Twistedspinster

Bjo and Ruth do San Cristobal

We started out Friday... going through LAX was great. The trip was great. The Mexico City Airport was not. It took us 2 hours to get through Migracion and so we missed our connection to Tuxtla Gutierrez. ooof.

We´re too old to do the damsels in distress, so we did two bitchy (and hysterical and very tired and cranky) old broads. Aviacsa airline finally waived the extra fee for the rebooking, and a very nice manager lady who was on very friendly terms with the Holiday Inn shuttle manager (kiss kiss) got us a ride and discounted room. Nice room, and it turns out that the mattresses were better than El Paraiso anyway.

We finally caught the connection to Tuxtla Guttierez (sp) and then took a taxi up to San Cristobal. It was an interesting ride. The driver´s name was David, but he didn´t speak English. He had a great time with us, though, giving the gringas a fun drive. Let´s just say they don´t drive that way in LA.

San Cristobal is awesome, but don´t believe it when the guidebooks tell you that you´ll always find someone who speaks English. But Josh (our last minute guide replacement) is good, and he takes good care of us.

Saturday afternoon we walked around and discovered a marvelous artisan´s market. Pictures are slowly uploading to Flickr... I may not get them all in tonight.

We met Chip Morris last night at dinner, which was at the hotel and very good, by the way. Chip looks like an old hippy, but is really an old, opinionated academic, with a passion for textiles. He also speaks several of the Mayan dialects, which helps a lot.

Today we toured a couple of Mayan towns, Chamula and Zinacantan, and the weather was drizzly. I bought a nice warm jacket at the women´s collective in Chamula, and it would even be nice to wear in the Library.

When we went to Zinacantan, at a place that translates to "Work of the Women in the Center," we were treated to homemade tortillas, and the fillings, cheese, salsa, and ground up toasted squash seeds. They also gave us some poshe, fermented sugar cane -- supposedly to get us drunk so we would buy lots of stuff. I almost bought a skirt... but somehow she didn´t come down from 500 pesos to the 50 I had in my pocket.

Bjo say hi, and she´s gonna do her own bjotting at bjottings.blogspot.com

posted by Ruth S. @ 4:00 PM