list of places to see was Holbox, an island famous for its quiet beaches, whale sharks and lack of cars. Indeed, Holbox is a small town only accessible by ferry where the mode of transport is golf carts on sandy tracks and where one can see whale sharks should you be visiting at the right time of year. We spent a very content couple of days exploring the small island, wandering up and down the sleepy beaches, rocking in hammocks in the sea and doing generally very little.

I think it might be my new favourite place to visit in Mexico. I love that there are no cars and the only traffic occurs when the sleepy street dogs block the roads for the golf cars because they’re taking a nap in the afternoon sun. I love that the town itself is so small that you can wander around it in an afternoon but the next day there will still be something new to see. I also love that you can only arrive by boat – in the future this should stop hordes of tourists coming to the island and taking over much like Cozumel, Isla Mujeres and Tulum.

“Let’s taco ‘bout it.”

“That’s nacho business.”

During Papa Sleath’s stay we had some of the most amazing food that the peninsular has to offer. Again, it was another personal mission to make my father fatter before he returned to the UK (he’s getting skinny). Within minutes of arriving in Mérida, Tin and I had dragged his sleepy butt to a café in the centre to have huevos rancheros and molletes. Over the course of the next 2 weeks we sampled everything; from pizza to panuchos, sushi to salbutes, croissants and jam to breakfast burritos, seafood platters to nachos coated in salsa and cheese… I could go on forever.

Some of the best food was sampled in some of the traditional restaurants around Mérida. In particular we visited Hacienda Teya, a famous spot for Yucatecan dishes. I’m not entirely sure how I feel about haciendas as they have a pretty dark history but the food at Hacienda Teya was top notch and it was nice to wander around the grounds after. Another restaurant worth mentioning is Kinich in Izamal (‘the yellow town’ see previous blog post White Beaches and Yellow Towns) where the food is excellent and you can try lots of different styles and flavours of Yucatecan food.

I also squeezed in a visit to Mérida’s biggest market with Dad so that we didn’t have to eat out every day and could make our own sandwiches eat breakfast in our snazzy airbnb. We enjoyed getting a little lost (we are never lost) amongst the fruit and veg stalls and paying next to nothing for some rather tasty, healthy, local food.

All iguana do, is have some fun

In addition to fantastic restaurants and some gorgeous beaches, Dad and I also visited a grand total of 5 different archaeological Mayan ruins in the space of 2 weeks. This included:

• the ever popular Modern Wonder of the World, Chichén Itzá, always bustling with thousands of tourists
• the unique ruins of Tulum which sit on a cliff above a romantic, secluded beach
• the deserted site of Mayapan which is literally just off a highway, yet we still missed it and drove around for a good 45 minutes looking for it…
• sleepy Dzibilchaltun with its pond-like cenote with little fish that nibble at your feet
• and, finally, Ek Balam, once the seat of the Mayan Kingdom but now a quiet archaeological site, hidden away in the jungle

What became very clear as we visited each ruin was that, although tourists visit these sites daily and, in some cases, in their thousands, the true kings of the ruins are the iguanas. No matter which ruin you visit you will find that they are always there, silently keeping watch over the ancient structures. They range from small fearless iguanas to the huge ones that look like descendants of dragons.

Having visited a couple of these sites before, my favourite by far was Ek Balam, which we visited with some lovely Finnish people. We stayed in a secluded little cabin in the village of Ek Balam (it shares its name with the ruins, I got confused too) and had dinner with a local family before exploring the ruins the next day. Our guide told us all about the history of Ek Balam which translates as Black Jaguar and was able give us the gossip about the excavations that are currently taking place on the site. A personal highlight was climbing to the top of the pyramid, sitting peacefully and surveying the endless jungle.

And so another visitor, another departure. I’m always really bummed out when somebody leaves and this was no exception. Having Papa Sleath here was the best and I had the most incredible 2 weeks. But this time it wasn’t a goodbye, it was a ‘see you soon’!!

Where the Sky is Born and Where the Dead Come Back to Life

I haven’t written in a stupidly long time. I genuinely don’t know where the time has gone. I suppose my only explanation is that I’ve been busy and just doing lots of lovely things.

I apologise to anyone who, for any reason, is interested in what I get up to. In this article I’m going to cover a couple of trips that I actually made before Christmas, one to the Sian Ka’an nature reserve, close to Tulum on the East coast of Quintana Roo (yes, in my mind it’s the Caribbean), and the other to Mexico City at the end of October for Day of the Dead Celebrations.

Generally when I got to Tulum I laze around on the beach, drink cocktails and wander around Maya ruins. This time I mixed things up a little. I lazed around on the beach, drank cocktails and floated around the Sian Ka’an biosphere reserve. In Maya, Sian Ka’an literally means ‘origin of the sky’, although to me it sounds like a faraway land in a Disney movie, and is a ginormous ecosystem in which the wildlife is protected but the people who live there are also able to live sustainably.

