Two Dramamines and the front seat of the shared van and I slept right through all the curves of the drive and the Ozzies in the back giving each other wet willies and farting and laughing at their own farts.
"They collectively have two brain cells," a friend in Oaxaca would later say upon meeting them. "But each cell entertains the other."
So it was that I woke up at the bus stop back in Oaxaca, my favorite place in Mexico so far (the city, not the bus stop), except this time with Josh, Josh, Oscar, Cas, and Rob along for the trip. We taxied through the crazy Día de los Muertos traffic to the Airbnb with Oscar's surf board hanging out the window, and when we got there I claimed a room and locked the door and made a little altar of books and vegetables and kind words in quotes to keep the evil spirits (my roommates) away.
The gang reunited in the living room, quickly procured bottles of liquor stashed away in who-knows-which body cavity, pulled up Latin Billboard's 100 on the TV speaker, and let the energy carry us away. It was Tuesday, October 31st, 3pm. As good a time as any to start la fiesta sin fin, the multi-day celebration of Día de los Muertos in Oaxaca, the city we were frequently told is the best place in the world to be for Día de los Muertos.
Following, a rundown of the days and nights, reflections on what I've been reading, and a gruesome little tale of romantic woe, sure to make your tummy shiver. Gracias por leer mi blog, güey. Espero que te guste.
It's not makeup, it's facepaint!
Me, Cas, Dirty Josh, Other Josh, Oscar
___
A Primer
Wait, Davidcito, I am but a fool, you may be thinking. I slept through middle school Spanish class and refused to watch Coco because of my fragile sense of masculinity and/or adulthood. I don't know what Día de los Muertos is!
First of all, Coco is for adults and tough men. Secondly, I picked up a good bit of información along the way, and I'd be proud to paint you with some primer before we begin.
Día de los Muertos: Is not Spanish for "Halloween." The celebration is really a blend of an Aztec/Mexica celebration of the underworld gods and the Catholic "All Souls Day." It's a good example of the blend of Catholicism and traditional beliefs that makes Mexico so interesting. While "All Souls Day" was more about remembering the deceased, the Aztec belief held that, on the days of celebration, the souls of the dead returned to visit their loved ones.
This belief of return is really what frames the celebration of el día. And of course, if someone's coming back after some time away, you'd want to receive them well. Families make ofrendas -- offerings, altars -- in their homes and at cemeteries to welcome their loved ones. Common altar decorations include marigold flowers (the bright orange shade was everywhere in Oaxaca), pictures of the person being welcomed, candles, incense, and, certainly, food and drink. It isn't some glum, sit-up-straight-for-the-ghost-of-grandma affair, either. It's more, take-a-shot-and-sing-along. This is grandma's favorite song. And we know she's here singing with us.
It's a real belief about the return, unlike many of the "beliefs" around US holidays (Santa's in the chimney, the Native Americans and the Pilgrims held hands and said a prayer, something about a chocolate bunny). As an example, I was driving with the director of the school I was volunteering at in Puerto Escondido (yes, I know, volunteer, good person, thank you), and he told me about how his family would celebrate.
There would be food and drink with all the family at his mother's house, he said. And at night, they would take his son Matias to meet his bisabuela -- his great grandmother, who had passed away. That's the way he said it. "A conocerla." To meet her.
It's a multi-day event, each day celebrating the return of different groups of people. At the end, on November 2nd, the spirits are thought to return to the other side. But from the 31st to the 2nd is a lively celebration, families and music and nightlife and joy.
Into the fray step five tall white boys. Would we be able to have a cultural experience? Would we see anything authentic, or spend the week staring down the neck of an upturned beer bottle?
I hoped, truly, for the former, but I wasn't too confident. The Ozzies couldn't spell "experience," but they sure could drink.
Let's see how this goes.
A colorful Oaxacan street
____
The Events
October 31st, Tuesday: We get to the Airbnb, have some drinks, then make our way to the center of Oaxaca. The already-colorful city is decorated to the nueves -- skeleton figures, street art, food vendors, and people out in costume and face paint.
