The arrival...

No tengo tiempo escriber un blog grande, pero...

Bill and Myrna had to leave for their flight at 4am, but I was able to sleep for a little while longer until I was too excited and nervous to sleep. Instead I finished the unabridged inventory of the contents of my backpack that mom and I had started while I was packing at my grandparents house. I took a shower and went downstairs for the free buffet. Oh it was so good and the staff encouraged me to try everything and took good care of me. The highlights: a tasty chicken and cheese omlette and the pina y coco yogurt. I went in a hotel shuttle back to the airport (although I could have easily walked) and had no trouble getting my tickets and getting through security. I wanted to let my parents know what happened and that I would be arriving in oaxaca later that day so when I saw a guy who looked like a university student a bit younger than me playing a game on his laptop I asked if I could use the internet. We got to talking about Oaxaca and dia de los muertos, and he gave me suggestions of foods I have to try. His name is Oscar and he was going back to visit his parents in Chiapas for the school break. We talked a little about the Zapatistas as well and he told me some stories about what it was like to be a small child in Chiapas in 1994.

I got to my gate on-time that day and the flight was very short. From the airport in Oaxaca (which is tiny. My dad would probably appreciate knowing that it is a walk-off-the-plane situation like when we visited the Big Island) I took a Taxi-Van with eight other people. When we got further into oaxaca it felt like we were going in circles and that the driver was dropping us off in no particular order. From my window seat I had a great view of the homes, stores, parks we passed, but what really struck me was the graffiti. I was fortunate enough to be the last person dropped off (although that seemeds kind of odd at the time) and it felt like I was getting a fast paced tour of the ¨public art¨ that covers the walls of all buildings and doors, with my own interpretation of the stencil work and messages as a tourguide. A lot of the graffiti was by & about APPO. There were also really large beautiful stencil works that gave me chills due to both their subject matter and creativity. I was dropped off in front of the garage-front door of the family I arranged to stay with and after putting my things in my room I went out to explore a bit. I mostly found an internet cafe or two (where I could send a message to my mom again) and a lot of mosquitos. I didn´t go too far because it was already getting dark.

The real exploring took place the next day. That is when I set out to find specific graffiti that I had seen the day before to take pictures. To my schock and disapointment many of the stencils near the zocalo were already painted over. This gave me a sense of urgency, I needed to find other graffiti masterpieces to see them again before they vanished forever.