Sunday ; Sunny and warm, a very nice day.
We slept late this morning. Still “recuperating” from the ordeal of a day of travel, we think. Maybe a bit of “jet lag” thrown in.
After a late start to the day, and a late breakfast we walked a couple of blocks to Mercado La Noria, our nearby mercado / market, to buy fresh fruits and vegetables. Well, that was the plan. I also bought some eggs, which can be bought here individually for three pesos / twenty-four cents each. And a small round of queso fresco. And this cheese was really fresco ! And still wrapped in its rind. Did not know that queso fresco has a rind. We’ve always seen it in its more “sanitized” looking version, with rind removed.
When I saw the queso fresco in the vendor’s glass display case, I asked “cuanto cuesta ?” / how much does it cost ? She replied viente-cinco (25) pesos / two dollars. SOLD ! She reached underneath her counter, took out a fresh round, still wrapped in rind, then sliced around the rind, removing the top half of the rind and leaving the round of cheese still sitting in the bottom half of the rind, as if it was in a bowl.
I “crumbled” some of it using the back of a spoon onto our home made tacos tonight. Crumbling it like that made it somewhat like feta, but much better tasting.
At home in the afternoon I paid the second half of our first month’s rent here, sending it via Western Union, as I did a couple of months ago with the deposit / first half of this month’s rent.
After a brief nap for me late in the afternoon we went out for a long walk to explore the neighbourhood. But first we went up four flights of stairs outside our apartment door to see the building’s rooftop patio. Nice, but … yeah ... our days of climbing four flights of stairs to see a nice view are … behind us. I doubt that we will be up there again. HA HA HA !
We wandered all around the neighbourhood for an hour and a half or so, finding restaurants, and lavanderias, and dentists, an interesting clothing store (with a lovely and sociable Siamese kitten), and churches, and … eventually getting lost. Good thing we had that i-Phone and its GPS map app !
Monday ; Sunny and warm, very nice weather here.
Our (Joanne’s) priority for today was to go to Mole Juquilita, the nearby chocolate and mole manufacturer to buy mole amarillo / yellow mole (molay) and freshly made chcocolate. Mole amarillo is one of the seven types of mole made in Oaxaca, and apparently the one most popular / best suited to be paired with chicken recipes. Moles are “cooking sauces” that are made with bitter chocolate as their foundation. Tastes a lot better than it sounds ! But we had no idea what form it is when bought from the artisanal manufacturer. Same with the (sweet) fresh chocolate Joanne wanted to buy / try.
We walked two blocks to Mole Juquilita. Neither the husband (back of shop, making the products) nor the wife (front of shop, selling the products) spoke English. Nevertheless we were able to understand both of them, who spoke Spanish slowly and simply to us. First we bought the mole amarillo. We were a bit surprised to find that it is sold “en polvo” / in powder form. The wife explained that it is be mixed with chicken broth, warm but not hot, or the powder will “harden”. The husband added that beef broth or pork broth is acceptable.
The chocolate, mixed in many variations / recipes, is sold in “rueda” (wheel) form, like hard “pucks”, picture attached below. The recipe / flavour we bought is chocolate a la canella y almendras / cinammon and almonds.
When we returned home I was eager to try the fresh chocolate, but … unsure how. So … I dropped a chocolate wheel / puck into the blender and … let ‘er rip ! OK … so now I had powdered chocolate with cinammon and almonds. OK … I added milk and … let ‘er rip ! WOW … great chocolate milk ! I wanted to try making that into a milkshake, but we didn’t have any ice cream. I added a few ice cubes to the blender and … let ‘er rip ! Well … not bad, but would be better with ice cream. We’ll buy some today when we return to Chedraui this afternoon for (mostly) non-food replenishment.
Our apartment building’s maintenance man came over this afternoon to resolve a number of minor maintenance items I had advised the landlord needed to be done. It seems to me that many of these AirBnB type rental apartments are habitually rented by three day to one week tenants who never advise the landlord of minor maintenance issues that should / need to be addressed.
