Dinner/Last Day/Watch Your Step/Night on the Bus

[Continuing and final journal entries written by Chiripa partners on the August 2008 buying trip.]

August 25: Dinner with Friends

This evening we had dinner in Oaxaca with our good friends, the Chavez y Santiago family (and friend Elsa). The family carries on a long hand-weaving tradition in Teotitlán del Valle, the renowned weaving village. The oldest son, Eric, recently took a position with the outstanding new Textile Museum in Oaxaca. The museum has both a Mexican and a worldwide focus, and houses an astonishing collection of the best natural textile craft from throughout the world. If you are ever in Oaxaca, you should not miss it.

Federico, Eric, and Elsa at Chiripa.

Eric, his father Federico and friend Elsa visited us in Madison last year, and gave a presentation at Chiripa about hand-woven rugs and natural dye techniques. At the museum, Eric is working with others to save and promote traditional textile materials and methods.

After dinner, we went back to the hotel to finish labeling and packing the small items we had collected. This is an exhausting task at the end of a long day. A friend will pick up the packed boxes in the morning, consolidate them with later deliveries that we have ordered in the Oaxaca area, and eventually send the consolidated shipment to our exporter in Guadalajara. The exporter will add the Oaxaca shipment to our shipments from other areas; check the packing, labeling and paperwork; and put the whole works on a truck for the U.S. We hope to receive the complete shipment, with a minimum of damage, in October. We always enjoy rediscovering our treasures when we unpack them at the shop.

August 26: Last Day in Oaxaca

On our last day in Oaxaca, we decided to travel (via the Abastos Market) to the village of Atzompa, which specializes in lovely clay figures. There was a better selection than last year, and we bought as many as we thought we could carry on the bus and airplane. Earlier, we had also placed an order for hand-made clay Christmas ornaments, made by the well-known artisans Luis Blanco and his wife María who live in Atzompa.

When we returned to Oaxaca, it was hot and the sun was bright. People walked on the shady side of the street. Some of the men wore sombreros (sombra = shade), and some of the women carried parasols (para sol = for the sun). In the afternoon, we escaped the heat by sitting in the shady courtyard of a pleasant little café, sipping a cerveza and trying to organize our paperwork prior to our long, all-night bus ride to Mexico City.

August 26: Watch Your Step

You must be careful when walking in Mexico – I mean, careful about where you put your feet. The sidewalks are generally constructed of rough stone or cobbles, and often a stone is missing. Cavernous holes may go unrepaired for years, even centuries.

For locals, walking a sidewalk is a little like walking a mountain path – you take it as you find it. Then too, the locals are familiar with the holes, and avoid them without even looking. But you should not be tempted to do as they do. You should keep your eyes on the ground, carefully pre-meditating each and every step.

Of course, this strategy may make you more vulnerable to overhead (or nearly overhead) hazards. In many places, the sidewalks are lined with street vendor stalls that have overhead metal awnings. These awnings are high enough to accommodate a 5-ft. local resident, but they may not accommodate you. From nearly every trip, I return with a minor head wound sustained while I was keeping my eyes on the sidewalk.

August 26-27: All Night on the Bus

We climbed on the bus at 8:30 PM for our all-night trip to the Mexico City airport. This was a 1st-class bus, and there was a big show of security. We had to pass through metal detectors and leave our box of clay figurines in the luggage compartment under the bus (where we feared that they would be smashed to small shards).

At 11:00 PM, we passed the little comedor in the wild mountain area between Oaxaca and Puebla. The night was pitch black, but in the little comedor the blue fluorescent lights were still on, and people were still eating.

We got off the bus in Puebla at 1:00 AM, and caught a taxi to another bus terminal. The taxi driver took one of those disconcerting shortcuts down deserted back streets, but we arrived just fine. At the second terminal, we waited for the 2:30 AM bus to the Mexico City airport. The small terminal was lively, and people seemed wide awake.

We arrived at the Mexico City airport at 4:30 AM. By 6:15 AM, we were on a plane headed home.

[Note: The shipment arrived October 31 with almost no damage. Another trip is in the planning. We'll keep you posted!]

Tinsmiths and Weavers

[Continuing journal written by Chiripa partners on the August 2008 buying trip.]

August 25

Before we headed out of town, we searched out a small tin workshop in downtown Oaxaca, to see tin ornaments being made. The ornaments were not pressed by a machine, as you might expect, but were individually cut and then hammered into shape by a tinsmith using a variety of different small hammers.



The tinsmith’s wife then painted the individual ornaments by hand, with painstaking care. We bought a number of the lovely ornaments for our Chiripa customers.



When we are in Oaxaca, we always make the bus trip to the village to Teotitlán del Valle. This time we also went to the nearby village of Santa Ana del Valle (just up the road from the market town of Tlacolula). Teotitlán and Santa Ana are known for making fine, handwoven wool rugs. Teotitlán is somewhat better known, and a bit more prosperous.

People in these and other area villages still speak Zapotec in their homes. Our friend Eric Chavez, a weaver’s son who grew up in Teotitlán, told us that each village has its own separate Zapotec dialect. These dialects are quite different from each other, so that it may be easier for people from different villages to communicate in Spanish, rather than in Zapotec.

The route to these villages leads down the Tlacolula Valley, past the ancient Tule tree (it was alive in the time of Christ, and is now one of the biggest living things in the world). Further down the road, past the weaving villages, you can visit the impressive pre-Hispanic ruins at Mitla (although we did not have time to visit Mitla on this trip).

In Teotitlán, we bought beautiful natural-dyed rugs and runners from our friends Bulmaro Perez and Federico Chavez, both recognized masters of the weaving craft. On hand-operated looms, these families still produce rich woolen rugs in the old way. Each rug starts with wool gathered from sheep in the surrounding highlands. The wool is carded and spun, colored with natural dyes such as cochineal, indigo and witch hazel, and then skillfully hand-woven into rich and elegant patterns. The families weave their ancient Zapotec tradition and individual craftsmanship into every rug.

Bulmaro demonstrates the natural dyes used in his beautiful rugs.

In Teotitlán, we also bought some warm, hand-knit wool caps from the Women’s Cooperative. We didn’t buy anything in Santa Ana this time, but did pay a visit to the parents of a friend’s acquaintance. Even though the parents did not know us, and were bereaved by a recent death in the family, they were kind enough to invite us for a meal. We had to decline, for lack of time, but will not soon forget their courtesy and hospitality.