“A huevo” (vernacular)
1. The declaration of a shared moment of appreciation and/or assent.
“Mate, the extent to which fundamental conflicts of interest and manipulative marketing strategies are allowed to continue to dominate both research and policy, from investment banking to medicine, is a frigging farce. Pinche capitalismo pendejo.”
“A huevo”
OR (related)
“These mountains, these shrooms…”
“A huevo”
2. To egg.
So little internet, so much to relate. Entonces, Europe should take a leaf out of Mexico’s book; specifically the one pertaining to inter-city bus construction. 19 hours of passable 60mph comfort and I reached the sleepy mountain village of
Xilitla. Heil HITLER was this place beautiful. Frail shrouds of cloud gently ensnared amongst lush treetop canopies. I arrived, shattered, on a grey afternoon with some blessedly refreshing showers of light rain. Antidote for the raging burns i'd sustained whilst surfing in Sayulita (another defeat in my ongoing tussle with the mexican sun). After settling in and stoically forgoing a tactical nap I checked out the local town. Turns out small and incredibly hilly. There were some semi-jovial shenanigans going on at the centre though, with a local band directing some kind of folk dance. From what I could make out, the men stepped rhythmically in half time, the women triplets, and most did it with the utmost solemnity. Only a few boisterous young men visibly appeared to be enjoying themselves; however there was also a palpable deficit in their ability to keep time with the old dogs.
NONETHELESS I'd come here for the chance to see Las Pozas. This was the legacy of Edward James, a wealthy British mentalist who found Eden in Xilitla, and devoted his life to building an insane concrete and stone homage to the surrounding architecture of the antideluvian jungle. His imagination explodes throughout the forest, concrete fantasies in communion with tree, vine and river. This included a series of piercing blue pools below the waterfall, connected by smooth stone slides. It was a ginuwine adult's playground. I've uploaded some photos to try and capture a sense of it.
Next came Puebla just south of El D.F; from the mountains of the north to a new plateau on my ongoing gastronomic Everest. Just off the picturesque main square was a small restaurant named Las Ranas where I ate the most INSANE lamb taco and torta (both being essentially just wheat in different forms). Bread soft as the bottom of the baby Aphrodite, meat more succulent than the most kobe-ed beef, and with the lasting heat of real good salsa. Otherwise Puebla was pleasant, with an interesting exhibit of a revolutionary family's house (La Casa de los Serdan) which still bore the bulletholes of Porfirian violence; however i quickly got itchy feet and followed the best taco i've ever had with
Oaxaca (the city), where I had the worst taco in Mexico. In fairness, I think my expectations had been inestimably raised by my Pueblan tacophilia, but this soggy wrap of pork gristle was more 'street' than 'food'. Thankfully Oxaca was otherwise a winner. A phenomenally majestic Cathedral, buzzing central market and super cheap hostel (necessary after the unfortunately expensive bus fares), where I came across some other travellers. They were a group of French exchange students and Mexican pal who’d just completed a year in Puebla; we had some beers and a dinner of much-needed salad (VEGETABLES) and I've linked up with them for my tour of Oaxaca (the province). The first stop was the aptly named
Hierva el Agua - some idyllic springs boiling up out of the mountains and settling in two deep infinity pools (no joke - looking onto more mountains) of deep blue and semi-translucent green. Great swimming, and something of a local water park which gets a little hectic during the day. Mik-mik, the Mexican i'm with, dismissed these basketball shirt-clad merrymakers as Americanised adulators of the north’s consumerist culture; the US is evidently a perenially divisive part of contemporary Mexican identities. He also began waxing lyrical about a place that translates to 'sky harbour', and an incredible natural phenomenon he'd only witnessed 17-18 times, where the island disappears before your eyes, and the air is cold. Mist. He was talking about mist. The poor guy's also never had the chance to experience snow. Part of the natural wonder here, though, were the cascadas petrificales - residue left by minerals in the water reacting with the stone, forming a frozen edifice of liquid, ‘flowing’ rock. Check it out in the photos, yo; sone muy bonito.
After sunrise we engaged in the agonising existentialism that is hitch-hiking; sitting in an infinite roadside limbo, hopes rising and falling with each passing car. Thankfully Mexico is not Europe, and the longest we had to wait was an hour. After a few generous lifts we succeeded in ascending 3,000 metres to the tranquil village of San Jose del Pacifico. THIS was an incredible move. We found a hillside cabin (the shower heated by a wood-fired stove!) looking down yet another misty valley of primordial green forest, and before a relaxed evening we checked in with the local (agri)Culturalist to get involved with a shamanistic ‘Temaszcal’ ritual for the following morning. This consisted of a 2km walk to his cabin at 7am, dressing down to boxers and sitting in a small, clay igloo. There followed a bodily purge, courtesy of especially brewed teas flicked onto red hot stones in the centre of the hut. A super humid steam room of eucalpytus, rosemary, arnica and other delicious herbs. This was completed with a quick, cold shower in water and then warm shroom tea. DESPUES, cleansed and refreshed, came the tea itself. Unexpectedly delicious in that it only hinted at the powerful earth twang of the actual fungus. The next few hours were spent on the jungly hillside, contemplating the infinite Now, the mindblowing, ultra-real beauty of Mother Nature, and the absolute subjectivity of our individual experience of both. “The martyrs go hand in hand into the arena; they are crucified alone” (Huxley). A seriously good trip.
This has become one of the longest things i've written all year, so I will leave you here for the beaches of the south-west. Hope all is well, I’m
Pacifically chilled.