It remains one of the most beautiful places I’ve visited. Sian Ka’an is bigger than Mexico City which, put quite is simply, is really, really huge. Our little boat trip wasn’t anywhere near enough to give you a realistic idea of the size of the reserve. It was just an endless maze of twisting canals, water meadows and tropical forests, beaches with sand as white as a snowy fields in England (which I hear is pretty accurate for this week’s weather forecast) and exotic and fascinating wildlife. We saw a family of beautiful manatees, crocodiles from a distance, spiders big enough to make me not what to get out of the van, the most awesome caterpillars, colourful friendly fish and various giant birds who looked too heavy for the branches they perched on (feel free to tell me the type of bird in the picture – not my area of expertise).

We spent a delightful morning travelling though the mangroves. In one area we were able to disembark the boat and, with rather fetching upside down life jackets which resembled nappies, we floated through the canals, carried along by the natural current in the water and protected from the sun by the twisted mangrove trees. This was possibly the most relaxing experience of my Mexican life. For 20 minutes I laid back and bobbed about in the water, not dissimilar to the rivers they have at theme parks but in complete peace. I was so content.

At the opposite end of the tourism scale is the crazy world that is Mexico City. I’m not even sure where to begin with this insane metropolis of life. Just arriving by plane and coming across the mountains to a view of endless colourful houses, buildings, towers, roads, and hills was enough to blow my breath away.

Being in Mexico City around the Day of the Dead celebrations was incredible, if a little scary. It was also full of tourists and spectators eager to see the procession made famous by Spectre. My sources tell me that the James Bond producers more or less created this spectacle and it has only been attracting visitors to the city since the movie’s release in 2015. We spent hours wondering up and down the streets in the centre watching all the dressed up dead people (who deliberately try to scare you) and taking pictures in the Zocalo square which had been decorated to look like Halloween threw up on it. There were sugar skulls everywhere.

 

Other highlights from Mehico Citay included

• Visiting the extensive and extremely impressive ruins of Teotihuacan. My only experience of Aztec ruins was pretty incredible and the race to the top was extremely rewarding (we didn’t make bets on how long it would take and then run to make sure we didn’t lose). See picture of the pyramid of the sun from which one can see the pyramid of the moon.
• Exploring some of the museums. Closely rivalling London for the most museums in a city, there are many to choose from in Mexico City. We opted for any free museum and actually ended up in a pretty cool aquarium which was underground and is the only place where I’ve touched a starfish (Plymouth aquarium got nothing on this). Didn’t make it to the Frida Kahlo museum. Next time.
• Listening to mariachi in Café Tacuba and stuffing ourselves silly on true Mexican food. We had saved up for this trip so we may have gone a little overboard with the ‘let’s treat ourselves’ attitude. But this was by far the best place to do it!
• Getting almost completely lost in one of the many markets in Mexico. I still can’t really believe we found the people we were looking for in this maze of stalls. I’ve never been anywhere quite like it and it was all a little overwhelming. I was encouraged not to stop for too long for security reasons but was able to take about 10 seconds to pay 10 pesos for some tiny Mexican Day of the Dead flags. I was very proud of my purchase.
• Oh, and we saw Paul McCartney.

A note to finish on. If you haven’t seen it yet, go and watch Coco in the cinema or however you watch your movies these days. Yes, it’s a Disney movie. Buuuuut it’s a really beautiful representation of Mexican life and the cultural traditions surrounding Day of the Dead. It’s also got some great songs in it.

 

 

 

Lakes, Ruins and Cenotes in Coba

Within maybe 7 hours of us finishing school a couple of weeks ago, Lettie and I had driven to the Caribbean sea, ordered ourselves a tequila sunrise and were relaxing close to the beach in Tulum. I say ‘close to’ because by this point we were just happy to crash out on the sofa in our hostel and make the most of the free cocktail happy hour that they had going on at the bar.

Before I go any further, I must once again make a small note about my health to those readers who have been informed of my continuous battle with Mexican diseases and whatnot. I am officially off medication and doing much better. And, fingers crossed, this this should be for the last time. I definitely did not postpone starting any antibiotics until after the weekend in order to make the most of free cocktail happy hour.

Aaaaaanyway. I’ve already written about the magic of Tulum, so instead, here is the low down of our trip to Coba, a small town about an hour inland of Tulum. We set off on the hunt for some cenotes in the Tulum area (using our trusty map, thanks Heather). Quite quickly we found two along the main road but decided against these. The first was called the Temple of Doom (did we need a reason to not enter) and the second one looked nice enough until we saw a snake. To start with, the snake was out of said cenote but when we moved closer (yes, I questioned this decision later too) it promptly swam into the cenote. We told the guy (there always seems to be just one guy) and I asked if it was dangerous. He said ‘was it green?’ and we didn’t know if that was a good thing or bad thing but we decided against swimming in it.

