Oaxaca Part II

Our plan to go to Monte Alban fell through because my mother was too tired, but we did get to visit the Oaxacan Museum. It's housed in an ex-convent (or monastery? I forget), which is lovely in itself, and has lots of interesting things. On the first floor is a very well presented display of ancient art and modern art, side by side, to underline common themes and inspiration. One of the modern pieces, the head of a woman carved from red marble, was gorgeous.

On the second floor is the real "historical" stuff: lots of funerary urns, pottery and the treasure of Tumba 7 de Monte Alban, which includes amazingly detailed gold objects, carved rock crystal, turquoise jewelery and all sorts of other things. They also have artifacts up to the 20th century, explaining how the region evolved, and information on the lives of the indigenous people of the province.

After that we had lunch on a roof-top terrace and my mother and I visited a very large craft shop while Max and my father went back to the hotel (lazy bums). When we eventually ended up back there too, everyone except me had a nap. I watched a Chinese movie dubbed (very poorly, like bad anime dubbing) in English and subtitled in Spanish, called "Warriors of Light". It was pretty silly at some parts (as those kinds of movies are wont to be), but could someone tell me who played Cloud? I know his face from somewhere.

A little before 6 o'clock, my mother and I took a look at the Mercado de Artesanias. Even though most of the stalls were closed, we got some good deals; I bought two blankets, thus deciding the colour scheme for my new bedroom. It'll be royal blue, lime green and raspberry sherbet pink.

Oaxaca Part III: The Revenge

Today we made it to Monte Alban! *cheers* It's quite large and quite a climb to the highest pyramid, in the noon-day sun as I was. The whole site is on top of what looks like a mountain with its peak lopped off, rearing its head in the middle of the very large valley where the city of Oaxaca sits.

I think it's comparable to El Tajin in the size of its buildings, though they're spread out over more territory. The views are spectacular and if you're willing to walk a little you could take panorama shots of all the surrounding mountains. What was better than at El Tajin was that the steps up the pyramids you're allowed to climb are much deeper -- at El Tajin, some of them were so shallow that it was impossible to do anything but to climb up or down sideways. Max and I got our parents to climb part of one, at least.

We got back to town around 1:30 and went back to the Mercado de las Artesanias, where we bought more woven goodness. After that we stocked up on juicy Jumex goodness and went back for a little down time at the hotel. For supper, I had quesadillas and now my mother and I are just walking around some more, enjoying the evening air.