The five stooges make our way to the hostel Cas and I stayed at before for drinks, with the idea that the people there would know where to go at night. "Eleven o'clock," we're told. "Then we go to the panteón -- the cemetery, where people will be celebrating. So we drink until eleven, then follow Kevin, the short British man who works at the hostel, in a big crowd on a long dark walk through the streets. We find the panteón. Here it is, the cultural experience!
There's a stage, but it's empty. We look around in confusion. The gate is locked. It's closed.
"Alright," Kevin says in his dumb British accent. "Next cemetery!" Off we go, walking like a bunch of dumb British scones or whatever, and we get to the next cemetery, and it's dark and empty, too.
"Alright," Kevin says, and I tune out the rest. Now it's late, like 1AM. There's talk about another cemetery, but Cas and I decide to head home. We walk the hour back to the Airbnb, kind of pissed. I had broken one of my rules to success: don't trust the Brits. We had spent the first night of el Día looking at the same gnarly hostel pool, drinking with a bunch of tourists. Now, a long walk home. This is our punishment. We try running, make it 2 blocks. Back to sad walk. The only redemption is stopping at a store to get a sleeve of Maria cookies for a dollar, and I eat the whole thing out of spite. Stupid Kevin.
_
November 1st, Wednesday: I wake up with a mission: See something real. Cas has the same mission. The Australians are scattered around the floor in half-liquid form. Early (kind of) we get on the bus to the center, and Rob (who is actually from England but seems vaguely trustworthy, against my better judgement) joins us. We head to Jalatlaco, a neighborhood of murals and colors, which is supposedly central to the action. We find people in stores, non-Australians and non-Brits, and ask them about activities for the day. The parade's at five, we're told. Be back at five. Okay, we can do that. Rob is so hungover that he's been moaning the whole time, deep, guttural, British sounds, and he gets a taxi back to the Airbnb. Cas and I walk around the town, explore the markets, check out the art. Very cool stuff. I stop for an ice cream, and as soon as I have it a little kid emerges from the shadows.
"Will you get me an ice cream?" he asks. He tugs on my shirt. He's maybe seven years old.
"Ah shit," I say, because I love ice cream, but I also have never really been able to say no to kids, which makes me bad at teaching but a favorite among kids. I get another cup and scoop half my ice cream into it. It feels like scooping out my own flesh. He lights up like a little Oaxacan candle, I slump my shoulders in defeat, and then like five more kids come running out, all doing the will-you-get-me-an-ice-cream, will-you-get-me-an-ice-cream, tug and shuffle.
Woah whoa whoa. Muchos niños. Thankfully, in last week's blog, I learned to say no. Now it's time to practice.
"Scram, fuckers!" I say. Just kidding. I point to the first kid. "He'll share with you," I say. I pass out extra spoons. That's like saying no. The best I can do.
Anyway, at five we head to watch the parade. We've got the five of us all together, like some hungover, off-brand version of the Avengers. The Discreditable Hulk. Captain Marvel-at-their-stupidity. The main street in Oaxaca along the Santo Domingo church is pedestrian-only, filled with vendors and art and people in costume. We get our faces painted like skeletons. Cas, bald, and a lover of attention, gets the back of his head painted. Oscar, dumb, and a lover of dumb ideas, gets raccoon eyes instead of a skeleton.
Off we go. The general store for beers and snacks, and then to the main plaza to watch the parade come in. It seems like 20,000 people walking down the main drag into the square, with a big stage and band, fireworks going off, music, dancing, all of it in the brightly-lit Oaxacan night. Coupled with the markets and the art earlier, it feels like a real day, a real thing, not just a party. Like seeing something worth seeing. I was hitting my goal! I can do the things I want to do! I'm a real boy!
But don't you know it, all of a sudden the parade ends and we all need to tinkle, and the only place we can think of is the hostel, and then we're back there, sucked into the vortex of the 2-for-3$ beers.
Even worse, there's a beer pong table, and soon I'm getting pulled down, down into the depths, missing cups and blaming the wind (there's no wind), yelling "run it back, run it back" in half-skeleton facepaint.
"Davey boy," Cas says, "time to go to the cemetery."
And thank willy he does. The two of us set off for a walk (the Ozzies don't want to stop drinking and Rob, I assume, is dead). We sober up in the cool night air, and make it eventually to el panteón.