So we just drove in a straight line towards the town of Coba where, as it was a Sunday, we had free entry into the ruins. Hooray for having residents’ cards! Unfortunately, despite being very impressive, the ruins at Coba are quite dispersed. Many tourists were cycling to and from the different archeological sites. We opted against this having seen how hot, tired and really rather bothered they were when arriving back and simply wandered around those closest to the entrance. We then sat and had coconuts and strange lychee fruits by the lake which is something I don’t think I’ve done since being in Mexico. Lakes and rivers don’t exist in the Yucatan. There are mangroves, beaches and cenotes (which I guess are technically underground lakes and rivers, if you’re being pedantic) but no real lakes. It was super lovely to sit and think about all the possible crocodiles there might be swimming close to us…

Post crocodile scare (who am I kidding, that would really have made our day exciting), we finally found our cenotes. Between the two of us, Lettie and I have been to a variety of cenotes by now; I think we worked out we’d visited maybe 30? But never such a mismatch of them in close proximity. Cenote numero uno was a quiet underground little cavern which you could paddle about in and jump off relatively tame rocks (not me, obvs). Contrastingly, cenote numero dos was the complete opposite. A sneaky give away of what we were about to experience was the huge yellow coach in the car park. Eurgh. Again, it was an underground cavern but as we descended in I swear it sounded like the entrance to a British public swimming pool. In fact, it reminded me of the public baths in Budapest. It was huge and full of people. There was a giant stairway down with boards for people to jump in from which was fun to watch for a short time but generally quite unbearable. So we moved swiftly onto cenote numero tres which was the furthest underground out of the three and therefore the coldest. But thankfully, much less people.

With our fill of beach, sea, cenotes, lakes and ruins (or sunburn, sand, snakes and sharing a hostel room with loud Spanish chicas) we returned to Mérida. Thankfully we left the Caribbean coast of Quintana Roo before it was hit by a tropical storm. Sadly, this was mine and Lettie’s final adventure together before she leaves Mexico to go on her travels and, ultimately, return to England. It’s been the most amazing year and it’s going to be a very different Mexico without her here!

Wonders of Yucatán

One of the most incredible things about living in this area of the world is being able to discover and explore so much of the magical and ancient history of Maya civilisation. This includes hunting down the mystical cenotes and visiting one of the 7 wonders of the modern world.

Previously I’ve written about Uxmal and the ruins at Palenque which were incredible. However, people come from all over the world to visit the ruins of Chichén Itzá. It was announced as a wonder of the modern world in 2007 and in April it was finally time to see what all the fuss is about.

The ruins of the city and giant pyramid that sits in the centre were incredible and the giant ball game court, where the residents of the ancient city would play pok-ta-pok (see Welcome to Mérida blog post for more info), is the largest in existence. However, in all honesty, it was slightly underwhelming in comparison to other ruins that I’ve visited. I also think it has been affected by the extreme number of tourists that visit daily. Apparently, on Sundays, up to 40,000 people can descend on the Maya ruins. The most impressive part of Chichén Itzá was possibly the Sacred Cenote. This is a humongous hole in the ground with dark and mysterious waters far below which you peer at from the edge of a sharp precipice. Knowing that this is where the Maya people committed sacrifices to the God Chaac was a little unsettling (although we don’t portray this in our selfie*).

Small note for anyone thinking of visiting this wonder of the modern world: if you read about Chichén Itzá before you go, you will see that everyone tells you to go super early and I can confirm that this advice is extremely accurate. We arrived just after 8am and were able to explore the ruins before the hordes of tourists arrived and even before the vendors could set up their irritating craft stalls. Of course this meant we achieved some pretty awesome photos with nobody in them. Win.

Believe it or not, all of the photos below were taken on the same day. We managed to experience glorious sunshine and gloomy grey skies all in the space of 2 hours.

Another wonder of the peninsular is the abundance of cenotes that sit in a sort of ring that goes right through the centre of Yucatán and Quintana Roo. Not all of them are as menacing and sinister as the Sacred Cenote at Chichén Itzá.

So far, I haven’t really written about these. So, quick history lesson for ya’ll. When the meteor hit which killed the dinosaurs it made the ground around the Yucatan peninsula very soft. Limestone rock collapses in sort of sink holes exposing the fresh water under the ground. It is said that the cenotes around the region are all linked via underground rivers in an intricate cave system. They can appear as deep dark underground caverns or as simple pools resembling ponds but each cenote is unique and wonderful.

The photos below show some of the cenotes that I’ve been to since arriving here last August. These include cenotes in magical caves with holes above to let in beautiful rays of sunlight, cenotes in lagoons which are up to 100 metres deep, cenotes next to ancient ruins (in particular, the sacred cenote at Chichén Itzá which was simply a terrifying giant hole in the ground), cenotes in marshland that you can only reach by boat… the list is never ending. At each cenote we also seem to experience some different form of wildlife; from laid-back racoons to menacing looking cows, from bright, friendly fish to fearless bats, beautiful birds and dragonflies.

Along the way we’ve explored many small, rural towns and villages. The people here are often intrigued by us and keen to come and say hello. Sometimes the children of the villages cycle ahead of you and act as guides to the hidden cenotes. Life here is just so colourful, whether you’re in the busy, vibrant centre of Mérida or wandering through the more peaceful, traditional pueblitos of the region.

