La Comida de Oaxaca

While there are many things to love about Oaxaca, one thing in particular stands out above the rest: the cuisine. I have been back in the states since April, and I still find myself dreaming about some of Oaxaca's famous dishes. In this blog post, I would like to share with you, my favorite Oaxacan foods.

1. Tlayudas

A tlayuda is a handmade dish consisting of a large, thin, and crunchy tortilla covered with a spread of beans, lettuce or cabbage, avacado, meat (typically beef or pork), quesillo or Oaxacan string cheese, and salsa. Tlayudas are often given the nickname "Oaxacan pizza." The best time to pick up one of these bad boys is when you are looking for a pretty filling dinner. You can order a tlayuda in a restuarant during a sit down meal or grab one to go at your favorite food vendor.

2. Elotes

Elotes are a very popular street food throughout Mexico. They are typically consumed on a stick, or by grasping the husk of the cob that has been pulled down to form a "handle". Condiments such as salt, chili powder, butter, cheese, lemon or lime, mayonnaise, and sour cream are usually added to the elote. I preffered my elote fairly simple: grilled with lime and cheese. This was probably my favorite midnight snack!

3. Pollo con mole negro

Oaxaca is known as "the land of seven moles." While each mole offered something a little different and exciting, I think my favorite mole was mole negro. This was the savory-sweet mole, and also the one most frequently found on American menus. According to foodrepublic.com, it is an intricate recipe with a lot of ingredients and steps, you’ll be grinding and stewing the following together: onion, garlic, whole spices like cinnamon, cloves, black pepper and cumin, dried chiles, pumpkin and sesame seeds, herbs like hoja santo and cilantro, bread for thickening and sometimes dried fruit for extra sweeteness. Oh, and plenty of dark chocolate.

4. Chocolate con leche

Lastly, I will leave you with my favorite Oaxacan treat: chocolate con leche. Mexican hot chocolate is very simple, it contains only cacao, cinnamon, sugar, and milk or water. The stick shown in the picture above is used to mash up the chocolate and mix it into either hot milk or water. Chocolate can be consumed any hour of the day, but it is often a morning drink to be had with pan dulces, or sweet breads, which you can dip into your drink.

Check out Oaxacan rapper Mare Advertencia Lirika!

"Mare Advertencia Lirika; rapera; zapoteca; feminista; cantante; mujer de nacida en Oaxaca"

Mare Advertencia Lirika; rapper; Zapotec; feminist; singer; woman born in Oaxaca

Mare writes and raps about pressing social issues surrounding women, indigenous people, and more. UVM Oaxaca Class of 2016 actually had the privilege to hear her perform in one of our classes.

¡Muy chido! How cool!

Check out her newest album here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZB94hDp4wLA

Photo series of Oaxaca's indigenous groups

Diego Huerta's work in Southern Mexico portrays the traditions and customs of indigenous groups of Oaxaca State through his incredible photography.

Check out his article and photos here.

Photo source: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/photographer-captures-the-breathtaking-beauty-of-mexicos-indigenous-communities_us_5704038ce4b0a06d5807300d

Photo source: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/photographer-captures-the-breathtaking-beauty-of-mexicos-indigenous-communities_us_5704038ce4b0a06d5807300d

Photo source: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/photographer-captures-the-breathtaking-beauty-of-mexicos-indigenous-communities_us_5704038ce4b0a06d5807300d

Final Week: Despedidas y Fiesta!

Two weeks ago, the UVM Oaxaca Study Abroad Program 2016 wound down to a fin, and reality sunk in that it was time to head back North of the border. Many students embarked on their journey home the day after the program ended, and some invited their parents down for a week of adventures and vacation to show them the Oaxacan ropes. 