While trying to retrieve a kitchen knife that Joanne had dropped behind the kitchen sink counter top … (don’t even ask … it’s Mexico !) … I banged my head into the cupboard above, splitting my scalp. OW !
After lunch and a brief nap for me we set off for Chedraui, the nearby large supermarket. We bought all the non-food items on our shopping list, and a few food items. HMPH … another large grocery store bill ! While at Chedraui I again withdrew a fairly large amount of cash from the Banamex ATM.
Joanne made pollo con mole amarillo sobre arroz / chicken with yellow mole sauce on rice, green beans on the side, for supper tonight. T’was a success ! Well done !
We have English language TV streaming services on the TV in our apartment. Joanne wanted to watch the final episode of THIS IS US while eating supper. We had not seen the final episode. Yesterday and Sunday we watched a few episodes of GRACE & FRANKIE, a series that she was introduced to by her sister a few years ago.
Tuesday ; Sunny and warm, another very nice day.
Ate a grasshopper today ! First time ! Probably the only time !
Staggered out of bed this morning at 7 AM, full bladder, headed to bathroom. YIKES … huge cockroach … STOMP ! HMPH … couldn’t get back to sleep after that !
We spent most of today exploring the two enormous mercados of Oaxaca ; Mercado 20 de Noviembre and across the street Mercado Benito Juarez. They are both about a mile from our apartment, so … walking distance. Mercado 20 de Noviembre is mostly food related ; bakeries, chocolate and mole vendors, butchers, fish mongers, and a lot of restaurants. Including what is known as Carnivore Row, a rather unique approach to selling meat based meals. Mercado Benito Juarez across the street is fruit and vegetable vendors, and lots of vendors selling lots of “stuff” ; exquisite Mexican embroidered clothing, bags, purse, belts, etc. and exquisite leather goods.
We bought some pan dulce (pastries), a couple of teleras (big sandwich buns), a round of fresh Queso Oaxaqueña (Oaxacan thick “string” cheese, slightly sweet, excellent !), a variety of fruits and vegetables. We had a tlayuda for lunch, deferring Carnivore Row until a future visit.
A tlayuda is sort of a Mexican version of a pizza, on a huge, round, corn tortilla, dark mole spread on (like tomato sauce on a pizza), covered with onions, tomato, lettuce, avocado, frijoles, etc. and … meat of your choice. We shared a tasajo (beef steak) tlayuda. It was interesting, not great. I ate a bit of the huge corn tortilla, then scraped the toppings off and ate them. I can’t process corn. While we ate lunch we chatted with a California woman sitting near us, while her Argentinian asshole husband rudely ignored us. I wonder if he’s an asshole because he’s from Argentina or because he’s now American ?
Carnivore Row aka Meat Row works like this ; there is a long aisle filled with meat vendors showcasing a variety of cuts of meats and sausages, beef, pork, and chicken. Each vendor has a wood fire barbecue grill. You select your meat choice and wait while they cook it for you, and serve it to you on a platter. Then you walk to the end of the long aisle where there are more vendors, these vendors selling “side dishes” and small bowls of “condiments” ; pico de gallo, roasted onions, a whole lot of different types of fire roasted peppers, shredded cabbage, shredded lettuce, arroz (seasoned rice) and so on. You buy side dishes and condiments, sit down at the long wooden picnic tables, and … chow down ! The whole area is smoky from meats being cooked on the wood fires, and fragrant with the smells of the cooking meat and everything else. YUMMY !
<whispering> Certainly beats the smells around the pescaderos (fish mongers) !