Just a quick note: if cenotes fascinate you even just a little bit, then have a little look at the documentary that’s currently on BBC iPlayer about the nature and geography of Mexico. My sources tell me that Yucatán is episode 2. I haven’t seen it as I can’t watch the BBC in Mexico but many friends and family from back home have mentioned it and highly recommend it!

 

*yes, we had a selfie stick. Selfie sticks are cool.

Adventures in Chiapas

This might be the quickest I’ve ever written a blog post about a trip but simultaneously the longest it’s ever taken me to publish one. This is most definitely down to the fact that I spent over 30 hours (probably quite a lot more but I haven’t worked it out…) on a bus travelling between Chiapas and Yucatan so I wrote a lot in one go. Since then I have only in the last couple of days had the time to read back through my notes or properly sort through the mountain (‘scuse the pun) of photos I took. So, finalmente, our trip to Chiapas…

Lettie y yo decided that we needed to escape our Mérida bubble for a few days over Easter and so embarked in a little adventure to Chiapas, a state not too far from Yucatan. We’d heard nought but good things and were keen to see some rivers deep and mountains high and also to experience some cooler weather.

Our first stop (out of two) was the ‘city’ of Palenque. I use inverted commas because Spanish speakers don’t really differentiate between village and town and so anything bigger than a small town is kind of just called a city. ‘Palenque: Mística y Natural’ is what’s written on the plaque as you enter the city and this filled us with excitement for our week ahead.

While staying in Palenque we visited a couple of truly mystical and natural sites. The waterfalls at Roberto Barrios, Agua Azul and Misol-Ha were simply beautiful. Agua Azul is justly named; the water is a glorious blue that doesn’t even appear to be real when you first see it. We enjoyed swimming (slipping and sliding would also be appropriate verbs here) and attempting (and failing) to jump into the pools that sit at the bottom of the waterfalls. We also visited the famous ruins at Palenque which were incredible. These were possibly my favourite Maya ruins so far. A crazy statistic for you; only 5% of the ancient city is available to explore, the other 95% is still hidden and buried in the jungle.

After a couple of days in Palenque we headed to San Cristóbal de las Casas. We’d been told that this was the place to visit in Chiapas but we were quite unprepared for what we found. San Cristobal is a city nestled in between mountains, approximately 2,000 meters above sea level. The city has a beautiful, colonial charm to it with hundreds of colourful houses lining cobbled streets which lead you up to churches at crazy heights and through some of the best markets I’ve ever been to. This is by far the coldest I have felt in a really long time. While the temperature in Mérida was creeping closer and closer to the 40 mark, San Cristóbal was chilling in the mountains in the delightful mid 20s. It was the first time since arriving in Mexico in August that I’d worn a coat.

Whilst in San Cristóbal we made a trip to the Cañon Sumidero. I do believe this was my first ever canyon and I came out of the experience rather windswept, with serious neck ache from constantly looking up and feeling like an extremely small human being. It truly was awe-inspiring. Much to Lettie’s disappointment we didn’t spot any crocodiles but on the plus side I bought a new hat (which was supposed to act as sun protection on our 2 hour boat ride through the canyon but didn’t stay on my head).

To wrap up this blog post, our trip to Chiapas was important for many reasons and it reminded me of many things:

• Sometimes you need to get away to get out of your little bubble of life. Don’t get me wrong there’s a lot of great things that I love about my life in Mérida right now but it still did me a world of good to detach for a couple of days and do something completely different.
• That I’m doing fine. There have been a few ups and downs recently but all it takes is to see life from a slightly different perspective and you realise that it’s all good.
• That Mexico is possibly the most colourful country I have ever been to. And I mean colourful in that the countryside, the towns and the lives of people are all painted with colour in a way that I’ve not seen before on my travels. All this does is remind me that Mexico is huge, something which I genuinely had no idea of before I came here, and it makes me want to explore this amazing country so much more.
• And finally, that I will never really really get to grips with the Mexican approach to time. I love the whole laid back thing and the ‘Mexican 5 minutes’ (which equates to, at best, half an hour), but it does get somewhat frustrating when you want to know where your bus is because it’s 3 hours late and nobody really seems to care! I’m just too English for this.

A Yucatecan Winter

As Winters go, I’d say this has been a pretty darn good one. I mean, one can’t really call it Winter when the coldest it gets is approximately 24 degrees… Having said this, there were the occasional signs of a seasonal change here in Mérida. For a few weeks my colleagues and I were heading to work in the morning in almost-darkness; I was sleeping for about a week without my fan on and, at about the same time, I could even be seen wearing – wait for it – jumpers and jeans. I’m pretty much a local now. Of course, that was shortlived and I am back to shorts and t-shirt, sweltering in the midday heat and hunting down the nearest aircon.

Anyhoo, I haven’t written a blog post for a really, really long time. Thus, the latest instalment consists of the top 4 places that I visited across Yucatan (and neighbouring Quintana Roo) in December, January and February and a ton of photographs that I took along the way. Enjoy.

