After an incredible meal of sopa de verduras (vegetable soup) seasoned with hierba santa (a green leaf with a faint scent of licorice), mole negro (black spicy chocolate sauce) with chicken, traditional tamales stuffed with chicken and mole amarillo (red-orange spicy sauce made with chiles, corn paste [masa], and chicken stock), we piled into two cars for the trip to the caves. We followed the tuk-tuks and pick-up trucks filled with villagers and arrived just in time for the 4:30 p.m. mass.
As the mass ended, people in line turned to each other, shook hands and welcomed in the new year with the blessing of “paz” — peace. The band began to play and we formed a procession down to the grotto where each of us made an offering of a few pesos at each of the three altars set into the sacred rock hillside. Children waited patiently at their parents feet or in their arms.
Boy waiting at Las Cuevitas
After making a prayer in the chapel, we picked our way up the hillside, over the rock escarpment and stone debris, past the playing band, to a spot where we build our symbolic homes, construct our dreams, make our wishes for the coming year. To do this conjures up truth and certainty. It will happen. We pile loose stones one atop of the other to form casita walls, then gather dried grasses and lay them atop rusty coat hangers bent to hold the roof. A flat rock becomes a ramp for an abuela. The sun begins to set.
The shadows of people are cut-out dolls against the pure blue sky. Children play and dance under feet. The firecrackers sizzle, explode, shoot skyward like rockets. Prospero ano nuevo.
As dusk approaches, the chill of night descends. Families sit by their miniature houses and dream of the future. Women unwrap snacks and sandwiches for a picnic. Young people hold hands. School will begin in a few days. 
A curl of smoke rises from the valley below.
Men and boys haul in bundles of twigs and small branches for bonfires. Many will camp here overnight in this sacred space. The story goes that a virgin appeared here and then returned again. A story overlaid upon an ancient Zapotec tradition, perhaps.
Now, Sr. Secundino Bazan Mendoza holds his handmade drum, stands by his compadres in the band. This weaver-musician has served his church for over 53 years. His granddaughter Estercita sits by the campfire above.
In silhouette, families sit cross-legged on the side of the hill facing south, watching, waiting, feeling the soft glow of the sun sink into the western sky. Warmth turns to chill. I put on my wool rebozo.
Now, it is almost dark. More people are streaming in from the village to make their wishes as we leave. The vendors line the dusty path between the parked cars and the steep steps to the chapel, selling sticky, hot fresh sugar buns, cookie wafers, sandwiches, pizza and beer. Children fall asleep in their mother’s arms or on their father’s shoulders. Teens help their aging grandparents down the steep, slippery, rocky slope. Cuidado, they call out. Careful. The rocks are loose underfoot. Now, there is hope that this year’s prayers will be answered: a son without papers in the U.S. will return home to be embraced after a 15 year absence, a house under construction for four years will be completed, a debt will be repaid, there will be enough food for the winter, enough visitors to improve the economy, a turn for the better.
Feliz y prospero ano neuvo. Good dreams and wishes for the year to come.
Photo Diaries: Blending Photography and Prose
What is photojournalism? Our workshop instructor June Finfer, Chicago documentary filmmaker/photographer/playwright explains it this way: It is making a picture, capturing the connection, creating something out of what you are feeling as you go beyond the surface of what you see.
Our charge this week is to make photographs and then write about impressions that our photographs evoke. The narrative accompanies the picture. June asks us to consider each photo and what persona relationship we have to it. Can a photo answer questions such as: What do you expect here? What is it about this experience that has changed you? “The exercise becomes like a picture story, says June. “Photography creates possibilities for a common language when language is a barrier. We all go to the same places and each of us comes back with a different feeling, experience, impression.”
Photograph #1: Making Tamales by Norma Hawthorne
Las mujeres, the women, sit together under the palapa, ancient hands and some younger and still soft, take a fistful of soft masa paste, smear it into the cups of tender young green corn husks. They are comadres, sit together under starlight. A child clings to his mother’s apron hem. Together they sing an ancient hymn of womanhood under the stars by the campfire, preparing the meal, obscured by steam from the cooking pot. For eternity, for now, for us.
Photograph #2: Tlacolula Child in Yellow by Norma Hawthorne
Lost underfoot or forgotten? Which among those legs and backs is the parent who loves her and leaves her to look out at something distant, beyond her grasp. It is a feast day. Their attention is on the priest who gives mass and absolution. She looks toward a future unknown. Were she mine, I would hold her and cherish her, this small, delicate child dressed in yellow.
Photography #3: Woman with Bundle by Norma Hawthorne
A refreshment is what she asks for. I ask for a photo. Perhaps, she says with lips pursed and a glint in one eye. I am not stealing her soul. Her hat is a bundle of grain stored in a grain sack, stamped words too blurred to read even magnified. Here she is: proud, defiant, strong, survivor beyond what is possible to endure. Her hat sanctifies her, a blessing. She is my gift of the day and I return the gift with pesos for a refresco. A dios.
Photograph #4: Señor Secundino at Las Cuevitas by Norma Hawthorne
Rugged, etched wood, rough-hewn, the texture of life — furrowed brow, creased cheek, gnarled hand, cracked leather strap, bristled mustache, mottled goatskin pulled taut over pine drum, rough pine, watch the splinters, tiny diamond pattern in finely woven straw hat, a brim offering a bit of shade. But now it is night. The shadow cast by an exposed light bulb defines him: solid, durable, tenacious.
Photograph #5: Sunset at Las Cuevitas 2012 by Norma Hawthorne
Shadowy figures, silhouettes mark time until sun sets. Beyond are mountains, magnificent purple, black. Sun rays spray the clouds like a crown of glory. In the dusk muffled voices utter a universal prayer for the ages: peace, good health, shelter and warmth. See the distant town. The church steeple. The call to forgiveness. Feliz y prospero año nuevo.
Oaxaca Women’s Creative Writing and Yoga Retreat is coming up March 2-9. Consider joining us.
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Posted in Cultural Commentary, Oaxaca Mexico art and culture, Teotitlan del Valle, Travel & Tourism, Workshops and Retreats
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