Beside the cheese vendor where I bought the Oaxacan string cheese was a vendor selling chapulines (chapooLEEnez) / seasoned, roasted or fried crickets and grasshoppers, a local culinary specialty. In many different sizes. They are eaten as a snack (like roasted peanuts ?), or added to other dishes, such as on a tlayuda, (or a pizza ?). OK … when in Rome … etc. I asked the vendor for a sample. I thought she would offer me a teensy little cricket, but NOOOOO ! She handed me a ginormous grasshopper ! YIKES ! I cringed, swallowed hard once, opened my mouth, threw it in, and … began chewing. HMPH ! Crunchy ! Salty ! UHHH … gracias, señora … I guess.
Throughout the day I was intermittently carrying on a WhatsApp texting conversation with a local dentista (female), starting and stumbling with the dentista, then via her English speaking assistant, trying to obtain information, “discussing” (negotiating) prices for examinations and cleanings, then making an appointment for dental cleanings for each of us in a couple of months.
I baked a fish fillet for supper tonight, a Tilapia fillet I bought yesterday at Chedraui. We watched another episode of Grace & Frankie while we ate supper.
Wednesday ; Sunny and warm, weather here seems close to perfect so far.
We slept very late again this morning. <shrug> Old people, lots of walking ! After a late breakfast we set off with our large bag of dirty laundry to the nearest lavanderia, 3 ½ blocks away. Each place we go to in Mexico, the lavanderias are further away from our apartments, and the prices are higher. Playa del Carmen was half a block, 13 pesos per kilogram of laundry. Price here is 22 pesos per kilogram.
I got a bit twisted around on our return trip home, and ended up at Mercado La Noria. Not where we were planning to go, but … since we were there Joanne went in to buy a leek she wanted for a recipe. I decided to check out the dentist outside the market. As I was looking at the signage on the building, the dentista arrived to open her office, her baby strapped to her chest, her older daughter (8 to 10 yrs. old ?) in her school uniform beside her. The dentista did not speak English, but she was welcoming and pleasant. Between my fractured Spanish, and her older daughter’s fractured (and reluctant) English, we got along famously. This Doctora was cheaper than yesterday’s dentista, and … I liked her attitude better. And her office is closer to our apartment. I made an appointment with her for mid-March for dental cleanings for both of us, then cancelled yesterday’s dentista’s appointments when we returned home.
At 6 PM we went out for another exercise walk, and to check out a local restaurant of interest. As soon as we stepped out of our apartment’s yard gate, a panaderia delivery truck turned the corner, stopped, and turned on his rooftop speaker pitching his bakery products. <me singing “el panadero con el pan” … Google it !) Well … shit … when opportunity knocks … HA HA HA ! I bought a cinammon bun (breakfast) and a pan dulce con crema limon / pastry filled with lemon crème (bedtime … with home made chocolate milkshake).
The restaurant was interesting. Even more interesting … their cake & pastry display case. I spoke fractured Spanish, Angeles (annHELas) the woman at the front counter spoke fractured English, I was able to determine that their baked goods are produced in house by their own baker. Their “to die for” chocolate cake on display was 75 pesos per slice, 700 pesos for the entire cake. The baker was gone home for the day, so she was not able to answer my question of … could he make a smaller version as a birthday cake for Joanne’s upcoming birthday. If yes, I will order it, if not, I will buy a couple of large slices on her birthday.
We continued to meander around the neighbourhood exploring areas we had not seen before. I stumbled across an optometrist / optician business, based in a home’s “front living room”, common for small, independent businesses in Mexico. I want an eye examination and new glasses before we return to Canada. The optometrist / optician was not home at that time, but his non-English speaking wife came out to serve me, then asked her teenage son and daughter, both of whom spoke fractured English, to assist. I gathered most of the information needed, costs of eye exam ($0 !), costs of new glasses including new frames, costs of new lenses using existing frames, etc. They will have their father contact me via WhatsApp … used by everybody / all businesses in Mexico, it seems ... with further information.
I expect / hope that this optometrist / optician’s service might be better and costs might be lower than the optician in the expensive mall surrounding the Chedraui supermarket, which is where I was planning to go for new glasses. Next time we go to Chedraui I will get information from that optician.