4. Uxmal

Just before Christmas a good friend from University came to stay. It was super exciting to have my first visitor (even if he was only here for 2 nights) and so I took the opportunity to show him some good old historical ruins. We spent a wonderful Monday wandering around Uxmal, an ancient Mayan town which features many insane pyramid-like structures. These are, in my opinion, absolutely terrifying to walk up and down due to the narrow steps and crazy height. So, for fear of tumbling to my death, I left that to ,Lettie and Ben. Then we sampled authentic Mayan hot chocolate in the chocolate museum and fed nuts to the rescued spider monkeys. All in all a great day.

Oh, and we also attempted to recreate Mayan sacrifice…

3. Cozumel

Christmas was simply incredible. I headed to the beautiful, vibrant island of Cozumel (which is technically not Yucatan…) to chill on the beach, soak up the Caribbean sun and drink beer and cocktails. And people ask me why it is I’m considering staying in Mexico…

It actually rained on Christmas Day which was fabulously British so we spent the morning drinking so much homemade mulled wine that I was more than a little tipsy by lunchtime. This was followed by an afternoon of hammock time. Not your average Christmas Day! Boxing Day was a tad more active as we took a snorkelling tour around some of the coral reefs which was heaps of fun. I’m not the strongest of swimmers and was content to just float about in not-too-deep water and watch all the colourful fish, the occasional turtle and, perhaps somewhat alarmingly, a barracuda. Things may have descended slightly when tequila was introduced into the equation… We did make for good entertainment apparently on the boat on the way back.

I also took the opportunity to walk around the town and photograph some of the fascinating graffiti that decorates the streets. I genuinely feel this is perhaps one of the most colourful places I have ever been in my life.

2. Chelem

In late January, a group of work buddies and myself headed to the nearby town of Chelem for a long weekend. In terms of tourism, Chelem was much quieter than any other place I’ve visited. Tulum was peaceful but a real traveller hub and Cozumel was swarming with tourists from the imposing cruiseships. Chelem is simply a local town on the northern coast of Yucatan. Its beaches are littered with ruins of houses that were destroyed in a hurricane years ago. Now the houses just lie abandoned but with this comes a sense of calm and peace that does not exist in many tourist hot spots around the peninsula. The weekend was spent photographing gorgeous houses, watching sunsets, eating nutella waffles, watching movies on a projector and attempting to take selfies in the unforgiving wind.

 

1. Bacalar

And finally, a couple of weeks ago one of my best friends came to visit from England. We made the most of our time together and so, within minutes of Heather landing at Mérida airport, we were on our way to Bacalar, infamous lagoon of seven colours. We had the most amazing weekend exploring pirate forts, swimming in cenotes and lagoons, snoozing in hammocks and getting delightfully sunkissed in the Quintana Roo sun. The lagoon itself was simply breathtaking. It is a fresh water lake named the Lagoon of Seven Colours due to the many different shades of blue that the water takes. We swam in the black cenote, a hole in the lagoon 100 metres deep where the water is scarily dark, and paddled in the shallow, crystal clear shores of Pirate Island where one can cover themselves in the mud-like sand (we weren’t entirely sure why people were doing this but jumped on the band wagon anyway). This has got to be one of the most beautiful places on Earth.

I Left My Heart in Tulum

So it’s almost December. What on Earth is going on?! Time is going so fast it’s unreal. The last month has been pretty crazy, as we’ve been filling all our free time with beach and cenote excursions, cultural festivals, car purchasing and road trips. Here’s what I’ve been doing since I last wrote…

Back at the beginning of November (slash end of October), my life was full with all things Halloween and Day of the Dead related. This included dressing up for kids’ classes at school (see face make-up below (I cannot entirely claim this as my own work as the hand-eye coordination required for doing face paint on one’s own face is somewhat lacking)), becoming a part of a Day of the Dead procession and creating an altar to celebrate Hanal Pixan, the festival specifically celebrated here in Yucatan.

I really enjoyed learning all about the Day of the Dead and the other, more local traditions that are celebrated in Mexico. I was surprised to find out that the big procession that takes place at the beginning of Spectre did not really exist prior to the film’s creation but has since become a tradition because tourists are flocking to Mexico City at Halloween to witness it. There was a similar parade in Mérida which began in graveyard and was formed of a giant dead man puppet and several hundred people in traditional dress with painted faces.

At one point I turned around to find my companions only for them to have been swallowed in a sea of masked people which was a little daunting. I was searching the crowd for some time before giving up and going back to watch the parade. Only to spot my friends in the procession amongst all the other people taking part in the spectacle. In my quest for a good photo I managed to accidentally step back onto a family’s alter decorations. I was horrified and unbelievably embarrassed to have appeared so stupidly inconsiderate but, luckily, they thought it was hilarious.

