OAXACA — Pay no attention to the “o” and the “x.” They are both dropped when you open your mouth to say, “Waaah” like a wailing child or “wa-wa” like a pitiful child.
The state of Oaxaca (Wa-ha-ca) is five hours from Mexico City by car or 1.5 hours by air.
For first-time visitors, pack an open mind, try anything once but put your guard up should your comfort and safety be compromised.
Liliana Perez and Mitch Rosario of Viajes Horizonte Latino welcomed us at the airport, as arranged by Arlina Onglao of Journeys of Faith, Inc.
Oaxaca sits on a seismic bed so the residents are used to being shaken by daily tremors. To minimize damage to life and limb, the state’s building code restricts the height of all structures up to only three floors.
Our hotel, Caza Conzatti, once the private sprawling residence of an Italian botanist, was just a leisurely walk to the center of town called Zocalo.
Liliana wrote down each day’s schedule in a city map to give us a clear guide. I found that very useful. “Finally,” I thought. “A tour operator who has addressed senior travelers and their (infuriating) habit of mixing up or forgetting itineraries.”
Liliana assigned Alex Leiva as our private guide who was a walking history book as well as being courteous and discreet. He did not push us to buy but was not stingy either with his tips on how to obtain the best bargains. He was particularly cautious about some native dishes that might be too strange for our taste and thus blemish our impression of Oaxaca.
But impressed we were:
The brightly painted walls and doors and the wrought-iron lace works of the houses in Oaxaca, its colonial architecture, especially the green cantera (quarried) buildings, and its ancient archaeological sites. Some of Mexico’s former presidents (Benito Juarez, Porfirio Diaz) and artists (Rufino Tamayo, Francisco Toledo) were born in Oaxaca.
I marveled at the well-preserved churches with opulent hand-carvings of holy images, angels and saints. The Santo Domingo Church in downtown Oaxaca was one such magnificent structure.
In another church in Ocotlan, a nearby town, I saw an unusual tableau of the Holy Trinity. It was a unique interpretation of La Pieta by Michelangelo but instead of the sorrowful Mary holding the lifeless and tortured body of Christ, it was God the Father who was holding His son while a dove (Holy Spirit) hovered nearby.
Ocotlan also has an open market held every Friday where native farmers bring their fresh produce harvested direct from their fields.
I saw women selling limestone and Alex explained, “Limestone is added to the pot when boiling corn because it makes the water boil faster, thus reducing cooking time as well as removing impurities from the corn.”
They also had an array of creative and imaginative indigenous handicrafts like alebrijes, black pottery, and the natural embroidery weavings of Teotitlan del Valle.
We loved the native bags festooned with hand-made dolls and cotton shirts embroidered with native designs that gave a glimpse of Oaxaca folklore.
I was all agog at their version of the chicharon, which was extremely large slabs of deep fried pork cracklings. The local butcher must have filleted the skin from the entire pig.
When I saw Zapotec women attired in their traditional traje crying out “Chapulines, chapulines,” I turned to Alex again who urged me to “Try them even once, or else you’ve not experienced Oaxaca at all.”
I gingerly picked a crispy one and bit the body, head and then the legs. “How are they cooked?” I asked. “They are soaked in lime juice or vinegar, chili and salt and then sun dried, roasted or deep-fried.”
I ate a critter farmed and collected by the indigenous people in their milpas/fields of corn and alfalfa near their villages. Alex said that it was a “tasty,” natural source of protein.
Another must try was the Mezcal, a distilled, alcoholic beverage with a dead worm pickled in the bottle. Mezcal is made from the same agave plant resembling a pineapple that tequila is made from but unlike tequila, when you drink Mezcal from a shot glass, you automatically drink the dead worm. They say the worm is an aphrodisiac, and it lives inside the agave plant, hand-harvested and placed with the Mezcal near the end of the bottling process.
My stomach turned so I chose the less adventurous variety: cappuccino and piñacolada, without the worms.
Local chocolate has its own earthy flavor from a mixture of cocoa beans, fresh vanilla, almonds, cinnamon sticks and red chili. It packed an odd, sweet kick that blended with the thick, dark, bitter taste.
There were delicious varieties of tamales and mole pastes made from chili peppers, spices, nuts, and chocolate — the mole was certainly an acquired taste.
Oaxacan fare was eaten with salsa made from fresh tomatoes, three kinds of dried chili — de arbol, smoked morita and jalapeño — mixed with fresh onions and cilantro.
Some of the best restaurants serving Oaxaca cuisine can be reached on foot like Marisqueria Neptuno situated next to hotel Casa Conzatti, and Casa Oaxaca located behind Santo Domingo church.
Dishes like flores de calabaza (ricotta cheese stuffed with squash blossoms), gorditas de pato confitado (corn fritters with duck confit), and pescadillas (deep fried fish quesadillas) and the sopa de habas con nopalitos y camarones (tender fava beans, nopalitos or cactus stem and baby shrimp in a costeño chili scented broth) were scrumptious.
Friendly Oaxacans made us feel safe and welcome. One lady, Lourdes Victoria, even gave me a welcome chance to converse in Spanish.
Oaxaca is a pleasant, enjoyable gateway to Mexico — critters, worms, chili, chocolates and all.
Add it to your bucket list.