So … pan dulce, birthday cake possibility, eye exam and new glasses possibility … a productive evening walk.
EEEUUUWWW ! Joanne is preparing supper. She just unwrapped a skinless chicken breast purchased at Chedruai four days ago and put in the freezer at that time. It stinks ! ! ! Into the garbage (outside) it goes ! So … her chicken tagine mole recipe suddenly has become beef tagine mole. HA HA HA … hope that works !
<whispering> Yeah … it didn’t really work. Ya win some, ya lose some.
Thursday ; Sunny and warm.
We slept late again this morning. We’ve been tired lately ! Around noon we set off for a day of errands and a bit of adventure. We walked to the nearby aqua purificado business and dropped off an empty five gallon water jug. Our apartment came with a full five gallon water jug and we have now used it up. Upon return of the empty jug the business disinfects the jug, refills it with reverse osmosis purified water, then delivers the refilled jug to your home. Cost is 22 pesos, a bit less than two dollars. Well .. that certainly seems reasonable, doesn’t it ? ! ?
From the water purification shop we headed off for the Mercado Artesanias / Artisans Market, about a mile or so away. Just before we reached the mercado there was a Banco Azteca where I knew I could recarga (reload / top-up) my Movistar phone service which was due to expire today.
Mercado Artesanias was a bit smaller than Mercado 20 de Noviembre and Mercado Benito Juarez. It was mostly dedicated to clothing and other cloth goods such as tablecloths, with a few home décor shops tossed in, selling hand made decorated wall mirrors and such. I bought Joanne an article of clothing as a birthday gift. <sigh> We discovered after she tried it on at home, that a larger size might be a bit better choice, and we will likely return to the mercado tomorrow and attempt to exchange it for a larger size.
We finished browsing at the Mercado Artesanias around 2:30 PM, and were ready for a late lunch. On our way to and from the other mercados a few days ago we had seen a buffet restaurant that interested us. We headed there for lunch. Excellent choice ! It was an opportunity to try small servings of many of the restaurant’s two dozen buffet selections, a crash course in Mexican dining. At a very reasonable price, 80 pesos each, about $6.50 each.
From the restaurant we headed to the lavanderia to pick up our laundered clothing. On the way … WHOA … a panaderia ! Opportunity knocking again ! HA HA HA ! WOO-HOO … Mexican tri-colore (tree coLOray) cookies, a wonderful bedtime snack ! When we got to the lavanderia, our laundry wasn’t yet ready. I should have known. When she said yesterday that it would be ready at 4 PM today, I should have realized she meant MEXICAN time. HA HA HA HA HA ! We’ll pick it up mañana / tomorrow !
Shortly after arriving home our telephone rang. It was the water delivery fellow, standing outside our gate with our refilled water jug. Joanne went to the gate to let him in while I searched for payment. The smallest money I had was two MXN$20 peso bills. He couldn’t make change. He took 20 pesos, told me I will owe him another 2 pesos next time. OK … that was nice.
By the way … the price of Joanne’s birthday gift was 350 pesos. When I told the vendor it was for Joanne’s 70th birthday the price changed to 320 pesos. I offered 300 pesos. SOLD ! Darn … my offer must have been too high ! HA HA HA !
OH … I must go ! I’m being summoned to make my contribution to dinner preparation. Supper is … HUH ? Soup and … milkshakes ? ! ? HA HA HA … whatever your corozon desires, mi amor !
After supper we completed the final few Winnipeg Humane Society new volunteer training videos. We’re now ready to attend next week’s WHS Volunteers’ Meeting via ZOOM.
Friday ; Sunny and hot, 91°F / 33° C when we went out around 11 AM.
This morning we headed out to Mercado de Artesanias to exchange Joanne’s birthday gift for a larger size. The vendor had the appropriate larger size, but not in the same colour. DARN ! Oh, well … this colour complements her beautiful hazel eyes. Since we had walked that far Joanne thought it made sense to keep going, and head over to Mercado 20 de Noviembre and Mercado Benito Juarez. She wanted to purchase a phone carry bag she found last time we were there, but I talked her out of buying it until we saw more of the markets’ vendors and offerings.