But before the big despedida, students had some classes to finish up! Arts and Sciences focused on their trip to La Mixteca and La Costa by creating videos that represented the essence of the trip and their Music of Anthropology class. The videos concentrated on student interviews, the history and identity of the regional music, and of course highlighted the different sounds and rhythms that they experienced on the trip. They then presented the videos at Prof. Sergio Navarrete's house, and they were quite impressive productions! Here is a small taste of the videos:

Food Systems and Global Health tracks finished up with Dr. Jean Harvey by taking a trip to PUENTE, which focuses on "farming, consumption, and commercialization of amaranth" which provides resources and nutrition to poor farmers and families of Oaxacan communities. You can visit their website here for more information:

Puente Oaxaca

Source: http://www.puentemexico.org

Saturday before the program ended, we finished up with a fiesta at SURCO, where there were final reflections of the program, the study abroad experience, gifts, great music and dancing, and of course lots of food from the Isthmus and Central Valley regions of Oaxaca! Here are some pictures of the festivities:

Thank you to all of the students and organizations we worked with for an incredible semester of learning from each other, living, your extremely hard work throughout the semester, and experiencing Oaxaca to the fullest. We appreciate your participation and knowledge so much, and look forward to seeing you return to Oaxaca sometime in the (near?) future!

Abrazos!

- The In-Country Crew :)

Viaje de Música de Antropología: Arts and Sciences

The arts and sciences folks had an extremely busy and exciting week on our field research trip across Oaxaca! For our Anthropology of Music class we first traveled north to Apoala and then worked our way south until we reached the coast of Oaxaca. This trip was an excellent way to learn about different types of music, dances, and cultures throughout the state in a hands-on way.

Our time in Apoala was spent learning about the saltery (salterio) and seeing amazing sights! After arriving in the town, we kicked off our trip with a pleasant hike to see the waterfalls of Apoala. Some students were brave enough swim in the cold tidal pools, while others were perfectly content taking pictures from the sidelines. In the picture to the right, you can see the entire arts and sciences crew with our professor, Sergio, and our special guest musician, Ruben.

The next day, the group traveled to Tlaxiaco, where we watched a band made up of children ages 8 to 17. The band played four of their pieces for us, and during one song, local dancers performed the traditional guelaguetza dance. After these performances, us UVMers had the opportunity to break off into small groups and chat with the children in the band. Many children were curious to know whether we had any musical talent and had us sing or try their instruments!

After Tlaxiaco we made our way to Pinotepa de Don Luis. We met up with a gentleman from the Cultural center who brought us to the house of a family in town. There several dancer from the town gathered to show us a series of dances from Carnival el baile de los tejorones. The dances showed stories of encounters with troublesome bulls, pesky rabbits, and dangerous panthers. A couple of the dances were also made to make fun of the Spanish conquerors as carnival was the only time the indigenous had the opportunity to do so. All of the dances involved costumes with elaborate masks and beautifully carved maracas. We even joined in for a few dances!

The next day we found ourselves in Cuajinicuilapa, a region of the northern neighbor to Oaxaca state called Guerrero. This is an area of Mexico where many black Mexicans (cultura afromestiza) reside and one can find a wonderful mix of black and mexican cultures and music. We met up with the director of the Center of Art and Culture. He and several folks from town played us some traditional music with some very curious instruments. Among these were the mandible of a donkey and a el bote del diablo, or devil’s bottle (a drum with a stick attached to the top that you rub to make an odd sound). After a couple songs they let us join in with our own instruments we brought from the city. A few chamacos (youngins) from the town came and freestyle rapped for us.

On our way to Mazunte we stopped by the hometown of our driver Goyo, Rio Grande. We had a lovely lunch with his family (chicken tamales, veggie tamales, and mole amarillo). Also, Goyo's brother in law is in a band from the town, and they came by to play their traditional music for us. The band consisted of two men, a singer and guitarist, a younger boy who was the violinist (taught by his father by ear), and a younger girl who played the trumpet. They played merequetengues, chilenas costeñas, and other types of typical costal music.

The end of the trip was spent in Mazunte, a beautiful town on the coast of Oaxaca. While here for three days, students experienced amazing food, night-time beach jam sessions, and an earthquake (no damage anywhere in Mexico- just some shaky students)!!! During the day, we had music class, where we learned 4 different songs. A few of the more musically-inclined students played saxophones, clarinets, and flutes, while the rest of us stuck to maracas and simple drum beats. However, after three days of working together with our instruments, we sounded pretty darn good. After our three hour classes each day, we had the afternoon to enjoy the beach! One night, the group set out to Punta Cometa to see the sunset. Apparently, this is one of a very small number of places where you can see the sun rise and set over the ocean. The hike itself was almost as incredible as the sunset. Mazunte was not only a good way to end the music trip but it also felt like a good way to wrap up our time in Oaxaca in general. Many of us UVMers are shocked that we are now in our final week of the program. At least you readers will get to see our smiling and tan faces soon enough!