The cemetery, truly, is beautiful. Lights shine from the majority of the tombs, brightly lit altars set to welcome loved ones back to the earth. Families are gathered, some playing music, most sharing food and drinks and laughter, talking about the people they are reuniting with. Cas and I walk slowly around, and eventually one woman, a mother of a family, welcomes us. We stand with her for a bit, and she gives us a cup and offers us mezcal, and she tells us a few stories about her grandmother, the woman they are celebrating. She is happy, remarkably happy. Her whole family is smiling, laughing, enjoying the moment. For an instant, we got to be part of it. We thank her and share a drink.
Later we reunite with the crew, make our way to a club for more drinks and dancing in costume. It's a great night altogether. But the highlight, undoubtably, is the generosity the woman extended to us at the cemetery, the welcome she shared, the invitation to participate in a tradition. It was a window into another belief, another custom, definitely. But it was also a window into true kindness.
_
November 2nd, Thursday: The past few days have caught up to the gang. For what it's worth, I watched one Australian pal at a bar shake a bunch of cocaine into his palm and then toss it down his gullet like a handful of peanuts. That'll catch up to you. In the morning they're all watching Adam Sandler, and I get the running itch (the itch to run, not itches from running), and so I go to the mountain behind our Airbnb and start hoofing it uphill. Quickly, it starts to feel like the insides of my body are on the outside and I'm getting pelted by rocks all over, so I walk the incline. Eventually, though, I get up to the ridge line, and then I get to hoot and holler on the trails winding through high pasture and cornfields with views of the city all around. That afternoon we go for food, and the gang, unbelievably, calls it an early night. One of my friends from high school, L, is also in Oaxaca, and the two of us spend the night watching the celebrations and trying out a few different bars. (I'll use abbreviations for L and her travel companion J, in consideration of the story at the end).
_
November 3rd, 4th, Friday and Saturday: Friday we check out of the Airbnb. We all go our separate ways -- Cas to Mexico City for a wedding he got invited to, the Australians to another hostel to "chill for a few days," (Maury: "That was a lie!") Rob I think to the hospital? and me to the same dang hostel, Ticuchi, for one night before my bus on Saturday night (it was the only place available). We group hug in the living room, wish each other well on our continued travels. Friday I do a little run around a track, I go watch the sunset with L, and we meet up with her travel partner, J, for wine on their rooftop, even though every cell in my body is begging me in multiple languages to stop drinking. Saturday I pack my bags and get ready for another night bus, away from Oaxaca. I get on the bus and think of the whole thing, the good friends, the goodbyes, the fun parties and mostly the experience at the cemetery, and I'm happy with all of it. It felt real.
One time, I paid $50,000 per year for an undergraduate degree in creative writing, and I learned that when you start and end a story in the same way, it's called a bookend.
On the bus I pop two Dramamine and fall fast asleep. And there we have it: a bookend.
___
Three Authors
So there it is, Day of the Dead. There's a lot more I could say, many more heinous deeds the Australians committed and many more meals, sights, sounds that I could report on, but I'm sitting at a coffee shop in a new town three days sober thinking about the whole thing and I don't really want to write about all that. Instead, I'd like to write about what I'm thinking about, and what I'm thinking about is what I've been reading, and what I've been reading is connected to what I've been writing. Permit me an explanation.
The first thing I read when Day of the Dead was over was L and J's travel blogs. They're both wonderful writers, and I finished reading their updates feeling really impacted by what they wrote.
J wrote a post about safety and the idea of guilt. She brought up a really thoughtful notion about "the backwards ironies of 'backpacking Latin America,'" of being a tourist searching for the "authentic" and the "real" in countries where so many residents are simply striving to get by, or in many cases, fleeing in search of safety and opportunity. She contrasts this with the mentality that many travelers have, of backpacking only for the purpose of partying and getting drunk.
L, in her Day of the Dead blog post, talked about her conflicting feelings of going on a cemetery tour and what she observed. She writes, discussing the cemetery, "I overheard a snippet of a Mexican family’s conversation: 'está tan lleno de gringos tomando fotos.' Translation: It’s so full of gringos taking pictures.'"