It was very special for me to learn about Hanal Pixan. Traditionally, families create an altar decorated with photos of family members that they have lost and favourite foods and objects. Candles and salt are placed on the floor to guide the spirits to the altar so that they can share the celebration. It’s a beautiful way to remember those we have lost. In England, mourning can be such a sad and painful experience but here it is a time to celebrate and rejoice in having had those people in our lives. Below is a picture of me and one of my classes when we made a Hanal Pixan altar during our lesson!

I wrote most of this blog post whilst sitting on the roof terrace in our super cute airbnb in Tulum which is where I spent my previous weekend.

Side note – it was a really lovely evening and I was swinging in a hammock whilst lots of small bats were flying around above me eating some kind of fruit from the tree above. They came very close to my head on several occasions – I have never seen a bat so clearly! There were also a couple of beautiful hummingbirds but they were too allusive for me to try and get a photo. It was all very dreamlike and quite surreal. That was until the bats started to poop on my head. At first I thought they were just dropping seeds but nope, they were pooping on me as I tried to relax in my hammock. Really destroyed the mood.

Anyway, so yes, last weekend was a Puente here in Mexico (a bank holiday), and so my fellow teachers and I took full advantage of the extra day at the weekend and travelled to the east coast of Quintana Roo to the beautiful town of Tulum. It was an eventful weekend to say the least. We had finally bought our car (off a rather lovely bloke called Ramon) and were excited to take her on her maiden road trip. I announced to one of my classes that we had named her Esmerelda (Ez for short of course) and my students proceeded to laugh hysterically at me. Apparently Mexicans don’t name their vehicles…

It was a long straight drive to the east coast and we so very nearly made it to our house when one of our rear tires basically blew up. ‘Twas a little scary but nothing could be achieved at 8pm on a Saturday evening so we parked Ez at the side of the road and went to find tacos and wine. We spent the following couple of days blissfully cycling around the town on colourful, hipster bikes, exploring ancient, Mayan ruins (and photographing iguanas), swimming in the gorgeous, Caribbean sea (I’m not sure if it’s technically the Caribbean but I’m just rolling with it – don’t burst my bubble), eating incredible fish tacos and haggling (badly) for hand-made dream catchers and hammocks. Tulum was hands down one of the most beautiful places I’ve ever been and I’m already planning my life there. If I don’t come back to England then this is where I will be.

With two new tires and a bit of a hole in our bank account we returned to Mérida via the toll road that basically just follows a straight line right back to the city. It’s a boring drive but actually never dull for long as Mexican driving is, what’s the right word… unpredictable. I think I’m getting the hang of it though (I dread to think what my dad, police driving instructor and driver to the Royal Family, would say). Basically, roundabouts are a free-for-all and one waits to see if it’s safe to go whilst sitting on the roundabout; if you haven’t moved a second after the lights have changed green then expect to be beeped at, at least twice; crazy u-turns in roads are the norm; speed bumps are a necessity but are actually out to kill your car; and the police will stop you just to say hi and ask how your day is going. On the plus side, people work in gas stations so you don’t have to get out to fill up your car. This is all very well but I hadn’t yet worked out how to open the petrol cap on Esmerelda the first time we went to fill up, much to the amusement of those in the petrol station.

And so, it is almost December. Christmas closer to the equator already feels very odd. It’s still supposed to reach 30 degrees during the day this week and I’m planning to spend most of the festive season on the beach. The complete opposite to Christmas back home and even Christmas in the Basque Country last year. I have yet to find an advent calendar so should anyone fancy sending me one, if you send it now, it should reach me by Christmas 2018.

From Basque Country With Love

So I thought I would write a bit more about the Basque and their country. I am learning that they are a proud people who are continuously fighting earnestly to preserve an old yet fascinating and beautiful culture and I am so grateful and so excited to be living here for a year, not least for the photography opportunities:

Here are some interesting facts that I have learnt about the Basque country and its people since arriving almost 2 months ago. Warning: as the first few sentences may suggest, I use the word Basque many times in the following blog post.

• Ok, first things first, the Basque don’t have Father Christmas. Madness I know. They do however have a similar version and his name is Olentzero. He lives in the mountains of Basque country and even has a house in Mungia. I have been past his house on many occasions but it must be his summer retreat as I’ve never seen any sign of life. Olentzero is an old man not dissimilar to Santa himself, who brings presents to children on the 24^th of December. Although there are many variations of the story of Olentzero, he is considered a friendly and generous man who wears a Basque beret and smokes a pipe. Of course, his arrival is a cause for celebration and the Basque, who need no excuse to party, descend onto the streets in traditional dress for an evening of eating, drinking and dancing.

• The Basque language is the oldest language in Europe – older than Latin – and nobody really knows where it comes from as it is completely different to any other. This is something that the people here take great pride in. ‘Euskera’ is spoken daily by at least 30% of the region’s population and can be seen almost everywhere, including on road signs, in shops, restaurants and supermarkets. This may be a somewhat controversial statement, but the Basque language is slowly dying. I work in an Ikastola, a Basque school, and the teachers conduct all their lessons in Basque in order to preserve the language and pass it down through the generations. Yet sadly it is being replaced in many aspects of life by Spanish which is more widely (and internationally) used. Many children no longer learn Basque first and converse mainly in Spanish and, unless you are in the rural villages, you can go for days without hearing it.