Saludos,

Jack Braidt & Allison Keen

The Sounds of Progress, or at Least Anthropology (Week 12)

Good morning, afternoon, and night fellow reader. Lance and Colin here to give you all a status update on our little journey south (of the U.S. that is).

If you have been keeping up with our illustrious blog the past few weeks you may be aware that our botany class has come to a close. It was enjoyable while it lasted but that does not mean the joy has ended. This past week we commenced our anthropology of music class. For the first two days we had very little idea on what to expect, seeing as we had been asked to meet in a dance studio on Monday. I (Lance) was honestly expecting a pseudo dance class where we learned Mexican rhythm as well as got to shake our booty, but in reality it was much different. We spent the first day imitating one another in addition to a little bit of acting with both movement and sound. At first it was rather awkward and tough to come up with sounds for the motions, but after some time we eased into it, and found it to be very fun! We did much the same for our following class however this time around it involved some drums and a great quantity of clapping. Come Wednesday, we simply held a lecture which taught us a little snippet of the great variety of music found here in Oaxaca as well as some of their origins found throughout the world.


The second half of our week was spent in lecture learning more and more about the music we'll be seeing next week when we have the opportunity to take a trip around the Southern coast of Oaxaca to discover the great variety of music found there. Along with class time, we were also brought on a day-trip to the church of San Jerónimo Tlacochahuaya (picture on right), where we enjoyed the sights of the art all throughout the church and, upon climbing to the upper balcony, listened to a performance of an authentic restored Oaxacan organ (picture on left). These, we learned, are unique due to the fact that most continental Spanish organs have been replaced by the German church organs, meaning that this organ was one of the most faithful representations of the traditional Spanish organ that was brought to the New World with its conquest. This, along with the fact that many of these organs were destroyed for their lead during the Mexican Civil War, being able to hear a performance of such a rare and historically meaningful instrument was extremely exciting.

That was our update for this week, stay tuned for next week's blog when we will discuss our trip to the coast to learn about other interesting local varieties of music from the state of Oaxaca!

Food, Health, and Culture oh my!

The Nutrition Transition

We kicked off our last two weeks of classes with our professor Jean Harvey. Our first two days we spent talking about the differences in diet between the US and Mexico and health disasters in Mexico. We looked at US and Mexico Dietary Guidelines noting how the US seemed slightly more detailed in terms of nutrient intake as well as building healthy eating patterns, while Mexico talked a little more about the importance of enjoying eating, which was an interesting cultural difference. We then turned our conversation towards obesity and how it is a huge problem in Mexico as well as the US. This is in part due to the nutrition transition, where before in “developing” countries were extremely malnourished and thin while “developed” countries have an obesity problem, now as poorer countries are developing and have access to food, it is typically food high in saturated fats and added sugars. Now these people who have struggled to get any type of food, receive mainly junk food, causing an obesity and diabetes problem. We talked about our own observations of this in Mexico, and how we have all noticed the large consumption of sweetened beverages, especially Coca Cola. This background in nutrition prepared us for the rest of the week where we started field trips around the city to learn more about programs combating food inaccessibility and malnutrition.

Health and Nutrition Issues in Oaxaca

After learning about the nutrition background on Mexico, we Food Systems and Global Health students headed to SURCO to hear a presentation by the Community Kitchen Coordinator of DIF. DIF standing for Sistema Nacional para el Desarrollo Integral de la Familia, provides assistance to food and nutrition vulnerable populations. This includes children 6-11 months, pregnant or lactating women, and elders. There are 2,350 Community Kitchens in 834 Municipalities. They promote food security, nutrition, and human rights. They operate by working with municipalities to support communities with food, aqua filters, kitchen equipment, and education. DIF beneficiaries accept the benefits and prepare the meals themselves in teams. This way communities are committing to cooking to meals rather than solely receiving them. Community Kitchens receive a wide range of food supplies that reflect their mission of fighting obesity and malnutrition. They are integrating greater amounts of soy and using less sugar and salt while preparing meals. DIF goals coincide with the national program SINHAMBRE to strive for Zero Hunger, eliminate child malnutrition, and promote community participation.