Both of them are grappling with conflicting feelings about travel. They're raising questions about how we travel, the impact and implications of our decisions, and the harsh reality that we have to confront about inequity, about privilege, and about the commodification of other cultures. Their writing is honest and contains depth. It feels humane and vulnerable.
Why am I thinking about this? I shared my blog with them, too. My last post, if you read it, was mostly about drugs and a hookup. There's a brief interlude to discuss my underwear. Zoinks.
Here's my takeaway: L and J are the best kind of traveler. They're conscientious, willing to acknowledge that we may not have all the answers but that we have to try, as J wrote, to "spread the cultural awareness and understanding [we] gain to others in order to bridge differences," as well as to "ground [ourselves] in the honor and gratitude [we] feel to be able to experience these places." Or, as L put it, we need to consider our "impact as a tourist, the positive and negative, and how [we] approach travel as a whole."
In all, one of the greatest strengths of both of their writing -- and their outlooks -- is that their focus is external: on the people, the cultures, and the communities they are interacting with. From there, they form their reflections.
My 19 minute, irony-laced ode to day drinking and the color of my own ass, well, it wasn't like that. For a lot of the time, I'm writing about...me.
The best thing we can do is learn from each other. I had experiences reading both of their blogs and talking to both of them that made me think, okay, yes, this is a big adventure. But the true adventure is in being curious, in getting to know cultures and customs and real people who are from the places you travel to. It's learning. Moving forward, I'm grateful for their reminder and example that the focus should be outward. Curiously, respectfully, outward.
_
So that's two. The third author I've been reading is Pam Houston. Pam Houston, like L and J, is an American treasure. She is my new favorite author. I read her book "Deep Creek," over the summer about buying a ranch in rural Colorado and finding herself through a sense of place. This past week, I finally got off the digital library waitlist for her collection of essays, "Cowboys are My Weakness," detailing all the relationships she had as a younger woman living in the American West, and all the things she learned about herself through those experiences (experiences like coming face-to-face with grizzlies, like following a crush on multi-day sheep hunts in Alaska, like riding rapids and racing horses in attempts to prove herself to men). I read the book in two sittings (one of which was on the outdoor sofa at the Airbnb in Oaxaca, curled under the tablecloth since all the blankets were taken. The other was on the night bus before the Dramamine kicked in.)
Pam Houston writes things like this:
"Watching Monte ride off through the long grains, I thought about the way we invent ourselves through our stories, and in a similar way, how the stories we tell put walls around our lives. And I think that may be true about cowboys."
That's a hell of a quote. It reminds me of another quote that Steve Almond said on the Dear Sugar podcast, about how we write because it's a way of making sense of who we are and the world around us. One idea is just that: The stories we tell are self-defining. They tell us who we are.
The other, maybe more challenging notion that Houston brings up, is that by defining ourselves through the stories we tell, we are limiting ourselves. We're creating narratives about who we are that we are then held within.
Another way of thinking of the same idea: the events in our lives are fixed, they are true. The thing we all do, the funny little human habit we all have, is to weave lines between the events, to interpret them in a way that gives them meaning as a whole. If we change the lines, we change the meaning.
Here's a magnificent piece of art I made to show the idea.
An easy example: You start a job. You get fired from that job. You get another job. Three fixed, factual events.
One line you might draw is that the world is against you. You can never catch a break. Capitalism is a scam, etc. You are never meant to have a good job and a steady income and all that is afforded through those things. You are not a family person. You are a drifter. You should do meth.
Another you might think of is that the world is constantly looking out for you. She gave you a break out of a situation that wasn't going anywhere, and put you somewhere you needed to be. You are made of stardust, a being of eternal light. You should share your good graces with the world through interpretive dance.
Either way, you then frame yourself within the narrative you've created. The stories build walls.
___
So what's it all mean? As I've said before and I'll probably say again, I ain't got a rootin' tootin' clue. I'm as empty as a tip jar at the embalmer's office. As blank as an X-ray on an earthworm.
