Oaxaca - Jan-Feb 2009

I arrived in the city of Oaxaca, capital of the state by the same name (by the way, a little known fact is that Mexico is officially called Los Estados Unidos De Mexico- the United States of Mexico, and it's a federation of 31 states plus the separate federal district). The city lies in a semi-arid valley, and is surrounded by a desert with a large variety of cacti. Well, I'm pretty sure in Israeli terms it wouldn't count as a desert, but in Mexico it is considered one. It actually reminded me a little bit of the semi-arid desert around Jerusalem. On the bus there I could already see one of the things the area is famous for: hundreds of fields of agave, a plant used to make the local drink mezcal, line the road to the city. The surrounding area is predominantly brownish yellow mountains, and is beautiful in a harsh way.

Chiapas- Jan. 2009

Ah, the mountains. In the Yucatan Peninsula I knew I was missing something, and once I got off the bus at Palenque I realised what it was: topography! The peninsula is extremely flat, with nothing more than an 80m hill in sight, and even that's a rarity. So when I laid my eyes on the green mountains of Chiapas, a smile emerged on my face, as if by itself.

Yucatán - Dec. 2008

[I'm gonna start and publish my edited group emails from my first trip to Mexico, back in 2008-9. It's been pretty interesting to read them from my current perspective, 6.5 years later and again in Mexico for a few months. Some things haven't changed, some things read as extremely naive, some are just interesting in the light of so much more knowledge I have today. Anyway, while reading, you can keep in mind that this was written by a past version of me. Or not, whatever strikes your fancy.]

Right from the start I felt that my Central American trip would be very different from my South American one. Initially, the main difference was sand vs ice. Where the first trip started out with snow-capped mountains, glaciers, whitewater rivers, waterfalls and multi-day treks, the second one was beach, beach, sun & beach.

25 things, supposedly about me

My cousin just reminded me of this list. It's something I wrote on facebook (I know...) a few months ago. Important update: I now have a harmonica, but in 4 months I haven't learnt how to play it. Oh, well. It's reproduced pretty much verbatim:

1. Let's start off big, why don't we: I have recently come to the conclusion (or maybe what I did recently is phrase a thought I've had for a long time) that I am quite in love with my doubt. I find it very hard to be sure of something, to be totally convinced, to not see the other side of a question. As such, I feel hard-pressed to commit to anything of importance, any single ideology, any major "truth". In fact, my one and only solid belief might be that there's no absolute truth.