DIF Community Kitchens trip

It was great to make the trip on Thursday to the Community Kitchen to see  the DIF program in action. We heard from the DIF sponsor, the president of the municipality, and his wife, while a group of women prepared soya-chorizo tacos with some pasta soup for the day’s comida. The DIF program is really striving to improve health and community development for vulnerable communities all around Oaxaca, and you could really sense the importance and strength of their mission when sitting in the dining hall surrounded by happy faces and amaranth bars. The people at the Kitchen were very hospitable, sharing some of the comida with us after our discussion and insisting on taking some photos. Overall it was a really good experience for us to see the efforts being made to better the lives of people here.

Food assistance, public health programs, food and nutrition policies

On Friday the Global Health and Nutrition tracks were fortunate enough to hear a presentation from an employee of the PROSPERA program. PROSPERA is a government program designed to improve well-being among impoverished families within Mexico. However, Prospera brings an interesting and unique approach to social welfare by empowering its participants through financial education and resources. These come in the form of ATM cards, microcredit loans, as well as financial education classes, with the ultimate goal of the program being to connect people with the formal job market, lifting them out of poverty. During class before this visit the group as a whole had a variety of conclusions regarding the dietary analysis project. Many found a lack of protein due to the lack of a consumption of meat. Others found that they were consuming more sugary beverages since living in Mexico. Aside from that, dietary trends were varied on a person to person basis. Neither of these are particularly surprising, as they are in accordance with larger trends within Mexico. Excited for another week of class with Jean!

Dietary Recommendations at the Community Kitchen

Presentations- Lucha(Libre) Contra Hambre!

Saludos,
Vanessa, SJ, Mary, and Benito

Global Health Practicums

After returning from village stays, the global health students went back to their practicums for one final week. -Lia and Selina share their experiences below.

       I, Selina, went back to the Centro de Esperanza Infantil-- the volunteer center for an organization called Oaxaca Street Children. The mission of this non-profit, grassroots organization is to improve the lives of marginalized children by giving them access to an education. The center supports children through university, and provides them with the tools and support they need to complete their education.

On an average week I would arrive in the morning and help the children there with their homework, and play games with them once they were finished. Then they would eat a nutritious lunch provided by the center before going to school in the afternoon. This past week was different however, due to the fact that the kids were on vacation. Vacation means no lunch is served at the center, and for a few kids also meant no homework. These two factors diminished incentive for the kids to attend. However, some kids did still come, as their alternative was hanging out in the Zócalo or on Alcalá with their street vendor parents.


      We spent time reading books, doing homework (turns out some kids had a lot of work to do over break) and playing. I also translated some letters from the kids’ sponsors from English to Spanish. I helped my buddy Javier, 5, (pictured above) learn how to write his name. Overall it was a much more laid back week for me. The global health students ended it by meeting up on Friday at SURCO and doing presentations about our practicums. It was fun and interesting to see what everyone else had been up to the past few weeks, seeing as I only had a rough idea of what my classmates had been doing! I am still continuing to visit the center a few times a week, as I have free time in the afternoon and didn’t want to say bye to my little friends yet. This experience was truly a wonderful one for me and although saying bye will be very hard, I am so grateful I got to be a part of these kids’ lives for a short time nonetheless.


 


       Lia, Mary and Ben returned to the Centro de Salud in Arrazola where they began a project in collaboration with the health clinic.  To figure out a theme or message to focus on, we met with some of the doctors who felt that the community could benefit from information on the prevention and warning signs of child cancer.  In order to handle this topic beautifully yet effectively, our teacher Jonathan was able to enlist the help of his goddaughter and local artist, Erendira.  With her expertise we were able to construct a sketch that represented a healthy lifestyle on one side, contrasted with symptoms and potential causes of cancer on the other.