But I think Pam Houston would argue that our job is to consider the narratives we tell about ourselves -- the lines we create. We should evaluate which ones hold weight, are true to the events that take place, and which do us good. We should find the ones that hold us back, that limit us. And fricken' scrap 'em.
When I set out to write the blog, my only goal was to tell good stories. Funny, entertaining, hopefully. Based in reality, but sometimes only loosely. As I look back, included in all of these stories are throughlines about who I think I am and who I want to be. There's narratives, somewhat ironic, about being an idiot abroad. About partying, chasing adventure, about mistakes and danger in which I, invariably, am the protagonist. But there's throughlines too about morality, about values. Reading L and J's blogs, I've found a throughline that I'd like to develop more, about respectful curiosity for the places and people I encounter. And I'll develop that.
And, reading Pam Houston, I'm reminded that I shouldn't be beholden by the lines I've set. I can write about being a big dumb gringo, but I don't actually have to be one.
I'm also reminded by Pam Houston that by writing about ourselves, by weaving stories out of the events in our lives, we do the work of seeing who we are. Through writing about ourselves, we explore. It's a self-portrait, or even better, taking the blindfold off after painting a self-portrait. So, as much as I'll add the focus on the exterior, on the people around me, I'll keep myself in the frame. I want to be curious about the world and the cultures I'm meeting. But I want to maintain curiosity towards myself, too.
All that said, the stories ain't stoppin'!
___
I'll end on one more story. L and J and I were sitting at dinner in Oaxaca. We were ordering food to share. They asked how much I eat, because they, they said, ate like little birds. I thought about eating whole sleeves of cookies at a time, five plates of dinner in one sitting. "A normal amount," I said. When we split ways I got four tacos and two ice cream cones on the way home.
Anyway, we were talking about meeting people when traveling, and one of us told the following story, which has become one of my favorite stories for it's encapsulation of Mexico, a land of romance and trouble and creative solutions. I won't say to whom this story belongs, in order to protect dignity. Could be me, could be one of them. I'm not telling.
"I had gone out with this Mexican person before," the story started, "and they did all these romantic gestures all the time. So this time when we went to hang out, they picked me up in the car, and they had a picnic all loaded, and we went to a park and had a romantic little picnic.
"And then I realized I had to go to the bathroom. And we kind of joked about it, in a funny, romantic way. But then I was like, no, I really have to go to the bathroom. Not some behind-the-shrub affair. A bathroom bathroom.
"'It's bad?' they ask.
"'Bad enough that I think I should just go home, I'm sorry,' I say.
"So we get back in the car and my stomach is aching. I realize then, I'm not gonna make it. We're fifteen minutes from the launchpad, but the rocket, so to speak, is reaching ignition. I say, 'Pull over, pull over,' and they stop at a big Starbucks in a sort of mall. And I run towards the bathroom and there's a line like five people deep. I'm starting to sweat buckets. I ask the cashier, 'Is there another bathroom?' and she says, 'Upstairs.' So I sprint upstairs. And the upstairs bathroom is locked. So I sprint back downstairs, but sprinting downstairs is all impact. Bad impact. And I just couldn't do it. I let it go. I let it all go."
"No way," the two listeners at dinner say.
"Yes," the story owner continues. "On the stairs. All over. And I'm wearing white freaking shorts.
"So finally the cashier comes and opens the upstairs bathroom, and I'm up there trying to clean out my shit-filled clothes, and I call the person I'm on the date with and tell them they have to go get me clothes.
"Instead they come knock on the bathroom door. I open it, and they're holding a scarf. 'It's my mom's scarf,' they say.
"'Ay, Jesus,' I say. I wrap myself in the scarf and get back in the car. I don't look at them. I tell them not to look at me. Never to look at me again. They drop me at my Airbnb. I get out without a word.
" ' Don't iron the scarf," they say.
"And that was the end of the relationship."
___
So there it is, in all it's glory: Día de los Muertos in Oaxaca. A collection of stories. All in all, another chapter in the fun, strange adventure, another learning experience. An open mind, they say, is good. Hope all is well in the real world.
-Davey boy (with a light dusting of glitter)
Great stuff, David! Glad that you met up with L and friend. Interesting to read about how their writing affected you and your writing. somewhat typical of art in all its forms.