But life is not so straightforward with a baby to feed, love and amuse, and we both have to learn to take things more slowly and resign ourselves to getting less done. We make a list. Organise language classes, find somewhere to rent long-term, visit the market to buy food to cook, and do the all-important laundry. We also contact one of Paul’s dearest friends, and get invited for lunch.
I’m nervous. Mari and Eneas are fantastic people, with no English and a love of cooking offal. Last time I visited they cooked sheep’s stomach stuffed with its own intestines as a festive dish, and made me eat raw chillies for a laugh. This time we’re taking our baby to see them, and my Spanish has got worse rather than better.
It’s difficult to know what to bring people for lunch when they run a shop of their own, but we turn up with a bottle of ice-cold Coca Cola (Mexican Christians tend not to drink alcohol, but their love of the sugary black stuff knows no bounds).Of course, ice cold Coke turns out to be the wrong thing to bring.
Despite it being hotter than the warmest summer day in England, Marie is convinced that it is too cold to drink chilled drinks, and that Daisy is freezing. She is also concerned that Daisy has not yet had her ears pierced, so people will think she is a boy.
I try to explain that this would not be culturally appropriate in English, but can’t make myself understood. During a discussion on how to make English cakes, I also suggest that I usually include a good measure of donkey (burro) with my eggs, flour and sugar. The word for butter is in fact mantequilla, but they are all hugely amused by my Pastel de Burro (donkey cake) and promise to come and eat some soon.
At some point in all this, Daisy chooses to do the loudest and most enormous pooh she has done in weeks, and Marie supervises Paul’s nappy changing. “You’ve missed a bit,” she remarks, before wrapping Daisy up in a shawl in the style of the indigenous women, and nipping off with her to buy some tortillas.
We eat pozole, a type of Mexican soup with maize and chopped pork (and no offal!), while Daisy wriggles around in the corner wrapped in an improbable number of blankets. Various family members turn up with children of their own.
Jeremias was toddling when we last saw him, but is now eager to show off how he can count to ten in English, while Camilla is a month younger than Daisy, but much bigger. Daisy reaches up a hand to touch Camilla’s hand, and it’s possibly the sweetest thing I’ve seen in weeks.
Saturday also marks our first trip to the market, a riot of colour and sound. Women from the villages around San Cristobal stand with live chickens for sale, wearing embroidered tunics. We buy tomatoes, potatoes, a squash and a fruit I’ve never seen before with huge dark seeds in it.
Paul thoroughly enjoys the attention he gets wearing a baby sling. Mexican men are not well known for carrying their babies, and I’m not sure whether it is Paul or Daisy who is more admired by the large numbers of giggling girls.
Negotiation takes places in a mixture of Spanish and the local indigenous language, Tzotzil. Daisy has a Tzotzil name as one of her second names (Nichim, which means flower), which causes much amusement from the local girls.
Back at the apartment, we cook our vegetables on the very slow oven and then tumble into bed. Daisy only wakes up four times in the night, wondering why it is so dark in the middle of the day.
No comments:
Post a Comment