   A group of students from the University of California Davis were in town for the week on an alternative Spring break trip.  We rallied them to join us in the painting process which allowed the project to be completed in just two scorching hot days.  It was great to have “real” artist on board, not only for her expertise but also to continue practicing our spanish.  She was very patient as Mary and I attempted to express our creative visions of kids juggling fruit on a bicycle and frolicking through the milpa (a traditional form of Mexican agriculture).  Here you can see Mary and Benito beginning the initial outline as based on the gridded sketch drawn out by Erendira.  On the right, Lia poses proudly with her paintbrush among her new UC Davis friends while Ben reaches down from the roof to paint some fresh air.

After a slightly more stressful first two weeks of the practicum doing outreach and education in the local secondary school, we were glad to blow off some creative steam with this project.  If there’s one lesson I learned on that last day, it’s to never underestimate the strength of the Oaxacan sun, no matter how tan I think I’ve gotten!  Putting my sunburned skin aside, it was great to see the community come together to make this happen, from Saul of Eco Alebrijes who supplied us with paint to the woman who volunteered the side of her house for the mural.  We are grateful for the learning opportunities and relationships we formed while interning at the clinic, as well the welcoming support and enthusiasm they gave us for the mural.
Side note:  If anyone at home receives an alebrije as a gift from their beloved UVM’er, this is the town those colorful wooden figures are made.

Hasta luego!
Lia and Selina

A fruitful week for the Food Systems folk

To be or not to be local? Monday 3/28

Food Systems students were greeted by professor Vern Grubinger for the week to study farming and food system of Oaxaca. 1st stop - Central de Abastos Market.  This market is where almost all items, food and non-food, first come into the city, which makes sense because "Central de Abasto" translates into "Center of Supply". The market is the size of multiple football fields crowded with people, smells, and sounds.  The mission of our trip was to find out where different food items are being produced by talking to different vendors.  We learned from a butcher that a lot of livestock is raised in Chiapas then slaughtered in Oaxaca.  We learned that a lot of vegetables come from Veracruz and Puebla.  Leaving Abastos that day, we definitely gained a more solid understanding of the Oaxacan food system, as well as an understanding of how much the actors in the food system (vendors, cooks etc.) actually know about the food that they're selling.

Children of the Corn! Tuesday 3/29 and Wednesday 3/30

The next two days we were jam packed with knowledge! We first headed to INIFAP (Instituto Nacional De Investigaciones Forestales, Agrícolas Y Pecuarias), a federal research and extension center station that is working to protect local maize genetics. We learned about corn production, corn markets, and the pollination process. We even got to visit their seed bank full of colorful rows of native corn.  Blue and purple corns are higher in protein, so put down that burger and grab an elote (corn on the cob)!

We stayed in a small village about four hours north of the city called Santa Maria Yaviche.  It's a small village that produces coffee as a cash crop, but also produces a lot of sugar cane.  We learned about the economics of their coffee selling, how the majority of it is organic and we also learned about a plague called La Rolla, which has been devastating coffee trees all over Central and South America in the past two years.  We learned how this is devastating their main cash crop, but they can still sustain themselves because nearly everyone in the village grows their own food.

Thursday, we went to go see the cattle market in Zaachila, which is a small town south of Oaxaca city.  The market only happens on Thursdays and we got there at around noon.  There was a lot of ganado (cattle), borregos y chivos (goat and sheep) and guajolotes y gallinas (turkeys and chickens).  You could buy a pair of work oxen, a yunta, for 45,000 pesos or about 2,500 USD.  There was a lot of action going on, a lot of men inspecting different animals, people leading five goats down the street, people yelling about how their animals are "bien chulos!" or "nice and cool/fat/delicious!".  There are also stands on the sides that are selling items catered to these cattlemen: spurs for cowboy boots, leather whips, saddles and other things related to livestock.  For lunch, we stopped at a stand and got tacos de barbacoa, which are goat meat tacos, very delicious.  From this trip, we got a better perspective of where all the meat in town comes from and what the realities are of raising the livestock that eventually end in our tacos.

Healthy looking ganado.

