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I was looking through my entries, thinking I should post more of my trip to Mexico, when I realized I hadn't posted this one on DW.

Dave picked me up at the airport, and after lunch we drove out to Dainzú, an old Zapotec site.


This is looking up, out of a tomb.

It is known to have been inhabited since around 700 bc, with the main phase of occupation and development between 200 bce and 350 ce.

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As mentioned, Dave picked me up at the airport, and after lunch we drove out to see the ruins at Dainzú, the old Zapotec site. Then we came back into town, and went up to Dave's for some mezcal. Then we went down the hill for dinner at La Flamita. Dave is an early riser, so he dropped me off at my place, and I walked around town taking pictures, for another hour or more.



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Yes, all those photos were from the restaurants!

Here is me with Jose Luis on the hilltop in downtown Monterrey.

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And that's all the pictures!

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After seeing my photos of Oaxaca, my mom asked me if it was safe. I realized then that my photos gave a worse impression of the city that actuality. This is because the run-down places make the best subjects. And I generally try to keep people out of my shots, so even the inhabited places look empty. And a lot of my photos were at night. And people see what they expect to see, and forget the rest.

All of this coupled with her general feelings about Mexico made it seem unsafe to her. But I never felt unsafe. On the other hand, I never feel unsafe anyway, so maybe I'm not the best judge. Sometimes I feel... wary. This is mainly because I carry the big camera with the big lens. I worry that I could lose all the photos inside it.

A collection of images from around the city...


The aqueduct, where it crosses the river.

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I'm not religious, but churches make great images. While every small town has at least one church, there are many of them in Oaxaca.



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Before visiting the palenque for the tour, we had a few minutes to kill, so we walked over to the old church in the tiny town of Santa Catarina Minas.





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Here is our host, the maestro Evodio, with Dave.

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SUNDAY
Originally, Jose Luis had planned for having me the whole weekend. But it turns out his football team, Atlas (Primera División de México), went to the championship for the first time in seventeen years. They hadn’t won since 1951 (they won, this time). He had to fly to Guadalajara to see the game, so I was alone. I spent most of the day sitting in my room, looking at photos, and going over the map, trying to figure out where I’d been.

Some of my coworkers arrived in early afternoon, so we went to dinner at 2:30. That was fine with me, since I had a big breakfast and hadn’t eaten lunch. Since we ate so early, I no longer felt full at bedtime, and was able to sleep.

MONDAY
Monday was back to work. We got a tour of the plant, and then spent the day with a group of people, answering questions and discussing things that they wanted to know about. Dinner was at the steak restaurant next to the hotel again. There were tons of appetizers. Guacamole, including hunks of meat, and other meat plates, and I forget whatall. I successfully ignored it. I wanted something light, and also Mexican-ish, so I ordered fish. My neighbor recommended the huachinango. Red snapper. It was the whole fish, deep fried. It was good, but bigger than it looked in the photo on the menu. Not a light meal. I was sure I’d be up half the night. They gave us a basket of wrapped snacks to choose from, for dessert. I got a piece of candied sweet potato to bring home.

TUESDAY
Work was more of the same. Spent more time with the quality and manufacturing engineering groups, discussing issues. For dinner, we went into the city. It was actually in an adjacent city called San Pedro. San Pedro is quite wealthy. There are high rise condos and luxury shopping centers, in addition to expensive colleges and business headquarters. It reminded me of Las Vegas.

The previous two nights, I had glanced at the menu before going, but didn't pick anything out. I should have, because the online menus were translated, but this didn't work in the restaurant. So this time, I made sure to pick something beforehand. But we got appetizers and no menus. And more appetizers. And more appetizers. It's a good thing I didn't pass on the appetizers because it turned out they just kept bringing us Mexican food until we'd had enough!

WEDNESDAY
Jose Luis came to pick me up after work on Wednesday, along with my coworker Paul. We drove to his place, where we met his wife, and had dinner. Guacamole, soup and tamales. Very good, of course. His wife, whose name I didn’t understand, doesn’t speak English very well and is shy, so she was nervous. It was funny, though, because none of us are talkers, so there was some silence.

They seem careful. They both wore masks around us, whenever they weren’t eating or drinking. He drinks beer but not liquor, but he only had non-alcoholic beer because he would be driving us home.

I didn’t intend to drink liquor, but she likes tequila, so we had some of that. Then he remembered that he had some whisky. He dug it out, and since it was Scotch, I had to have some – to please the host, not for my own enjoyment. Besides it was cheap stuff that he had won last year.

THURSDAY
I packed my suitcase the night before, so I had a minimum of preparation necessary in the morning. Alarm at 5:20, be downstairs at 6:00 for the possible 6:15 shuttle to the airport. It was 6:30, though. Got to the airport at 6:45 for the 8:45 flight. Good thing we were there early, because I had lost a crucial immigration form. When I first entered the country, I filled out the form and the person at the booth stamped it and handed the bottom part back. I don't know what happened to it. It's strange because I didn't think I threw anything away – not receipts or spent boarding passes, nothing. So when the woman at the desk at check-in asked for it, I looked in every pocket and compartment in my clothes and bags. Nothing(it still didn't turn up after I got home). I had to go to the immigration office at the airport, fill out the form and pay $600 pesos ($30). Fortunately, we had time, and my coworkers didn't mind waiting for me. Paul said that when he got it, he was told to keep it, but I'm pretty sure the person didn't say anything in English when she handed it to me. But like I said, I didn't throw anything away, and this was rather official looking, with the stamp.

Anyway, the rest of the day was uneventful. Coworker Uriel had been through Houston many times, so he could guide us through, though I'm sure I could have figured it out with no trouble. It certainly made it much less stressful to be with other people.

There were heavy winds across the northern part of the country overnight and into the morning. There were gusts over 50 mph here at home. They had died down to a reasonable level by afternoon when my fight came in. It was a bit bumpy coming in, but nothing serious.

And just for the record, I was down to less than $10 worth of pesos when I was done.

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