• Surprisingly, the weather is more English than Spanish and the Basque talk about the weather just as much as we do. Aside from knowing that it rains on the plains in Spain, we just assume that Spain has sunny and warm weather. Yet the mountainous and windy Basque Country has its own climate. The weather here is changeable, you can experience more than one season in a day. It starts off freezing but clear in the morning, it’s raining by lunchtime and when you leave work you need your sunglasses. Apparently, even the airlines don’t like to fly here because nobody likes landing in such windy conditions. My experience living in Cardiff for 4 years taught me to never leave the house without an umbrella. You never know what may happen. Currently the weather forecast for the next few days looks like this:

• Many traditions in Basque country were banned under Franco’s regime between the Second World War and the 1970s. Aside from destroying churches, industry and the economy, Franco ordered the burning of Basque books, forbid Basque radio and even public speaking in Euskera. Since then, the Basque people have fought hard to reinstate many cultural customs including the flag and the language.

• The football team in Bilbao is one of the top football teams in the country. Athletic have one of the best records in Spanish football history having never been relegated to the second division. In addition to this, Athletic football team is made up purely of Basque players. Everyone in Bilbao and the surrounding area supports Athletic no matter their level of interest in football. I have been told by many that I must make a visit to San Mamés, their huge stadium, at some point during my stay.

• The country’s nickname is ‘Little Switzerland’ due to its mountainous countryside, and chalet type houses. The houses are called Baserris and, once again, are central to Basque culture and family life. Many here have built their own homes for their families and thus often live next door to their parents or grandparents. Baserris are characterised by their big sloping roofs, stone walls and often symmetrical designs. Dotted about on the hillsides, these gorgeous dwellings help paint an idyllic landscape and you can be forgiven for thinking you’ve wandered into the Swiss mountains. I have yet to take a picture of my house so this will have to do (I will update it soon):

• Basque people see themselves neither as French nor Spanish and in cities such as Bilbao and Donostia (San Sebastian) you will find many flags hanging from balconies which argue as such. Basque Country is not just in Spain, there are provinces in Southern France too and you will often find graffiti of ‘3+4=1’ which literally means 3 Spanish provinces plus 4 French provinces = Basque Country.

• Bilbao is the largest city in Basque country (the tenth largest in Spain) and is a wonderfully charming city. It is a mix of old and new but remains strongly Basque. You can wander the maze of streets in the enchanting Casco Viejo (Old Town), grab a coffee or look in the shops on Gran Via, Bilbao’s modern high street, take in the spectacular view from the top of the funicular railway (in its 100^th year), go for a stroll along the river which winds its way through the city, or simply sample the bars’ never-ending supply of pintxos over a cerveza or kalimotxo. The Basque name for Bilbao is ‘Bilbo’ and this is written on the side of all the buses that operate in the city; the ‘bilbobus’.

• The Basque flag is everywhere in Basque country, from the windows of people’s houses to the decorations on their cakes and pastries. The red of the flag represents the Biscayan people, the white is for Catholicism and green symbolises the oak tree of Gernika (a town which was bombed heavily during WWII), which in turn symbolises the freedom of the Basque people. Like the image below it does not always have the Lauburu symbol in the middle:

• The Lauburu (see above) is the Basque symbol and google describes it as a ‘traditional Basque swastika with four comma-shaped heads’. The heads usually face clockwise, in the positive form, but can occasionally be seen to be facing in the other direction, the negative form. Amongst other things, it symbolises mankind and ‘nature in action’. Therefore, in the positive form, the Lauburu represents life and appears in many homes, often above the fireplace or in the woodwork of the house. In the negative form it can represent death and can be found on gravestones.

• And finally, to finish on a lighter note, the Basque have a fantastic gastronomic culture. Food is often the focal point of the day with many people not having a lunch break and then eating when they arrive home from work at 4 in the afternoon. Basque cuisine is among the best that I have come across. From the assortment of pastries, tarts and breads in the bakeries to the intricate and individual pintxos laid out across the tables in bars; from their love of strange and unheard-of seafood to their appreciation of good wine and beer, the Basque have got it right.

Lost in Translation

I have recently been experiencing symptoms of yoko meshi:

Thus, I was inspired to write about the elements that I find particularly difficult concerning the art of conversing in Spanish and, subsequently, Basque (or Euskera). In all honesty, and with perhaps a little smugness, I believed I was setting foot in Spain with a reasonable understanding of their language. Having achieved a rather hard-fought-for B at A level, my Spanish was once at a relatively high standard. 5 years later and I am proving to be somewhat rusty. This most definitely threw me in my first week here but I have since attempted to retrieve any knowledge of the Spanish language that I have and now carry on my person at all times a little yellow notebook full of extremely useful words and phrases. So far it contains some examples of tenses, a list of Basque food and drink that I need to learn to pronounce (and can therefore order at a bar) and the difference between ‘ya me he enterado’ and ‘ya me he enterrado’. I used the latter on a recent occasion when trying to say ‘I have heard’ when I in fact said something along the lines of ‘I have buried in the ground’.