Friday 4/1

Today, our teachers decided to just give us the day off.  April fools! We actually went to go see a large scale, organic, heirloom tomato operation.  The operation is six acres of greenhouses and exports to Los Angeles.  The owner explained to us the challenges of being organic, how he found his buyers in the United States, why he decided to go into a different market and how the tomatoes are grown.  We saw inside of the invernaderos (greenhouses) and saw the different organic fertilizers that they use.  They also produce a lot of organic cucumbers, and we got to try some of those.  Muy delicioso!

The owner of the greenhouse showing us some compost tea that is applied to plants

After the greenhouses, we took a tour of Universidad Technológica de los Valles Centrales de Oaxaca (Technological University of the Central Valleys of Oaxaca.)  This was a cool experience because we got to feel what is like to be back on a college campus again, with all the buzz of kids and people rushing to class and people hanging out under trees.  The technological university offers degrees in gastronomy, mechanical engineering, nutrition and food science, business, agronomy and sustainable energy.  Definitely interesting to see the similarities and differences between this university and UVM.

Saturday 4/2

Today we had a talk with a coffee co-op called Yeni Navan (Zapotec for "New Light").  We learned how the organization is a combination of more than forty coffee producing villages and how it's all certified organic.  We talked to the president of the organization and learned about the economics of it all, how paying for organic and fair trade certification is really expensive, but it works out because they can sell for a significantly higher price.  We learned how in normal years in the past, the organization was producing a combined five hundred tons of coffee, but with the La Rolla plague, they will probably only be able to produce two hundred fifty.  He explained how the buyers of their coffee exert a lot of pressure on them to meet the demand, but he remained optimistic that the coffee trees will beat the plague, telling us how there is a lot of research being done in Mexico about fighting it and resistant trees.

Sara Jean with some delicious, local coffee.

Food Systems had a great week. Hasta luego!

Vanessa y Mateo

Village Stay: El Carmen

Ben Quinn, Lia Van Dyke, Mary Washburn, Jack Braidt, Mateo Solberg, Sarah Jean Whelan

No one in our group seemed to know exactly what to expect going into our trip to El Carmen. While we all held preconceived notions about what life was like and what we would experience, these were uncertain at best and were undoubtedly changed by the time we left on Saturday morning. Below one can find the personal accounts of each of the students that spent Semana Santa in El Carmen de Inés del Monte. This experience in a rural pueblo is something that all of us will carry with great regard for the rest of our lives. Each of us developed relationships with people in the community and were initially struck with how many differences there were, but upon our departure what resonated were the similarities.  Below, each of us will talk a little bit about our experiences.

At beginning of our stay at el Carmen, I felt very much like an outsider. We would walk down the streets and never once did we not get at least a double take if not a stare by each and every person we walked by. I can’t say I found this at all surprising seeing as I was one of seven white Americans in a town of 700 rural Mexicans. It didn’t take all too long for this to change. After a couple days of playing basketball with the local kids and attending masses and talking to people on the streets, almost all of whom were interested enough to approach and engage us first, I began to feel very welcome here. In talking to the people of this town, I found that all the townspeople there I talked to were very interested in two things: (1) why we were here and (2) once they ascertained that we were from the US, what the political situation was like there. I got the idea that many of these people really believed the US was an ideal sort of place, or at least as good as a place to live could be. My host father was very interested in the differences between government aid programs in the US and in Mexico, and it was also interesting to see, every morning when we sat down for breakfast, our host father telling his 8 month old granddaughter how she is going to learn English and go to the north. Those people in town who knew anything about the political goings on in the US asked me, scarily enough, about Trump. As one can imagine they were not too fond of him or what they knew about his platform. I told them not to worry too much, I doubt he’ll win... One man asked what I’d do if he did. I told them I’d move to Canada :)

Going into El Carmen, I had no idea what to expect. When we got to our house, we made it clear that we wanted to help in whatever way possible, and our family was happy to oblige. Most of our days were spent doing relatively intense manual labor, from picking and sorting through hundreds of tomatoes to be sold to stores, to lugging massive amounts of manure to fill an entire greenhouse. It was a lot of work, and as the days went on I felt increasingly humbled by how privileged I am to have been born into my life. It was hard to see that our family worked so much and received such little pay, how they had little access to clean or running water, and how they had to be very conscious of conserving their resources. At the same time, it was a week full of great learning experiences and connecting to some very interesting people.

