From bed to mountains

Besides starting back up with fieldwork I got back into the social swing of things Sunday... and no one seemed to mind that I'm still a little lung hacking. My new friend J held a "ladies brunch" in the morning which was very lovely. She's an American in her mid-30s who moved down here to teach English and then married a Oaxacan man (who's also lovely) and is currently working to get a permanent resident visa for him (they have truly opened my eyes to the fact that marrying someone does not mean that they can even visit the US... the state dept refused him a tourist visa because having an American wife means that he is more likely to overstay!). J has pulled together this community of American women living down here (mostly doing non-profit work or research) and she is a wonderful cook and she has cute cute adopted puppies. I met another grad student there who is plugged into the American researcher community here, which is always good.... although she seemed surprised that both L and I are doing work outside the city.

Leaving L and I and two other women decided that we could basically walk from J's house on the other side of the "river" if we had a ride to the river (which is just across from the sprawling abastos market for those who care) and we would take the first one.... which was a mototaxi. So the four of us squeezed into the back... when I thought that 2 would be pushing it... the driver was thrilled, he kept expressing surprise that we were all American and didn't mind mototaxis and spoke English and and and... didn't feel skeezy unlike this man who asked me out on my way home in a collectivo on Monday.

Later in the afternoon L and I met up with her friend G to explore San Felipe. L's boyfriend is going to come live here with her in the winter and she wants to move because her apt is tiny and our neighbor J is crazy, so L is constantly on the hunt for furnished apts. San Felipe is basically the furthest north part of the city and has a weird mix of people... I've been told that the richest of the richest live there (including the governor), but there are also a lot of artists and intellectuals, and poor people as well. There is also an ecotourism park where I went for an abortive hike the last time I was here. G,L, and I decided that this time we would go up and find the waterfalls... even though the ranger looked at us like we were total fools. He sent his dog with us (they really are gringa herding dogs), but I think that the dog decided that three women didn't need an escort so he abandoned us early.

It was super fun and while we didn't find the falls, it was a good hour up and back, and L and I are trying to only speak Spanish with each other when we're around Mexicans (for my Spanish). Apparently the term 'trail" means something a little different as we often were following where it looked like others had bushwacked picking the side of the little creek that looked the most passible. It was definitely a good example of erosion as I made use of little trees and all four limbs on some of the slopes. There was only one time where I was actually worried as L tried out a descent and people below us called up that it was straight down at the bottom and I ended up sliding down without a good foot stop.... but it was fine and we laughed a lot. I think that we may try again this Sat as there is an outdoor yoga class in the same location.

And finally, I've found a yoga class I really like. It's at a place called Casa del Angel and has much more of the meditative/ being in your own body/ quieting your mind aspects that I really appreciate... the kind of class where the teacher sees me using a prop and has me make the pose "easier" (in the sense of on my muscles) to get a more open line. And, I was able to basically understand it all in Spanish, I'm getting good at body parts!