A good time to consider these wise words from Sean Bean:

It’s safe to say the thing I find most frustrating is the simple distinction between what is masculine and what is feminine. Much to my host family’s delight I regularly refer to myself as a boy. This is not something that we in England are used to having to think about. For example, ‘estoy cansada’ translates as ‘I am tired’, a phrase I used a lot in my first few days here in País Vasco. Easily misspoken as ‘estoy cansado’. For the 9 year old in my host family (subsequently referred to as Cheeky Monkey) this is unbelievably funny. Furthermore, I am usually tired whilst trying to express this in Spanish and therefore I am bound to make some mistakes! 2 weeks down the line and I still struggle with gendered nouns on a daily basis. Why is the day masculine yet the week is feminine? How is it that the theatre is masculine but the swimming pool is feminine? I could go on.

I persistently fail to remember how to use the past tense. Sadly, I basically forgot most of what I learnt at A level. I studied Spanish 5 years ago and since then have only used it on maybe 2 holidays during which the predominant phrases involve asking for a glass of wine, requesting fruit and veg in the supermarket or ordering a croissant for breakfast. The latter was more difficult than one might imagine. It was often the case that my family and I would wake up so late in the morning that by the time we’d made it to a café for breakfast, alas, there would be no croissants. A conversation would ensue whereby we would attempt to order toast, not a toasted sandwich, just toasted bread with jam please. So yes, I am out of practice. And recalling the past tense was like trying to remember the periodic table (I never knew more than a few elements thanks to the first 5 or 6 seconds of a very drunk Sheldon singing the periodic table song: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hAElfmG2H2Y) . As it is, I do everything in the present. Living life to the full me.

And then, as if I wasn’t trying hard enough to understand their language, the speed at which the Spanish talk is, simply put, ridiculous. This has always been an area that I’ve battled with. For a reasonably laid back country, I find that the Spanish talk as though they are worried the world is going to end. And all their words come out in a great big tumble of sounds and expressions. Occasionally I can pick out the occasional verb or recognisable noun but as soon as a verb is conjugated or a noun changes depending on whether it is masculine or feminine I get completely lost. We met up with some friends of my host family the other day and spent a lovely afternoon sat outside drinking coffee and chatting about current affairs (apparently). There was a super cute dog called Siri. She was possibly some species of terrier; very animated, adorably small, white and fluffy. See image below of one I found on google images. Dog breeds; something I know very little about. Anyway, I felt that Siri and I shared a real connection as neither of us really had a clue what was going on. We both wanted to be involved yet weren’t quite sure how to make the first move. We truly bonded that afternoon.

This sounds a little bit harsh. In fact, people I have met have made a great effort to speak to me in English or more slowly in Spanish. A combination well-known as Spanglish and something I am quickly becoming an expert in. My host family in particular have been excellent at including me in conversation despite the language barrier and I have already been able to improve my Spanish and become more confident.

However, Spanish is not my only problem. I am now experiencing the unknown territory of Euskera. This is solid. The oldest language in Europe (according to one of my teacher textbooks), this is different to anything I have tried to learn before. I find it sounds similar to Greek, with a vague resemblance to Spanish but with sounds you might find in Russian or somewhere in Eastern Europe. For starters, they don’t have the letter ‘C’. I found this out when I received my teaching timetable and saw I was teaching classes A, B and D. What did C do wrong? When I asked my tutor, apparently my tone of voice suggested that I was genuinely concerned for C’s welfare. It just doesn’t exist. Brutal. Poor C. They make up for their lack of C’s with additional use of K’s, X’s and Z’s. See why I think it sounds Greek?

However, I spent the other evening listening to Cheeky Monkey reading a story aloud in Euskera and have discovered that, much the same as Spanish, once you know how to pronounce a certain letter you can read and say pretty much any word. Whether I can understand anything is a different matter entirely. The words are frustratingly long. I have only just added ‘thank you’ to my limited repertoire of Euskera terms. And I had to get someone to write it down for me. ‘Eskerrik asko’ resembles no other word for thank you that I can remember learning and, at 5 syllables, is longer that it looks. I have yet to really put it to good use. In addition, learning students’ names has been and still poses a challenge. So far I recognise a couple of Jons, Gorkas (Georges) and Annas. A couple of particularly unfamiliar and arduous names are Onintze, Iratxe, Erkuden and Uxue. I’m not 100% which are boys and which are girls. Don’t even get me started on the days of the week.

As it is, I go nowhere with my little yellow book, have mastered the art of asking people to slow down please and am spending my bus journeys eavesdropping on unsuspecting passengers in an attempt to improve my Spanish listening skills. You wait, by Christmas I’ll be conversing fluently in both Basque and Spanish. Yeah.