We walked over to Mercado 20 de Noviembre. HMPH ! The vendor with the phone bag was not open today. The “hit or miss” nature of Mexican vendors / businesses is a frustration to us. Despite the one item we went there for being unavailable today, we still managed to spend almost 500 pesos / 40 bucks in the two mercados, mostly on Oaxacan specialty food items. Chorizo de rez, salchichas ejutla (both of those are local specialty types of beef sausage), a couple of pan de yema (egg yolk bread/buns, another Oaxacan specialty), a round of Queso Oaxaqueño, a round of Queso Fresco, a large cinnamon bun filled with chocolate and raisins (an artisinal produced product from the nearby small village of Tlacolula), small potatoes, tomatoes, green beans … etc.
On the way back home we stopped at Lavanderia Cancer and picked up our bag of washed and folded laundry. By the time we arrived back home in mid-afternoon, after walking about 5 km./ 3 miles we were pretty tired.
We think we need a “day off” tomorrow.
We watched another episode of Only Murders In The Building while having supper, then I reconciled and paid credit card bills. I’m a bit annoyed at the monthly credit card bill for 61 cents which resulted from Good Sam Emergency Roadside Service “recurrent” charging me, then refunding the same amount a few days later after I cancelled, and the US$ to CA$ exchange rate had changed in the meantime. Those were the only two transactions on that credit card in the last billing period ! HMPH !
Saturday ; Sunny and warm.
This morning we went for a walk (again !) to the local optometrist / optician business to get information. As can be expected, the optometrist / optician Carlos either never received my message left with his young brother and sister, or ignored the message. Or was planning to contact me at some later “mañana” Mexican time ! Today the business was open. We found out after being invited in by his mother, that Carlos did not live there, but she would phone him and he would arrive “soon”. <sigh> Okay !
Carlos arrived ten or fifteen minutes later. Nice fellow. Spoke no English. We both used our phone translator functions a lot. It didn’t take long for him to understand that I wanted tri-focal lenses. It didn’t take long for him to communicate to me that tri-focals were not available, only “progressive” lenses. And he thought that would be the case at all opticians in Oaxaca. None of the local optical labs dealt with tri-focals any longer, only “progressive” lenses. <sigh> Gracias … adios.
I will check the optician shop beside the Chedraui to verify if that is indeed the case.
From there we walked to Mercado La Noria to buy a litre of milk. We were surprised to find that this small neighbourhood mercado has less vendors operating on Saturday than on weekdays. While at the market I visited with a friendly, old Husky cross snoozing in an aisleway. I assume he belongs to one of the vendors. Poor guy, sweltering in his long, thick coat. Somebody needs to give the poor fellow a haircut !
This afternoon while I was running water in the outdoor “laundry tub” sink, in the courtyard outside our kitchen / rear door, to wash our filthy floor mop, an American Karen resident from upstairs who has taken it upon herself to be the Oaxacan Water Sheriff heard water running, and rushed downstairs to pound on our front door to ask if we were “aware of the water shortage problem in Oaxaca ?” Yes, Karen … I am … so … **** off, ***** ! ! ! The last part was thought, not spoken. Although … my tone of voice implied it !
We went out for our late afternoon walk at 6 PM. I stopped at Restaurante Oscuro Brebaje (Dark Brew Restaurant) because … <fume> … the hostess Angeles failed to follow through with her commitment made to me a few days ago to ask their baker if he could / would make a small birthday cake, then she was to phone me with the answer. Tonight’s front counter host knew the answer to that question. YES ! Wonderful ! I ordered and paid for a small chocolate cake for Joanne’s 70th birthday in two weeks.
Joanne made cole slaw and I made a chorizo, leek, tomato and queso fresco baked omelette for supper tonight. It turned out very well !
DSK
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