Although the manual labor consumed much of our time and initial attention, it was impossible to ignore cultural differences. These people worked more hours than the average US citizen doing physically harder labor too, which is enough to comment on itself, but the role I saw women play in this scenario was so much more. After working in the fields with them for many hours the only thing I could do was collapse on my bed and sleep for an hour. When I woke up, I noticed the men in the family had similarly passed out on the couch, but our host mom, who had done the same work in the fields as the men, had gone straight from farming to the overheated kitchen to prepare us dinner. While it was admirable to see the women in our family working in the fields too, it was difficult for us to see that they still had to pick up household chores after a long day of work. Another cultural difference I noticed was due to the fact that I was one of two vegetarians living in El Carmen for the week. It was nearly impossible to get our family to understand that we didn’t eat any type of meat. Not even chicken or seafood we would tell them. For us, living in the US, a lot of people understand that vegetarian means no meat, and more than that, vegetarians have access to food that’s not meat. Our host mom told us that she had once tried to be a vegetarian because she didn’t eat meat, but stopped because one day the only thing available for her to eat was meat. These cultural differences were very-eye opening. The amount of work they do and the little that they received made me feel so humbled. I had a great time working with them, but was thoroughly exhausted by the end of the week and was astounded to see how much they worked on a daily basis.

The thing that impressed me most during my stay in El Carmen was the pride and generosity that my family exhibited throughout my stay with them and increasingly leading up to our departure. Although they came from extremely humble means, both of our families were more than willing to provide us with as much as their limited resources would allow. We changed houses after a day to move into a house with electricity at the urging of both families. At first I thought that it was no big deal that they were simply looking out for what was best for us. It wasn’t until later that I realized how big of a deal it was for our original family. On Saturday during breakfast we began a conversation about how difficult it was for them to attain electricity. Our original host, Don Antonio, explained that it would be in the neighborhood of about a million pesos in order for them to hook electricity in the house (this is what I heard). It was after that that he took on a more solemn tone. He looked me in the eyes and apologized profusely that his family was unable to provide light for us and that we no longer stayed in their house. The pride and generosity to strangers is something that both myself and others could learn from this particularly generous and kind family.

March Madness was in full effect during our stay in El Carmen.  Most days were spent playing basketball at the town basketball court.  Often times, a couple different town kids would wander up and we would play some sort of game.  Benito and Mateo played a three game 1v1 series, spread over three different days, with Benito coming out victorious. On Friday night, the Madness really came out.  Us UVM kids had been hanging out at the basketball court all evening, drinking Coca-Cola and playing basketball.  At around 8pm, the church mass got out, and many people wandered over to the court to see what was going on.  After a while it was clear what was to happen: all the older teenage boys had evidently gotten out of church, and came over to the basketball court to see what was up.  There were about 10 people just kind of sitting around, watching Mateo shoot hoops.  Mateo looked around, then decided to organize a game.  It ended up being Mateo and four Mexican guys vs Benito and four Mexican guys.  It really did feel like an organized game, because the court was lit up, many women and young children were watching us play, people were even cheering for the different teams!  Mateo and his team ended up winning, and all of the players celebrated after with some Coca-Cola and a big bag of chips, a typical snack for us during the village stay.  

Skepticism was the word that would best describe my first reaction to this village stay. I found myself asking, what are we going to do here all week? This attitude quickly morphed into one of reverence for the way of life of the people of El Carmen. Their hard work in the face of limited resources, and their ingenuity despite the lack of a formal education are all things that we will take away from this. The opportunity that this village stay afforded me, to connect with people I seemingly have nothing in common with, is one that I will always remember and hold as one of the most valuable memories from this trip. Although I can’t speak for everyone, it is for sure that this trip was unlike anything we had experienced before and will resonate with us for life. I for one am extremely grateful for this opportunity and want to thank the UVM Oaxaca staff for making it happen.